Iranians in control of Tour of Qinghai Lake
The 2010 Tour of Qinghai Lake is in the books, with the Tabriz Petrochemical Cycling Team of Iran having fielded a strong team and dominated the race. Hossein Askari won the overall yellow jersey of the race, having first taken it in the sixth stage, where he put in an amazing performance while riding for the same Iran-based team as the defending Tour champion Andrey Mizorov.
Besides Askari and Mizorov, the team was stacked with proven performers. Tabriz won the 2010 Tour of Langkawi, thanks to German teammate Tobias Erler, who led the race for three days, while Ghader Mizbani also turned in a very strong performance. Askari earned a 44 second lead ahead of the runner-up, and a 1:25 lead ahead of the third place contender.
“I cannot believe what’s happened,” said Radoslav Rogina, the overall leader before Askari took over. “It's unbelievable how they rode in front.”
The trio, including the two Tabriz riders plus the Serbian Nikola Kozomara, left the peloton to take the first intermediate sprint of stage 6, 37.9km into the 152.4km stage from Bird Island to Xihaizhen. After the sprint they managed to stay ahead for the entire race, taking all other sprint and king-of-the-mountain points between them and reaching a maximum lead of six minutes, 37km from the finish line.
“We rode very hard to the finish and I am very happy for my team,” said Askari. “Yesterday was very bad day for me because I don’t like cold weather, every time there's cold weather I have problems, today I hoped for good weather.”
The Iranian team broke the expectation that there wouldn’t be a major shake-up until the mountains of stage seven and eight.
“I'm on cloud nine,” said Askari. “The most important thing for us is teamwork. We obtained everything we wanted from this stage. We showed our abilities today, they did not consider our abilities, because of that we broke away."
The dominating Iranian team entered Saturday’s 150km stage from Mulezhen to Qingshizui with every jersey in the race. Askari had the yellow as well as the green jersey, for sprint points, and took the best Asian rider title from his teammate Mizbani, who was already dominating the king-of-the-mountain classification. This put Tabriz-Petrochemical in first place in the team classification, as well as earning them the award as the best Asian team.
“My team is about teamwork,” said team manager Khatoun Abadi Azar Kazem. “I am happy for Mehdi Sohrabi to win the stage but the yellow jersey was most important, I am very happy today”
Stage 8, the final mountain stage of the Tour of Qinghai Lake included to intermediate sprints and on hors-categorie climb at 3,767m above sea level. The climb left many riders in the dust while the Iranians proved themselves to be outstanding climbers. Going into the 9th stage, Mizbani maintained his stranglehold on the king-of-the-mountain award as expected, and Askari held onto his overall lead for the third consecutive stage.
"All the teams come together at the finish, it was a good result for us today, we have the yellow jersey, now we wait for tomorrow," said Askari.
Stage 9, the final stage of the Tour of Qinghai Lake, took place on Sunday, July 25. Team Tabriz, dressed in the colours of the race leaders, had no difficulty maintaining their control. Mehdi Sohrabi shut down the early escape and took the stage win in one hour and 17 minutes. Askari won the Tour 44 second ahead of Radoslav Rogina and 1:19 ahead of Keil Reijnen overall.
“I am very happy, my team worked very well,” said Askari after the stage. “I have third, I have second, and now I have first. I am also very happy for Mehdi to win the final stage, it is great for my team.”
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