Jimmy Engoulvent succeeds at the opening prologue stage of the Skoda-Tour De Luxembourg
Jimmy Engoulvent of Team Saur-Sojasun wins the opening stage of the Skoda-Tour de Luxembourg 2012 after his splendid performance during the 2.65 kilometre stage of the race.
Gregory Rast of Team RadioShack-Nissan finished 02.97 seconds behind and occupied the second position with Jonathan Hivert of Team Saur-Sojasun and Mathew Hayman of Team Lotto Belisol holding the third and the fourth positions respectively.
Jimmy’s Director Sportif Gilles Pauchard was delighted with the stage victory and noted that Engoulvent has worked really hard to achieve the current form.
"Initially, it caused him to lose his punch. He finally found the right adjustment, he came back in the game," he briefed.
The 32-year-old registered his first victory of the 2012 season during the stage 3 of the Four Days of Dunkirk and also occupied the first overall position at the race.
He rode exceptionally well during the Fleche d’Emeraude and finished third at the French event.
Gregory Rast is having a good season and was recently seen in action at the Amgen Tour of California.
He was looking good for a stage victory but could not match the likes of his French opponent and had to settle for the second position.
Rast noted, "Every year I'm good in this Prologue, I did a little better than I expected today”.
“I came back from California and suffered a little bit of jet lag, plus I was a little bit sick with a cold. I was focused to try to win this prologue but it was not possible this time".
Team Saur Sojasun was the fastest team during the first day of racing at the Skoda-Tour De Luxembourg.
Team RadioShack-Nissan is holding the second spot with Team Cofidis, Le Credit En Ligne, Team Sky and Team Argos-Shimano holding the next four spots in the respective order.
Tom Dumoulin of Team Argos-Shimano, Wouter Poels of Team Vacansoleil-DCM Pro Cycling Team, Tobias Ludvigsson of Team Argos-Shimano, Alex Dowsett of Team Sky and Adrien Petit of Team Cofidis were the top five young riders on the day.
Jimmy Engoulvent is now leading the stage 1 classifications with a lead of 3 seconds over Gregory Rast of Team RadioShack-Nissan and 6 seconds over Jonathan Hivert of Team Saur-Sojasun.
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