John Degenkolb happy with his fourth position at the Worlds
After failing to finish amongst the top 100 at the Copenhagen’s World Championships last year, John Degenkolb has done well to make his way amongst the top five this year in Holland.
The German sprinter is in absolute form right from the start of the 2012 season and made full use of his legs at the UCI Road World Championships Elite Men category.
He was up against some of the toughest cyclists from across the globe, hungry to get their hands on the rainbow jersey.
Although he missed the podium but finishing fourth in a race that include fighters like reigning champion Mark Cavendish, three-time past winner Oscar Friere, Philippe Gilbert, Edvald Boasson Hagen, Alejandro Valverde and Thomas Voeckler is definitely commendable.
Philippe Gilbert’s attack in the last 2 kilometres of the race stunned all the cyclists in the leading bunch as he crossed the finish-line in a flash and received the honour by finishing the 261 race in a total time of 6 hours, 10 minutes and 41 seconds
After having a superb past season, Philippe had a slow start to his 2012 campaign with his first victory coming at the ninth stage of the Vuelta a Espana.
The Belgian also managed to bag the 19th stage of the race but more importantly, found the right form for the biggest goal of his 2012 season, the Worlds.
Edvald Boasson Hagen fell four second short at the second position with Alejandro Valverde finishing at the same time as Degenkolb but achieved the third position.
Degenkolb’s German teammate Fabian Wegmann told Cyclingnews during an interview that the team was confident that John could take the top spot considering his top form in the 2012 season.
“We already knew that John can do a good sprint, and we'd agreed to work for him, but he was very, very strong on that last climb, particularly after such a very hard race," Wegmann, who finished 27th noted.
"He really impressed me - I mean, this was nearly 300 kilometres of racing today!"
"I gave it everything to try and chase down those three guys, but it wasn't easy”.
“Gilbert was unbeatable I guess, nobody could follow him but with the tailwind he was going at over 65 kmh so we couldn't have gone much faster," Fabian concluded.
John’s other commendable performance in the season include stage victories at the Tour de Picardie, Vuelta a Espana, Four Days of Dunkirk and first place finishes at the Tour de Picardie, Grand Prix D’Isbergues 2012.
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