September 8/07 10:33 am - Tour de l'Avenir: Stage 3

Posted by Editoress on 09/8/07
 

Tour de l'Avenir France
Courtesy Kris Westwood, CCA

Christian Meier of the Canadian team has vaulted himself into the top 10 at the Tour de l'Avenir, after making it into a crucial breakaway on stage three.

Meier was one of 21 riders who broke away after just 2.5 km of today's 138-km stage, from Pipriac to Cholet. The break quickly built a two-minute lead, despite the efforts of Portugal, Italy and Lithuania, all of whom missed the crucial move. By the half-way point, the break had close to four minutes on the field.

France made no effort to defend the yellow jersey of Stéphane Poulhiès, and the gap only began to drop as the field was put under pressure from repeated attacks from Poulhiès himself. Injury was added to insult when Poulhiès finally broke clear with two other riders with about 40 km to race, only to crash on a sharp corner and find himself chasing to get back in the field.

At that point, the peloton eased up and the breakaway's lead jumped to more than six minutes. All 21 riders in the break were keen to work together to gain as much time as possible, and the attacks only began in the final three kilometers. Kristof Vandewalle of the Belgian team, who was already the best placed breakaway rider on the overall standings, won the stage and took the yellow jersey. Meier was content to cross the line in 17th position, having maneuvered himself into eighth position in the overall standings, just 18 seconds out of the lead.

Brad Fairall (33rd), Ryan Anderson (34th) and David Veilleux (84th) all crossed the line in the main field, 6:37 behind, while Keven Lacombe sat up in the final stretch to finish a few seconds behind. The team's workhorse, Eric Boily, lost contact with the field 50 km from the finish and carefully dosed his effort to finish 27:44 down, hitting the 15-percent time limit.right on the nose.

Stage four tomorrow is the longest of the Tour: 211 km from Cholet to Contres.