Lucas Euser took the bullet in the third stage of Castilla y Leon, allowing his three Garmin-Slipstream teammates in the top ten of the overall to have a protected ride on a stage that averaged more than 28 mph!
“It was a wild and bumpy ride today.” said Euser. “I think CVV’s quote after the race sums it up well, ‘That race went by so fast I felt like I was in a dream!’ The break wasn’t a typical one. It took almost 100km and 2 hours for it to go, leaving only a little over 50km to go when we went. Attacks were thrown from every direction and it wasn’t until most everyone had enough that we were able to get away.”
“We worked well together in the remaining kilometers, all of which were in a headwind and seemingly uphill. Unfortunately Astana was nervous and as we worked our butts off so did they and we never got more than 1:40. Not enough time to make it very far. We worked well and inevitably were doomed on the snow capped peaks of the Porto de San Isidro. Luckily the effort doesn’t go without its intended plan of keeping the boys from having to work from behind and making Astana do all the work. With the guys safely tucked in the peloton it opens up the possibilities for tomorrow’s mountainous stage. At only 145km we cover two category 1 climbs and finishing on the second one. We know Astana is strong, but the idea is to weaken them before tomorrow and use that to our advantage. That is the idea with putting someone in the breakaway. Next up is using that to our advantage and capitalizing on our team effort over the last 3 days!!! With nothing to lose and everything to gain, we will keep things rolling and go for it tomorrow, looking for lady luck to be on our side.”
With the stage ending in a field sprint there were no changes at the top of the general classification, with David Zabriskie holding a prime position in third at just 22 seconds off the lead. Tom Danielson and Christian Vande Velde complete the Garmin-Slipstream triple threat a little more than a minute-and-a-half back.
Director’s report from Johnny Weltz
It was very fast even if it was a mountain stage! We did decide to attack from start and so did others, but no one got away until after the feed zone. A group of six with Lucas got away and gained a minute. But that was it because the chase was on right away, as there where several good climbers in there. They stayed away until 3km to go and were caught by a group of 80. We had everyone in there except Hans. Dave Z attacked with 1km to go but was quickly chased down. Valverde won and I have to say it was not a very hard last climb.
Team Garmin-Slipstream stage 3 results
1. Alejandro Valverde 3h28’16
37. Christian Vande Velde
39. Tom Danielson
44. David Zabriskie
46. Huub Duyn
77. Ricardo Van Der Velde
80. Blake Caldwell
99. Lucas Euser +2’20
130. Hans Dekkers +7’14
Team Garmin-Slipstream GC results
1. Levi Leipheimer 8h33′26
3. David Zabriskie +0′22
9. Tom Danielson +1′36
10. Christian Vande Velde +1′39
40. Blake Caldwell +2′51
85. Lucas Euser +7’07
92. Huub Duyn +8’35
101. Hans Dekkers +10’42
103. Ricardo Van Der Velde +10’50
