Tour of California - Dom Rollin Wins After Miserable Day

 

Results: Stage Four: Seaside - San Luis Obispo, 217 km 

A miserable start to what would be the longest stage in the race.  Cold temperatures and more rain greeted the riders, most of whom donned rain jackets, leg warmers and hats.  And, to make matters worse, the stomach bug that took out race leader Tyler Farrar yesterday is making its rounds through the peloton at an astonishing pace.  Health Net is reporting that their entire team is sick with the exception of Aussie tough guy Rory Sutherland.  Toyota United says that only a few of their riders have escaped it.  Fabian Wegmann, Peter Wrolich, Johannes Fröhlinger and Heinrich Haussler, all from the Gerolsteiner team, didn’t make the start today. 

There were two intermediate sprints out on the road today and three KOM climbs – two category 4 hills followed by a category 3.   Just like yesterday there were several attempts at attacks early on today but the Astana team was keeping a tight rein on things and doing their best to keep the pace high making a breakaway difficult. 

About 20 km in a break of 11 riders got away including Bauke Mollema (Rabobank), Bryce Mead (Jelly Belly), Danilo Wyss and Jackson Stewart (BMC Racing Team), Dominique Rollin (Toyota - United), Edward King (Bissell), Iker Camano Ortuzar (Saunier Duval-Scott), Jonathan Hivert (Credit Agricole), Julien Belgy (Bouygues Telecom), Roman Kilun (Health Net p/b Maxxis) and George Hincapie (High Road) who lost seven minutes to Leipheimer yesterday after his attempt to break away before the second big climb. 

Once the break had opened up a gap of about 40 seconds, Tom Danielson (Slipstream) attacked off the front of the peloton and tried to bridge the gap up to the leaders.  He didn’t make it and instead fell back, right through the pack and abandoned the race.  Gerolsteiner’s Mathias Frank also abandoned out on the road. 

At the intermediate sprint Rollin took first place, uncontested by the other riders in the break, with Kilun second and Hincapie third. 

At the first KOM climb the break had just over two minutes on the peloton.  Jackson Stewart went over, uncontested by the other riders in the break (this must have all been worked out amongst them once they got away), Wyss in second and Ortuzar in third. 

Astana was doing all the work on the front of the peloton with CSC tucked in behind them, not working too hard, but making sure that Fabian Cancellara stayws close to Leipheimer so that he’s in a good position to challenge him at tomorrow’s time trial. 

Next to succumb to the stomach bug was Dmytro Grabovskyy (Quick Step) who abandoned on the road.  Word is that so many riders have dropped out that the “broom wagon” had to dump bikes at the Feed Zone to make room for more. 

Hincapie was organizing the break and doing a lot of work on the front trying to stay clear of the Astana machine powering on the front of the peloton behind them.   They lost Julien Belgy (Bouygues Telecom) who abandoned the race at about the 85 km mark.  Ivan Dominguez (Toyota) baled out as well.  If Levi can stay healthy he might win this race on Sunday just by being the only rider left on the road. 

Climbing up the second KOM climb the rain was pouring down on the break away.  Stewart took first place over the top with Wyss and Hincapie second and third.  The third and last climb followed right after the second and again Stewart took first place followed by King and Hivert.  That KOM jersey was safe in the BMC camp for another night.  

The climbs and the rain took their toll on the breakaway group and Jonathan Hivert (Credit Agricole) fell out leaving nine.  They’d increased the gap to three minutes, as they went through the second and final intermediate sprint with Dom Rollin again taking top points followed by Kilyn and Wyss.   

Jackson Stewart fell back to the peloton shortly after securing the last KOM points for his team and actually abandoned the race.  Word from his team is that he was hypothermic when he made it back to the team car – again, just an incredible effort by BMC in this race.  The break was now down to eight men. 

Heading into the final 50 kms the rain was so hard and the sky so dark over the break away that the service cars had to put their lights on to see through it.   It was still Astana on the front of the peloton behind doing all the work just as they had all day.  CSC was still right in behind them protecting Cancellara.  Miserable was the word of the day for the peleton who had been on the road for six hours now in freezing cold temperatures and nearly constant cold rain.   

But Astana was pushing through the pain and with 30 km to go they upped the pace bringing the gap back down to two minutes.  Bryce Mead (Jelly Belly) fell back from the break and was caught by the peloton and now the break was down to seven very cold, very wet, very tired men. 

With 20 km to go the break fractured.  Rollin attacked and opened up a gap of about 20 seconds on the rest of the riders.  Camano and Hincapie reacted and chased.  Incredible effort by Rollin after such a long, tough day in the saddle.   

There seemed to be a little disagreement within the peloton as to how to react to splitting of the break.  Levi came to the front and stopped his guys from chasing but with only 10kms to go the sprinters teams now decided that they would move to the front and do a little work.   CSC moved up to set something up for Haedo.  They were joined by Slipstream and Quick Step and the pace jumped. 

Rollin - in full aero position - managed to open up a gap of 30 seconds over Camano and Hincapie.   The furious pace being set by CSC behind smashed up the peloton as riders who could barely feel their frozen legs just weren’t able to keep up.  By the 8 km to go mark the peloton was down to about 40-50 riders. 

5 km to go and Rollin was still 20 seconds ahead of Hincapie and Camano.  Just to torture the riders a little more today there was actually a small climb about 3km from the finish.  The pain was evident on Rollin’s face as he hit the incline, he was now only about 10 seconds ahead of his chasers. 

With 2 km to go the peloton was still minutes behind and no threat to Rollin but would Hincapie and Camano be able to catch him before the line?   

No they wouldn’t.  After a horrendous seven and a half hours in the cold hard rain Rollin got the stage win, a huge victory for this young Canadian rider and for the Toyota-United Pro team!  As an added bonus Rollin takes over the sprinter’s jersey from Haedo tonight. 

Hincapie sprinted past Camano for second.  Levi came in safely at the front of the peloton a few minutes later shaking his head, still safely in yellow.  Surely he and all the guys who were out there all day will be looking forward to warm buses and hot soup.

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