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During the 2011 Tour de France, the sport director Alexandr Shefer will accompany the Astana riders up to the Champs Elysees. He talks about the team, its objectives and his friendship with Alexandre Vinokourov that will run Tour de France this year for the last time in his cycling career.

 

Last Friday, the selection of the 9 riders * for the next Tour de France was officially announced "We have made a fairly heterogeneous group around our leader Alexandre Vinokourov. We have different potential to be competitive on all fronts, the time trial, as the plains and mountains. Andriy Grivko, Tomas Vaitkus, Andrey Zeits and Maxim Iglinskiy will work the most during the first week and others will be more useful in the following weeks for the mountain stages. "

 

The Astana will pursue two main objectives, "We really want that Vino wears the yellow jersey a few days and hope to win a stage. Also, our sponsors rely on us for the best team classification, as we won during the last Giro, we will do our best. "

 

The riders were in training camp last week "The goal was rather to recover. Most of them rode for Criterium du Dauphine, while Paolo Tiralongo and Roman Kreuziger, still had to get back in condition after the Giro d'Italia. The objective of this camp was more to maintain condition than to ramp up. They are in good shape, I think they will start this Tour in optimal conditions. Also, the atmosphere is very good within the group, between the riders as within the staff, there is a real cohesion! "

 

Alexandre Vinokourov and Alexandr Shefer have known each other for 25 years now, "We met in 1986 and since then we always staid in contact. I was one of the first Kazakh to become a professional, I arrived in Europe in 1993 and a few years after he came for his debut in 1997 in the formation of Vincent Lavenu. "

 

This will be the final season of “Vino” as a professional cyclist, "On the one hand, I think he made the good decision to stop because he is almost 38 years old, it is the right time. But part of me of course will miss him, because it is a really special stimulation to go on races with someone like Vino. He is a great champion but he is my friend above all, my emotions are dependent on his own, when he is happy, I am too. "

 

If we were wishing for something to Alexandre for his last Tour "It would be to finish on the podium of the Tour de France. Be on a podium in the middle of the Champs Elysees to finish his career, I think it's really the best thing ever that could happen! "

 

*Tour de France 2011 - Riders List:

 

Alexandre VINOKOUROV (KAZ) - Rémy DI GREGORIO (FRA) - Dmitriy FOFONOV (KAZ) - Andriy GRIVKO (UKR) - Maxim IGLINSKIY (KAZ) - Roman KREUZIGER (CZE) - Paolo TIRALONGO (ITA) - Tomas VAITKUS  (LTU) - Andrey ZEITS (KAZ)

28-06-2011

 

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SSIA - Team Katusha encores at the Russian National Championships: after the win by Anton Vorobyev in the Under 23 ITT, Mikhail Ignatyev obtains the success in the Elite ITT. In a 45-kms-long course, Ignatyev recorded the best performance, stopping the clock at 55'25''. To confirm the Team Katusha predominance, second place for Vladimir Karpets, 18'' far from the winner, while Artem Ovechkin closed at the 4th position, with +45''.

MOLDOVA - Today, in Chisinau, at Braila - Horesti the road race of Moldavian Road Championships was held. For the second time in a row and for the third time in his career, Alexandr Pliuschin from "Katusha Team" became Moldavian RR Champion.
Pliuschin attacked after 80 km of distance to do a decisive advantage, holding it till the finish line. Finally, Alex Pliuschin took a solo victory, bringing the first champion´s jersey to "Katusha Team".

Second place and, respectively, silver medal took Oleg Berdos from "De Rosa Ceramica Flaminia", who outsprinted Sergiu Cioban from "Tusnad Cycling Team" and Victor Mironov from "CTN Moldova".

“Today it was 35 degrees, so it was hot day. I knew that finish line was perfect plane, so I attacked to avoid the massive sprint, which, finally was realised, but only for 2 - 3 places. I am satisfied with my performance and happy to hold Moldavian champion´s jersey in Katusha” - said Alexandr Pliuschin.

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Another Italian race, another lesson or two learnt and an Autogrill. Thursday the 2nd was Republic Day in Italy, hence the public holiday and a reason for a bike race. The scene, 12 laps, 8 of which was on a short flat loop with a few dodgy corners, followed by 4 laps on a larger loop that had a nasty 2.5k broken road section thrown into it and to top it all off the final lap involved a climb to the finish line of 2k.

 

Unlike Australia where you show up to a race perfectly timed an hour out to fit all your normal routines in, here in Italy you get there within 3hours just to be time conscious. First up my team mates and I joined all the other teams in a camp like atmosphere dining hall to chow down some pasta. Then it was onto the team bus where I floated around thinking about the race and taking amble time with pinning on my number to my jersey (good time passer) and soon enough at 3pm it was time for a bike race.

 

The race unofficially started before ‘go’ was even thought about being said to get good position on the start line.  Once we all were settled and everyone had marked her territory the peloton and myself waited another 15minutes for I assume is mental preparation time… The race eventually started and all was tame for the first few laps and I felt good. After 3 laps that feel good feeling vanished. I was suffering stomach cramps. I’m not a cramp sufferer in a race I never have been so this was a new one for me. I thought my race was over at 4 laps, but with a quick word to our team leader a bit of ‘tranquilla’ time at the back and then see how I feel in the next few laps. I suffered a lot in the following laps but at lap 7 I was back on. The race spiced up in pace and with entering the final 4 laps of the big loop it was on like Donkey Kong. With the peloton staying together we hit the last 2k climb to the finish with speed and that’s about where it finished, every girl and here bike clawing up the steep ‘need a 27 tooth cog’ climb. Rasa Leleivyte (Vaiano Tepso Solaristech) took the win. Results went down to top ten…well that’s all I could find, I reckon the 15^th-20^th bracket I fell into.

 

The lesson of the week went to what I drink before the race. The cramps was a result I discovered of downing a few bottles of Gatorade supplied by the dinning hall before the race, I wanted to make sure my hydration safety cap was on. However consuming too much led to mineral salt overdose thus my introduction into the other extreme of the cramping world, lesson noted.

 

After the race it was onto the showers …once they had been found then it was time for a quick Aussie catch up pointing out our highs of the week. The in form Rach Neylan (4^th in todays race) and I discussed the joy of discovering that to get internet on your phone is only 3 euro a week, good bye mindless reading of Italians magazines at the café!

 

Then it was off home but not before the Autogrill. This could be best described in Australian terms as ‘the best bakery in town’ kind of place. Every Autogrill is close to the same in Italy and stocks a healthy supply of focaccias and all other bakery type items, when your on the go it’s the best choice. I now have what I regularly get down pat, placing my order as if I was 13 years old again telling my mum what I want in my happy meal.

 

Finally it was the second good bye to everyone you knew from the race and it was back on the road again. Lucky this time it was only a 2hour drive.