Rate it!

5 votes

While Stijn Devolder was busy defending his Flanders crown, fortune smiled less favourably on the likes of Fabian Cancellara and Thor Hushovd.

Cancellara (pictured) was already struggling to be fit for the Ronde - following both injury and illness - and so it was cruel to see the Swiss rouleur's hopes of making a splash disappear with an untimely chain break on the Koppenberg, almost 200km into the race.

With big "Tommeke" Boonen setting a blistering pace on the race's most arduous of cobbled climbs, Cancellara could be seen throwing his bike to the floor in exasperation, before slinging it over his shoulder and walking up the precipitous slope.

But then Cancellara realised his plight: the chain was broken and with race rules forbidding support cars up the Koppenberg, his race was effectively over. The Saxo-Bank rider managed a wry smile as he posed (with his prodigious proboscis and Sherman McCoy-esque noble chin) for a picture taken by one fan, before asking an official in one car which did make it up, just how far back his support vehicle was.

"About an hour," came the reply - prompting Cancellara to pick up his broken chain, wrap it around his neck (no don't do it!) and freewheel (phew!) back down the Koppenberg in search of a masseur's vehicle to drive him to the finish.

"It just happened. Nobody is to blame. It's nothing more than ridiculous - especially the timing of it," he said. "Having to end the Tour of Flanders like this was very disappointing and also annoying."

Not as annoying as the plight of Hushovd, that's for sure.

THOR PUSHED OFF? The Norwegian sprinter - who, like Tom Boonen, George Hincapie and the former-cyclist-cum-coffee-magnate Magnus Backstedt, is one of the few riders whose name is officially allowed to be prefixed with the qualifying sobriquet 'big' - came a cropper 200m from the line in spectacular fashion on Sunday.

A nasty collision with Astana's Gregory Rast saw Hushovd's chances of taking third place behind team-mate Heinrich Haussler evaporate as he hit the deck and seriously hurt a couple of fingers and wrist, sparking off a war of words between his Cervelo team and Astana.

Cervelo sports director Jean Paul van Poppel lamented the "unnecessary" nature of the crash, adding in a fit of pique normally reserved for a post-spinach blow-out: "It was some rider who was not a real sprinter who took a risk. He put himself in, tried to put his front wheel in somewhere where you could not and he crashed and took Thor with him that was a pity."

Strong words from the Dutchman called 'Popeye' who, rather lazily, opted to name his son Boy. Rast - clearly more concerned with being labelled the perpetrator of the high-speed spill than being referred to as "some rider who's not a real sprinter" - was certainly not impressed.

"Hushovd closed the door. Incredible," the Swiss harrumphed. "I did nothing wrong and now some riders accuse me. It was Thor who went to the left and guided me into the barriers. Fortunately I have no fractures. I feel good and will show it again in the next race," he warned real sprinters ahead of Paris-Roubaix.

Slow-mo replays do show that Rast had little option but to smash into the barriers after Hushovd apparently veered over to the left of the road following a move by eventual third-placed Philippe Gilbert and, more significantly, a FdJ rider - thought to be Anthony Geslin - who acted as the second piece of bread alongside Rast in the Hushovd sandwich-spill.

IN THE EYES OF DEVOLDER: It's not as if "Volderke" didn't warn the peloton that both he and QuickStep were the ones to watch in the 93rd Tour of Flanders.

Speaking to Cyclingnews ahead of the race he said: "It is very important to have a strong team and riders who have experience with the Belgian roads, the cobbles and the hills.

"Last year was amazing to be alone in the end. It was fantastic for me and I hope to do the same this year. Last year I had a free role, but you don't know how it goes in the finale on Sunday. The plan is to have a strong team this year."

"Tom is the first leader. Then there is Chavanel and me." With more foreboding than Nostradamus, he concluded: "I think I am at about the same level as last year." BS would say he was exactly the same level, no abouts about it.

QUOTES OF THE WEEK: "We were riding on the front after the Bosberg for Thor's chances in the sprint. He said he had good legs, but with one kilometre to go he just said, 'attack'. I attacked and with 500m to go, my legs were ready to explode. The directeur was yelling in my ear, 'don't look back, don't look back, just pedal!'" Had he looked back, Haussler would have seen a bike-baguette and his team-mate being torn up by tarmac.

"It is like sprinting against myself with regards to Cav." Robbie McEwen manages to praise Mark Cavendish while simultaneously bigging himself up after successive second-places to the Manxman in La Panne.

TALKING POINT: Does anyone else think that Liquigas' Manuel Quinziato should have pressed on to the finish line with Preben Van Hecke instead of arguing aimlessly with Chavanel in the closing stages of Flanders? The Frenchman was clearly not going to reel in his team-mate Devolder so all the Italian managed to achieve was to lose a place on the podium.

Felix Lowe / Eurosport