Translated material
Waiting for Armstrong
Iron Lance will resume his career on the Green Continent
The events of the World Road Cycling Championships taking place in the Italian city of Varese yesterday went into the shadows ahead of the anticipation of a press conference held late in the evening Moscow time by seven-time Tour de France winner American Lance Armstrong, who was supposed to announce which team he would resume his career with. interrupted in 2005 after another triumph on the Great Loop.The vice-president of the Kazakh cycling federation, Nikolai Proskurin, took the lead, declaring in the afternoon that Armstrong would sign a contract with Astana. The exact date of Iron Lance's return to the official starts is already known. He will take part in the seven-day Tour Down Under on the roads of the Green Continent from 20 to 25 January 2005. This competition is part of the Pro Tour series.
On the first day of the world championship, a time trial race took place among young riders in the age category up to 23 years old. In this type of program, at the three previous similar tournaments, the Russian team invariably won medals, and due to the almost maximum contribution to the team treasury of the Athens Olympics triumphant in the track race on points, St. Petersburger Mikhail Ignatiev. Three years ago in Madrid he received gold, and then in Austrian Salzburg and German Stuttgart he achieved silver.
This time it was far from the podium. Artem Ovechkin finished in tenth time, losing more than one and a half minutes to the winner, Italian Adriano Malori, over a distance of 33.55 km. The second place went to the German Patrick Gretsch, the third was the Australian Cameron Meyer.
Yesterday representatives of the fairer sex entered the competition for awards. The US team, through the efforts of Amber Neben, who raced 25.15 km in 33.51 with the best time at both control points (6.68 and 15.26 km), regained the championship in this type of program, where two years ago the best was Kristin Armstrong, who is nothing more than the namesake of the seven-time Tour de France winner. Last year's champion, German Hanka Kupfernagel, did not start in Varese, so the silver medalist of the 2007 World Championship Armstrong went to the distance last, that is, with the first number on the overalls.
Just 8 seconds. Austrian Christiane Soeder lost to Neben. The bronze medal will go to the home collection of the silver medalist of the Athens Olympics in the group race, German Judith Arndt, who lost her pace in the last third of the route. She has a total of 22 seconds. lagging behind the leader. At the finish line, the athlete from Germany managed to match the time of her rivals who had already completed the distance and was one and a half seconds ahead of the Russian Tatyana Antoshina, who remained fourth, that is, in the most offensive position in the final protocol. Armstrong is the fifth, two-time world champion in this type of program, Karin Thurig from Switzerland, in sixth place. Moreover, the density of the results of the leading racers turned out to be very high - all the participants from the strongest sextet fit within a half-minute gap behind the winner.
And yet, the main character of the women’s “cutting” should be called the legendary Frenchwoman Jeannie Longo. Even though she was 13th among 43 participants, you just have to think about her age - at the end of October this unique athlete will celebrate her 50th (!) anniversary. Moreover, so far we haven’t even heard any talk about her leaving professional cycling racing.