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Thüringen Rundfahrt, 2009

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Charlotte Becker (Equipe Nürnberger Versicherung) broke away form the leading bunch in the final 10km of the stage to win the second stage in Gera . Becker followed an attack by Fabiana Luperini (Selle Italia Ghezzi) attacked the leading group and her team mate Luisa Tamanini went with her. Becker was the only one from the group of 8 breakaway leaders to make the gap and Tamanini and Becker continued the attack and Luperini fell back to the chasers. Becker broke away from Tamanini and was solo for the most of the last 5km. Tamanini managed to come back in the final kilometre and almost caught Becker on the line. In the sprint for third Marianne Vos (DSB Bank) was the clear leader ahead of Andrea Bosman (Netherlands National Team).

The bunch stayed together over the first climb. First to cross was the leader in the Mountain competition Tina Leibig (DSB Bank). She was followed by team mate Eike Gebhardt and Eva Lechner (Gauss RDZ Ormu-Colnago).  

On the decent to St. Gangloff the peloton were strung out and they continued to stretch the legs through the first and second sprint points. The twists and turns on the way to second climb at Buchheim enabled Tamanini and Noemi Cantele (Bigla) to stretch the bunch out and create a break of nine riders. Luise Keller (Colombia HTC), Becker, Leibig and team mate Marieke van Wanroij, Noemi Cantele (Bigla), Mirjam Melchers-van-Poppel (Team Flexpoint) and Luperini.  

The leaders quickly gained a momentum and increased their lead to 2 minutes 25 seconds with 63km of racing completed. At this point the nine riders had lost van Wanroij, who had fallen 2 minutes behind the leaders as they approached the climb up to Drossdorf. With 88.5km completed the gap had blown out to 2 minutes 50 seconds. With 109km completed the chase from the front of the peloton had started, led by the race leader Vos. The team was on the front chasing back and with 10km to go the gap was down to 1 minute 10 seconds.  

The chasers closed in on the remaining escapees and caught them with 1km to go. Vos led the sprint across the line for third. 

Vos held on to the sprinters jersey now 3 points ahead of Becker with 12 points. Leibig remains in the Mountains jersey 6 points ahead with 12 points. Vos also holds the U23 jersey. 

Noemi Cantele (Bigla) was awarded the Most active jersey for her work in the break. 

Post Race Comments

Charlotte Becker (Equipe Nürnberger Versicherung) was very pleased to have won stage 2 into Gera . “It was tough for me, when Luperini attacked I managed to go with her, then I did the last lap almost on my own. I am very happy with this win for the team,” said Becker. Becker missed out on being in the leaders jersey by 2 seconds.  

Marianne Vos (DSB Bank) won the sprint for third after her team had worked hard to bring the break back, “It was tough defending the jersey, my team worked pretty hard. They are all very tired. We did not do enough to hold the jersey but it is still a long tour and we will have chances later in the week. We have the time trial to go, it is going to be hard, in the front it was tough today and it will only get harder this week I am sure,” said Vos  

Sarah Duster (Cervelo Test Team) had a tough day in the saddle, “It was hard today,” said Duster. “We did not have anyone in the break so we had to work really hard to bring it back. It was tough, I hope we have not lost too much time on GC for our main contenders” she added.  

Tina Leibig (DSB Bank) was happy to stay in the Mountains jersey, “I tried to keep the Mountains jersey but we really wanted to keep the yellow jersey. With only one in the lead group it meant we had to work hard in the chase group to bring it back,” said Leibig.

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