Roman Kreuziger - Team Liquigas

Excellent performance and fourth place

Sun July 11, 2010, 20:08

Roman has shown his great shape in the Alpine stage with the top mountain finish in Morzine. He finished fourth and has moved up to seventh place overall.

"I am happy with my performance. Many people have made comments in the past about my inactive riding so I tried to attack at the right time. Unfortunately, Contador followed my wheel and it didn’t work out. Then Andy Schleck got away and Contador wasn’t able to keep up with him. If I had managed to get away I could have fought for the stage victory but, still, it wasn’t bad at all. Andy earned the victory, he was the strongest rider at the end. I am very pleased with the fact that not many riders were better than me today," said Roman who got tangled into a crash at the beginning of the stage. "About fifteen riders went down and I just burned my leg on the tire. It was nothing serious," he revealed. 
"It was good than Ivan Basso was in that group with me. His presence gave me a great mental boost. It definitely feels better to ride at the front with Ivan around" said the Liquigas leader who does not overestimate his seventh place overall. "We have covered half of the race so far, the Tour is going to be long and tough. The Tuesday’s stage is also very difficult and it is important to do our best. I believe that tomorrow’s rest day will come in handy." 
 
8th stage (189 km): 1st A. Schleck (Lux/Saxo Bank) 4:54:11, 2nd S. Sánchez (Spa/Euskaltel) , 3rd Gesink (Ned/Rabobank), 4th Roman Kreuziger (CZE/Liquigas), 5th Contador (Spa/Astana), 6th Evans (Aus/BMC), 7th van den Broeck (Bel/Lotto), 8th Leipheimer (USA/RadioShack), 9th Basso (Ita/Liquigas), 10th Mensov (Rus/Rabobank) all +10, ... 61st Armstrong (USA/RadioShack) +11:45.  
Overall: 1st Evans 37:57:09, 2nd A. Schleck +20, 3rd Contador +1:01, 4th van den Broeck +1:03, 5th Mensov +1:10, 6th Hesjedal +1:11, 7th Roman Kreuziger +1:45, 8th Leipheimer +2:14.

This article is also translated :
Famózní výkon a čtvrté místo