I couldn’t get into a breakaway, my hand hurt

“It was probably the price I paid for the yesterday´s effort. It swelled up last night and today it hurt quite badly. I didn’t feel up to getting into a breakaway, I wasn’t strong enough. We had Fofonov in the first group but as he had chipped a bone on his wrist he was having difficulty holding firm onto the bars, plus his back hurt a lot. He almost had to stop on that climb and stretch his back so that he could continue in the stage. The Tour is no picnic,” Roman said.He still sticks to the strategy of taking a stage victory. “The tomorrow´s stage is one of the hardest at the Tour. If I have good legs I will give it a shot, or I will pick a day in the Alps and I will try to win there,” stated the Astana´s rider who took it easy at the end of today´s stage. “I slackened off the pace after 6km of that climb. Then our group rode at a reasonable pace until the finish.”Other than that, Roman gave a word of praise to Hushovd who pulled off a brilliant performance. “Thor has shown that he is justly wearing the rainbow jersey. He has the ability to sprint, he can do well in the classics and he is able to push hard in hilly stages as well. He is in excellent shape and I congratulate him on today´s victory.”Stage 13 (Pau-Lurdy, 152.5 km): 1st Thor Hushovd (Nor/Garmin-Cervélo) 3:47:36, 2nd David Moncoutie (Fra/Cofidis) +10, 3rd Jérémy Roy (Fra/FDJ) +26, 4th Lars Bak (Den/HTC-Highroad) +5:00, 5th Jérome Pineau (Fra/Quick Step) +5:02, 6th Boasson Hagen (Nor/Sky) +5:03, … 164th Roman Kreuziger (Cze/Astana) +22:08.