September 21, 2006 (Salzburg, Austria) — Switzerland scored their second medal of the 2006 Road World Cycling Championships in Salzburg, Austria and their first Rainbow Jersey with Fabian Cancellara who stormed through the 50-km time-trial course in a time of 1:00:11.

Dave Zabriskie (USA) was second, a minute and a half behind while Alexander Vinokourov (Kazakhstan) was third despite unshipping a chain on the steep 10% hill near Hallwang, 10.1 km from the start.

“It was a perfect day,” said Cancellara. “I am just 25 years old and this has been my most beautiful year as a cyclist.”

Team Canada were happy with their performances which saw third-starter Svein Tuft occupy the winning rider’s hotseat for 15 minutes and Ryder Hesjedal post 1hr 4min 24sec for the route which took in a total of 344m of climbing.

Hesjedal’s time and Tuft’s 1hr 4min 57sec were good enough for 22nd and 28th respectively.

“I can’t complain,” Hesjedal said. “Technically I rode very well and I think my time was respectable compared to the best guys.”

Michael Rogers (Australia), who has held the time trial world title for the past three years, was a dejected eighth place. He was off the pace through both time checks and appeared to be struggling to get on top of his gear.

Rubbing salt in the wound was the fact that the winning nations’ flags, Switzerland, USA and Kazakhstan, were already being attached to the presentation flagpoles before Rogers finished.

Cancellara was emotional on the podium, but his victory caps off a tremendous season in which the 25-year-old won the one-day classic Paris-Roubaix, as well as a stage in the Tirreno-Adriatico stage race.

In 1999 he won the U23 Worlds TT as an 18-year-old and followed it up the next year with a silver in the same event. In 2004 he scored his biggest win until today taking the prologue at Tour de France.

“I’ve spent the last two weeks preparing for this race,” Cancellara said. “I worked really hard towards it and was really looking forward to it.”

“Today is just a starting point for me,” he continued. “There are so many more races to win, such as the Tour of Flanders.”

American Dave Zabriskie, was satisfied with his silver medal. “I knew (Cancellara) would be strong but I didn’t think he’d be superman.”

“Silver is nice but obviously it’s nicer to win, but I’m not going to throw (the medal) in the bin! I’m still motivated to come back and try and win this one day.”

Vinokourov downplayed his technical difficulties but said that, in his mind, it left him fighting for silver or bronze only.

“I found the race difficult but I think I did well so it’s OK,” he said. “I don’t want to put too much importance on what happened and after it happened I thought I’d be second or third.”

Undoubtedly one of the race heroes was Brian Vandborg (Denmark), who set off 11th out of 52 starters and held the hotseat with his 1:02:40 time for over an hour.

He was eventually knocked down and off the podium to fourth. He won a brand new Tissot watch as longest hotseat occupier of the day but couldn’t hide his disappointment at missing out on a medal.

Notable was the “˜CSC’ factor in the final outcome. Bjarne Riis’ men finished first, second and fourth and he was present at the finish to embrace his cohorts on a job well done.

“(Riis) gave me time to concentrate on this race,” Zabriskie said of his team manager, while Cancellara talked of CSC’s concentration on time-trial technique and investment in equipment.

Tomorrow (Friday) is a rest day for the riders with the racing resuming on Saturday (Sept. 23) with the U23 men’s 178-km road race at 9am local time followed by the Elite Women’s 132 km event at 2:30 pm local time.

Race Notes:
– Marco Oreggia is the third member of the Austrian U23 team to be involved in a doping scandal since the Road World Championships began. It was announced on Thursday morning (Sept. 21) that Oreggia had tested positive for EPO and has been thrown out of the team for Saturday’s road race. His test result follows the disappearance of two other team members, Markus Eibegger and Christian Ebner before they were due to undergo testing earlier this week. Oreggia has a week to request a B sample test.

– Belgium has a distinctive blue which has decorated their national team kit for as long as anyone can remember, but this year’s Road World Championship kit has the odd addition of a black patch over the crotch area. The addition to the outfits makes it look somewhat like an added protection piece worn outside of the shorts, and according to one opinion “is silly, to say the least.”


Results – 50.83 kms

1 Fabian Cancellara (Switzerland) 1.00.11.75 (50.664 km/h)
2 David Zabriskie (United States Of America) 1.29.97
3 Alexandr Vinokurov (Kazakhstan) 1.49.72
4 Brian Bach Vandborg (Denmark) 1.53.10
5 Sebastian Lang (Germany) 2.08.85
6 Vasili Kiryienka (Belarus) 2.13.65
7 Leif Hoste (Belgium) 2.31.28
8 Michael Rogers (Australia) 2.31.86
9 Andriy Grivko (Ukraine) 2.45.03
10 Vladimir Gusev (Russian Federation) 2.53.71
11 Andrey Kashechkin (Kazakhstan) 2.54.05
12 Raivis Belohvosciks (Latvia) 2.57.36
13 Stijn Devolder (Belgium) 2.57.87
14 José Ivan Gutierrez Palacios (Spain) 3.07.46
15 David Millar (Great Britain) 3.21.99
16 Vincenzo Nibali (Italy) 3.27.01
17 David George (South Africa) 3.34.13
18 Robert Hunter (South Africa) 3.39.83
19 Laszlo Bodrogi (Hungary) 3.51.02
20 Marco Pinotti (Italy) 3.52.81
21 Ben Day (Australia) 3.53.42
22 Ryder Hesjedal (Canada) 4.12.29
23 Peter Luttenberger (Austria) 4.12.82
24 Stef Clement (Netherlands) 4.16.13
25 Gustav Larsson (Sweden) 4.23.46
26 Christopher Baldwin (United States Of America) 4.41.82
27 Andreas Klöden (Germany) 4.42.21
28 Svein Tuft (Canada) 4.45.57
29 Thomas Lövkvist (Sweden) 4.59.26
30 David O’loughlin (Ireland) 5.02.61
31 Alexander Bespalov (Russian Federation) 5.05.62
32 Ondrej Sosenka (Czech Republic) 5.15.38
33 Yuriy Krivtsov (Ukraine) 5.16.21
34 Marlon Alirio Perez Arango (Colombia) 5.27.37
35 Ruslan Ivanov (Republic of Moldova) 5.30.08
36 Adrian Bonilla (Costa Rica) 5.32.69
37 Denis Shkarpeta (Uzbekistan) 5.45.81
38 Matti Helminen (Finland) 5.55.23
39 David Mccann (Ireland) 6.01.39
40 Frantisek Rabon (Czech Republic) 6.17.06
41 Christophe Kern (France) 6.25.95
42 Joost Posthuma (Netherlands) 6.37.14
43 Knut Anders Fostervold (Norway) 6.40.17
44 Benoît Vaugrenard (France) 6.42.55
45 Michael Schär (Switzerland) 6.44.76
46 Gregor Gazvoda (Slovenia) 7.00.93
47 Thomas Rohregger (Austria) 7.34.86
48 Pedro Nicacio (Brazil) 8.38.05
49 Erik Hoffmann (Namibia) 8.42.32
50 Zoltan Remak (Slovakia) 9.05.05
51 Csaba Szekeres (Hungary) 9.05.90
52 Vitaly Kornilov (Latvia) 12.13.37
DNS Peter Mazur (Poland)

Intermediate Check 1 – 10.1 km

1 Fabian Cancellara (Switzerland) 13.58.92
2 David Zabriskie (United States Of America) 0.18.01
3 Vasili Kiryienka (Belarus) 0.22.30
4 Sebastian Lang (Germany) 0.25.07
5 Raivis Belohvosciks (Latvia) 0.25.48
6 Leif Hoste (Belgium) 0.25.62
7 Michael Rogers (Australia) 0.26.48
8 Vincenzo Nibali (Italy) 0.27.74
9 José Ivan Gutierrez Palacios (Spain) 0.32.74
10 Brian Bach Vandborg (Denmark) 0.35.43
11 Andriy Grivko (Ukraine) 0.35.90
12 Vladimir Gusev (Russian Federation) 0.39.68
13 Alexandr Vinokurov (Kazakhstan) 0.39.86
14 Stijn Devolder (Belgium) 0.41.16
15 Ryder Hesjedal (Canada) 0.41.32
16 Marco Pinotti (Italy) 0.43.49
17 Gustav Larsson (Sweden) 0.43.72
18 Christopher Baldwin (United States Of America) 0.46.35
19 Andreas Klöden (Germany) 0.49.40
20 Stef Clement (Netherlands) 0.49.59
21 Peter Luttenberger (Austria) 0.49.67
22 Thomas Lövkvist (Sweden) 0.52.84
23 David Millar (Great Britain) 0.53.78
24 David George (South Africa) 0.56.26
25 Denis Shkarpeta (Uzbekistan) 0.58.12
26 Andrey Kashechkin (Kazakhstan) 0.58.70
27 Alexander Bespalov (Russian Federation) 0.58.74
28 Laszlo Bodrogi (Hungary) 0.59.73
29 Robert Hunter (South Africa) 0.59.82
30 Ruslan Ivanov (Republic of Moldova) 1.00.02
31 Benoît Vaugrenard (France) 1.02.01
32 Ben Day (Australia) 1.03.11
33 Marlon Alirio Perez Arango (Colombia) 1.03.86
34 Ondrej Sosenka (Czech Republic) 1.04.22
35 Yuriy Krivtsov (Ukraine) 1.06.96
36 Matti Helminen (Finland) 1.07.42
37 Adrian Bonilla (Costa Rica) 1.11.32
38 Svein Tuft (Canada) 1.13.43
39 David O’loughlin (Ireland) 1.14.42
40 Frantisek Rabon (Czech Republic) 1.15.59
41 Knut Anders Fostervold (Norway) 1.16.38
42 Michael Schär (Switzerland) 1.19.48
43 Gregor Gazvoda (Slovenia) 1.20.00
44 Joost Posthuma (Netherlands) 1.25.58
45 Christophe Kern (France) 1.26.36
46 Thomas Rohregger (Austria) 1.30.68
47 Csaba Szekeres (Hungary) 1.48.40
48 David Mccann (Ireland) 1.49.75
49 Zoltan Remak (Slovakia) 1.51.44
50 Erik Hoffmann (Namibia) 1.55.41
51 Pedro Nicacio (Brazil) 2.04.61
52 Vitaly Kornilov (Latvia) 3.05.85


Intermediate Check 2 – 35 km

1 Fabian Cancellara (Switzerland) 44.13.71
2 David Zabriskie (United States Of America) 0.56.20
3 Alexandr Vinokurov (Kazakhstan) 1.25.95
4 Brian Bach Vandborg (Denmark) 1.34.59
5 Vasili Kiryienka (Belarus)
6 Michael Rogers (Australia) 1.37.42
7 Sebastian Lang (Germany) 1.43.60
8 Andriy Grivko (Ukraine) 1.48.81
9 Raivis Belohvosciks (Latvia) 1.52.54
10 Leif Hoste (Belgium) 1.53.51
11 Vladimir Gusev (Russian Federation) 1.59.94
12 Andrey Kashechkin (Kazakhstan) 2.08.26
13 José Ivan Gutierrez Palacios (Spain) 2.12.62
14 Vincenzo Nibali (Italy) 2.17.25
15 Stijn Devolder (Belgium) 2.19.30
16 David George (South Africa) 2.26.72
17 David Millar (Great Britain) 2.32.88
18 Ben Day (Australia) 2.45.87
19 Marco Pinotti (Italy) 2.46.53
20 Robert Hunter (South Africa) 2.51.96
21 Laszlo Bodrogi (Hungary) 2.52.40
22 Peter Luttenberger (Austria) 3.01.33
23 Ryder Hesjedal (Canada) 3.03.30
24 Stef Clement (Netherlands) 3.06.44
25 Gustav Larsson (Sweden) 3.09.32
26 Andreas Klöden (Germany) 3.19.74
27 Thomas Lövkvist (Sweden) 3.23.53
28 Christopher Baldwin (United States Of America) 3.36.97
29 Yuriy Krivtsov (Ukraine) 3.40.87
30 Denis Shkarpeta (Uzbekistan) 3.41.41
31 Svein Tuft (Canada) 3.42.78
32 Alexander Bespalov (Russian Federation) 3.48.76
33 Ondrej Sosenka (Czech Republic) 3.57.79
34 David O’loughlin (Ireland) 3.58.40
35 Ruslan Ivanov (Republic of Moldova) 4.02.48
36 Adrian Bonilla (Costa Rica) 4.04.10
37 Marlon Alirio Perez Arango (Colombia) 4.04.24
38 Matti Helminen (Finland) 4.13.59
39 Frantisek Rabon (Czech Republic) 4.18.71
40 Benoît Vaugrenard (France) 4.35.43
41 Knut Anders Fostervold (Norway) 4.40.80
42 Christophe Kern (France) 4.58.29
43 David Mccann (Ireland) 4.59.40
44 Joost Posthuma (Netherlands) 5.01.44
45 Michael Schär (Switzerland) 5.04.76
46 Gregor Gazvoda (Slovenia) 5.08.38
47 Thomas Rohregger (Austria) 5.25.18
48 Erik Hoffmann (Namibia) 6.35.89
49 Pedro Nicacio (Brazil) 6.43.64
50 Zoltan Remak (Slovakia) 6.45.35
51 Csaba Szekeres (Hungary) 6.45.52
52 Vitaly Kornilov (Latvia) 9.14.54