The 60th Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré is a cycling stage race that took place from June 8th to 15th, 2008. It was held in a prologue and seven stages over a distance of 1139.9 kilometers.
The race was part of the UCI ProTour 2008 . The leader after the Tour of Catalonia Damiano Cunego was not at the start.
Field of participants
All 18 UCI ProTeams took part in the tour . Due to the increased costs for the fight against doping, the race management did not invite any Continental teams . Thus, defending champion Christophe Moreau from Agritubel was missing .
Several favorites for the overall victory of the Tour de France 2008 started in Avignon: The runner-up of the Tour and Critérium 2007 Cadel Evans had start number 1. He had an excellent start to the season with four wins and good placements in the Ardennes classics in April. However, he suffered tendinitis in his knee in May while preparing for the Tour de France. At his side is Yaroslav Popovych , third at Paris – Nice in March. Alejandro Valverde , already victorious in Liège – Bastogne – Liège and the Tour of Murcia in 2008, and Óscar Pereiro start for Caisse d'Epargne . Team CSC is captained by Carlos Sastre .
The Euskaltel-Euskadi team had three contenders for stage wins: Haimar Zubeldia , Mikel Astarloza and Samuel Sanchez . After two months without a competition due to a virus infection, the Australian Michael Rogers (Team High Road) started. Levi Leipheimer was the only former winner of the Critériums du Dauphiné Libéré at the start (2006). His team Astana was not invited to the Tour de France 2008 , so the Dauphiné Libéré was his season highlight. His team-mate Alberto Contador was originally supposed to take on this role, but after his victory at the Giro he gave up.
The Dutch Rabobank team relied on Robert Gesink (22 years old). The outsiders included the Spaniards Manuel Beltrán (Liquigas), Ángel Gómez Marchante , Juan Cobo (Saunier Duval), Carlos Barredo , Juan Manuel Gárate (Quick Step), the French Sandy Casar (Française des Jeux), Cyril Dessel (AG2R) and the Austrian Bernhard Kohl (Gerolsteiner), third in 2006.
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important drivers
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Belgium SIL Silence Lotto
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Cadel Evans , Yaroslav Popovych
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Belgium QST Quick Step
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Carlos Barredo , Juan Manuel Gárate
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Denmark CSC CSC
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Alexander Kolobnev , Chris Sørensen , Iñigo Cuesta , Karsten Kroon , Carlos Sastre
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Spain GCE Caisse d'Epargne
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Alejandro Valverde , Óscar Pereiro , Nicolas Portal
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Spain EUS Euskaltel-Euskadi
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Samuel Sanchez , Mikel Astarloza , Haimar Zubeldia
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Spain SDV Saunier Duval-Scott
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Juan Cobo , Ángel Gómez Marchante , David de la Fuente
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France ALM ag2r La Mondiale
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Vladimir Efimkin , John Gadret , Cyril Dessel , Stéphane Goubert , José Luis Arrieta
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France BTL Bouygues Télécom
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Thomas Voeckler , Pierrick Fédrigo , Laurent Lefèvre
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France CA Crédit Agricole
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Thor Hushovd , Patrice Halgand , Simon Gerrans , William Bonnet , Christophe Le Mével
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France COF Cofidis
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Maxime Monfort , David Moncoutié , Samuel Dumoulin , Florent Brard
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France FDJ La Française des Jeux
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Sandy Casar , Remy Di Gregorio
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Germany GST Gerolsteiner
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Heinrich Haussler , Sebastian Lang , Fabian Wegmann
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United States THR Team High Road
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George Hincapie , Michael Rogers , André Greipel
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Germany MRM Milram
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Sergio Ghisalberti , Andrij Hrywko
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Italy LAM Lampre
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Paolo Bossoni , Sylwester Szmyd
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Italy LIQ Liquigas
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Manuel Beltrán , Frederik Willems
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Netherlands RAB Rabobank
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Robert Gesink , Juan Antonio Flecha
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Luxembourg AST Astana
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Levi Leipheimer
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Stages
Overview
Prologue: Le Pontet – Avignon
1st stage: Avignon – Privas
The first stage started in Avignon on the banks of the Petit Rhône . The route led north into the Drôme department, through Vaison-la-Romaine and Nyons. The only mountain classification of the day was in Puy-Saint-Martin (4th category). Then it went west, across the Rhône to the Ardèche department through La Voulte-sur-Rhône. The last three kilometers to the finish in Privas were uphill with a difference in altitude of 115 meters. Alejandro Valverde was able to prevail in the mass sprint.
2nd stage: Bourg-Saint-Andéol – Vienne
The second stage ran over 184 kilometers from Bourg-Saint-Andéol to Vienne. Shortly before the finish there was a mountain classification in the fourth category. Sebastian Lang attacked 1000 meters from the finish, only George Hincapie followed suit and overtook Lang in the sprint.
3rd stage: Saint-Paul-en-Jarez (EZF)
31-kilometer individual time trial.
4th stage: Vienne – Annemasse
The first 120 kilometers of the route were without any difficulties. The route led east into the Ain department along the Rhône. The first two hills followed, the Mont des Princes (3rd category) and the Saint-Jean (4th cat.), Both of which are located in the Haute-Savoie department. The 9-kilometer ascent of the Salèves (1st category) began 25 kilometers from the finish and led the riders to an altitude of 1,300 meters. Two kilometers before the summit, the eventual winner of the day Cyril Dessel pulled away.
5th stage: Ville-la-Grand-Morzine
The entire stage led through the Haute-Savoie department. The first mountain test was the Col de Saxel (3rd category) at kilometer 51 - the. This is followed by ratings of the 4th category (Col du Perret and Chatillon-sur-Cluses). The climb to the Col de Joux Plane (Hors category) is the great difficulty of the day. It starts in Samoëns and after 11.5 kilometers takes the riders to an altitude of 1691 meters. The descent leads to the destination Morzine .
After several unsuccessful attacks, Hubert Dupont (AG2R) started the decisive breakaway attempt at the foot of the Col de Saxel . He was followed by Juan José Cobo (Saunier Duval), Iñigo Cuesta (Team CSC), Vladimir Efimkin (AG2R), George Hincapie (Team High Road), Aliaksandr Kuchynski (Liquigas), Daniel Navarro (Astana) and Juri Trofimow (Bouygues Telecom). At the beginning of the ascent to Joux Plane, the lead was 2:15 minutes over the main field led by the Caise d'Epargne.
Efimkin, Trofimow, Cuesta and Cobo were able to distance their companions. After that, Efimkin and Cuesta also fell back. After the mountain classification, Trofimow was able to pull away from Cobo and saved an 18-second lead at the finish. In the main field, Robert Gesink (Rabobank) accelerated the pace. The attacks by Alejandro Valverde and Cadel Evans left Levi Leipheimer in trouble.
6th stage: Morzine – La Toussuire
7th stage: Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne – Grenoble
Jerseys in the course of the tour
The table shows the wearer of the respective jersey during the individual stage or the leaders of the respective overall ranking on the evening of the previous day.
- Thor Hushovd wore the points jersey on stage 1.
- Alejandro Valverde wore the points jersey on stage 3.
- Levi Leipheimer wore the points jersey from the 4th to the 7th stage.
ProTour intermediate result
Intermediate status of the ProTour 2008 after the Dauphiné Libéré (as of June 15, 2008).
Web links
Leader
Thor Hushovd
Yuri Trofimov
Dmitri Fofonov
Cadel Evans
Sylwester Szmyd
Cadel Evans
Damiano Cunego
Alberto Contador
Thomas Dekker
Stijn Devolder
Team Astana
Francais de Jeux
Team High Road
Colombia
