Press Release: Today, Team Saxo Bank’s powerful delegation of riders was doing the 216 kilometer long and only German one-day-race, Vattenfall CyClassics in UCI’s ProTour with Fabian Cancellara, Dominic Klemme, Frank H?j, Jakob Fuglsang, Marcus Ljungqvist, Matthew Goss, Matti Breschel and Stuart O’Grady who crossed the finish line as the first rider in the 2004-edition of the race.
The Australian rider was the only participant of past winners in this 14th version of the course where the Team Saxo Bank-riders put their fingerprints on the events with several bold and powerful attacks in the final phase where the Danish champion Matti Breschel, number two in the German championships, Dominic Klemme and not least the Swiss champion Fabian Cancellara were particularly active in order to minimize the lead to the duo in front, Philippe Gilbert (Silence-Lotto) and Nick Nuyens (Rabobank).
With twenty kilometers to go, Team Saxo Bank’s Swiss sparkled by reducing the field in to clusters of riders while Stuart O’Grady left the pursuing group and rode up to the front duo.
On the last kilometers in the narrow streets of Hamburg the peloton was complete with Team Saxo Bank leading the main group. Here Fabian Cancellara showed off his unique speed and explosively led Stuart O’Grady to the front with Matti Breschel on his wheel and the Danish champion made a strong effort to take the win but finished just behind Tyler Farrar who was celebrated as the first American victor of Vattenfall CyClassics.
"The first 150 kilometers of the course were mostly boring kilometers of pure transportation where we for a long time left the responsibility to Columbia and Milram. It was our plan from the very beginning to ride for Matti and we would wait until the right moment to lead him out for the sprint. Here, the team did a great effort through Fabian and Stuart and especially Matti himself. It would have been fantastic with a victory here in Hamburg but we are satisfied with second place after a strong Farrar", concluded sports director Kim Andersen after the race.
