Team Garmin-Transitions will be stretched thin this week. The ongoing Giro d’Italia and today’s start of the Tour of California will split the Boulder-based cycling team 6,000 miles apart.
It does have its positive side. Garmin-Transitions director Jonathan Vaughters, preparing his squad for California, didn’t have to watch Monday when star Christian Vande Velde crashed out of the Giro for the second year in a row.
The good news is the broken collarbone isn’t nearly as bad as last year’s injuries. Vande Velde had surgery Tuesday and starts training today. The bad news is the training missed in last year’s Giro affected him in the Tour de France, where he finished eighth.
“Groundhog Day, right?” Vaughters said Friday from Sacramento where the Tour of California finishes today’s first stage after starting in Nevada City, Calif. “Last year, Christian would’ve been very likely on the podium if it weren’t for his fractures. This is a less serious injury, but it’s still an unknown how it’ll affect his preparations.”
Garmin-Transitions needs a healthy Vande Velde to continue a hot start to the 2010 cycling season. Sprinter Tyler Farrar broke through with his first Grand Tour stage victory by winning the Giro’s second stage.
After seven stages in Italy, David Millar is in third place, 1:29 behind leader Alexandre Vinokourov, the Kazakh back with Astana after a two-year doping ban.
In Belgium’s spring classics, Millar won the 3 Days of De Panne and Farrar took the Classic Scheldepris.
The team is rebounding from the loss of Bradley Wiggins, who took fourth in last year’s Tour, his first with Garmin, and then bolted to fledgling Team Sky in his native Great Britain.
With Wiggins gone, someone can step up.
“We have a number of options,” Vaughters said. “(David) Zabriskie being one, Vande Velde being another. We’ll see what comes out of the Giro. The Tour will be really focused in the sprints with Tyler Farrar.”
Farrar’s ongoing battle with Britain’s Mark Cavendish, who beat Farrar for six stage wins in last year’s Tour, has been strengthened by the signings of South African Robbie Hunter and Brazilian Murilo Fischer.
As for the Tour of California, Vaughters is backing Zabriskie with Tom Danielson, Hunter and fellow new signee Peter Stetina. They’ll go up against favorites Levi Leipheimer, the three-time champion, Michael Rogers of Australia and Andy Schleck of Luxembourg.
Lance Armstrong, the seven-time Tour champ, will be in the race with his new team, RadioShack, at age 38.
“I think he’ll be good but not great,” Vaughters said. “He hasn’t been that good this year.”
While the timing of the Tour of California could’ve been better, at least the weather will be. Race officials moved the 5-year-old race from February to May after numerous stages were plagued with rain and snow.
The race featurs a stage start in San Francisco and a 21-mile criterium in Los Angeles the day before it ends next Sunday.
John Henderson: 303-954-1299 or jhenderson@
