DURANGO —Tom Danielson didn’t win Stage 1 of the USA Pro Challenge, but his send-off from Durango sure made him feel like a winner.
The former national collegiate mountain bike champion from Durango’s Fort Lewis College had hundreds of friends among the thousands of people at the start of the stage.
“It was pretty cool,” said Danielson, an East Lyme, Conn., native. “A lot of my friends were at the start, then they rode their dirt bikes all the way through the trails and I saw them on Lizard Head Pass. That was part of the atmosphere that I experienced, seeing the commitment. OK, riding a dirt bike is fun. But it was cool to see them in the rain.”
Painful road back for Farrar. Tyler Farrar, Danielson’s teammate with Boulder-based Team Garmin-Sharp, won the stage in a sprint finish.
A month ago, he could barely walk. He crashed three days in a row in the first week of the Tour de France and was never a factor.
“The Tour was no fun,” he said. “It’s not a nice feeling when you’re in the biggest race in the world and something you’ve been preparing for for months and you’re injured. You can’t realize your own goals. You can’t even help the team. You’re just kind of there taking up space and plugging on to get to Paris just to say you got to Paris.”
Italian impressed. Alessandro Bazzana of the Continental team, Team Type 1-Sanofi, won the sprint jersey and wanted to reward the crowds.
An Italian, Bazzana lived in Boulder from 2009-10.
“I really did enjoy the race,” he said. “The crowds were amazing. I never saw that in Europe.”
Zabriskie struggles. It didn’t all go well for Garmin-Sharp. David Zabriskie, one of its GC hopefuls, struggled all day and finished 88th, 15:22 behind.
John Henderson, The Denver Post
