CYCLING FOCUS ON CARLOS SASTRE:A long-time contender in the three-week stage races, last season saw Carlos Sastre finally climb to the pinnacle of his sport and win the Tour de France. The affable Spaniard returns to racing this month with his new Cervélo Test Team and, as he tells SHANE STOKES, he's got big targets
FACTFILE
Date of birth:April 22nd, 1975.
Lives:El Barraco, Ávila, Spain.
Current team:Cervélo Test Team (won Tour with CSC — Saxo Bank).
Top career achievements:Winner one stage and overall, 2008 Tour de France, third in 2006. Second overall in 2005 and 2007 Tours of Spain, king of the mountains winner in 2000.
Interests out of cycling:Family time with his wife Piedad and children Yeray and Claudia. Charity work with the Kinderkankerfonds (foundation for children with cancer) and Victor Sastre School of Cycling.
Goals for 2009:Tour de France, Giro d'Italia and world championships.
Interesting statistic:Only two riders have taken all three of these races in one season; Eddy Merckx and Stephen Roche.
IT’S JULY 23RD, it’s stage 17, and it’s the decisive day of the 2008 Tour de France. As the race hits the bottom of the renowned, revered Alpe d’Huez climb, Spanish rider Carlos Sastre accelerates clear of the other favourites. Only one rider is able to go with the Team CSC competitor, but Denis Menchov soon wilts under the pressure and drifts back, head dropping, morale bombing and legs awash with lactic acid.
Sastre has become stronger in this third week of the race and drives the pedals onwards, alternating shoulder-rocking periods sitting down with shorter, punchier stints out of the saddle. He’s riding well and is also aided by the fact that team-mates and brothers Frank and Andy Schleck are behind, marking the others and covering any further attacks.
Frank started the day in the yellow jersey of race leadership but his weak time-trialling means his chance of winning the Tour outright is uncertain. Protecting his lead on the Alpe is a gamble for the team, and so Sastre is allowed to play his own card.
Whoever ends the day in front will gain the team’s full backing.
He seizes the opportunity.
“THAT DAY I knew that I had my opportunity and I had to fight for it. That is what I did,” he told The Irish Times. “If you wait until the last part of the climb, you cannot make a big difference. But if you attack on the bottom, it reveals more things about your rivals and yourself.
“I knew that I am a climber, a pure climber, and that I had to do my best on that mountain, to dig deep in order to get my goal. I succeeded, taking the stage victory and the yellow jersey. It was a really nice day.”
Alpe d’Huez is one of the Tour’s most famous finishes and always guarantees a spectacular day’s racing. Following a 40-minute ascent through screaming fans, Sastre reached the summit two minutes and three seconds ahead of the next riders, Olympic champion-to-be Samuel Sanchez (Euskaltel-Euskadi) and Andy Schleck. Yellow jersey Frank was 10 seconds further back and finished just in front of pre-race favourite Cadel Evans (Silence Lotto).
That was more than enough for the maillot jaune to change hands. It was the first time for Sastre to lead cycling’s biggest event, and he was equally delighted and distracted, the hullabaloo helping him not to dwell on the pressure.
“At that moment I was very happy because I won and also got the yellow jersey,” he explained, casting his mind back to the swirl of emotions of that day. “But you don’t have any time to think about it. You are talking to the media, speaking to so many journalists, and you are also thinking about the next stage because you need to recover and be ready for it.”
He fared well the following two days and headed into the final time-trial one minute 24 seconds ahead of Schleck and one minute 34 up on Evans. It was the big showdown, and few predicted what would happen.
It seemed to be Evans’ race to lose. The Australian had finished second overall in the previous year’s Tour, being sandwiched on the podium by Astana team-mates Alberto Contador and Levi Leipheimer. Their team did not get an invite to last year’s race and so, most believed heading into the event that Evans would use his all-round abilities to triumph overall.
Things seemed to be going to plan, despite an early crash in the race.
He headed into that final time-trial within striking distance of Sastre and, being normally far better against the clock, appeared poised to make his move. Yet the burden of expectation proved too much; he choked, placing only seventh on the stage.
Sastre was the opposite, being so calm he fell asleep in the team bus and slept for an hour and a half shortly before the biggest athletic examination of his career. The lack of nerves proved vital. He only conceded 29 seconds to Evans in the time-trial and ended the day with a buffer of one minute and five seconds over him, more than enough to guarantee a triumphant procession into Paris one day later.
“I felt like a small chicken,” Sastre said, joking, thinking back to his arrival on the Champs Elysees in the bright yellow jersey of race winner. “A small guy between all the big guys in the team.”
Self-depreciation aside, it was also a very proud moment.
“It was great to arrive in yellow there with all my team-mates, and also being the team classification winners too,” he enthused.
“That was a special moment for all of us . . . it was the first victory in the Tour de France for that team, and I think it was something really special for everyone.”
WINNING THE Tour at 33 years of age, 11 seasons after he turned pro, is the clear peak of Sastre’s career. He had been one of the most consistent Grand Tour riders in recent years, taking 20th, 10th, ninth, eighth, 21st, third and fourth in Tours between 2001 and 2007, as well as two second places in the Tour of Spain.
And yet, because he had taken just four individual pro victories at that point in time, few envisaged him scaling the very top step of the podium.
Contender, yes, but winner?
Few foresaw that.
He pulled it off, though, and life hasn’t been the same since.
“My life around me has changed hugely . . . not everything, but almost everything,” he said. “That said, my own life, my private life, is as before – I am the same person, two kids, one wife, two dogs. We are happy, I try to keep it like this.”
Apart from experiencing life as the Tour champion, another very big change for Sastre is the jersey he will be wearing in 2009. He decided to leave the CSC Saxo Bank team early last summer, explaining recently he recognised that the Schleck brothers’ growing talent risked creating a rift in the squad.
“I knew before the Tour de France that I wanted to change my previous team,” he said.
“I had seven nice years there and I don’t want to split that harmony, that atmosphere. After the Tour I heard about a new project, the Cervélo Test Team, and thought that maybe it could be a good idea to build a new squad.
“That decision can help me and can also help these new talents, the Schleck brothers and other riders – they have more freedom and they can progress [unhindered] if they have those conditions. That is why I changed.”
SASTRE IS HIGHLY regarded in cycling, recognised as a decent, down-to-earth man. That is reflected in those comments, the explanation that he is willing to move on to preserve harmony.
The new set-up is funded by the bike manufacturer, Cervélo, plus several equipment manufacturers, and will enable the riders to help develop and streamline products. A number of other big names will the there, including Tour stage winners Thor Hushovd and Simon Gerrans.
Irish rider Philip Deignan has also been signed up and if he hits top form, may earn the chance to ride alongside Sastre in this year’s Tour de France. He’s impressed by the Spaniard.
“Carlos is just a normal, regular bloke. You can see him out on the training rides, always giving a lot of advice to riders. He is like a book of knowledge, he just has so much experience and is willing to share. Out on the bike he might be telling riders to spin an easier gear in training, to take it easy if they are going too hard. He definitely seems to be a guy who will help out that way.”
Sastre got his season under way on St Valentine’s Day when he began the first stage of the Tour of California. After that, he’ll ride the Vuelta Castilla y León in March, then the Vuelta a Pais Vasco, Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Flèche Wallonne in April. His main targets then follow.
“My goal is to be ready for the Giro. To be ready for the Tour. And to be ready for the Worlds. If I am ready for it, I will aim for the overall classification in the Giro. The Tour too, of course. And the World Championship is on a more difficult circuit this year. It is possible that a small break can go, maybe it is possible for me to finish higher than ever in that race.”
This year’s Tour de France will be very different to that of 2009, due to the expected participation of the Astana team. Alberto Contador, 2007 winner, will be back, and so too previous podium- finishers Levi Leipheimer and Andreas Klöden. But a bigger name is also expected to don the blue and yellow kit; seven-time Tour champion Lance Armstrong.
So what does he think about the American’s somewhat controversial return to the sport, over three years after he retired amid allegations that he cheated to win his first Tour?
It’s hard to say if he personally approves or not; his answer is brief, to the point.
“It is his decision,” he said. “It is good for the media because the media is talking about cycling because of him. But nothing more.”
And that’s that; no elaboration, no discussion.
He says simply that he doesn’t think much about his, and Astana’s return.
“It won’t change the way I will ride the Tour this year. I will focus on myself and my team. We have the number one through to nine,” he said, referring to the jersey numbers awarded to the defending champion and his squad. “They have to try to take it from us, if they want.”
The strength of that rival squad means that Sastre will once again start as something of an outsider. That sits just fine; being a dark horse suits him, will lessen the pressure and remove the need for his own team to try to control the race.
Yet, as Alpe d’Huez showed, you can’t write him off. One strong, well-timed attack and yellow could be his yet again.
