T-Mobile Takes First Look at Tour Course

 

Story posted May 31
Team Press Release

 

 

 

The T-Mobile Team - one of the world’s leading professional cycling teams – took to the streets of central London today to take a first look at the course for this year’s Tour de France Prologue stage. Four of the Team’s leading riders - Britain’s Mark Cavendish and Roger Hammond, team-leader Michael Rogers and German Linus Gerdemann made for an impressive, if unusual, spectacle as they wound through the capital in the famous T-Mobile magenta. For all of the riders,  it was a first opportunity to take a good look at the roads that will make up the route of the 7.9km opener to the Tour on July 7th.

 

Throughout the day the riders took in the major sections of the Prologue course, including the roads through Hyde Park and Whitehall, and past some of London’s most famous sites - Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament. For Britain’s Cavendish and Hammond the prospect of riding a stage of the Tour de France in their home country could be a once in a lifetime opportunity, and although the T-Mobile line-up for this year’s race has not yet been announced, they will both be out to impress over the coming weeks hoping to be included.

 

 

Both Brits are in a rich vein of form – Cavendish having won two stages at last week’s Tour of Catalonia - his first ever Pro Tour race, and Hammond having had a superb early season, is currently the leading British road racer in the world.

 

After experiencing the streets of London in rush-hour, Cavendish commented “It was fantastic, if a little scary, to ride through London on the roads that will be used to host the Tour Prologue. I can only imagine how incredible the atmosphere is going to be on 7th July and it will be amazing to see the race back on British soil. I think this trip will do us a lot of good as a team – even if we do not make the team for the Tour, we have invaluable experience and knowledge of the route which we can pass on to our colleagues.”

 

 Mark admits he has no idea whether he will get selected for the Tour but is crossing his fingers he does get selected as he knows it will be a chance in a lifetime to race the Tour on home soil. For now, he flies to America and Philadelphia for three races out there in the space of a week before returning to Europe for a Team Time Trial in Andover, probably his last race before the Road nationals on July 1. As for his training programme, Mark explained that his programme for the last month or more has been pretty heavy and what he does now will depend on the team selected for Tour de France and what races follow for him after the road nationals.

 

"My form is still on the up and I'm not at full fitness yet. I've really only been racing for properly for five or six weeks and so am not at the top of my game yet". Mark was expecting to do the Route de Sud in France but after his performance in the Team Time Trial in Spain recently, Mark is down to do the ProTour Team Time Trial instead on the 24th of June in Holland. He explained that the techniques he learnt on the track for the Team Pursuit and other events have stood him in good stead for the Team Time Trial.

 

Meanwhile his British teammate Roger Hammond has the Tour of Switzerland on his programme, an event he has done before prior to returning to Britain and winning the National Road Race Championship. An omen for the big race on July 1 perhaps... Good luck to both Roger and Mark.