De Deen Asbjørn Hellemose won zondag in het Waalse Courcelles. Zaterdag werd de Deen nog 2e in Zoutleeuw. Hieronder lees je een uitgebreid verslag van de wedstrijd van de Deense ploeg.
"As saturday the whole team was in front from the start. The peloton was only about 55 riders, wich gave us 1/5 of all the riders. So we had to participate in anything with many riders. The start went, and already after a few hundred metres, gaps was made. Our flat riders Lasse Krejberg and Tobias "Dunke" Hjortshøj was in front. I rode up to them, and raised the speed a bit to really put pressure the riders in the back. A few riders tried to attack, but they did not get away. We held a high speed all the way to the bottom of the hill. Asbjørn Hellemose tried to get away from the bottom. When he did not get away, I counter-attacked on the left, and made the gap. We learned yesterday that here in Belgium the riders do not dig deep when they attack, but they attack many times, so I tried digging really deep! On the top of the hill i had a nice gap, and then i just rode high speed, but not more than what i knew i could held." - Asbjørn Ravn Rasmussen
"Ravn had gotten a really nice gap on the hill. After a few corners around a parking lot the belgians began riding fast. When we entered the city they stopped, and Hellemose yelled to me: "Attack", and when Helle yells "attack", you attack! So I did, and I got away without anyone else. I tried to yell to Ravn that i was coming, but he did not here me at first. When he did, he slowed down a bit, and when i got up he said: "Great Felle, let's ride!". And we rode full gas, I took a hard pull up the hill. We were never under 350 watts!" - Mikkel Feldtmann Hansen
"In the peleton Martin Tranegaard, Thomas Bilde and I rode with every attack the belgians made. At one point two belgians got a gap to the peleton, and I got with them. They closed the gap the Felle and Ravn with me on the wheel. We worked really well together, and with work from especially our teammate Martin we got a big gap really quick. With 6 laps left, I told my teammates that I Had really good legs, and I would attack on the hill entering the last two laps. Everything went as planned, I did not take any leads for half a lap, so my legs were fresh. I made a very powerful attack to which they could not respond. At the my teammates rode fantaticly in the group behind to help me, and in the front I used my technique in the corners and all the power left in my legs to win the race." - Asbjørn Hellemose
"When Helle got the gap, Felle and I backed off everytime the two belgian guys tried something. We were always in second position, so the tempo always went down. A couple of times I told Felle to try to brake away, and get up to Helle. But Ugo was to strong to get away from. Eventhough the belgians never really worked well together, and Helle kept the pace in front. The one belgian guy got planted on the second-to-last hill, and Ugo rode full speed down the hill. At the bottom Felle tried to attack away, but unfortunatly he hit the wall halfway up, and Ugo pulled him in. When he did, I started my sprint and came in second just after Hellemose. Ugo could not follow me in the sprint, after all the work he had done and he came in a few seconds after me, and Felle a few more behind on 4th." - Asbjørn Ravn Rasmussen
"It was a really hard race, with a lot of height metres. The finish hill was really hard, and at the last lap I was really on the edge, but I got up, and celebrated my first victory in 7 years, in what was only my second race as a junior rider. Many congratulations to Ugo with 3rd place, he really did well along the route! And a great arrangement too!" - Asbjørn Hellemose