Levi Leipheimer of the US won the USA Pro Cycling Challenge and his third stage race title this year with a seventh-place finish on Sunday’s sixth stage.
Daniel Oss, who rides for the Italian Liquigas team, won the 114.1km final stage of the inaugural event in 2 hours, 27 minutes, 8 seconds.
Leipheimer, a Montana native who lives in Santa Rosa, California, and competes for RadioShack, assumed his second race lead with a slim victory in the stage 3 time trial and led the race for five of its seven days.
Christian Vande Velde (Garmin-Cervelo) finished second overall, trailing by 11 seconds, while Tejay Van Garderen (HTC-Highroad) finished third, 17 seconds behind.
“The victory means so much to me, mainly because of the way we raced,” said Leipheimer, who earlier this month won the six-day Tour of Utah and in June won the nine-day Tour of Switzerland, the biggest win of his 15-year professional career. “It took some of the best form of my life to beat Christian and Tejay. I took the [leader’s] jersey, I lost the jersey. I had to race one of the best time trial’s of my life to get it back and keep it. It took every ounce of energy I had.”
Elia Viviani (Liquigas) of Italy, victorious on stage 4 and stage 5, was second in the finale.
Fred Rodriguez of the US, a former three-time national road champion, was third.
The event featured 17 teams and a starting field of 130 in Colorado Springs that included reigning Tour de France champion Cadel Evans, as well as brothers Andy and Frank Schleck, who placed second and third in the Tour de France last month.
Evans, who had not competed in the US since 2006, finished seventh overall, trailing by 1 minute, 18 seconds. Frank Schleck placed 13th overall, with Andy Schleck 34th.
Leipheimer, who placed third in the 2007 Tour de France, was among four teammates predicted as top contenders in this year’s Tour de France . None of the contenders found success, with Leipheimer the only finisher, 32nd overall, the lowest of his seven Tour de France finishes in nine attempts.
“Four or five crashes will set you back, but I refocused and had some other goals, like the Tour of Utah and here in Colorado,” Leipheimer said.
Leipheimer is also an accomplished mountain biker who won the Leadville 100 last year, breaking the course record set by former teammate Lance Armstrong the previous year.
Shohei Ohtani and his wife arrived in South Korea with his Los Angeles Dodgers teammates yesterday ahead of their season-opening games with the San Diego Padres next week. Ohtani, wearing a black training suit and a cap backwards, was the first Dodgers player who showed up at the arrival gate of Incheon International Airport, west of Seoul. His wife, Mamiko Tanaka, walked several steps behind him. As a crowd of fans, many wearing Dodgers jerseys, shouted his name and cheered slogans, Ohtani briefly waved his hand, but did not say anything before he entered a limousine bus with his wife. Fans held placards
Taiwan’s Tai Tzu-ying yesterday advanced to the quarter-finals at the All England Open, beating Kim Ga-eun of South Korea 21-17, 21-15. With the win, Tai earned a semi-final against China’s He Bingjiao, who beat Michelle Li of Canada 21-9, 21-9. Defending champion An Se-young defeated India’s P.V. Sindhu 21-19, 21-11. An on Wednesday cruised into the second round, unlike last year’s men’s winner, Li Shifeng, who suffered a shock defeat. South Korea’s An, the world No. 1, overcame Taiwan’s Hsu Wen-chi 21-17, 21-16 to set up the match against Sindhu. In other women’s singles matches, Taiwan’s Sung Shuo-yun lost 21-18, 24-22 against Carolina Marin of
EYEING TOP SPOT: A victory in today’s final against Storm Hunter and Katerina Siniakova would return 38-year-old Hsieh Su-wei to the world No. 1 ranking Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and Elise Mertens on Thursday secured a spot in the women’s doubles finals at the BNP Paribas Open after dispatching Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the US and Australia’s Ellen Perez 6-2, 7-6 (7/5) at Indian Wells. Hsieh and her Belgian partner Mertens, who won the Australian Open in late January, coasted through the first set after breaking their opponents’ serve twice, but found the going tougher in the second. Both pairs could only muster one break point over 12 games, neither of which were converted, leaving the set to be decided by a tiebreaker. Hsieh and Mertens took a 6-3 lead,
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