Serramenti in second stage win
NST, 15/2/2008

VENEZUELAN outfit Serramenti PVC Diquigiovanni-Androni Giocattoli, the team with the longest name in cycling, registered their second stage win in the 13th edition of Le Tour de Langkawi (LTdL) when Jose Serpa outsmarted his 15 breakaway partners to snatch his fourth ever victory in the race in Stage Six from Bandar Penawar to Kuala Rompin yesterday.

The 29-year-old Colombian Serpa also maintained his proud record of stage wins in each of his three appearances thus far, and yesterday's win after a successful breakaway brought back memories of his feat in 2006, when Serpa bagged two victories in a row, winning after riding solo in the final three kilometres of Stage Four from Tapah to Kuala Selangor, then taking the Genting stage the following day.

Yesterday's win came after Serpa outsmarted his breakaway partners who had attacked 50 kilometres into the tough 182.8km stage that ran through undulating terrain and had the peloton against crosswinds throughout.

He had made his decisive move inside the final kilometre and despite the rest closing in, Serpa still edged Ag2r-La Mondiale's Belarussian rider Alexandre Usov and SouthAustralia.com's Johnnie Walker to take the stage win.

The breakaway group, which also included 2005 LTdL winner Dabid George of South Africa and Tinkoff's Pavel Brutt, breakaway winner of Stage Nine last year and Trek-Marco Polo's Malaysian hopeful Loh Sea Keong, built up an advantage of more than nine minutes over the rest at one point, but was eventually brought back to four minutes and 28 seconds at the finish line.

"With our team manager (Gianni) Savio and Marco Bellini, we always plan each stage to the detail and in the race we just carry out the plan. With 25 teams in this race, it is always going to be difficult to control, so the plan was to be in a breakaway, which was always going to happen in a stage like this," said Serpa, of the plan that registered his team's second win after sprinter Danilo Hondo had taken Stage Four on Tuesday.

"I knew I had to find a way to be ahead of the sprinters in this group, so when approaching the finish, I went away early. I was in front inside the final kilometre and when I saw that I had a good lead inside the final 300 metres, I just gave it everything I had and sprinted to the finish."

The attack of the 16 winning riders yesterday went away after the first intermediate sprint at Felda Pulai, 41km into the stage which saw Seoul City's Park Sung Baek take the maximum five points and a three-second time bonus, which wrested the Proton blue jersey as the leading Asian rider in the race from Meitan Hompo-GDR's Shinichi Fukushima.

The 23-year-old Sung Baek now leads the classification with a second's advantage over Fukushima, with three stages remaining.

The first king of the mountains jersey was pulled on by 23-year-old German Team Ista rider Chris Meschemoser, who outfoxed Southaustralia.com's Johnnie Walker and South Africa's Dennis Van Niekirk to take the maximum four points and the Genting polka dot jersey as a result of the first categorised climb of this year's Tour in Jemaluang yesterday.

Today offers some respite before the peloton tackles the Fraser's Hill climb tomorrow in the Tour's shortest stage, a 129km run from Kuala Rompin to Kuantan, with an expected bunch sprint finish.

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