BARDOLINO, Italy, 29 September 2004 — Swiss racer Karin Thurig improved on her impressive Olympic bronze medal from Athens by scorching to the women’s time trial crown at the World Championships here yesterday.
Thurig, a keen triathlete who competes in Iron Man competitions, claimed her first major international crown in a blistering time of 30min 53sec over the 24.050km course.
Germany’s Judith Arndt took her second successive silver medal in the Worlds event after being relegated to second by a massive 51secs by the 32-year-old Swiss.
Former world champion Zoulfia Zabirova, the winner in 2002, took her second consecutive bronze medal in the discipline after holding off reigning champion Joane Somarriba of Spain, the multiple women’s Tour de France winner who could only manage fourth place.
Thurig admitted to almost getting her race plan all wrong as the pain began to kick in early after her blistering start. “I started very aggressively, that was my plan, but after five or six kilometers the legs began to hurt a bit and I began to wonder if I had started out to fast,” said Thurig. Thurig, starting second last from the 34-strong field, took a significant lead at the intermediate checkpoint at 11.8km, which final starter Somarriba passed in second place. At the finish line Arndt’s time of 31:45 became the new benchmark, pushing Zabirova down into third.
Moments later Thurig came over the line to blow the race apart, and it came down to a battle for the bronze. Somarriba however could only manage fourth, handing the 30-year-old red-haired Russian her third podium place in as many years. Patrick Gretsch of Germany won the junior men’s world time trial title yesterday. Gretsch clocked a time of 30min 29secs over the 24.050 km course to claim gold ahead of 18-year-old Czech rider Roman Kreuziger and another German, Stefan Schafer, the long-time leader.
Meanwhile, the stalemate between cycling’s ruling body and organizers of the three major Tours took a new twist yesterday after UCI President Hein Verbruggen insisted his plans for major reforms would go ahead.
However Verbruggen, who has met opposition to his proposals for a new-look ProTour which would radically shake up the sport when it is introduced in January 2005, has admitted that he could be forced to introduce a slimmed down version of his initial plans for the race calendar. Verbruggen’s project would see 20 top cycling teams buy four-year licenses to ride in a 22-race annual series, which was to include most or all of the World Cup series and all the big Tours of Italy, France and Spain.
Its aim was to unify the sport and its image toward major media networks, thus giving sponsors more solid guarantees, which in turn would have a positive effect on the sometimes wobbly nature of teams’ finances.
On Monday, he admitted it could be based around a smaller calendar of 15 races, with the expectation that races would eventually join up in one or two years time.
Russia Plan to Challenge Hamilton Decision
Russia, meanwhile, are to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) after American cyclist Tyler Hamilton was last week cleared of doping violations by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
Hamilton twice tested positive for a blood transfusion, first in Athens on Aug. 18 after winning the Olympic time trial gold medal and then following his victory in a time trial in this month’s Tour of Spain.
