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Petacchi wins 1st stage of Tour de France
(Agencies)
Updated: 2010-07-05 22:37
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BRUSSELS, Belgium?- Alessandro Petacchi of Italy won Sunday's crash-marred first stage of the Tour de France, with top sprinting rivals and race favorites like Lance Armstrong delayed by spills.
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 Lampre rider Alessandro Petacchi of Italy celebrates as he crosses the finish line to win the first stage of the Tour de France cycling race from Rotterdam to Brussels, July 4, 2010. [Agencies]
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Three crashes tangled up riders in the last few kilometers, including a big pileup within the last kilometer that stalled a large bunch including race leader Fabian Cancellara and Armstrong.
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Alberto Contador, the 2009 champion, is sixth, 27 seconds behind, following the 223.5-kilometer trek through flat Belgian and Dutch lowlands from Rotterdam to Brussels.
Top sprinters like Britain's Mark Cavendish, who won six Tour stages last year, and Oscar Freire of Spain, crashed together while negotiating a sharp turn in the last few kilometers.
Then, in the last kilometer, a massive pileup left Lampre rider Petacchi a relatively easy sprint victory ahead of about 20 riders who were able to avoid the spill.
Petacchi clocked 5 hours, 9 minutes, 38 seconds for the stage, and thrust his index fingers in the air and screamed as he crossed the finish. The 36-year-old Italian is riding his first Tour since 2004 _ a year after he collected four stage victories.
Mark Renshaw of Australia was second, and Norway's Thor Hushovd placed third among 157 riders who were awarded the same time as the Italian stage winner _ including Armstrong and Cancellara.
"It was really nervous today, and at the end it was just insane," said Cancellara, noting that cycling's biggest races mean many riders jostle anxiously for stage-win glory in the early flat stages.
"At the end, I couldn't do anything. I was also in the chaos," he said. "I hit the ground pretty hard ... Tomorrow I will feel the asphalt that I found at the end."
Millar and Giro d'Italia winner Ivan Basso crashed after a dog darted into the peloton around the 56-kilometer mark _ before getting up and returning to the race.
Even before his own spill, Cavendish was without the services of one of his top lead-out men, as HTC-Columbia teammate Adam Hansen of Australia fell in an early crash. Team officials said it wasn't immediately clear what happened, but they suspected a broken left collarbone and said he'd go directly to the hospital after the stage.
Moldavian champion Alexandr Pliuschin burst out of the pack with about 25 kilometers left to catch three breakaway riders who had jumped out very early. He and Belgium's Martin Wynants held off the main bunch until being over taken with 10 kilometers to go.
Riders embark on another mostly flat ride Monday for the second stage, a 201-kilometer jaunt from Brussels to Spa.