Froome retains Dauphine yellow as Voeckler wins stage

GRENOBLE, France: Team Sky’s Chris Froome retained the race leader’s yellow jersey after yesterday’s sixth stage of the Criterium du Dauphine won by Thomas Voeckler.
The British rider remained 52sec ahead of Australian teammate Richie Porte in the overall standings, with another Australian, Garmin’s Rohan Dennis, a further 2sec adrift.
Europcar’s Voeckler won a sprint finish at the end of the 143km stage raced in bright sunshine, coming through the line ahead of Spain’s Jesus Herrada, Belgian Kevin Seeldrayers and Russian Egor Silin, 46sec ahead of the peloton.
The quartet had kicked ahead of four other riders in a breakaway from the 30km mark, Voeckler’s stage win the first by a French rider on the Dauphine this year.
“That feels really good!” the French champion Voeckler said of his victory — his first of the season after crashing in the Amstel Gold Race on April 14 and breaking a collarbone.
He also fell on his return to competition in the first half of May, taking a tumble on the first stage of the Tour of Belgium and battled to finish the race.
“Nearly everyone tells me that it makes a bad thing good, that I’ll have extra freshness for the Tour de France. It’s possible. But what is certain is that I missed some big races,” the 34-year-old added.
Saturday’s seventh and penultimate stage is a 187.5km ride between Pont-de-Claix and Superdevoluy, passing by Alpe d’Huez and including a descent of the Col de Sarenne, one of the stand-out stages of this summer’s Tour de France for which the Dauphine is a key warm-up.
Cancellara opts out
Swiss Fabian Cancellara will not take part in this year’s Tour de France so he can prepare for the World Championships, the RadioShack-Leopard rider was quoted as saying yesterday.
“The Tour has given me beautiful things already, but now I have different targets. That new target is the world championships, this year in Florence,” the four-times time trial world champion and 2008 Olympic time trial gold medalist was quoted as saying by Belgian newspaper Het Nieuwsblad on their website (www.nieuwsblad.be).
“That’s why, after the Tour de Suisse, I will not do the Tour, but the tours of Austria, Poland and Spain to prepare for the world championships.” Cancellara, 32, has won eight Tour de France stages and has enjoyed spells in the overall leader’s yellow jersey.
The Tour de France starts on June 29 from Corsica while the world championships will be held in Florence, Italy, from Sept. 22-29.