Tour of Britain: Stages 8&9 - 18/09/11

The Tour of Britain concluded with two fantastic stages around the nations capital, both of which provided worthy British winners, in what was generally agreed to be the best ever edition of the race.

In the morning’s individual time trial Alex Dowsett salvaged some pride for team Sky, winning ahead of overall race leader Lars Boom, with a stunning ride in perfect sunshine. The last stage, a 90km circuit race in the afternoon, was taken out in textbook style by Mark Cavendish, who won an impressive bunch sprint outside of Downing street as the predicted rain finally began to fall on London. Rabobank’s Lars Boom had another good day and ran out a satisfied an impressive overall winner of the race.

Rapha Condor Sharp went out of their Tour of Britain in a blaze of glory on the streets of London with Jon Tiernan-Locke riding a brilliant time trial to move up into sixth place in the general classification, and Kritsian House attacking from the start of the afternoon’s stage in a great display of aggressive racing.

The team had gone into the final day of the eight-day Tour safe in the knowledge that Jonathon Tiernan-Locke would win the Skoda King of the Mountains, but understanding that there was still kilometres to be raced and a job to do.
Talking about his ride Tiernan-Locke commented, “I’m not really a time triallist and this was a bit of a testers course so I knew I was going to have to do something special to get a good G.C. place. It’s funny because the Mountains jersey was already a huge success but I wanted to get a good G.C. to prove I can last the distance in this kind of race. I’m going well, and I gave it everything, I didn’t feel like I was going that well, but I think at the end of a few days racing like this you are never going to feel brilliant”.

The only scare of the entire race for Rapha Condor Sharp came with two laps to go when Jonathon punctured, and had to chase hard to return to the speeding peloton, which was by then in full flight behind the break.

“I was a bit worried when I punctured, because all of a sudden you can see all your hard work going to nothing. But I stayed calm, got a quick change and before I knew it was back in the bunch. If it had come any later I might have been in trouble, but we were all ready for anything here. I’m glad it’s done now, I feel like I’ve really done something in this race”.

Tiernan-Locke may have finished as the best domestic British rider overall, but on the day it was House who won the plaudits of the massive London crowd, bridging across to one lone leader after half a lap and staying out front until the final three kilometres. After the stage he said, “We have already had a great tour here, the best I’ve done in this team, but I wasn’t interested in resting on our laurels. The crowd was so big, and for our team it was pretty much a home game, so I went out there and gave it everything. In the end we didn’t have enough to make it, but these are some of the best teams in the world at making sure it finishes in a sprint. It was amazing out there, I was very proud to be part of this”.

The Tour of Britain was the last race for the 2011 Rapha Condor Sharp team and the Tour of Britain was the icing on the cake of a very successful season, that saw the team take 44 victories at home and abroad.

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