Tejay van Garderen reports on stage 3 of the Tour of California

As told by Tejay to Marcel

With the most difficult stage ahead today the pace was not too bad for the first 25 miles. A group op 17 got of the front early on and Discovery was content to let them go for now.
“I felt fine on the first climb, which was motivating for the remaining climbs.”
As the break gained more and more time the Discovery team started to pick up the pace.
The Discovery team was desperately looking for help form other teams and eventually found an ally in Rabobank. Discovery and Rabobank had the pack strung out for miles up and down the climbs and never let up the pace. I got popped on the third climb at around mile 60. At the same time a rider from Lotto/Predictor lost contact with the peloton as well. It was then that I found out how the Pro-Tour guys tackle climbs: By holding on to one of the cars in the caravan he slingshot himself up to the back of the pack for a little longer. This was a practice that I noticed was applied by a lot of riders that were on the raged edge. The commissaries were handing out $800 fines for each infraction! Several of the domestic teams were using this practice as well and finishing within the time cut.
After I lost contact with the peloton I ended up in a group of 7 and we rolled through as best as we could to try to make the time cut without cheating and hanging on cars. When all was said and done I lost 17:22 which was within the 8% time cut. Four of my team mates were not so lucky and won’t be able to start tomorrow’s stage to San Luis Obispo. The morale in the team is pretty low right now and I feel like I have been stretched to my limits.

The first stage was the longest race of my life, the second stage was the longest of my life, the third stage was the hardest race of my life and tomorrow’s stage will be the longest race of my life…

Tejay is now in 116th position at 17:57 behind race leader Levi Leipheimer.

Send Tejay some positive thoughts for today’s stage …

Thanks for reading,

marcel