Evans eyeing top 10 finish on debut
Cadel Evans insists he does not care what he does on this year's Tour de France, but the way he is going the former mountain bike champion looks to be heading for a respectable top 10 place on his debut.
It is not the podium, and he might have some work to do if he is to catch the likes of Lance Armstrong and Ivan Basso, however Evans' performance on Saturday's tough 14th stage showed he will be a definite yellow jersey contender.
The 28-year-old from Katherine in the Northern Territory kept pace again with Armstrong's group - which was half-heartedly chasing down an earlier attack which led to Austrian Georg Totschnig and Italian Stefano Garzelli leading going onto the last climb.
On the 15-kilometre climb to the summit of the unclassified-rated Porte de Pailheres, Evans was among the riders who began to fall off the back as Armstrong, Basso and Jan Ullrich all tried to eliminate each other.
Evans eventually finished 14th at only four minutes and three seconds behind Totschnig.
Not bad considering Armstrong finished 56 seconds behind the Austrian, Ullrich 1:16 behind.
And as Evans gulped down bottles of water at the summit and showed journalists the collarbone injury he has been carrying for two months - and which is being held together with gaffer tape - he said he is happy for now.
"I got dropped," he said when asked what happened on the final, eight-kilometre climb to the Pyreanean ski station.
"I was on the limit for almost the entire previous climb. We chased back and just got back on at the bottom of the decent and then they hit it again.
"The guys in the front group are two or three levels higher than me. I did what I could. I rode conservatively. As soon as the moves started going above my limit I rode at my own tempo."
Evans, sitting 12th in the general classification, nine minutes and 14 seconds behind Armstrong ahead of Sunday's killer climbing 15th stage in the Pyrenees, admitted that he had been going for the win.
"Before the stage I thought if there was going to be a day, today was the day. It's a bit steeper, smaller roads, a change of gradient I'm not of the level of the best guys here and that's the way it is. So you do what you can," he said.
Asked what he has learned from his first Tour experience, Evans simply said: "That the Tour is pretty hard. It's my first Tour remember, I didn't even get selected last year."
Last year Evans's former team T-Mobile did not pick him despite him winning the Tour of Austria shortly beforehand.
Since leaving Ullrich's outfit he has blossomed at Davitamon-Lotto, which is based around sprinter Robbie McEwen.
"Our team is really built around Robbie, but with Cadel there it gives us another possibility for next year," team manager Marc Sergeant said.
"I can't say we'll have a team to match Lance Armstrong's but next year we might be able to challenge in the general classification and for the green jersey."
Odds on
Armstrong, meanwhile, is looking odds on to claim his seventh consecutive yellow jersey before he retires, although Sunday's second stage in the Pyrenees will prove decisive.
"Tomorrow's tough. I would not want to be making explosive moves throughout the day. Everything's going to happen on the last climb," said the American, who has a 1:41 lead on Danish climber Michael Rasmussen and 2:46 on Ivan Basso.
Ullrich, Germany's 1997 winner and five-time runner-up, moved up to fourth at 4:34.
After Armstrong retires, the Tour's yellow jersey contenders will multiply as the likes of Basso, Spain's Alejandro Valverde, Italian Damiano Cunego, and perhaps an ageing Ullrich contend cycling's biggest stage race prize.
For Evans, the wait to get in among that group of contenders shouldn't be too long.
But before then, he is happy just seeing how far he can go.
"I seem to be on the level of fifth to 10th of this Tour on my best days," he said.
"I said from the start I want to come here and see what I can do. I don't care what people think I might do.
"At the moment I seem to be able to climb with the first 10. I didn't make it on the last climb.
"Somewhere around there seems to be my limit ... at the moment," he warned.
-AFP