San Luis Obispo, CA, 10th November 2009 – Team Columbia-HTC has received Eurosport’s Number One Team ranking in the 2009 Classment Eurosport, and Mark Cavendish tops the ranking as the number one cyclist in 2009. With three riders in the top ten and 86 wins during 2009, Team Columbia-HTC capped the team ranking with an impressive 7,253 points, ahead of Teams Astana and Saxo Bank by greater than a 40 percent gap.

The ranking is based on more than 160 races on the UCI calendar. Points are awarded to riders in the top ten of each race, the top 20 in the major Tours, stage winners and jersey wearers. According to the point totals published on www.fr.sports.yahoo.com/cyclisme, Cavendish, as the most successful rider of the season, scored a total of 3,193 points for his 23 victories riding for Columbia-HTC.
Team Columbia-HTC riders earned three of the top-ten individual spots, and Cavendish also topped the best young rider ranking.

“What sets our team apart,” commented Columbia-HTC Directeur Sportif Rolf Aldag, “is we won races from January to October, including 17 Grand Tour stage wins, Milan-San Remo, Ghent-Wevelgem, six stage wins in the Tour of Switzerland, and seven national time trial championships titles. Together we can be proud of our results in 2009.”

First Endurance rider (Mark Cavendish) won stage 2 today at the Tour of Missouri.  This is Mark’s second consecutive stage win at the race.  The star sprinter extended his lead in the overall classification by gaining a ten-second time bonus in stage two Tuesday.  ”We started fast and kept a good tempo all day,” commented sports director Tristan Hoffman.  [Columbia-HTC teammate] Kanstantsin [Sivtsov] and Michael Barry worked the whole race, along with [American teammate] Craig Lewis, on the consistently rolling course.”

“The guys really looked after me again today,” commented Cavendish after the win.  “It was a bit hectic in the last kilometres, but George [Hincapie] kept me out of trouble.”  It was US Pro Champion George Hincapie who escorted Cavendish through the final kilometres to the Briton’s 23rd victory of the season.  “In the last kilometres, the pace picked up.  Cervelo tried to damage our train.  But George took Mark to the end,” added Hoffman.  “Mark jumped on Thor Hushovd’s wheel and had no trouble getting past him.  And the final result was a brilliant win.”

First Endurance rider Mark Cavendish finished off the Columbia-HTC lead out at the Tour of Missouri on Monday, sprinting to win Stage One of the Tour, taking with him the leaders jersey and a Buell 1150cc motorbike.  A break of three riders spent the majority of the race out in front during the 120km circuit race around the streets of St Louis. They were gradually reeled in during the last lap of racing.  ”The guys did a great job,” said Cavendish. “Cervelo tried to give us a hard time at the end but the guys kept control and did a perfect job.   George [Hincapie] fell down a hole in the road in the final, so I hope he’s ok,” he added. “I jumped on Thor’s [Hushhovd] wheel and came round him.  I didn’t feel too good today due to the jetlag, but it was a pretty straight forward race and the guys kept it under control from the beginning.”

Cavendish looks forward to taking his new Buell for a spin in the off season.  ”It’s pretty cool,” he said. “I’ll get my license in the next couple of months so I can take it for a ride.”

Results

1	Mark Cavendish (GBr) Columbia-HTC
2	Juan Jose Haedo (Arg) Saxo Bank
3	Thor Hushovd (Nor) Cervelo Test Team

First Endurance rider Mark Cavendish (Columbia-HTC) sprinted to his twenty-first victory of the season in stage two of the Tour of Ireland on Saturday.  ”It’s always good to win,” Cavendish said afterwards, “and though it was a tough finish we managed to take control of things with two kilometres to go.  ”It was a team win, one guy crosses the line with his arms in the air, but it’s a success for everybody.”

The winner of six stages in the Tour de France this summer, Cavendish said, “This is the first time I’ve gone really deep since July.  ”I’m not going to be going for the overall here, but for sure it’s an objective for the team. We won it last year with an amazing ride on the last day, and I think we can do it again.”  After Ireland, Cavendish’s next race will be the Tour of Missouri in the USA.  ”My objective there is a stage win. After that, I’ll go on to the World Championships, where I’ll be going to support my team-mates, and then I want to do Paris-Tours.”  Saturday’s triumph was Cavendish fourth stage victory of his career in the Tour of Ireland, and brings the tally of 2009 wins for Columbia-HTC’s men’s team to 68.

COLUMBIA-HTC TESTING NEW 1st ENDURANCE PROTOTYPES-Columbia-HTC is working with 1st Endurance on a new OptygenHP upgrade and a new EFS drink upgrade.  They’ve had the OptygenHP prototype since the Tour of California and received the EFS drink prototype right before the Tour of Ireland.

By Cathy Mehl

 In the shadow of the Arc de Triomphe, First Endurance rider Alberto Contador (Team Astana) held up two fingers on each hand to signify his second Tour de France win in what played out to be a near-perfect ride for the young Spanish champion. Contador took both a mountain stage and time trial win, along with the victory for the team time trial, making for a well-rounded Tour from the world’s current best stage racer.  After almost 85-hours of racing, Contador’s gap to second place was a dominant four minutes, satisfying even nay-sayers that his repeat performance at the top of the podium in Paris is not a fluke. Coming in 4:11 behind Contador was Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank) and rounding out the podium was seven-time Tour champion Lance Armstrong in his return to the sport after a four year retirement.  Team Astana also took the win in the Teams classification, a testament to the hard work put in by 6th place finisher Andreas Klöden, Sergio Paulinho, Yaroslav Popovych, Haimar Zubeldia, Gregory Rast, Dmitriy Muravyev and Levi Leipheimer to put two men on the podium.

Champagne, pats on the back and plenty of animated chatter among the riders was the scene in the early part of today’s stage. After a casual ride from the countryside into the city of Paris on a beautiful summer’s day, Team Astana rode first on to theChamps Élysées, led by hard-working Rast at the front of the group, the boys in blue lined up behind him with Contador in yellow safely tucked behind Armstrong.  Then the peloton went into over-drive with several groups going off the front, including a strong seven-man break that included Thomas Voeckler (Bbox-Bouygues-Telecom) and Fumy Beppu (Skil-Shimano).  Columbia-HTC made sure they rode hard at the front to keep the break from staying away and methodically shut it down by the last lap.

 During the bell lap as the peloton approached the half-way point on the lap, Garmin tried to outfox the Columbia-HTC team by going to the front early, but they arrived one man short and had a little too far to go to make it stick.  Under the 1km to go red kite George Hincapie held court at the front of the peloton with Mark Renshaw and Mark Cavendish lined up just behind.  Coming into the final corner onto the Champs Élysées Renshaw and Cavendish hit it first with everyone else having to slow to get back on the line.  That was all the two in front needed to get First Endurance rider Mark Cavendish (Columbia-HCT) ramped up and speeding for the finish line, horizoning all other sprinters, far enough ahead that his lead-out man Renshaw captured second on the stage. 

This win makes nine Tour wins for General Manager Johan Bruyneel…that’s nine in 11 years for the master strategist who relishes the challenge of winning the Tour…again and again and again. Not to be over-looked are the other Tour sports directors: Alain Gallopin, Viatcheslav Ekimov and Dirk Demol. And of course congratulations to all the hard-working staff as well. Well done!