HTC-Columbia’s André Greipel has taken his second win in 24 hours in the Tour of Turkey on Monday, winning the bunch sprint which decided stage one for his eighth victory of the season. Greipel’s victory came hard on the heels of his win in the opening prologue and reinforces his position as overall leader of the race.

“It was a really tough day. A lot of climbing, particularly in the last 20 kilometres, but André stuck in there and we finally got the win,” said HTC-Columbia’s sports director Jan Schaffrath. “The whole team really did a great job. Gert Dockx and Aleksejs Saramotins were particularly strong, bringing back the attackers time after time.”

Schaffrath said after looking at the stage course profile this morning, “It looked like a heart rate monitor, there were so many little climbs. Fortunately none of them were too big. The longest was about three kilometres. The last sprint was a little bit dangerous, though, and came after another little climb in the final kilometres, but André held on and then did a great sprint.”

“Tomorrow’s another difficult stage, it’s even hillier. But we’ve got several options, including Tejay Van Garderen. and everybody got through today’s stage fine. We’re optimistic.”

Stage 2 Results:
1. Andre Greipel (GER/HTC-Columbia), les 181 km en 4h40:33.
2. Angelo Furlan (ITA) m.t.
3. Claudio Cucinotta (ITA) m.t.
4. Mattia Gavazzi (ITA) m.t.
5. Francisco Ventoso Alberdi (ESP) m.t.

Overall Results:
1. Andre Greipel (GER/HTC Columbia) 4:49:03
2. Tejay Van Garderen (USA) à 16.
3. Maciej Bodnar (POL) 19.
4. Rein Taaramae (EST) 20.
5. Frantisek Rabon (CZE) 21.