MILRAM’s Robert Förster sprints into the top ten for the first time at the season’s first UCI ProTour race in Australia

Dortmund, 22. January 2010. MILRAM’s Thomas Rohregger was able to defend the best climber’s jersey in the fourth stage of the Tour Down Under (17.-24.01./UCI ProTour). The Austrian rider was alert from the very beginning and attacked early in the race, together with six other riders. Their breakaway was ended only three kilometers from the finish line in Goolwa.

In the breakaway of the day, the climber from Tyrol pocketed the points for the first and only mountain prize and single-handedly defended the jersey for the best climber on his way up to Lenswood. “I was able to gain vital points in the fight for the mountains jersey. Tommorrow another hard stage awaits us, with two climbs. I will try anything to take the jersey home with me to Austria,” an exhausted Thomas Rohregger said after the fourth stage’s finish. But even though the ambitious Tyrolean is going to be at the start in the “Skoda King Of The Mountain” jersey, he is not happy with how today’s stage ended. “It didn’t go all too well in the end. At some point in the race, I was fifth in the overall thanks to the bonus seconds I got in the intermediate sprints. But after the long breakaway and the strong winds in the finale, I didn’t have enough strength and lost some vital seconds.”

Rohregger’s teammates Luke Roberts and Markus Fothen crossed the finish line at the same time as today’s winner and overall leader Greipel. They are now in places eleven and 17 in the overall, which keeps them in a hopeful position. In the teams classification, the German ProTour team ranks three.

For the first time since the Australian ProTour race started, MILRAM sprinter Robert Förster was able to catch a place in the top ten. The rider from Leipzig came in ninth, while overall leader Andre Greipel (Columbia-HTC) got his third victory. After 149.5 kilometers from Norwood to Goolwa, places two and three went to the two Australians Robbie McEwen (Katusha) and Graeme Brown (Rabobank).

Once more, it was one of the highly motivated local heroes from Team UniSA, David Kemp, who launched the first attack in Australia’s biggest race. Apart from MILRAM’s allrounder Rohregger, the Australian was joined by Olivier Kaisen (Omega Pharma-Lotto), Anthony Ravard (AG2R-La Mondiale), Stef Clement (Rabobank), and Jonathan Castroviejo (Euskaltel-Euskadi) amongst others. The group worked together well and soon their gap was over three minutes. In the course of the race, they battled together against the pack which kept closing in, as well as the strong winds. But their long breakaway came to an end three kilometers from the finish line, and the awaited mass sprint ensued.