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News :: Lars Bak Confident Before Classics

21 March 2006

Lars Bak Confident Before Classics

Lars Bak Confident, photo: Jesper Johannesen

The Danish Champion, Lars Bak of Team CSC, has a good morale, even after early season bad luck.

"Well, so far I think it's been OK. I rode fairly good in Marseille, and also OK in Tour de California, but so far I think it's been OK, without being showy," Bak explains.

The 26 year-old Dane was forced to withdraw from stage 3 of the Tirreno-Adriatico, after high winds caused both him and race leader Paolo Bettini to crash. He reckons he might be ready in around a week, time enough to partake in Brabantse Pijl.

"Today, was the first day I was riding outside, and it actually went OK, although my back still hurts a lot, and my ribs a little too," continued the Dane. "But the best is to go outside and make the blood circulation work a little, so the last three days I've progressed a lot. The soreness is getting better, but I still feel that my back hurts a lot, so I have to take it easy the next couple of days. My plan will be to ride Brabantse Pijl next Sunday, and I think it should be realistic. As mentioned, I've progressed in the last couple of days, and I'll now use my massage instrument and pour on ice, 'cause the back and the arms are still quite sore. This helps me to hold on properly on the bike. I think that it's realistic to start out there [Brabantse Pijl]."

Lars Bak's racing program hasn't been fully decided yet, as the Danish ProTour squadra has been struck by a lot of injuries lately, and therefore have been forced to change their rosters for the races.

"At the moment, there're quite a lot of injuries in the team," continued Bak. "This means that the race program has been changed for some of the riders, and I don't know exactly about my coming race program since I don't really know how I can perform with my current condition. To be frank, I don't really know what the plans are for the coming races, which races I'll be riding, so we'll have to wait around a week to see. After all, there're quite a lot [of riders] carrying an injury right now. Time will tell."

Lars Bak believes that the numerous injuries and crashes haven't anything to do with CSC's hard training regime, nor has there been too much competition for team selection at the races.

"No, it hasn't got anything to do with too hard of a training program. It's pure misfortune," said the Dane. "Concerning Stuart O'Grady, he went directly into a big hole in the middle of the road. Completely inexcusable that there could be such a hole in the road, and the people who saw it were completely shocked that the race organization hadn't covered it. That's a thing you can't protect yourself against. Regarding my own accident, the wind simply blew me off the road. There wasn't anyone around me, neither in front nor behind of me. I'm no 50 kilogram lad who can't control my bike. I was down in the drops, in front of the peloton, and actually in a three-man escape. And I was just slung off the road, so I don't think I could have done anything differently to avoid it."

"Accidents often appear in droves. Now, we can only hope that the luck will come later on in the season," said an upbeat Bak. "Last year, we had a lot of early season victories, which we haven't really had this year. But we have won a stage in each of the two first ProTour races: Julich in Paris-Nice and Cancellara in Tirreno-Adriatico. Fortune and misfortune mostly balance in a season, so I bet will benefit from this later in the season."

"The morale is still good, and people are still happy, but of course it's irritating that we crash all the time. But honestly, we just joke about it." The Dane humorously adds, "We say, 'Who will be the next to crash?'"
- feltet.dk

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