It's Millar!

True to his word, Briton claims biggest win of career

True to his word, David Millar took the biggest win of his career, storming home for his maiden Tour road stage triumph at Béziers, reports Cycling Weekly magazine

MISSION accomplished: David Millar (Cofidis) has kept his pre-Tour promise of a stage win. In the south-eastern city of Béziers on the slight uphill finish at the end of stage 13, the Scot made a fine charge home for first place from a break of five.

Millar’s convincing victory over Basque David Etxebarria (Euskaltel-Euskadi) and Holland’s Michael Boogerd (Rabobank) came after a day-long break through the rough terrain of south-eastern France.

What it meant DAVID Millar’s second Tour de France stage win is the sort of international success which is welcome for any cycling nation, but it is a real morale boost for British cycling in particular. It is also exactly the boost the Scot was looking for in his career. “A top-15 place on GC doesn’t get you a quarter of the publicity you get by being up there in a break,” Millar told CW during the Dauphiné Libéré. After injuries, crashes, not to mention disappointment in the Pyrenean stages after all that training in the mountains in Spain, this was a real U-turn for the Scot. Nor were his rivals inexperienced in taking transition stages -- quite apart from the wise old fox Laurent Jalabert, David Etxebarria took two in 1999, even Michael Boogerd won one on a rain-soaked day way back in 1996. But Millar outwitted and outgunned them all. Millar’s Béziers victory is also confirmation that his Vuelta road stage win last year was no flash in the pan. He can battle it out with the big names now and, at 25, it’s a sure sign that he’s going to give British cycling fans a great deal of enjoyment in the years to come.

But the 25-year-old seemed fresh as a daisy as he stormed past Jean Delatour veteran Laurent Brochard to win by a bike length, his arms aloft and a huge grin on his face.

It was the Scot’s first victory of 2002, and what a win. Britain had not taken a road victory in the Tour since Max Sciandri outsprinted Colombian Chepe Gonzalez in 1995 at Saint Etienne, and this was Millar’s second Tour stage after his victory at the opening time trial at Futuroscope in 2000.

'I knew I was strongest'

”I was feeling good after the Pyrenees, despite suffering there,” Millar said. “And I knew I was the strongest with five kilometers to go.

“So I played it all out on the final sprint, watching the others and then taking my chance,” he added.

Just like before, when he outsprinted Santiago Botero in the Tour of Spain at Torrelavega, that morning Millar had written on a piece of paper: “Today, I win.”

“I don’t normally do that, only about once a year,” he joked.

Still, the day had started with a bang for the Scot, who jumped on the first break to go, on the climb of Montségur.

Eddy Mazzoleni (Tacconi Sport) had shot away after just four kilometers of racing, with Laurent Jalabert (CSC), keen to reinforce his hold on the mountains jersey, quickly chasing him down together with Boogerd and Millar coming across before the summit. A s the quartet began working well together, another seven broke away behind, Bobby Julich (Telekom), Etxebarria, Brochard, Mapei-Quick Step’s Miguel Martinez, the ibanesto.com duo of David Latasa and Javier Pascual, and another Rabobank rider, evergreen Beat Zberg.

Millar's group led the seven by around a minute over the next two early climbs, but finally, after around 52 kilometers of the 171-kilometer stage, the two groups fused, with their advantage rocketing upwards past the eight-minute mark by the sprint at Limoux.

The gap was heading for nearly double that after another two hours of racing, when Lampre joined Lance Armstrong’s blue U.S. Postal train behind to preserve Raimondas Rumsas’s fourth place overall.

Meanwhile, the 11 ahead could see dense smoke rising from woodland fires caused by the intense heat, but fortunately the road veered away towards Béziers and the Mediterranean coast.

The break was obviously going to stay away, the only problem was its size and that -- for Millar -- it contained two powerful sprinters in Etxebarria and Zberg, as well as Jalabert, of course. Somebody would try a long-range attack, the question was -- who?

As it turned out, Jalabert himself tried an unusually clumsy move from the front on the long tree-lined avenues leading to Béziers. His attack didn’t work out but the ensuing confusion offered Millar a golden opportunity to charge away down the left.

Behind Millar came Etxebarria, Boogerd, Latasa and Brochard, and after some brief encouraging gestures from the Scot, the five began to work hard together. Behind, an exhausted Jalabert and the rest of the break threw in the towel.

Edge of the sofa stuff

It was nail-biting stuff. For the first time since Chris Boardman in the SuperBesse Tour stage in 1996, a Briton was up the road and in with a chance of winning and, as they came close to the Béziers suburbs, the five were still together.

Five kilometers from the finish, Brochard bolted, but Millar was straight on to his wheel. Then Etxebarria did the same on the opposite side of the road, and again the little group chased him down.

Three kilometers to go, and the riders were watching each other more than the road. Brochard made a second attack, Etxebarria responded, while Millar was sitting at the back, taking it all in.

“It was like a game of chess,” the Scot said.

Only when Latasa made a surge, the Spaniard’s first, did Millar go after him. With 600 meters to go the ibanesto.com rider led out the string again, but the other four quickly overtook him. Then Brochard charged again and this time Millar did not wait, confidently tearing past him to take the win on the slightly rising finish.

It looked -- although it probably didn’t feel -- like a ridiculously comfortable win for the Scot. Second-placed Etxebarria, who was sitting on his wheel but never managed to begin to move ahead, said afterwards: “He was simply too strong. There was nothing I could do.”

The Cofidis rider, speaking in fluent French, told reporters: “It was all going to come down to the sprint, and I told myself to stay calm and wait.

“It was like cat and mouse, except on this occasion I was the cat!

“This is what I was aiming for here in the Tour,” he added, and nobody could deny that he had succeeded in style.

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