Tour of California CX Classification Update

After posting yesterday’s Amgen Tour of California CX Classification standings, Jeremy Powers got in touch to help lay down some guidelines for the competition. First, to better define the field, only riders that podiumed in a UCI cyclocross race are eligible for the CX classification jersey. This makes it easy to eliminate the occasional ‘cross dabbler (read: Lance) and concentrate the jersey race on the cyclocross professionals. Powers also suggested classifications for “most time spent off the front, most awesome, most foreign, funniest …”

Not sure what we can come up for some of those, but for funniest, I believe Tom Boonen (Quick Step) may be leading that race despite not being a CX guy. When asked about Lars Boom’s Stage 4 performance, Boonen said “Lars Boom should get a medal for today, a medal that says, go back to cyclocross.”

For today, we are going to feature “Best Cyclocross Dismount or Remount” at this year’s Tour of California. So far, we have two nominees for the award. The aforementioned Jeremy Powers (Jelly Belly), who managed to jettison his bike in the pile-up that bloodied Armstrong, and hop over bodies and bikes without going down.

The second nominee is Peter Sagan (Liquigas-Doimo), who went down on Stage Three. Sagan hit the deck, rolled once, got up, grabbed his bike and executed a beautiful running remount. Sagan did this on a climb and did not lose his spot at the front of the field.

Those are your nominees. Tell us via comment or Tweet to @CXHairs who should take the prize.

As for the GC standings, Tejay Van Garderen had a good day moving up to third in the CX race. Sagan, by winning the stage, moved into a big lead on points. Powers picked up some second place sprint points as well.

CX Classification

1. Peter Sagan  0:15

2. Lars Boom  31:32

3. Tejay Van Garderen 36:29

4. Davide Frattini 46:59

5. Jeremy Powers 59:25

Points:

Sagan 34

Boom 20

Powers 6