The ever-popular George Hincapie won Stage 2 of the Tour of Missouri on Wednesday, propelling himself into the yellow jersey.
The 34-year-old Greenville, SC, resident is longest-standing member of the soon-to-be-defunct cycling team sponsored by the Discovery Channel. He's the only Discovery member to have accompanied Lance Armstrong on all of his 7 Tour de France victories.
Winner of the USA Cycling pro road championship in 2006, Hincapie wore the stars and stripes at races in the US and Europe this year. He gave up the title to teammate Levi Leipheimer over the Labor Day weekend.
At Wednesday's finish in Springfield, Leipheimer and most of the rest of the peloton found themselves at least 14 minutes behind the 12-man breakaway that Hincapie joined early in the race.
VeloNews says that 11 of the Tour's 15 cycling teams had riders in the breakaway, so there was little effort to chase them down. Reporter Jason Sumner says that barring a disaster, Hincapie could hold the yellow all the way to the finish in St. Louis on Sunday with the help of the Discovery team.
Wedneday's stage was a 126-mile race from Clinton to Springfield. Stage 3 is an 18-mile individual time trial around Branson.
The top 10 overall:
1. George Hincapie (USA) Discovery Channel
2. Dominique Rollin (Can) KodakGallery – 0.04
3. Frank Pipp (USA) Health Net -0.07
4. Valeriy Kobzarenko (Ukr) Navigators – 0.10
5. Stefan Parinussa (Ger) Team Sparkasse – 0.11
6. Andrew Guptill (USA) Colavita/Sutter – 0.13
7. Michael Friedman (USA) Team Slipstream
8. David Canada (Spa) Prodir-Saunier Duval
9. Andrew Randell (Can) Symmetrics Cycling Team
10. Matthew Rice (Aus) Jelly Belly Cycling Team
More at CyclingNews and VeloNews.
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