Rafał Majka hoping for good result on Col d’Ospendale

autor: Paweł Gadzała :: 29 marca 2014, 18:52@8aldwin

Rafał Majka returns to racing in Corsica, eyes Col d’Ospendale finish on Sunday

Despite contusion and last week’s early withdrawal from Tinkoff-Saxo line-up for Volta a Catalunya, Rafał Majka managed to recover and is racing again – this time planning an offensive on Corsican roads.

Elbow injury ruled out Majka’s start in Catalunya, while Tinkoff-Saxo team has reported that Polish climber needs more time to recover from injuries sustained during last stage of Paris-Nice. 24-year-old was caught in a crash on the final kilometer and hit the barriers, bruising and cutting his elbow.

Injuries did not stop him from training. On Tuesday Majka used his oficial Facebook profile to communicate that he was feeling better and the team decided to send him to Corsica, to race 83rd edition of Criterium International.

I’m really happy to come back to peleton earlier than expected. I’m looking forward to racing in Corsica and I want to fight for a good result in general classification. I did 15 hours of training in the mountains during past three days. I’m feeling really good, but the elbow still hurts a little

– Majka wrote on his official Facebook profile, heading to France.

The race kicked off today with morning flat stage and afternoon time trial. Frenchman Nacer Bouhanni claimed the opening act of the event and Giant-Shimano’s Tom Dumoulin stormed to victory and overall lead in 7km technical fight against the clock. Majka finished 19th and is now sitting in 19th overall, 27 seconds behind his Dutch peer. He has also lost some to other climbing specialists – Jean-Christophe Peraud (Ag2r La Mondiale), Mathias Frank (IAM Cycling), Jerome Coppel (Cofidis) and Eduardo Sepulveda (Bretagne-Seche Environment).

I think Rafa (Majka) did a solid time trial considering the course and compared to other rivals for tomorrow’s mountain wrap-up. The big question is though, how well he’s doing after his crash and following break from racing. But we’ll do our very best to support him and we hope that he can finish among the best in tomorrow’s mountain top finish

– said team’s directeur sportif, Fabrizio Guidi.

Tomorrow’s stage is a 176km journey around south part of Napoleon Bonaparte’s island with final climb of Col d’Ospendale (14,1 km, 6,2%) giving riders the ultimate possibility to fight for top places.