Kim Kirchen soared away on stage eight of the Tour of Switzerland to capture Columbia-Highroad’s fifth win of the prestigious ProTour race - and the team’s fifth victory in less than 24 hours. Kirchen tore out of the pack with less than a kilometre to go to the uphill finish in Vallorbe Superparc, finishing two seconds ahead of Czech Roman Kreuziger and  seven seconds ahead of the main pack.
The Swiss stage is Kirchen’s first of the season following Spring Classics campaign all but wrecked by injuries.

 “Tactically Kim’s win was taken very cleverly,” commented Columbia-Highroad chief sports director Rolf Aldag. “When Kreuziger attacked, first of all Albasini went with him, which forced the other teams to work. Then when Michael cracked, first Maxime [Monfort] and then Kim were waiting to go for yet more attacks.”

“That kind of team-based strategy only works when you’ve got really good team spirit, and that’s definitely the case in Columbia-Highroad. Even earlier on, Marcus Burghardt had been in the break of the day but after it had got caught on the final climb, he kept working for his team-mates as best he could. And though Tony Martin crashed twice in quick succession, Mark Cavendish and Bernhard Eisel were waiting to bring him back  each time round. It was great to see them working for their young team-mate to try and help him protect his place overall.”

According to Aldag, Columbia-Highroad’s domination in Switzerland in stages of all kinds is also due to the team working very closely as a squad.

“We’ve had four different winners in five stages, which is a sign of our versatility but also how strong that team spirit is again. In Columbia-Highroad it’s not like there’s one super-star here and everybody works for him as if they were in an office doing the routine stuff from nine to five. Everybody has a chance. That brings up the squad’s level of motivation and sense of responsibility across the board and by a massive level.

“The whole squad knows that if, for example, they work to bring one rider to the foot of a climb,  then the next day they’ll get a good lead-out in return. In Kim’s case, he had a difficult spring, but he’s shown here he’s definitely coming up for July. Not being so strong in the Ardennes Classics could be an advantage in the Tour, too where he’s sometimes suffered in the third week. This time round, by coming into form a bit later, he should be able to have a better second half of the race. And with that powerful sprint of his on mountain-top finishes, there are definitely some stages where we expect him to shine.”

“I’m not here to train for results, I’m here for results,” Kirchen said afterwards. “It’s also a great boost to my morale after what happened to me earlier in the season. Kreuziger attacked with three kilometres to go, but I waited to see what would happen and then went for it with less than a kilometre to the finish. My form’s in really good shape now, in time for the Tour de France.”

Asked why the team was winning so much, Kirchen explained that “we learned a lot of lessons last year when we were very successful too. We keep on gaining in experience, but the most important thing is we’re willing to help each other in the races, we’re friends as well as team-mates. On top of that, the young guys are hungry for success.  We ride to win each race.”