Columbia-HTC’s Ina-Yoko Teutenberg powered into the race lead of the Route de France on Tuesday after coming within hundredths of a second of claiming victory in the stage two time trial in Cholet.

“I was just a fraction of a second behind the stage winner, and it’s always a bit disappointing to miss a victory by so little,” Teutenberg said afterwards. “However, getting the lead is really important, too.”

The winner of stage one in a bunch sprint said she was “a little surprised to be going so well in the time trials right now, but that makes it doubly pleasing.

“I did have some time references from my team-mates for the time trial, and the course suited me. In any case, there was only one real tactic in a time trial like this, which was to go all out from the start.”

With three days racing remaining, Teutenberg is cautious about her chances of holding onto the top position overall.

“I don’t know if I’ll be able to hold the lead right the way through to the finish. There are some pretty important climbs at the end of the race and as a sprinter, when you come into form your climbing’s always the thing that gets better last.

“So I’ll take it on the day by day, and see what happens.”