Levi Leipheimer is leading the team at Volta a Catalunya, starting on Monday, March 19. We spoke with Levi about his upcoming race, and much more.
How are you feeling after the unfortunate three crashes at Paris-Nice Stage 6?
I mean you know I am actually pretty lucky having crashed three times, hitting a motorbike. I just have scrapes bruises and soreness, but it's all going away pretty quickly.
How do you think you will feel when Tour of Catalunya starts on Monday?
I think I'll be OK. I was able to ride five hours today, some intervals. I think it will be all right.
Are there any stages of Catalunya you're aiming for?
There is one really big mountain stage where it's like 4,500 meters of climbing. It has four really major climbs, and it ends going up a long climb. It's really the decisive stage of the race, so if you do well that day you're going to do well in the overall. We'll see how I do that day, kind of ride into it a bit. It's the third day, but that gives me a couple days to see how I am doing before that.
Amgen Tour of California race organizers just announced the participating teams, and Omega Pharma - Quick Step Cycling Team is on the list. Living in California and being a three-time winner, what does this mean to you?
It's going to be exciting. This whole year has been a fresh start, changing teams. It's been a long time since I've changed teams, which brings a lot of new motivation and perspective. Regarding Amgen Tour of California, it's an extra special year. It starts in my home town of Santa Rosa. I think that our community has been looking forward to this for a long time. I'm right there with them, looking forward to it. It's going to be exciting.
The team has already won 23 races. What are your thoughts on how quickly this team has come together?
You know, it's special. I've been doing this a while, doing this long enough to appreciate this success for what it is. It's not something you can really plan for. You do the training camps and training, but you don't say 'yeah, we're going to win 23 races by the middle of March.' This is something i've never seen. I think we just need to appreciate the fact we're having one of best starts of any team ever. If things dont go our way, that's actually the norm. It's abnormal to win this many races. I think there's been a lot of work done by us, but it's just hard to explain to people why we've won this many races. There's an X-factor to it, that's hard to put your fingers on.
Has there been a team leader so far?
Tom has always been the leader of this team. This team it's somewhat different, but it's still the team it's always been. Tom has always been the center of the team. He's the leader of the team. There's other guys like myself and Tony Martin, Peter Velits — we have all come to the team this year as new riders so we don't have the seniority Tom has, but we've helped to motivate everyone else and that includes Tom as well. But I think i would pick him as the leader.