As expected, the prologue in the streets of Houilles didn't lead to big time gaps due to the race route being only 2.9 kilometers long, quite winding and in a rural area.

In order to get the first yellow jersey at the end of the afternoon, a rider should thus almost rather be a sprinter than a time trial specialist. A track profile would also work out and that's what Damien Gaudin (Team Europcar) showed by winning this first part of Paris-Nice 2013.

The summary of the Paris-Nice 2013 prologue in Houilles

The first rider to start in Houilles was Marco Bandiera of the IAM Cycling team and with 3'55" he of course wrote down the first reference time.

This didn't last for long however and after several rapid changes, it was finally Borut Bozic who stopped the clock at a new reference time, at 3'40"95. Peter Velits, who started almost 45 minutes later, was the next one to get under Bozic' time for 93 hundreds of a second.

Half an hour later, Geoffrey Soupe was the first rider to get under the 3'40" limit by doing the 2.9 kilometers with an average speed of 47.67 km/h. Only another about thirty riders later the young Wilco Kelderman of the Blanco Pro Cycling Team (the new name for the former Rabobank team) again got under the reference time, for 6 hundreds of a second only.

When Maxime Monfort (Radioshack-Leopard) started his race at 4.12PM he probably didn't imagine that less than one minute later he would slip away in a turn and thus see all his hopes on a good position in the general classification fly away. He had quite a lucky escape however, because the Belgian rider finally only had some scrapes on his right leg. He ended this time trial at the forelast place however, 42 seconds behind the winner.

The race of course went on and the French time trial champion, Sylvain Chavanel (Omega Pharma-QuickStep), was the first to register a time within 3 minutes and 38 secondes. Shortly, everyone thought he was the winner of this explosive effort but that didn't last long since the rider who started right after him, Damien Gaudin (Team Europcar), removed an additional 56 hundreds of a second of the reference time and thus won this prologue in 3'37"69, with an average speed of 48,11 km/h.

Once he got his yellow jersey on the podium, the rider of the Europcar team didn't really realise yet that he won this prologue: It's a nice surprise, my first pro victory, I've been waiting for it since 6 years. Indeed, after a victory in Paris-Roubaix Espoirs in 2007 - a race which unfortunately won't be organised in 2013 - the rider from Beaupréau didn't raise his hands anymore until he got on the podium today.

Gaudin indicated himself that his history as a track rider had been useful today: 3'37" is quite similar to the time on the pursuit. I've been working on this for the last two weeks with some violent efforts. I did know however that I had to take some risks.

Lieuwe Westra (Vacansoleil-DCM Pro Cycling Team) took the 3rd place between Chavanel and Kelderman to form a top 3 within one second! Kelderman however still is the best young rider, ahead of Geoffrey Soupe.

The classifications for Paris-Nice 2013 after the prologue

Here are the classifcations after this prologue in Houilles:

Stage classification and overall classification

Here's the top 5 of this prologue which is identical for the general classification and the points classification (the number of points is mentioned between brackets):

1/ Damien Gaudin (Team Europcar) - 3'37" (25)
2/ Sylvain Chavanel (Omega Pharma-QuickStep) - +0'01" (22)
3/ Lieuwe Westra (20)
4/ Wilco Kelderman (Blanco Pro Cycling Team) - +0'02" (18)
5/ Geoffrey Soupe (FDJ) (16)

Best young riders classification

Among the young riders Wilco Kelderman is thus the current leader of this classification of which you can find the top 5 below:

1/ Wilco Kelderman (Blanco Pro Cycling Team) - 3'39"64
2/ Geoffrey Soupe (FDJ)
3/ Tony Gallopin (Radioshack-Leopard) - +0'01"
4/ Elia Viviani (Cannondale) - +0'03"
5/ Jesus Herrada Lopez (Movistar Team)

The photos of the Paris-Nice 2013 prologue

A selection of 174 photos has been published tonight, with a photo of almost each of the riders participating in Paris-Nice 2013:

>> Watch the photos of the Paris-Nice 2013 prologue in Houilles

door Thomas Vergouwen
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this publication is published in: Paris-Nice | Paris-Nice 2013

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