Samu finishes 5th in Paris-Nice

There were no major changes to the overall classification on yesterday's concluding Paris-Nice stage. That means that Samu will have to make do with a 5th place overall, a results which, for him, is neither good nor bad. On the stage he was the only Euskaltel rider to come home with the leading bunch, but Romain did well to come home alongside Leipheimer, Gerrans, Schleck and Millar just 59 seconds down. Iván was 2:48 back in 49th place, while Egoi ended up a whopping 10:46 in arrears, while Beñat was even less impressive, coming home 18:45 down. Not good.

As for the overall, it looks like this:

• 5th, Samuel Sánchez
• 58th, Romain Sicard
• 60th, Iván Velasco
• 72nd, Beñat Intxausti
• 77th, Egoi Martínez

After the stage, Samu had this to say: "Overall I'm pleased with the race. Overall we were five guys within 30 seconds of each other and I was one of them, so we have to see it that way. It was a very high level of competition this year and it was very hard to fight for the win. The one annoying thing though is that I missed out on the podium by 5 seconds. I was fourth yesterday (Saturday), and I was fourth in an amputated sprint today (Sunday). We fought for stage-wins, and we were close, but we didn't make it. Now I have to recover and train well so that I can go to the Vuelta al País Vasco in top form".