Team Sky will target stage wins for the rest of the Tour de France as their Tour leader Bradley Wiggins recovers from a broken collarbone and prepares for a possible assault on the world championships at the end of the season, the team said.

Asked where Wiggins’s departure on Friday leaves him, Geraint Thomas said simply “off the front”, meaning that he will be looking for a chance to get in any escapes.

“It would be a shame to go under the radar, get our heads down for a few days,” said Thomas. “The days when there will be breakaways will go soon, it’s the next few days, so we have to turn it round right away and race hard. If Bradley was still here we would be doing a job for him, but now we have a chance to get up the road.”

When asked what he had told the team after Wiggins’s return to Britain, Sky’s team principal Dave Brailsford said: “I said to the guys this is an opportunity for them.”

“The likes of Geraint and Edvald Boasson Hagen were going to commit themselves totally to Brad, now they have an opportunity to ride with free will, with abandon, looking for stage victories. We need to see what development opportunities there are, what people can learn for their careers in the longer-term.”

Wiggins was flown out of a military airport near Châteauroux on a private flight to Manchester on Friday night. The flight left late, meaning that it was not possible to operate on his broken left collarbone, but the operation was expected to take place on Saturday.

The fracture is clean, and while a plate will remain in place for up to two years, most cyclists with similar injuries may resume training on a home trainer after five days, returning to the road after 10 days.

There is speculation that Wiggins may race the Tour of Spain in order to prepare for the world road time-trial championship in Denmark at the end of September. The Vuelta starts on 20 August and there is speculation that a possible comeback race for the triple Olympic gold medallist could be the Tour of Denmark from 3-7 August.

“I’d fully endorse [Sky' senior sports director] Sean Yates’s thoughts on Brad riding at least one grand tour this season,” said head coach Shane Sutton, who has been responsible for Wiggins’s preparation this season together with the former Australian swimming coach Tim Kerrison. Wiggins was expected to race the Tour of Britain from 11-18 September but would have to miss it if he opted for the Tour of Spain.

Sutton said that much of the team’s racing programme for the end of the season would have to be re-evaluated in the light of Wiggins’s withdrawal from the Tour.

“I would like him to consider the Vuelta, not just riding it but being competitive. We need to see how Brad feels about it. He’s well up for the world time-trial and off the back of what he has done this year, 10 days off the road isn’t going to be a lot.”

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010

Published via the Guardian News Feed plugin for WordPress.

This article titled “Team Sky riders to be let loose as Bradley Wiggins undergoes surgery” was written by William Fotheringham at Super-Besse Sancy, for The Guardian on Saturday 9th July 2011 10.10 UTC

Team Sky riders to be let loose as Bradley Wiggins undergoes surgery is a post from: worldwormweb

More at cyclingnews.com

[mappress]

Astarloza: Drug Cheat is a post from: worldwormweb