New Zealand cyclist Greg Henderson claimed Stage Three of the 2011 Amgen Tour of California with a winning time of 5:14:29. Henderson used some unexpected sprinting power to surge past some of the greatest sprinters in the world, edging out over 100 other racers at the Modesto finish line.
The victory also moved Greg Henderson to the top of leaderboard, ahead of teammate Ben Swift, who was part of that closing pack. In reality Henderson and Swift are virtually tied atop the leaderboard, with a four second edge on Peter Sagan and Juan Jose Haedo. The Henderson-Swift team of Sky Procycling is making its first run in the Tour of California.
Stage 4 kicks off tomorrow morning at 11:45am pacific time and runs from Livermore to San Jose. It will be the only stage near the Bay Area. You can view our full coverage of the race in our Tour of California stream. Additionally, you can check out all the in-race discussion over at Podium Cafe's open thread for Stage 3. Here are the current top ten overall standings after the first two stages (stage one was snowed out). There are 39 total racers tied at 8:01:41
| Pos. | No. | UCI Code | Rider | Team | Time | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| 1. | 35 | NZL19760910 | HENDERSON, Gregory | SKY | 08:01:31 | 00:00:00 |
| 2. | 38 | GBR19871105 | SWIFT, Ben* | SKY | 08:01:31 | 00:00:00 |
| 3. | 61 | SVK19900126 | SAGAN, Peter* | LIQ | 08:01:35 | 00:00:04 |
| 4. | 73 | ARG19810126 | HAEDO, Juan Jose | SBS | 08:01:35 | 00:00:04 |
| 5. | 14 | NOR19780118 | HUSHOVD, Thor | GRM | 08:01:37 | 00:00:06 |
| 6. | 23 | AUS19861105 | GOSS, Matthew Harley* | THR | 08:01:37 | 00:00:06 |
| 7. | 126 | CAN19850712 | LACOMBE, Kevin* | CSM | 08:01:41 | 00:00:10 |
| 8. | 47 | USA19900627 | PHINNEY, Taylor* | BMC | 08:01:41 | 00:00:10 |
| 9. | 92 | GER19780127 | FÖRSTER, Robert | UHC | 08:01:41 | 00:00:10 |
| 10. | 164 | USA19750226 | CANDELARIO, Alex | KBS | 08:01:41 | 00:00:10 |