All the reaction from the Team Sky camp following the opening stage of the Tour Down Under.
'You can't win them all' admits DS Yates
Sean Yates, Team Sky's sports director at the Tour Down Under, paid tribute to André Greipel, the winner of stage one, and said he was pleased with his own riders' performance.
"They maybe hit it a bit early, because I think [final lead-out man CJ] Sutton is dying a bit now," said Yates at the finish in Tanunda.
"It was a good finish for Greipel - he's big and strong, and it was a slightly uphill finish, with a headwind. He's maybe the fastest in the world behind Cav [Mark Cavendish] so for Greg [Henderson] to finish fifth behind him isn't bad.
"You can't win them all," smiled Yates. "We know we're one of the stronger teams in the race, which means we have to take on some responsibility today, which we did."
Chris Froome had assisted the peloton's pursuit of a three-man break, which at one stage had a lead of almost ten minutes.
"Columbia took responsibility as well, and won the stage," added Yates. "They've got the leader's jersey now and it's up to them to defend it. We'll try and nick another [win] later in the week."
Allan Peiper, Yates' counterpart at HTC-Columbia, was delighted to see his man power home in front.
Greipel had to give second best to Team Sky pair Henderson and Sutton in the curtain-raising criterium but he made no mistake on the first stage proper.
Pieper said: "We came a little bit unstuck on the lasp lap on Sunday and wanted to correct things today so it's great to get the win."
Split
The Team Sky train, which had delivered Henderson and Sutton to first and second in Sunday's criterium, wasn't able to function at full strength after Russell Downing and Ben Swift were caught in a split on Menglers Hill, with 25km to go.
"I didn't quite have the legs on the climb to dig that deep," said Downing. "It was fast and Ben and myself just couldn't make the split - we were fourth or fifth in line when it happened. But it's the first big effort of the year."
With the snow that hit Britain in late December, Downing and Swift had been forced to prepare for the heat of Australia on turbo trainers in Downing's living room. "It wasn't the best preparation," admitted Downing. "But it's great to be here and to get the first road race in our legs. Obviously I'd have liked to be there at the finish to help Hendy, but it wasn't to be today. But that's what we're here for and we'll keep trying."
