Asia Tour thread (with SPOILERS)

The Tour de Langkawi starts this week, but I doubt there's huge interest on this forum in cycling in Asia, so rather than starting a thread for every big Asian race, I've started this consolidated thread for anyone who is interested...

One interesting thing this year is that Astana have a team at Langkawi, including the is-he-retired-or-isn't-he, Vinokourov. There's a pretty strong Japanese team too as well as all the usual.

There's a full African team in the TdL too with a mix of black and white riders. It'll be interesting to see how they go.

"The race squad comprises of athletes from around the African continent, including four black African riders (Adrien Niyonshuti from Rwanda, and Jani Tewelde, Meron Russom and Tesfai Habtariam from Eritrea) and two South African riders (Jacques Janse van Rensburg and Dennis van Niekerk)."

Ah yes, I forgot that - looks really interesting. Niyonshuti is supposed to be a pretty hot climbing talent.

Zabriskie wins the ITT; predictable I suppose.

Khalilikhosroshahi came in 10th which is of little interest unless you have the misfortune of being a commentator.

But by a minute over 20km, destroyed them.

Well, Jose Serpa took the overall (again) with Jose Rujano second. The race was also notable for Andrea Guardini taking a pretty amazing 6 stages en route to the points title. For those interested in how MTN-Qhubeka (the African squad) did - they performed very well indeed, 3rd overall, with 4 riders finishing in the top 30, with Jani Tewelde from Eritrea in 18th and Adrien Niyonshuti from Rwanda in 30th. Good news for African cycling...

Tour de Taiwan started today - some British interest with Rapha-Condor riding, as well as Saxo Bank.

After 3 stages, the answer so far is 'not bad, but not great'. Furthest up the GC is experienced Kristian House in 19th.

The Jelajah Malaysia has just finished, and I was pleased to see that Shinichi Fukushima took the final stage (and was 5th overall). I've long been a fan of the Fukushima brothers and had the great pleasure of chatting with them at the Tour of Britain a few years ago. Really nice guys.