Читать книгу My World онлайн

24 страница из 72

And they did. The first one was the following day when I won from a small group after our attacks had whittled down the peloton over some hilly country. It was like being back in Žilina: a flat grey sky that seemed to merge with the horizon and snow flurries that caused the stage start to be brought forward 50 kilometers into the race.

Three days later I was at it again; this time attacking 3 kilometers out when everybody was waiting for the sprint and arriving in Aix-en-Provence two seconds before everybody else. The question that I would hear from the press most days in my pro career was asked for the first time that afternoon: Was I a sprinter or not?

That Paris–Nice gave me my first points jersey, too. As I stood on the podium next to Alberto Contador, who had won the race with his usual attacking panache, I thought: You could get used to this, Peter.

I picked up another points jersey at the Tour of California, and the season flew by. A year later and I was picking up that Californian green jersey again, then taking three stages in my first Grand Tour, the Vuelta, where I managed to complete the whole three weeks. In all, I won 15 races in 2011 and 16 more in 2012.