Carlos Sastre Candil (born 22 April 1975 in
Leganés,
Madrid) is a
Spanish professional
road bicycle racer and champion of the
2008 Tour de France. Sastre rides for
UCI Professional Continental team
Geox-TMC. Through his consistently improved top 10 results in the
Vuelta a España and good showings in the
Tour de France, Sastre established himself as a strong and stable
climbing specialist, and after working to improve his
individual time trial skills, he has become a contender for the top
GC spots in the
Grand Tours.
When Sastre was young, professional cyclist
Francisco Ignacio San Román lived in his parents's house during military service.
Sastre was at first coached by his father, until he became an amateur.
Sastre signed his first professional contract in 1997 with
ONCE. In his five years at ONCE he mostly served as a
domestique and only managed a few wins, though he showed his strength in the mountains with several good results, most notably winning the
mountain competition in the 2000 Vuelta a España.
In 2002 he switched to
Team CSC, where he filled the role of captain in the Vuelta a España and, until 2005, had a free role in the Tour de France. This resulted in his winning the 13th stage of the
2003 Tour de France, which Sastre won with a pacifier in his mouth, as a greeting to his infant daughter.
Sastre finished 2 minutes 32 seconds ahead of team captain
Tyler Hamilton on the stage.
Before the 2004 season, Carlos Sastre and teammate
Ivan Basso trained extensively to improve their individual time trial skills, making them better all-round riders. They went to
Boston to train on
MIT's wind tunnel.
This helped Sastre improve his Vuelta a España performance, ranking 6th in the overall classification, as well as 8th in the
2004 Tour de France.
In the
2005 Tour de France he was a domestique for Ivan Basso, and 21st in the overall classification. However, as the captain of Team CSC's
2005 Vuelta a España campaign, Sastre finally reached the podium of a Grand Tour, finishing in third place behind
Denis Menchov and initial winner
Roberto Heras. Heras was later disqualified due to a positive
EPO test, making Sastre the
de facto second placed rider of the competition. After the Vuelta a España, he extended his contract with Team CSC for another year. In May 2006 he signed a new contract which expired after the 2008 season.
Before the
2006 Giro d'Italia in May, Sastre decided to ride the Giro d'Italia to help Ivan Basso to win,indicating that he would ride all three Grand Tours; the Giro and Tour in support of Basso and the Vuelta as team captain. In the Giro, Sastre's pace on select mountain stages helped Basso win the overall classification. Sastre finished 43rd in the GC of the 2006 Giro.
Days before the 2006 Tour de France started in July, Team CSC suspended Ivan Basso as his name was brought up in the
Operación Puerto doping case. This meant Sastre became the CSC team captain at the 2006 Tour. Even though his main focus for the season had been the
2006 Vuelta a España in September, this Tour was a great opportunity for Sastre to prove himself as a Tour GC contender. Through the mountain stages, Sastre proved himself the strongest mountain rider in the
peloton, beating
Floyd Landis by one minute and 59 seconds and
Andreas Klöden by two and a half minutes on mountain climbs.
Sastre was placed well on stage 15, and came in 2nd on both stage 16 and 17, where he closed the gap to the then yellow jersey
Óscar Pereiro. Before the penultimate stage of the Tour, the stage 19 individual time trial, Sastre was the second placed rider overall, trailing race leader Óscar Pereiro by 14 seconds. However, on the final time trial, which stretched 57 kilometres between
Le Creusot and
Montceau-les-Mines, Sastre finished 20th, losing several minutes to Pereiro, eventual overall winner Floyd Landis and Andreas Klöden, who took third place overall. Sastre thus finished the 2006 Tour in 4th place. Floyd Landis has since been stripped of this title, making Sastre 3rd in the 2006 Tour de France.
By completing the Vuelta, Sastre, who also rode the Giro d'Italia and Tour de France in 2006, became one of a rare breed of riders to finish all three Grand Tours in one year.
Coming into the
2008 Tour de France, Sastre was considered one of the favorites to win the race along with Australian
Cadel Evans of Team
Silence-Lotto, Spaniard
Alejandro Valverde of
Caisse d'Epargne and Russian
Denis Menchov of
Rabobank. He also faced competition within his own team from brothers
Andy and
Fränk Schleck, despite officially being the leader of
Team CSC Saxo Bank.
Sastre had a quiet, understated opening to the tour. After a lacklustere opening time-trial, he remained relatively restrained in the opening mountain stages in the
Pyrenees and opted to stay defensive and follow the wheel of his main rivals. This allowed his CSC teammate Fränk Schleck to claim the
yellow jersey at the finish to stage 15 at Prato Nevoso. However, on the crucial 17th stage, Sastre showed his class and mountain climbing prowess, attacking at the bottom of the final climb of the day,
Alpe d'Huez, finishing 2 minutes and 15 seconds ahead of Evans,
claiming both the stage win and the yellow jersey.
Sastre, knowing that a slender lead over a strong time-trialist like Evans may not have been enough to secure overall victory going into the penultimate stage, sought to gain an advantage of at least a couple of minutes over his closest rivals.
Following his victorious Stage 17 attack, Sastre took a lead of 1 minute and 24 seconds over teammate Fränk Schleck into the final time trial, although, more crucially, he had a further 10 seconds advantage over Evans, a man considered to be a more accomplished time trialist,
who was widely expected to overcome the deficit and leapfrog Sastre into first place. However, Sastre managed to hold onto his lead in the time trial, finishing the Tour with a 58 second lead.
Sastre's victory capped an exceptional 2008 tour for
Team CSC Saxo Bank, as they also won the
young rider classification with
Andy Schleck, the overall team classification, as well as 2 stages, the latter being won by Sastre, on l'Alpe d'Huez.
His victory was however criticized by
Lance Armstrong, who said the 2008 Tour was a joke. Armstrong later apologized for this to Sastre.
Sastre and CSC could not agree on a new contract, so Sastre left the team at the end of the year.
Sastre joined the new
Cervélo TestTeam for the 2009 season. He won the high mountain Stage 16 of the
2009 Giro d'Italia, which had been called the Giro's queen stage, after seven hours and twelve minutes. His decisive attack saw him break free from a group of general classification contenders to get to the summit of
Monte Petrano just under half a minute faster than the group he left.
After seeming off his form in Stage 17 of that race, Sastre rebounded with another solo ride to victory in Stage 19 to
Mount Vesuvius. He then completed the Giro with a solid ride in the final time-trial around Rome to hold off
Ivan Basso and take 4th place and another top ten placing in a
Grand Tour.
