Petacchi Strikes 3 Straight Mass Sprints

Milram's Petacchi beat out compatriot Fabrizio Guidi (Barloworld) and German Olaf Pollack (Wiesenhof-Felt) to win the final sprint.

A seven man break-away took off 11 kilometres into the fifth and final stage in Portugal eventually building a five-minute lead.

Petacchi's Milram and Predictor-Lotto easily reeled in the break-away with 10-km left to go after three category three climbs.

After the five circuits around the city-centre course in Portimão Petacchi again easily dominated the finale in what seemed almost like a foregone conclusion.

Lithuania's Tomas Vaitkus (Discovery) and France's Sébastien Chavanel (Française des Jeux) took fourth and fifth in the final sprint behind Pollack.

Petacchi ultimately won the general classification by two seconds from Austria's René Haselbacher (Astana) with Vaitkus finishing third at 22 seconds behind Petacchi.