By Susan Westemeyer T-Mobile's Marcus Burghardt is bouncing back from an injury-filled 2006 season...
Markus Burghardt (Image credit: Luc Claessen)
By Susan Westemeyer
T-Mobile's Marcus Burghardt is bouncing back from an injury-filled 2006 season to become the team's captain in the Spring Classics, a role he feels he handles well.
2006 was a bad year for young Marcus Burghardt. Knee problems caused him to miss much of the season and his two-year contract with T-Mobile team was coming to an end. A new wind was blowing through the team, bringing a new management, and Burghardt didn't know if he was going to be a part of the "new" team or not.
Fast forward to March 31, 2007 and Burghardt stood on the podium of the E3 Prijs in Harelbeke, Belgium, having finished third in the race, which he went in to as T-Mobile's captain. And he is heading to the Ronde van Vlaanderen on Sunday not only as the team's co-captain, but also with a three-star recommendation from the Belgian newspaper Het Nieuwsblatt.
He is only 23 years-old but self-confident and calm about his new responsibilities. "After our captain Andreas Klier had to withdraw a day before Dwars door Vlaanderen one of us had to take over the responsibility. I was pretty satisfied with my form in Paris-Nice and came out of that race well," he said.
