Favorites play it safe in men's road race

By Deborah Charles

BEIJING (Reuters) - The Favorites to win the Olympic men's road race played it safe in the first half of the 245-km race on Saturday, preserving their energy for tough climbs in the last half of the event at the Great Wall of China.

As the race passed the halfway mark, Favorites Alejandro Valverde of Spain, defending Olympic champion Paolo Bettini and Germany's Stefan Schumacher, took it easy in the peloton as temperatures hovered around 29 degrees Celsius and humidity was near 80 percent.

After catching up to Chile's Patricio Almonacid, who staged a breakaway with Bolivia's Horacio Gallardo about five minutes into the race and led for a bit more than 100 km, a group of about 25 riders held a five-minute lead over the peleton at the 126-km mark.

The lead group included Tour de France champion Carlos Sastre of Spain, Luxembourg's Kim Kirchen and Germany's Jens Voigt.

In addition to a flat 80-km out of Beijing, they have completed two of the seven laps of the hilly 24-km circuit between two sections of the Great Wall.

(Editing by Miles Evans)

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