Cadel Evans (BMC) struggled in today's queen stage of Tirreno Adriatico and ended up 14th with a time loss of 1.13 to stage winner Chris Froome (Team Sky). The 2011 Tour winner had no excuses and admitted that his competitors were just stronger.

Cadel Evans had been very clear about his objectives going into this year's Tirreno-Adriatico. He wanted to repeat his 2011 victory in the race of the two seas - a victory which kick started an impressive season culminating in his Tour win.

After an injury plagued 2012 season Evans had been encouraged by a strong performance in his season debut at the Tour of Oman and felt that he was back to his former level. Hence, it was a disappointment for the Australian to realize that he still lacks quite a bit compared to his main competitors in July.

The BMC team was seen pacing the peloton on the descent from the penultimate climb and into the lower slopes of the final ascent up Prato di Tivo. Riders like Michael Schär, Manuel Quinziato, Greg Van Avermaet and Klaas Lodewyck all took huge turns at the front of the peloton to position their captain in the perfect position.

A disappointed Evans praised the performance of his teammates', but was honest in his assessment of his own performance.

"The guys were really good and delivered me to the bottom of the climb and then it was up to me," Evans said. "I'm not at the level of the best guys here at Tirreno this year, which, of course, is a little bit disappointing. But that's the way it goes." 

Ochowicz wows to fight on

BMC general manager Jim Ochowicz described the reason for the team's furious accelaration.

 "We were trying to set the speed up to make sure Cadel came into the climb in the right place, but in our situation Cadel just couldn't hold the front group," he explained after the race.

Evans is now 11th in the GC 1.18 behind new leader Michal Kwiatkowski (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) and 1.14 behind Froome. Tomorrow the race takes in its second straight day in the mountains with the difficult 1310 meters Passo Lanciano inside the final 50 km of the race before the stage ends with the short, steep finish in Chieti which has been included in the last several editions of the race.

With such a difficult stage coming up Ochowicz hopes for improvements and won't give up on the overall victory just yet.

"Tomrrow is not easy," he said. "I think we're going to see some changes again in the GC. Hopefully we'll see a different performance from us. The race isn't over yet. I think we're still fighting for the win here."

Evans was third in Chieti in 2011 on his way to the overall victory, and he will certainly look to repeat that performance in an attempt to get revenge for today's defeat.