A Week in a Day: The Last Week of the 2007 Tour de France
Prelude: This is quite long and thorough. I've bolded some of my main points for those of you who don't want to slog through the whole thing. As always, thanks for reading.
Thanks to the miracle of TiVo, I've got stages 15, 16, 17 and 18 recorded and ready to roll. I should have 14, 19 and 20, but something got messed up and I just spent 30 minutes on the phone with DirecTV trying to figure out why it was saying TiVo was inactive and unable to record programs. The solution? The same one for all computers: reset the dang thing. When in Rome...
Here's what I know:
Michael Rasmussen was kicked off his team or something.
Something happened with Alexandre Vinokourov too, I think. Chris left a message and started to say something about Vino and I took the phone away from my ear.
That's it. I did well to keep my head in the sand. Even for the Tour de France, it's difficult. There is a story in the sports page every day, and I've been trying to check box scores for my fantasy team without seeing the Tour headlines. I only logged online 3 times in the last week, again for fantasy purposes, and haven't been on ESPN.com once in that whole span.
So here's how this is going to work. I'm going to watch each day, hear what the news is from my favorite four cycling analysts, watch the stage and write a reaction for each stage. I'm recording the repeat of stage 20 tonight so the only day I'll miss was 19. Might be decisive, but usually the tour is decided by then. We'll see.
Ironically, Barry Bonds is one home run away from tying Hank Aaron and that game is just underway. Last night I watched Dontrelle Willis shut him down and finally came to grips with my true feelings about the whole thing. It makes me absolutely sick. This is THE record in all of sports, and Barry doesn't deserve it. I'll be much more excited about A-Rod getting to 500. Still, I'm keeping an eye on the Yahoo! boxscore since I can't have ESPNews on because even now I almost saw what happened in the Tour. Barry just grounded out in his first at bat.
Off we go...
Pre-Stage 15...
When last I watched, in Stage 13 Vinokourov just rode himself to a win in the Time Trial. Rasmussen rode the Time Trial of his life to keep the yellow jersey back to the mountains. Here's one thought I had about Vino that I never jotted down. Last year, Floyd Landis was caught doping on Stage 17, a day after he had cracked and dropped out of first place. That day he rode the ride of his life, won the stage and got yellow back. He was desperate. I think he went all-or-nothing and doped on that one day. He knew he was going to have surgery on his knee after the Tour. This might be his only chance to win. Whether it was the endorsements he was interested in or possibly just the glory, I don't know. But I think he took a calculated risk and got caught. The one rider in a similar situation this year was Vinokourov. Who knows how beat up he is. He was the pre-race favorite. Everything went wrong when he crashed. If anyone had that all-or-nothing motivation it was Vinokourov. For all I know, whatever Chris was talking about when he mentioned Vino, it might not be doping at all. It's just a similarity I noticed that I thought I'd jot down here.
On Rasmussen... I think it was a little stranger and stupider if he doped. Here's the two-time king of the mountain winner. He had a clean, friendly image until that silly diary thing. Why risk it all to win the tour? Maybe it meant that much to him to win the whole race. If he did. I don't even know. But that's what I'm thinking.
Just saw what happened in stage 14, Alberto Contador beating out Rasmussen for the win and moving into 2nd place overall. I really like Contador. I think he might win this thing. He's got a flippin metal plate in his head! That's Lance-esque. And of course, my new favorite, Popovich, did the early damage to set up Contador.
Stage 15 - Vino and Contador star
Beautiful video of this race. The Hors Categorie climb towards the end of the day came up through a fog bank into a crystal clear sky at the summitt. Unreal. I'm not into naps, but if you are, between the colorful flow of the peloton and the scenery of France there isn't a better sport in the world to nap to. Great race by Vino. I wish I hadn't had that inkling that something was up with him because I would have enjoyed it much more. He's got a lot of heart, whatever is pumping through it. Contador is superb, gaining time again on all the contenders except Rasmussen. Team Discovery remains well placed. And Yaroslav Popovich had his role in the days battle, as did old George Hincapie. Tip of the cap to Rasmussen for sticking with Contador, but what a difference a week makes. I just don't have the same good feelings for the guy after hearing he got the boot.
Happy day! Barry didn't homer. Long live Hammerin' Hank!
Stage 16 - Vino Out and the Penultimate Battle on the Mountains
Instead of the standard musical montage with highlights from the previous day, Al Trautwig opens things up with a monologue about doping in sports...segueing into the news that Vinokourov was doping.
From there, into a panel discussion with the other hosts. Paul and Phil say its a good thing that the cheaters are getting caught. Al continually reminds us all how silly we feel for cheering for Vinokourov, a cheater. Bob calls him stupid. I agree with it all.
What a waste of talent. I don't know what the details are, but I wonder if my Landis-theory holds true, if he turned to doping as his last hope. The silliest thing is every stage leader gets tested. Floyd got caught in the standard stage leader test last year, and now Vino gets caught after a stage victory.
Still no bad news about Rasmussen though... Tomorrow maybe? This had to happen. The more high-profile cyclists who fall, less who will dope and the more good guys will rise to the top. And I'm still hooked on the Tour and I still think this year is cleaner than any of the recent races.
Last word about the pre-race show: poor old Phil Liggett looks so sad. He's shell-shocked about Vino. He so wants the race to be clean. He just said that he hopes Contador catches Rasmussen today so I wonder if he suspects something about the Dane.
Today is a mother of a race with an uphill finish on an Hors Catagorie climb. Really interesting start to the race. Most of the field waited at the start in an organized protest in support of a clean race. Very poignant. Rasmussen didn't wait, but as the yellow jersey holder he has to go to start the race. I'd like to see something like that in baseball, like the Players Association organizing a one-day walk-out to protest PEDs. It's all symbolic, of course. But there is too much camaraderie in sports for whistle blowers so I'm not sure what else can be done, besides individuals coming clean about their own usage.
There is always a lot of writing on the roads of the Tour in support of riders and teams. Just noticed "VINO" and "RASMUSSEN" with a circle around them and an arrow pointing at a drawing of a red syringe.
On the first mountain, Rasmussen lost his lead in the King of the Mountain competition to the enjoyable new kid from Columbia, Juan Mauricio Soler. He's trying to pull a Rasmussen-'04 and win the polka dot jersey in his first Tour. Memo to Vino: training in the high altitude Andes is a legal way to dope your blood.
But the stage not surprisingly came down to the beast at the end. And after one relative down year, Team Discovery is back in charge. When they dropped the hammer they lost all of Rasmussen's teammates and were left with Popovich, Contador and Leipheimer (all Team Discovery) surrounding Rasmussen with Cadell Evans and Soler the only two other passengers
From there, Leipheimer attacked as Popovich dropped back, his job done. Rasmussen defended, Contador and Evans followed, but Soler was dropped. If doping was out of the picture, the 2007 Tour would have been decided among these four over the final 5 miles of steep uphill climbing.
Contador and Leipheimer started taking turns attacking. Rasmussen should have let Leipheimer go because he had several minutes on the American. But with miles to go he wasn't going to take that chance. At the 5km mark Rasmussen found himself leading the way up the hill, but with the two wolves from Team Discovery toying with his heels. Again, I wish I didn't know about Rasmussen's fate because at least for a while I could enjoy Rasmussen's climbing brilliance.
Never seen this before: Rasmussen was surprisingly whiny about the television camera motor bikes being too close to Leipheimer in first, so much so that he brought on some rare criticism from Phil, who told him to "just get on with it." For several minutes he was complaining and waving at the motorcycles. Bizarre.
With 1km to go, it was Leipheimer, Rasmussen, Contador in a row. Suddenly, Leipeheimer dropped off leaving the top two to fight for the stage. Just as suddenly Rasmussen shot off the front, cracked Contador and rode away. Phil Liggett all but declared him the Tour de France winner.
It must have been the best moment of Old Spider Legs' life. But stage winners always get tested for doping...
Stage 17 - Rasmussen Out as the Tour Gets Flat Again
No opening montage...straight to an Al Trautwig monologue. So! No positive test for Rasmussen. Rabobank tossed him out voluntarily because of a number of times where he wasn't where he was supposed to be. "Guilty by association," says Trautwig. "They're quite right to throw him out and may he never ride again," says Liggett. A complete reversal of his dismissive words towards the whole Denmark/Diary thing that started this all. "It's actually the teams and the organizers of the grand tours that are fighting the problem more than the international federations," says Sherwin. Roll says its cycling's darkest hour but Liggett suggests in a few years it might be cycling's finest hour. Sherwin, who I respect most out of the four, says he started to get suspicious after Rasmussen's time trial. Liggett implies that cyclists can go dope when they're training in the mountains, wait 10 days so it clears your system, and come to the race clean. Finally, Sherwin gives some observational evidence that Contador, Leipheimer, and Evans are clean.
Cofidis is out as well! Christian Moreni tested positive in stage 11. I've barely heard of Moreni, but it's sad that one guy can pull a whole team out. As Barry Bonds has shown, guys are more likely to dope on their own rather than as a team. It's easier to get away with it. I'm much more suspicious about Vinokourov's team, Astana, because of the performance of their top guys in the time trial. But at the same time, I do agree with the policy of punishing the entire team. Let's take baseball again. What if teams were docked 5 wins if a player tested positive for PEDs? If you can bring your team down by cheating, you're less likely to do it for the same reason that clean teammates don't turn in dirty teammates. At the same time, the full-team punishment encourages teams to self-police and kick out suspect characters like Rasmussen. Bottom line: if the Tour treats possible dopers like Rasmussen as guilty until proven innocent, that makes it easier for fans like me to believe that the cyclists are innocent until they're declared guilty.
It's fascinating stuff, really. And still Phil Liggett and I think the race is mainly clean. Says Liggett during the stage, "The system is working. We are catching the cheats. It doesn't matter how big a name they are; we're getting rid of them." So let's get on with the cleanest stage yet...
No yellow jersey. How terribly sad. Dennis Menchov the -1 jersey wearer of Rabobank just retired. Liggett speculates he's been mentally beaten by the Rasmussen affair and says he should have been the team leader in his own right but instead drove Rasmussen up the mountains. He killed himself for a phony. Imagine how you would feel.
HISTORICAL INTERLUDE
Here's Wikipedia's article about Michel Pollentier who got caught trying to give a phony urine sample after winning a stage at the famous Alpes d'Huez. There was no yellow jersey the next day either.
END HISTORICAL INTERLUDE
The tour is going to come down to the individual time trial of Stage 19...which I don't have recorded. If Cadell Evans lays down a monster he can take a well-deserved yellow. If Contador holds him off, he's a well-deserved winner too. Leipheimer is an outside shot to jump by both of them.
Today's stage saw a rare successful breakaway (they're more likely to succeed after the mountains have tired the peloton out). At about 10 miles to go things got interesting when the boys in the breakaway started to attack, chopping the group from 8 to 4. But in the 4 was one stellar sprinter, Daniele Bennati. The other three tried to attack before the final sprint, but Bennati nailed them back each time and in the end, the bottom line was he was fastest. There was also a race out of the peloton for ninth place because of the points available to the green jersey competitors won by the best sprinter this year, Tom Boonen.
Stage 18 - Normalcy, whatever that means
Hooray! This one started with a highlights montage instead of an Al Trautwig monologue and Phil Liggett doesn't look like he spent the night sobbing. Much better. Paul Sherwin notes that sprinters have very rarely been implicated in PEDs and doping. Flat stage = sprinter stage = a stage for the good guys.
For the second time this Tour, a cyclist hit a dog. This time the incident was a bit more serious, as one rider who was in the breakaway had to drop back to the peloton due to his injuries. The dog, again, was fine. Amazingly though, Sandy Casar, the cyclist who actually hit the dog and tore his shorts to reveal an ever-growing bruise won the stage with a clever attack across the inside of a divided bend in the road. The three chasers actually caught him but never finished him off and the veteran, a familiar name even to me for several second place finishes, gets his first ever stage victory. As for the green jersey, Tom Boonen grabbed a close 5th place to seal the deal. Well done, Belgian Bullet.
Stage 20 - Conclusion (What did I miss?)
"A time trial for the ages has made this one of the closest Tours in history..." Trautwig in the opening montage. Whoa. Usually the green jersey is still up for grabs but the yellow jersey is sealed up. This time the 3 boys at the top are separated by only 31 seconds. Leipheimer won the time trial stage. Evans was faster than Contador but not by enough! The 24-year-old wore yellow this morning... is he still wearing it tonight?
First off, is Contador clean? Rasmussen had a steady, endless stream of energy. Contador climbed like we all climb on our bikes. Short burst standing up...recover...short burst...recover. His bursts were faster than everyone, but someone has to be fastest. Plus he's 24-years-old and he's got that metal plate in his head from surgery after a brain aneurism that you've got to think gives him a mental edge over pain just like Lance had (he read Lance's book while recovering). Both Contador and Leipheimer were set up by strong teammates. As for Evans, he rode defensively in the mountains, grinding out every second to stake his position on the podium. He emptied his tank every day, unlike, it seemed, Rasmussen. One of these guys won the Tour. I really hope they're all clean. I think they are. I'm cheering for them. What else can I do?
Even with the race so close, the last stage had the same mood as it traditionally does: relaxed and festive. The stage is very short, so 23 seconds is a lot of time. Still, there are a couple of time bonuses along the way at 2 different points, and the stage win gives a big time bonus. If Evans grabs all of those and a couple more seconds, he could do it. If he somehow sprints away from Contador, that might do it too. But there is a tradition that no one will battle for the win on stage 20. The war is over. Stage 20 is the triumphant march home.
23 seconds is longer than you think. Evans isn't just racing Contador. The big sprinters will be lining up for the win. Discovery will be surrounding Contador and guiding him past Evans. The speeds for the final laps around Paris are always very high, preventing breakaways. It's just not that realistic. That's why I'm sitting here watching Evans...do nothing.
In the end, Daniele Benatti won another stage. Contador wins the 2007 Tour de France.
So there you go. There's a lot of cynical thoughts out there about the tour that I haven't even begun to wade into. Honestly, I feel more cynical about the sports where PEDs would be helpful but few signs of them have cropped up (NFL). And despite the cheaters there remains a distinct difference between cycling and other sports. When you ride in the Tour, you spend hours suffering alongside your fellow competitors for 21 stages. You make friends and a few enemies. But there is a camaraderie in the peloton unlike any other sport. Vino and Rasmussen are out of that peleton. I'm not naive enough to think cyclists won't dope because of the camaraderie, but I do believe it is a significant deterrent that all other sports lack. That is, I believe in peer pressure. And I think peer pressure is a greater force in cycling than in other sports. Getting caught doping destroys your team and alienates you forever from your fellow cyclists.
Congratulations to Alberto Contador, Juan Maricio Soler, and Tom Boonen. (I think.)
Thanks to the miracle of TiVo, I've got stages 15, 16, 17 and 18 recorded and ready to roll. I should have 14, 19 and 20, but something got messed up and I just spent 30 minutes on the phone with DirecTV trying to figure out why it was saying TiVo was inactive and unable to record programs. The solution? The same one for all computers: reset the dang thing. When in Rome...
Here's what I know:
Michael Rasmussen was kicked off his team or something.
Something happened with Alexandre Vinokourov too, I think. Chris left a message and started to say something about Vino and I took the phone away from my ear.
That's it. I did well to keep my head in the sand. Even for the Tour de France, it's difficult. There is a story in the sports page every day, and I've been trying to check box scores for my fantasy team without seeing the Tour headlines. I only logged online 3 times in the last week, again for fantasy purposes, and haven't been on ESPN.com once in that whole span.
So here's how this is going to work. I'm going to watch each day, hear what the news is from my favorite four cycling analysts, watch the stage and write a reaction for each stage. I'm recording the repeat of stage 20 tonight so the only day I'll miss was 19. Might be decisive, but usually the tour is decided by then. We'll see.
Ironically, Barry Bonds is one home run away from tying Hank Aaron and that game is just underway. Last night I watched Dontrelle Willis shut him down and finally came to grips with my true feelings about the whole thing. It makes me absolutely sick. This is THE record in all of sports, and Barry doesn't deserve it. I'll be much more excited about A-Rod getting to 500. Still, I'm keeping an eye on the Yahoo! boxscore since I can't have ESPNews on because even now I almost saw what happened in the Tour. Barry just grounded out in his first at bat.
Off we go...
Pre-Stage 15...
When last I watched, in Stage 13 Vinokourov just rode himself to a win in the Time Trial. Rasmussen rode the Time Trial of his life to keep the yellow jersey back to the mountains. Here's one thought I had about Vino that I never jotted down. Last year, Floyd Landis was caught doping on Stage 17, a day after he had cracked and dropped out of first place. That day he rode the ride of his life, won the stage and got yellow back. He was desperate. I think he went all-or-nothing and doped on that one day. He knew he was going to have surgery on his knee after the Tour. This might be his only chance to win. Whether it was the endorsements he was interested in or possibly just the glory, I don't know. But I think he took a calculated risk and got caught. The one rider in a similar situation this year was Vinokourov. Who knows how beat up he is. He was the pre-race favorite. Everything went wrong when he crashed. If anyone had that all-or-nothing motivation it was Vinokourov. For all I know, whatever Chris was talking about when he mentioned Vino, it might not be doping at all. It's just a similarity I noticed that I thought I'd jot down here.
On Rasmussen... I think it was a little stranger and stupider if he doped. Here's the two-time king of the mountain winner. He had a clean, friendly image until that silly diary thing. Why risk it all to win the tour? Maybe it meant that much to him to win the whole race. If he did. I don't even know. But that's what I'm thinking.
Just saw what happened in stage 14, Alberto Contador beating out Rasmussen for the win and moving into 2nd place overall. I really like Contador. I think he might win this thing. He's got a flippin metal plate in his head! That's Lance-esque. And of course, my new favorite, Popovich, did the early damage to set up Contador.
Stage 15 - Vino and Contador star
Beautiful video of this race. The Hors Categorie climb towards the end of the day came up through a fog bank into a crystal clear sky at the summitt. Unreal. I'm not into naps, but if you are, between the colorful flow of the peloton and the scenery of France there isn't a better sport in the world to nap to. Great race by Vino. I wish I hadn't had that inkling that something was up with him because I would have enjoyed it much more. He's got a lot of heart, whatever is pumping through it. Contador is superb, gaining time again on all the contenders except Rasmussen. Team Discovery remains well placed. And Yaroslav Popovich had his role in the days battle, as did old George Hincapie. Tip of the cap to Rasmussen for sticking with Contador, but what a difference a week makes. I just don't have the same good feelings for the guy after hearing he got the boot.
Happy day! Barry didn't homer. Long live Hammerin' Hank!
Stage 16 - Vino Out and the Penultimate Battle on the Mountains
Instead of the standard musical montage with highlights from the previous day, Al Trautwig opens things up with a monologue about doping in sports...segueing into the news that Vinokourov was doping.
From there, into a panel discussion with the other hosts. Paul and Phil say its a good thing that the cheaters are getting caught. Al continually reminds us all how silly we feel for cheering for Vinokourov, a cheater. Bob calls him stupid. I agree with it all.
What a waste of talent. I don't know what the details are, but I wonder if my Landis-theory holds true, if he turned to doping as his last hope. The silliest thing is every stage leader gets tested. Floyd got caught in the standard stage leader test last year, and now Vino gets caught after a stage victory.
Still no bad news about Rasmussen though... Tomorrow maybe? This had to happen. The more high-profile cyclists who fall, less who will dope and the more good guys will rise to the top. And I'm still hooked on the Tour and I still think this year is cleaner than any of the recent races.
Last word about the pre-race show: poor old Phil Liggett looks so sad. He's shell-shocked about Vino. He so wants the race to be clean. He just said that he hopes Contador catches Rasmussen today so I wonder if he suspects something about the Dane.
Today is a mother of a race with an uphill finish on an Hors Catagorie climb. Really interesting start to the race. Most of the field waited at the start in an organized protest in support of a clean race. Very poignant. Rasmussen didn't wait, but as the yellow jersey holder he has to go to start the race. I'd like to see something like that in baseball, like the Players Association organizing a one-day walk-out to protest PEDs. It's all symbolic, of course. But there is too much camaraderie in sports for whistle blowers so I'm not sure what else can be done, besides individuals coming clean about their own usage.
There is always a lot of writing on the roads of the Tour in support of riders and teams. Just noticed "VINO" and "RASMUSSEN" with a circle around them and an arrow pointing at a drawing of a red syringe.
On the first mountain, Rasmussen lost his lead in the King of the Mountain competition to the enjoyable new kid from Columbia, Juan Mauricio Soler. He's trying to pull a Rasmussen-'04 and win the polka dot jersey in his first Tour. Memo to Vino: training in the high altitude Andes is a legal way to dope your blood.
But the stage not surprisingly came down to the beast at the end. And after one relative down year, Team Discovery is back in charge. When they dropped the hammer they lost all of Rasmussen's teammates and were left with Popovich, Contador and Leipheimer (all Team Discovery) surrounding Rasmussen with Cadell Evans and Soler the only two other passengers
From there, Leipheimer attacked as Popovich dropped back, his job done. Rasmussen defended, Contador and Evans followed, but Soler was dropped. If doping was out of the picture, the 2007 Tour would have been decided among these four over the final 5 miles of steep uphill climbing.
Contador and Leipheimer started taking turns attacking. Rasmussen should have let Leipheimer go because he had several minutes on the American. But with miles to go he wasn't going to take that chance. At the 5km mark Rasmussen found himself leading the way up the hill, but with the two wolves from Team Discovery toying with his heels. Again, I wish I didn't know about Rasmussen's fate because at least for a while I could enjoy Rasmussen's climbing brilliance.
Never seen this before: Rasmussen was surprisingly whiny about the television camera motor bikes being too close to Leipheimer in first, so much so that he brought on some rare criticism from Phil, who told him to "just get on with it." For several minutes he was complaining and waving at the motorcycles. Bizarre.
With 1km to go, it was Leipheimer, Rasmussen, Contador in a row. Suddenly, Leipeheimer dropped off leaving the top two to fight for the stage. Just as suddenly Rasmussen shot off the front, cracked Contador and rode away. Phil Liggett all but declared him the Tour de France winner.
It must have been the best moment of Old Spider Legs' life. But stage winners always get tested for doping...
Stage 17 - Rasmussen Out as the Tour Gets Flat Again
No opening montage...straight to an Al Trautwig monologue. So! No positive test for Rasmussen. Rabobank tossed him out voluntarily because of a number of times where he wasn't where he was supposed to be. "Guilty by association," says Trautwig. "They're quite right to throw him out and may he never ride again," says Liggett. A complete reversal of his dismissive words towards the whole Denmark/Diary thing that started this all. "It's actually the teams and the organizers of the grand tours that are fighting the problem more than the international federations," says Sherwin. Roll says its cycling's darkest hour but Liggett suggests in a few years it might be cycling's finest hour. Sherwin, who I respect most out of the four, says he started to get suspicious after Rasmussen's time trial. Liggett implies that cyclists can go dope when they're training in the mountains, wait 10 days so it clears your system, and come to the race clean. Finally, Sherwin gives some observational evidence that Contador, Leipheimer, and Evans are clean.
Cofidis is out as well! Christian Moreni tested positive in stage 11. I've barely heard of Moreni, but it's sad that one guy can pull a whole team out. As Barry Bonds has shown, guys are more likely to dope on their own rather than as a team. It's easier to get away with it. I'm much more suspicious about Vinokourov's team, Astana, because of the performance of their top guys in the time trial. But at the same time, I do agree with the policy of punishing the entire team. Let's take baseball again. What if teams were docked 5 wins if a player tested positive for PEDs? If you can bring your team down by cheating, you're less likely to do it for the same reason that clean teammates don't turn in dirty teammates. At the same time, the full-team punishment encourages teams to self-police and kick out suspect characters like Rasmussen. Bottom line: if the Tour treats possible dopers like Rasmussen as guilty until proven innocent, that makes it easier for fans like me to believe that the cyclists are innocent until they're declared guilty.
It's fascinating stuff, really. And still Phil Liggett and I think the race is mainly clean. Says Liggett during the stage, "The system is working. We are catching the cheats. It doesn't matter how big a name they are; we're getting rid of them." So let's get on with the cleanest stage yet...
No yellow jersey. How terribly sad. Dennis Menchov the -1 jersey wearer of Rabobank just retired. Liggett speculates he's been mentally beaten by the Rasmussen affair and says he should have been the team leader in his own right but instead drove Rasmussen up the mountains. He killed himself for a phony. Imagine how you would feel.
HISTORICAL INTERLUDE
Here's Wikipedia's article about Michel Pollentier who got caught trying to give a phony urine sample after winning a stage at the famous Alpes d'Huez. There was no yellow jersey the next day either.
END HISTORICAL INTERLUDE
The tour is going to come down to the individual time trial of Stage 19...which I don't have recorded. If Cadell Evans lays down a monster he can take a well-deserved yellow. If Contador holds him off, he's a well-deserved winner too. Leipheimer is an outside shot to jump by both of them.
Today's stage saw a rare successful breakaway (they're more likely to succeed after the mountains have tired the peloton out). At about 10 miles to go things got interesting when the boys in the breakaway started to attack, chopping the group from 8 to 4. But in the 4 was one stellar sprinter, Daniele Bennati. The other three tried to attack before the final sprint, but Bennati nailed them back each time and in the end, the bottom line was he was fastest. There was also a race out of the peloton for ninth place because of the points available to the green jersey competitors won by the best sprinter this year, Tom Boonen.
Stage 18 - Normalcy, whatever that means
Hooray! This one started with a highlights montage instead of an Al Trautwig monologue and Phil Liggett doesn't look like he spent the night sobbing. Much better. Paul Sherwin notes that sprinters have very rarely been implicated in PEDs and doping. Flat stage = sprinter stage = a stage for the good guys.
For the second time this Tour, a cyclist hit a dog. This time the incident was a bit more serious, as one rider who was in the breakaway had to drop back to the peloton due to his injuries. The dog, again, was fine. Amazingly though, Sandy Casar, the cyclist who actually hit the dog and tore his shorts to reveal an ever-growing bruise won the stage with a clever attack across the inside of a divided bend in the road. The three chasers actually caught him but never finished him off and the veteran, a familiar name even to me for several second place finishes, gets his first ever stage victory. As for the green jersey, Tom Boonen grabbed a close 5th place to seal the deal. Well done, Belgian Bullet.
Stage 20 - Conclusion (What did I miss?)
"A time trial for the ages has made this one of the closest Tours in history..." Trautwig in the opening montage. Whoa. Usually the green jersey is still up for grabs but the yellow jersey is sealed up. This time the 3 boys at the top are separated by only 31 seconds. Leipheimer won the time trial stage. Evans was faster than Contador but not by enough! The 24-year-old wore yellow this morning... is he still wearing it tonight?
First off, is Contador clean? Rasmussen had a steady, endless stream of energy. Contador climbed like we all climb on our bikes. Short burst standing up...recover...short burst...recover. His bursts were faster than everyone, but someone has to be fastest. Plus he's 24-years-old and he's got that metal plate in his head from surgery after a brain aneurism that you've got to think gives him a mental edge over pain just like Lance had (he read Lance's book while recovering). Both Contador and Leipheimer were set up by strong teammates. As for Evans, he rode defensively in the mountains, grinding out every second to stake his position on the podium. He emptied his tank every day, unlike, it seemed, Rasmussen. One of these guys won the Tour. I really hope they're all clean. I think they are. I'm cheering for them. What else can I do?
Even with the race so close, the last stage had the same mood as it traditionally does: relaxed and festive. The stage is very short, so 23 seconds is a lot of time. Still, there are a couple of time bonuses along the way at 2 different points, and the stage win gives a big time bonus. If Evans grabs all of those and a couple more seconds, he could do it. If he somehow sprints away from Contador, that might do it too. But there is a tradition that no one will battle for the win on stage 20. The war is over. Stage 20 is the triumphant march home.
23 seconds is longer than you think. Evans isn't just racing Contador. The big sprinters will be lining up for the win. Discovery will be surrounding Contador and guiding him past Evans. The speeds for the final laps around Paris are always very high, preventing breakaways. It's just not that realistic. That's why I'm sitting here watching Evans...do nothing.
In the end, Daniele Benatti won another stage. Contador wins the 2007 Tour de France.
So there you go. There's a lot of cynical thoughts out there about the tour that I haven't even begun to wade into. Honestly, I feel more cynical about the sports where PEDs would be helpful but few signs of them have cropped up (NFL). And despite the cheaters there remains a distinct difference between cycling and other sports. When you ride in the Tour, you spend hours suffering alongside your fellow competitors for 21 stages. You make friends and a few enemies. But there is a camaraderie in the peloton unlike any other sport. Vino and Rasmussen are out of that peleton. I'm not naive enough to think cyclists won't dope because of the camaraderie, but I do believe it is a significant deterrent that all other sports lack. That is, I believe in peer pressure. And I think peer pressure is a greater force in cycling than in other sports. Getting caught doping destroys your team and alienates you forever from your fellow cyclists.
Congratulations to Alberto Contador, Juan Maricio Soler, and Tom Boonen. (I think.)
Labels: Tour de France
posted by Prof. A at 6:38 PM
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