Don't worry about it. It's not a boardwide rule, just what I do. With about 50 km left, Basso had a puncture (or some sort of mechanical problem), and two CSC teammates dropped back to help him back to the group. They flashed by another CSC rider who was stopped on the side of the road with a problem - given his time, I'm guessing it was Zabriskie (who may or may not have also been dropping back when he had his flat). If so, that's probably why he lost so much time. Without help, it would've been really tough to get back to the peloton. It took a while to get the final results posted. Initially, Hincapie had dropped to fourth with Vinokourov all the way up to 2nd. But after they sorted out all the riders who were in the group at the time of the crash, Big George remains in 2nd. Vino did get to keep his 7" gap over the group since he was already in front by a bit when the crash occurred, plus he also got a 12" time bonus for finishing second on the stage, so he moves all the way up from 7th to 3rd in the GC, 1'02" behind Lance. Good move by him. Other than that, the only change in the top 10 was Zabriskie dropping out. Basso moves up to 9th while CSC teammate Kurt-Asle Arvesen into 10th. No changes in the green or white jersey races or the team standings, but Rabobank's Karsten Kroon is the new KOM leader. Christophe Mengin, who was leading when he fell, gets the consolation of wearing the red number in the next stage. I don't blame him for the accident - it was so slick on that final corner, I think it was inevitable that someone was going down. Certainly a fortuitous win for Lorenzo Bernucci, but I'm sure that doesn't take away from his elation at getting his first-ever pro win in the world's biggest race:
It's always nice to see an anonymous rider win a stage. Usually, Bernucci's job is to support the leader, but, sometimes, the "porteur d'eau" strikes back. After Mengin fell, slowing Vinokourov, Bernucci was in a very unexpected situation, and had the clear-headedness to turn this into a victory. It was fun to see his captain, still within the fallen riders, shouting in the mike "Aventi, Aventi". Good to see surprises still can happen on the Tour.
Bonjour! I am excited that the route goes by the Chambord! One of the most wonderful architectural structures that few people outside France know about.
That's why I love Vino. He's not afraid to attack. The first of what I'm sure will be many more attacks to come from him. He will be an animator in this tour.
If Vino won, would he be the most famous Kazak ever? If DZ finishes the race, and I hopehe does, that will take some serious guts. To loose that much time has to say how much he hurts. Not that it matters but the farther he goes, the more admiration I have for him. Any idea how badly the guy who fell hard today was?
Mengin had a black eye after his fall, but he has made the start of today's Stage 7. Only two riders have withdrawn so far - the second one was Claudio Corioni (Fassa Bortolo) who stopped out on yesterday's stage. Here's the profile for today - Just 2 climbs early in the stage, so probably another bunch finish. And there is more rain predicted.
McEwen takes the stage over Backstedt and Eisel. Is it me, or does the race Green Jersey seem like it will be very heated this year? Unless there are modifications, the top 20 remain about the same.
David ZABRISKIE is now in 159th 10:28 minutes behind. I think the fact he is still riding is amazing.
Great sprint finish today. McEwen is amazing because he seemingly comes out of nowhere. Also because, for a sprinter, he's such a little guy. A freak of nature. Looks like Boonen might've been effected by an early fall in the stage, only getting 7th. The points race always seems to be pretty tight - it'd be even tighter if McEwen hadn't lost his 3rd place in Stage 3 when he got declassified. But he's said he doesn't care as much for the green jersey as stage wins. Seeing how he never seems to contest the intermediate sprints, I think he's Boonen - 133 Hushovd - 122 McEwen - 96 King of the Mountains is pretty wide open as well, with Fabian Wegmann taking over the lead today after his long breakaway. Wegmann will also wear the red number tomorrow. An early break could open things up a bit in the KOM race tomorrow as there are 4 Cat 3 climbs in the first 50km. The more interesting Cat 2 climb (which could effect the GC) is toward the end: There were two more withdrawals today - Phonak's Steve Zampieri and Lampre's Alessandro Spezialetti. Pretty amazing that only 4 riders are out so far with all the falls there have been so far.
Just saw that Christophe Mengin (the erstwhile stage winner who fell at the end of yesterday's stage) has been diagnosed with a fractured eye socket and will require surgery. So he won't be starting tomorrow. Jeez, what guts he had to ride in and finish today's stage. Nasty:
Ouch! That is not too good. Can you imagine trying to ride in the Tour with a fractured eye socket. Sue, I agree that finally there will be some movement in the GC tomorrow. I think that a few things could happen. An early breakaway could push Discovery to react and force them to work hard, which could lead to an interesting climb on the col de schlucht.
I think Basso may try to sneak out tomorrow. He's just far enough behind that he probably can't make it up in a one-on-one duel with Lance. With the way the stage sets up tomorrow, he could form a breakaway in the flat, middle stages, and the climb towards the end could feasibly keep the peloton from catching him. The same could be said of Ullrich.
Another rider (besides Mengin) did not start today's stage Domina Vacanze team leader Sergei Honchar also did not make the start. In early news on today's stage: [result]Danish Rabobank rider Mickael Rasmussen led an early 5-man break over the first four climbs of the day to take over the lead in the King of the Mountains classification. Jens Voigt and George Hincapie were also part of the group, which stayed out front until after the first sprint, won by Hincapie over Voigt. All of the group (except Sandy Casar) were caught by the main group, led by T-Mobile, following the sprint. T-Mobile was riding to protect Vinokourov's position in the GC - Voigt's 4" bonus moved him past Vino into virtual third place. I just love trying to understand the tactics of the peloton. [/result]
Some fun racing today. Attacks all over the place, and it sure seems like T-Mibile has an advantage over Discovery in the mountains. Armstrong was the only one from Discovery in the lead group and had to respond to every attack by himself. If the 3 leaders from T-Mobile keep attacking, Lance should hope that at least a couple of his teammates would be able to help him.
Finally, the attacks have started! Some interesting questions: Why was Lance left alone to defend against the attacks? Where were the other Discovery riders who were supposed to shield Lance? I think leaving Lance alone was a serious mistake by Discovery. The next couple of days are definitely gonna be very interesting.
Well, I definitely don't think Discovery INTENDED for Lance to be left alone - I think everybody just fell off the pace. As he said after the stage, the team will have to have a "long talk" tonight. Don't know if talking will help their legs, but perhaps they'll save the dependable Hincapie for the latter parts of the stages instead of wasting him early on like they did today. Savoldelli was a real disappointment, vanishing after the first couple of Vino's attacks. And Popovych fell back as well, losing the white jersey in the process. That's probably just as well since it was another distraction, but I'm starting to wonder if these guys really have the mentality to ride for somebody else. Tomorrow will tell the tale, I think. As for the stage, it was apparently the closest stage finish ever, and I couldn't really tell even from the photo how they decided that Weening had beaten Kloden. But a nice reward for the Tour rookie, and he'll get the red number tomorrow as well. Rasmussen took over the polka dot jersey while Thor Hushovd made up some ground on Tom Boonen in the points race, moving to within 5 points. Last year's white jersey winner Vladimir Karpets took over the lead in that competition from Popovych by one second (I wish Phil Liggett would call it "young rider" instead of "best rookie" since that's really misleading). And of course the GC got a good shake-up, with a lot of familiar names moving up into the top 10 (including 4 Americans): 1. Armstrong 2. Voigt 1'00" 3. Vinokourov 1'02" 4. Julich 1'07" 5. Basso 1'26" 6. Ullrich 1'36" 7. Sastre 1'36" 8. Hincapie 1'47" 9. Kloden 1'50" 10.Landis 1'50" Not surprisingly, with 4 riders in the top 10, CSC still leads the team competition, but now T-Mobile is in second 1'50" back, while Discovery dropped back to 3rd at 1'58". Sunday's profile: Reminder for US viewers that OLN goes on-air live at 6:30 am Eastern time for Stage 9.
Lance will be in deep trouble and cant win the tour, if he dont have a strong team behind him all the way, so both T-Mobile and CSC will surely do all they can to attack him now they have seen some weakness in the Discovery team... Michael Rasmussen "The chicken from Tølløse" as he is called in Denmark, has the main goal to get a stage win and hopefully reach Paris in the polka dot jersey and he seems to be well on his way to do so. He's surely an excellent "mountain climber" and he will try to attack to get the points needed.. The Michael Rasmussen website (in English) : http://www.feltet.dk/michaelrasmussen/news.php .
This could be very interesting next few days. I expect CSC and T-Mobile to attack like crazy the next few days. But on the flip side, this could be really good. If Armstrong were to loose the Yellow Jersey, it would allow him to act instead of react like he is required to now. If he lost it tomorrow (I do not think he will) he then could come from behind in the Alps and Pyrenees. On second thought, mabye this is a little gamesmanship. Forcing T-Mobile and CSC to show what they have before Lance buries them. I doubt it, but it could be.
Besides Mengin and Honchar not starting today, 3 other riders dropped out of the race on the stage - Sylvain Calzati (AG2R), Leon Van Bon (Lotto) and Isaac Galvez (Illes Balears). Galvez was one of the riders who crashed in the final stretch of yesterday's sprint. Australian Allan Davis was determined to have caused that crash and got declassified yesterday, but that's scant consolation for Galvez. Here is today's photo finish. I don't know how they made the determination.
So far in the early going, it's starting to be a bit of a competition here. I'd like to see how Discovery bounces back from today in the next stage.
Isn't it obvious that there are 2 pixels between the freont tire and the line on that slowpoke on the bottom and only one on the top!! I'd hate to be the judge on this one.