2011 Tour de France

[guru]

Congratulations to Evans, who beat Andy by over two minutes on the day, and now leads the race by over a minute heading to Paris. Without a doubt the guy earned it, with his efforts in the Alps the last two days, followed by an outstanding time trial. I thought those climbs might take significant juice out of his legs today, but he looked terrific.

[bambam]

I've only seen that happen once, on Alpe D'Huez in 1999 I believe, but the fans got the rider back on his back and pushed him off so fast that he was still able to win the stage.

In the 1970s Eddy Merckx was leading a mountain stage near the end, and in yellow, and a fan came out and punched him rather violently in the abdomen. Merckx finished, but Bernard Thevenet went on to win the Tour that year, as I recall, and it was blamed on damage Merckx suffered from the attack.

[bambam]

From Wikipedia re the Merckx punch in the 1975 Tour-

1975 Tour de France

The finishing climb on the Puy de Dome (12 km, 7% gradient) was the beginning of the end for Merckx. ... Just over 4 kilometers up the finishing climb, Thevenet charged off the front with Van Impe in tow. The two slowly pulled away from Merckx and Zoetemelk. ... As Merckx tried to close the gap near the top of the climb he was punched by a spectator. Review of French TV film shows the man standing along side the road with his hands at his side. As Merckx passes him the man punches him in the lower right abdomen (not a kidney punch as has been claimed in the past) with as much force as he probably could from launching the punch from a hip position.

[jazzcyclist]

Who would have thought that Voeckler, who admits to having devoted little attention to his time trialing ability, would beat both the Schleck brothers in the final time trial? For as much as Liggett derided him as being a second tier cyclist who didn't deserve to be mentioned with the GC contenders, he could have easily ended up on the podium if he hadn't thrown away 27 seconds in that descent in the Pyrenees and hadn't wasted a ton of effort yesterday in a futile effort to catch up with Contador and Andy Schleck (the peleton ended up catching them anyway).

Hats off to Evans. Today, he left no question that he was the strongest man in the race. Tony Martin barely beat him, but he had the luxury of finishing with the autobus during the two days in the Alps while Evans was chasing Contador and Schleck who were attacking like madmen from start to finish. I don't think Lance Armstrong ever had to deal with serious attacks like that so far from the finish during his seven-year reign, with the exception being the 2000 stage to Morzine when Marco Pantani tried to pull a Floyd Landis, but predictably cracked before he reached the final climb of the Col de Joux-Plane.

[jazzcyclist]

As for tactics in the high mountains, it can depend on the wind, which can be rather strong and cause more problems for leading than you might think, especially when the differential between riders is pretty small. That is one of the reason that Armstrong had so many good riders to push the first part of the climbs and why they went out and got Heras.

If wind is the Schleck's concern, shouldn't Frank just get on the front and set a murderous tempo while Andy follows, a la Heras and Armstrong? Are they more concerned with getting both on the podium (second and third places) or winning the race (first and eight places)? Isn't the Yellow Jersey the ultimate goal? Do they really want to go into the time trial even with Cadel Evans?

As for Frank blocking for Andy -- that throws away one of your two guys and would be a mistake at this stage. Besides, Frank is looking to be on as good a form as Andy but has a little less of a jump than his brother.

It's a mistake if their priority is getting both of them on the podium, but not if their goal is to wear yellow in Paris. US Postal probably could have gotten Roberto Heras on the podium in 2002, but at what cost?

I hate to say I told you so, but I told you so.

[jeremyp]

Crikey Cadel!!!!

[26mi235]

I guy with a camera jumped in front of the leader (biggish lead), and I think surprised the guy by going left instead of to the right. He picked himself up and won the race. Since he was not in the GC race, it did not matter what the time gap was. The two met (at least once) later and there were no hard feelings, as I recall.


As for the time trial, the Schlecks did a pretty good job. Before the race I certainly would have thought that if Andy would ride within they would ride fast enough that if Evans had Cancellara's time that they would win and that is what they did 56 seconds back) but Andy came no where close to winning (which actually probably makes it easier).

1 Tony Martin (Ger) HTC-Highroad 0:55:33
2 Cadel Evans (Aus) BMC Racing Team 0:00:07
3 Alberto Contador Velasco (Spa) Saxo Bank Sungard 0:01:06
4 Thomas De Gendt (Bel) Vacansoleil-DCM Pro Cycling Team 0:01:29
5 Richie Porte (Aus) Saxo Bank Sungard 0:01:30
6 Jean-Christophe Peraud (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale 0:01:33
7 Samuel Sanchez Gonzalez (Spa) Euskaltel-Euskadi 0:01:37
8 Fabian Cancellara (Swi) Leopard Trek 0:01:42
9 Peter Velits (Svk) HTC-Highroad 0:02:03
10 Rein Taaramae (Est) Cofidis, Le Credit En Ligne
11 Thomas Danielson (USA) Team Garmin-Cervelo 0:02:08
12 Edvald Boasson Hagen (Nor) Sky Procycling 0:02:10
13 Thomas Voeckler (Fra) Team Europcar 0:02:14
14 Maxime Monfort (Bel) Leopard Trek 0:02:36
15 Kristijan Koren (Slo) Liquigas-Cannondale
16 Adriano Malori (Ita) Lampre - ISD 0:02:38
17 Andy Schleck (Lux) Leopard Trek 0:02:38
18 Lieuwe Westra (Ned) Vacansoleil-DCM Pro Cycling Team 0:02:39
19 Christophe Riblon (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale
20 Fränk Schleck (Lux) Leopard Trek 0:02:41

He was 56 seconds behind Cancellara

[Pego]

This tidbit might interest the cycling history buffs. Peter Velits is the best Slovak road cyclist since Vlasto Ružička in the early fifties. They had a few track world class cyclists, but not the road, AFAIK.

[jazzcyclist]

26mi, here's a serious question. Based the folks who finshed ahead of Cancellara, and based on the folks who finshed close behind him (he only beat Voeckler by 32 seconds), would you say that today was representative of a typical Cancellara time trial performance?

[guru]

Speaking of the crazy fans earlier - how does that devil guy have his own wiki page lol

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Didi_Senft

[26mi235]

26mi, here's a serious question. Based the folks who finshed ahead of Cancellara, and based on the folks who finshed close behind him (he only beat Voeckler by 32 seconds), would you say that today was representative of a typical Cancellara time trial performance?

You are right in what I think you are thinking and was a bit implicit in the way that I structured my comment. Cancellara was not at the level we expected, but that was not clear until some others started taking down his time. I still find it notable that a number of riders that worked a lot harder over the last few days out-rode him. I still maintain, however, that the Schlecks rode quite well given how hard they have both worked over the last several days.

My turn for a question: I your opinion, where does this race fit in terms of racing (excitement, quality of racing) in the last five years, ten years, twenty years?

I thought it was a smashing last several days, myself and was glad that the issues of the early days did not have the same degree of effect.

[jazzcyclist]

I think it was probably the most exciting race since 1989, especially Thursday thru Saturday. Going into Thursday, it was literally a six-man race, and in that respect, you might argue that it was more exciting than Lemond-Fignon from 1989 or Armstrong-Ullrich from 2003. Even after Contador and Sanchez cracked on the Galibier, it was still a four-man race going into Friday and a three-man race going into Saturday.

To me, Voeckler was the star of the race despite the fact that Evans was obviously the strongest rider. So many of our presumptions about him were wrong, and in hindsight, he almost stole the race. Phil Liggett said we would need binoculars to see him when the GC contenders finished at the Galibier, and while it was true that binoculars were needed, they were needed to see Contador and Sanchez, not Voeckler. Voeckler doesn't have the talent of Evans, Andy Schleck or Contador, but by riding within himself and suffering like a dog every day, he stayed in the race. If you think about it, the only two times he lost significant time was when he tried to ride beyond his abilities. First, he lost 27 seconds to all the contenders when he tried to take time out of them on the descent to the finish of stage 17 and ended up overcooking it in a turn. The other time he rode outside of his abilities is when he made his Don Quixote-like effort to catch Contador and Schleck on stage 19 instead of falling back to the comfort of the peleton with Evans. Because of all this wasted energy, he ended up losing 2:25 on the climb up Alpe-D'Huez, and that is the only mountain top finish that he was unable to finish with the GC contenders. With 50K of flats and descents from the top of the Galibier to the base of Aple D'Huez, he should have known that there was no way Contador and Schleck would stay away from the peleton anyway, especially with BMC and his Europcar teammates driving the peleton. That was a huge tactical error on his part, which ended up costing him a spot on the podium, probably second place, as well as one more day in yellow (Evans would have still taken yellow in the time trial).

You have to be smart and patient to win the Tour. I remember in 2003, Lance Armstrong, while wearing yellow, watched Jan Ullrich ride away from him on a climb a long way from the finish and made no effort to respond. Later on in the stage, he ended up catching Ullrich and after the race, he was asked if the reason he let Ullrich go was because he was certain he would come back to him. Armstrong reponded that he wasn't certain at all, but if Ullrich was strong enough to sustain an effort that far from the finish line, there would have been nothing he could do about it anyway. So even Armstrong knew better than to ride outside of his ability, chasing desperate riders who are trying to do their best Floyd Landis impressions. The lesson is: "Don't try to be Superman just because you're wearing the yellow jersey".

[jazzcyclist]

Are the anti-doping folks winning the war on drugs in pro cycling?

"Cadel Evans' performances are the best way to measure this. He's been stable for the past eight years. He doesn't do any better than in previous years. It's the Schlecks and Contador who are slower. This Tour has been one of the slowest on the climbs since 2004," commented Grappe, who is usually known for his scepticism with regard to doping.

On stage 19 to l’Alpe d'Huez, where the individual times of each rider were officially clocked, Euskaltel-Euskadi's Samuel Sanchez recorded the best time with 41:45 minutes. But this is only the 24th best time in history. The day's winner Pierre Rolland (Europcar) climbed the mountain in 42:22 - yet in 2006, it took Fränk Schleck 40:46 minutes to get to the top en route to victory, while Floyd Landis and Andreas Klöden were clocked at 38:34 the same day.

Of course, one should always take into account the conditions of the day, the stage length prior to the climb and many other factors that can come into play. Still, the head doctor of the French cycling federation Armand Mégret, was convinced that this year's Tour has been cleaner just from watching the TV images.

"The ascent to l’Alpe d'Huez was very revealing: the worn-out face of Pierre Rolland, Alberto Contador who blows up, Thomas Voeckler paying for his efforts...," Mégret said.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/2011-to ... cent-years

The big mountain stages have been contested at a much slower pace this time than by the likes of Marco Pantani and Lance Armstrong in the past, which is seen by many as evidence of a decrease in doping practices. “I don’t want to draw conclusions too quickly,” Prudhomme said cautiously. “It’s a fact that also depends on the length of the stages. But the indications we had from Luz Ardiden and Plateau de Beille have been confirmed at l’Alpe d’Huez, and that was a very short stage.”

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/prudhom ... -de-france

[26mi235]

I concur with Jazz on his long post. I think that the attack by Andy on Thursday was an attempt that he needed to make. He got lucky for a while with the infighting/negligence that allowed the lead to grow rather than shrink on the transition but the effort there still cost Andy in the last 5km, especially the last kilo, although the others were not exactly steaming up rapidly either.

The contrast to Armstrong in tactics (although Lance typically had more cards to play with teammates) is quite good. Jazz might have added, but it was really implicit, is that Evans most often did display the right degree of patience.

Contador, too, might have pulled things out on his gamble but was not quite the rider from before, but even last year, he was really only marginally better on the climbs and he did not have the ability to continue on at the hard pace he was setting on the first climb, and then it took too much effort, for naught, to get to the base of the last climb, and then he was spent without enough ammo left for the climb.

Jazz especially nails it because there were so many with a chance to win; it was not just a duel of two guys. Hence, even greater rewards for patience and getting the feel for the right strategy. Johan Bruyneel has been touted as having a good head for strategy; it would have been interesting to see how he might have played things. If Radio Shack had not been affected by any of the crashes, with four riders they might have had at least one affecting the overall lead and it would have complicated matters even further.

As for the story on doping immediately above, it fits in with what I see happening. Specifically, between the tests and the passport assessment, it is harder to dope and harder to dope in large measure. That narrows the differential between those doping and those not. Thus, since there is always the cost of getting caught, more riders are choosing to be clean. Apparently, doing so means that the race for the top is more even, with a number of riders in contention.

It will now be harder for Contador to equal or break the 'record' for Tours because he missed one year and lost this year. Since the race at the top appears to be rather even, the likelihood of getting enough of the good breaks and avoiding the bad ones is low enough that reeling off five more seems rather unlikely. However, Contador might well have won this Tour if he had not lost time early caught by the early crash and hurting his knee in his second one.

[26mi235]

Jazz (and others):

Does Cav stay with THC-Columbia (into whatever it becomes, if it does so real soon), in order to stay with Renshaw and Eisel or does he switch to (most likely) Sky?

[DrJay]

Cadel Evans will be riding in the USA Pro Cycling Challenge in Colorado Aug 22-28. Apparently Versus said that the Schlecks will also ride, but the race organizers have not confirmed that yet. Team rosters for the event are to be announced next week.

http://espn.go.com/olympics/cycling/sto ... orado-race

Stage 1 is a five mile prologue here in Colorado Springs. Stage 3 has two climbs over 12,000' passes, with about 8200' total climbing (stage 18 of Le Tour had about 16,000' of climbing!)

http://www.usaprocyclingchallenge.com/

[Conor Dary]

Too bad they aren't using the Coors Classic Morgul-Bismark near Boulder, the site of my cameo in American Flyer. A lot of fun to watch.

[jazzcyclist]

Jazz (and others):

Does Cav stay with THC-Columbia (into whatever it becomes, if it does so real soon), in order to stay with Renshaw and Eisel or does he switch to (most likely) Sky?

I think I heard Phil Liggett sat that Bob Stapleton is shopping Cavendish and his lead-out train as a package deal to Sky and other teams. By the way, here are some highlights from Robert Millar's excellent post-Tour analysis:

Uphill? No problem, the Schlecks do that as good as anyone, only Contador is better. Coming down the other side, however, it doesn't look comfortable. As a weakness, descending is probably their most obvious one, particularly in the wet and other riders are always going to exploit that. . . . .

in the Pyrenees when they ought to have been attacking relentlessly to distance their rivals, they either couldn't or wouldn't, in case Contador countered them. What with the constant looking around to see what the other brother was up to, they seemed more frightened of what the Spaniard might do rather than just getting on with trying to win the race.

The moments where we saw them riding next to Contador and giving him the evils were never going to be anything other than a complete waste of time. The guy has won three Tours, a Giro and a Vuelta, he's not going to be scared by playground antics. When they did commit themselves, it was too little and too late in the stages so the gain wasn't great. . . . .

As an aside, quite what the yellow jersey wearer thought he was doing in no-man’s land was beyond me, his DS needed to either tell him to wait for his teammates in the chasing group behind or talk to the Saxo Bank guys about getting Contador to knock off the pace and let him get up to the front. If that had happened and they all rode in the front until the base of the last climb then there might have been a panic at BMC. As it was, Voeckler lost his podium place by continuing to chase on his own for too long.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/blogs/robert ... k-brothers

[jazzcyclist]

HTC-Highroad disbands after failed sponsor search.

Stapleton pointed to the sport's doping problems as another hurdle for all teams, not just Stapleton's. The still-unresolved doping case of Alberto Contador from the 2010 Tour de France and the federal investigation into doping at the US Postal Service team, both of which have been heavily reported in the media, have hampered new sponsor negotations for Stapleton.

"All I can tell you is that I don't think there has been a single discussion with a potential sponsor where one or the other wasn't talked about. It's been a factor in everyone's view of cycling in the last year."

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/htc-hig ... sor-search

When the world's #1 team can't find a sponsor after having just won six stages at the Tour de France, I think it's fair to say that the dopers have killed the goose that was laying the golden eggs.

[26mi235]

It was a pretty good story on the situation. Jazz beat me to this; I was going to post it myself.

[guru]

HTC-Highroad disbands after failed sponsor search.

I think it's fair to say that the dopers have killed the goose that was laying the golden eggs.

Hard to say. Without Armstrong winning several Tours, the sport's profile would have remained low here in the US, and a multi-million dollar team like HTC probably doesn't form in the first place.

[jazzcyclist]

HTC-Highroad disbands after failed sponsor search.

I think it's fair to say that the dopers have killed the goose that was laying the golden eggs.

Hard to say. Without Armstrong winning several Tours, the sport's profile would have remained low here in the US, and a multi-million dollar team like HTC probably doesn't form in the first place.

This theory assumes that Lance couldn't have won seven Tours in a row if the entire peleton had been clean. Before steroids and other PED's took over MLB, Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens were the best hitter and pitcher of their generation respectively. During the steroid era, they were still the best of their generation, just more powerful. Ten years ago, the top climbers took 38 minutes to ascend Alpe D'Huez. This year, Pierre Roland won Alpe D'Huez with a 42-minute ascent. Surely a clean Armstrong would have been able to match that effort in his prime.

It would seem that the natural superstars of any sport are the ones with the greatest incentive to eliminate PED's since that's the only way that their true talent can shine out without having to resort to PED use themselves. I've often wondered why the FBI doesn't recruit active athletes to be informants. Surely there are some clean athletes out there, who compete in sports where teams have hard salary caps or race/meet directors have tight budgets, and who are incensed when they see dirty athletes raking in cash that could have gone to them.

[Conor Dary]

HTC-Highroad disbands after failed sponsor search.

Stapleton pointed to the sport's doping problems as another hurdle for all teams, not just Stapleton's. The still-unresolved doping case of Alberto Contador from the 2010 Tour de France and the federal investigation into doping at the US Postal Service team, both of which have been heavily reported in the media, have hampered new sponsor negotations for Stapleton.

"All I can tell you is that I don't think there has been a single discussion with a potential sponsor where one or the other wasn't talked about. It's been a factor in everyone's view of cycling in the last year."

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/htc-hig ... sor-search

When the world's #1 team can't find a sponsor after having just won six stages at the Tour de France, I think it's fair to say that the dopers have killed the goose that was laying the golden eggs.

So Cav goes to Sky?

Drugs are certainly part of it, but it also doesn't help that the economy, here and especially Europe, is sucking at the moment and likely to get worse.