After about a dozen years of watching the Tour and really following pro cycling over these last few years, I've developed a list of favorite riders. It's easy to like Lance Armstrong, or Ivan Basso, or Mark Cavendish or Fabian Cancellara. And sure, they are all great champions. But three guys in the peloton really strike me as real characters...
3. Thomas Voeckler
We all got to know Thomas Voeckler way back in 2004 when he was part of a breakaway that got away from the peloton and catapulted the unlikely 25-year-old into the Yellow Jersey. But his legacy was cemented when he held on to his race lead for 10 stages, even as the mountains (and Lance Armstrong) seemed likely to take it away from him. Although he has never again worn the Yellow Jersey at the Tour, he always is willing to jump into a breakaway. And the last two years he has succeeded, winning Stage 5 in 2009 (and giving him the polka dot jersey for a few days) and winning stage 15 (the infamous Chaingate stage) in 2010. Voeckler always gives 110%, and his contorted face is seen on a regular basis at the front of the field.
2. Alexander Vinokourov
Probably my favorite racer, but I felt guilty giving him #1 billing when he did cheat. (Ok, everyone cheated - Vino got caught). Regardless, Vino has had an amazing career. His career started back in 99 with a win in the Dauphine Libere and then a silver medal at the Sydney Olympics in the Road Race previewed a remarkable run. His list of victories include the Vuelta overall, Paris-Nice, Amstel Gold, Liege-Bastogne-Liege among others. Add in a 3rd overall and a 5th overall at the Tour, plus two World Championship bronze medals in the time trial and you have a remarkable career. . His win on stage 21 of the 2005 Tour, when he broke away from the lined-up-for-the-final-sprint peloton was an amazing highlight.
Vino's positive test at the 2007 Tour was thought to be career-ending. He actually announced his retirement from cycling in late 2007, but quickly recanted. His return from his suspension has been a remarkable success, as he has won several big races, including this year's Liege-Bastogne-Liege and a dominant performace at the Tour. He easily could have won Stage 12 if Alberto Contador hadn't challenged a late break by Joaquin Rodriguez, but regrouped overnight to perfect a late breakaway to solo to win his 4th career Tour de France stage (2 others were taken away due to his doping violation). He has also been an ideal domestique to Alberto Contador in the Alps and the Pyrenees this year. Congrats on a great comeback Vino!
Although it might get lost with all the IAAF Diamond League, ITU, 70.3, and Tour de France races that seem to be dominating the endurance headlines, Chrissie Wellington put together a day today at the Quelle Challenge Roth that might never be matched.
Going into the Iron-distance race today, Wellington was looking at her first race at this distance since Kona 2009, after having to sit out her normal spring visit to Ironman Australia due to recovery from her bike injuries in January. There was also some question about whether she still had the drive to keep setting the bar higher and higher, even with other women like Mirinda Carfrae and Julie Dibens starting to match her dominance in 70.3 races.
All those question marks were thrown out today, after Chrissie went a remarkable 8:19:13 today (a race in which only 6 guys beat her time). This was almost 13 MINUTES faster than the previous women's world record (which was set a year ago by Chrissie at this same race). She also broke the course records at Roth with best bike time (4:36:33) and best run time (2:48:54) to win by 33 minutes over Rebekah Keat. Chrissie now appears to be making Kona a race for second place.
Although my blogging has been abysmally quiet for the past two months, I reckon to be better...
Ok, with today's rest day after a very good first 8 stages to start this year's Tour, I thought it would be a good time to post a couple of thoughts. This year's Tour was expected to be decided in the huge mountains of the Pyrenees during stages 14-17, but a few early fireworks, a couple crashes, and the extremely bad luck of one Mr Armstrong have done a great job to produce a ton of noteworthy events.
10. The Crashes
So far this year's Tour has included crashes that have knocked out GC contenders like Frank Schleck and Christian VandeVelde, eliminated Lance from contention, and caused many other top riders to ride with bandages and ride through pain. It has been the most chaotic first week in memory, and hopefully the worst is over and we don't need to lament any further DNFs.
9. I went to the Tour and a Fight Broke Out...
Apparently, Carlos Barredo and Rui Costa don't really like each other. According to one story, Costa elbowed Barredo in the gut with 20 km left in Stage 6. At the finish line, Barredo grabbed his front wheel and tried to hit Costa with it. A fist fight ensued, followed by an apology and the inevitable fine from the Tour.
8. No doping controversies...yet...
We have made it through the first 9 days of the Tour without a positive drug test, and can only hope for many more days of silence on this front. The never-shy Floyd Landis used the start of the Tour to publish more details of his doping allegations in the Wall Street Journal but thankfully more people are starting to ignore Landis and his cries for attention.
Is the Tour finally starting to clean up? We all hope so, even as previously suspended Riccardo Ricco won last week's Tour of Austria
7. A Load of Canadian News...
Even without talking too much about Ryder Hesjadal (keep reading), this year's Tour has had the most Canadian content since way back in 1986. That was the year that Alex Stieda and Steve Bauer competed together in the Tour, and it had been 24 long years since 2 Canadians competed in the Tour. (As an aside, Stieda became the first North American to wear the Yellow Jersey in the Tour that year). But this year, Hesjedal (3rd Tour in a row) is joined by Team Sky's Michael Barry, who at age 36, just might the oldest Tour rookie in this year's peloton. Barry has been a pro cyclist for 13 years, and had seemingly just missed making a Tour team while riding for US Postal from 2002-2006 and on T-Mobile/High Road/Columbia from 2007-2009. However, this year, his vast experience is being leaned on to help protect Bradley Wiggins in the peloton and to help out Edvard Boasson Hagen in the sprints. Barry even acknowledged the "hundreds of Canadian flags" lining the roads of France during this interview with Pedal Magazine.
On a not-TDF but perhaps soon topic, a recent interview with Team Spidertech's team director Steve Bauer (yep, the same Bauer as the previous paragraph) revealed that Spidertech is "close to achieving ProTour status" and "could be completed by September 1". This would be a huge step on getting closer to having a Canadian team with Canadian riders onto the European (and hopefully Grand Tour) stage. Stay tuned.
6. The Most Behind-the-scenes Content Ever...
In this age of instant information, it's great to see that ProTour teams have embraced the web as a way to give their fans more detailed information. I have been following the news that comes out of RadioShack, Team Sky, Garmin, and Cervelo TestTeam camps. It is especially to follow the news about the guys who don't often get mainstream (Velonews, Cyclingnews) coverage.
5. The Manx Missile
After a crash-filled Stage 1 that eliminated Mark Cavendish from a chance to start this year's Tour the same he ended last year's Tour, we all thought it would only be a day or two before he re-affirmed his dominance in the sprint finishes. But after another crash filled day on Stage 2, the cobblestones on Stage 3, and a mistimed attack during the sprint to the line in Stage 4, a lot of people thought Cavendish didn't have it anymore.
He must have heard the criticism as he returned with a vengeance on Stage 5, winning in his typical swashbuckling fashion. Then he did it again on Stage 6, winning again and proving that he is closer to his 2009 form than perhaps anyone expected.
However, he is only in 5th place in the Green Jersey competition, behind leader Thor Hushovd, Robbie McEwen, and fellow two-stage winner Alessandro Petacchi. He is currently 31 points behind, and needs to ensure he doesn't miss out on any more sprint points along the way to have any chance of wearing Green into Paris.
4. A huge list of GC contenders...
This year's Tour had an amazing list of potential podium finishers. Last year's Top 3 (Contador, Schleck, Armstrong) were joined by Cadel Evans, Frank Schleck, Christian VandeVelde, Brad Wiggins, Alex Vinokourov, Robert Gesink, Levi Leipheimer, Michael Rogers, and Samuel Sanchez. And you know what, after 9 days, 9 of those 12 guys are in the Top 16 of the race, with Frank Schleck and VandeVelde missing because of injuries that caused them to drop out and Armstrong missing because of his crash-filled Stage 8. It's still anyone's Tour!
3. Is Contador beatable?
It might be premature, but the overwhelming favorite to win the Tour has had a couple blips in the first week. His prologue was pretty good, but he did lose time to Lance Armstrong and didn't get as much time on some of his other rivals as expected. Then came the end of Stage 8, when he seemed to respond with ease with late accelerations by Robert Gesink and Ivan Basso before being unable to counter the decisive move by Andy Schleck. Is this a sign of things to come? Or will we see a repeat of last year's Tour, where he seemed to be able to distance his rivals whenever he needed a minute or two.
2. Ryder!!
Put your hand up if you had Ryder Hesjedal as a bonafide podium contender. The 29 year-old Hesjedal is perhaps the biggest surprise of week 1. After a week which included a prologue, a couple tough stages, and a rash of riders getting beat up, our proud Canuck is only 10 seconds behind Alberto Contador and is ahead of such Tour favorites as Carlos Sastre, Bradley Wiggins, and Ivan Basso. Can he keep it up?
Three more Ryder tidbits - here is an chat that he did today with Pedal Magazine. And an article from cyclingnews.com that talks about his desire to finish Top 10 in the Tour. And finally, here is a video from June where Ryder attempts to break the climb record of the Rocacorba in Girona, Spain. Watch the video to see how he does, as well as to check out what goes into the physiology testing of pro cyclists.
1. The demise of Lance Armstrong....
Although Lance's fans were buoyed by his remarkable performance in the Tour's prologue and his ability to stay with the big names for most of the first 7 days of the Tour, his chances of winning the Yellow Jersey or even matching last year's podium finish came to a skidding end during yesterday's Stage 8. Stage 8 was supposed to where the GC classification and separation began. Unfortunately for Lance, it was where his Tour came to a violent and painful end.
Watch the first two seconds of this video for a remarkable video of his crash in yesterday's Stage 8 which ultimately eliminated any chance of a high finish in the Tour.
Although he was not injured too badly, Lance's Tour ambitions ended with the miserable combination of bad timing of this crash (right at the bottom of a big climb),the pacemaking by Team Astana to hurt all the main rivals of Alberto Contador, and a later crash which further made Armstrong stop and get off his bike kept Armstrong from re-attaching to the group of the leaders. The three events (and what his teammate Chris Hormer called a "bonk") caused Lance to lose a further 8 minutes on the climb to Morzine to end yesterday's stage.
Say what you want about Lance, he has done more for North American cycling than anyone, has used his fame to do more for cancer awareness than any athlete ever, and has provided fans with many epic moments.
Bonus: here is his new commercial for Nike...
See you soon - I would say Friday but my history has been spotty of late...
