Vive le Tour!
I am going to spam you with my comments from le Tour de France. You should maybe read if you want to have a conversation with me ever during July :D
Today’s main scandal in the cycling world - who will be Team Astana’s leader this tour?
In the red corner Alberto Contador, 2007 winner and who the tour website has at number 21 (The numbers that end in One are the team leaders). Contador has only competed in one out of the last three tours - in 2006 his entire team was dropped from the tour due to doping, but was latter cleared (other team members were not so lucky). In 2008 the same team were told they would not be invited back to the tour that year.
In the blue corner we have Lance Armstrong, former 7-time winner of the Tour. Rumored to be fighting with Contador about whose tour this is going to be, he’s come out of retirement to raise awareness for prostate cancer. Having already shattered his collarbone this year, this writer has doubts whether he’ll make it trough the tour.
As well, here in New Zealand, we have our own cycling battle going on - between Julian Dean and Hayden Roulston. Will Dean continue last years climb through the ranks? I myself may put money on him to win a stage - he came damn close several times last year and by now his led-out train should be well oiled. Or will the ex-Bad Boy Roulston take the spotlight and become the new Mark Cavindish? After all, both came off the back of international wins - Cavindish at the Commonwealth Games and Roulston at the bigger Olympic games. Personally I pick Dean - experience and the NZ road race champ. Look for him in his special Black and White suit.
Tonight we look forward to the time trial, and nice revert to tradition, unlike last years race opener, a flat stage. My thought on how everyone fared tomorrow… and the answer to the big question - Who will win the first yellow jersey of 2009?!
So last night we had the prologue, which was the first of the time trial’s, an individual. A time trial is a leg which is shorter and faster - today’s leg was aprox. 15.5 km. Each rider rides separately, in the beginning one minute apart. Riders in backwards order of rank - with last years winner starting last. Latter in the tour we will have the second of the two individual time trials, and not to far into the future we have the team trial. The team time trial has not featured for some years, and so should be interesting viewing.
Today’s time trial was a difficult one - the first 7.5km was a climb, making this a real all rounders race. The decent was incredibly technical, with one bend in particular that no one could find the right line.
The wining was not as important as not losing major time for those wanting to win. The eventual winner was Fabian Cancellara former World Time Trial Champion (2006, 2007), Olympic Time Trial Champion (2008), Swiss Time Trial Champion (2002, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008) and this years Swiss Road Race Champion. As impressive as this sounds, there was doubt as to his time-trialing fitness, having concentrated on winning the Swiss road race rather than the time trial this year. Due to his win, he now holds the Yellow and Green jerseys. Alberto Contador was first at the summit, and so holds the mountain climbing polka dot jersey, and Roman Kreuziger holds the White jersey as the best young rider in the race so far. In the top ten we have, in order:
- Fabian Cancellara (Team Saxo Bank)
- Alberto Contador (Astana)
- Bradley Wiggins (Garmin - Slipstream)
- Andreas Kloden (Astana)
- Cadel Evans (Silence - Lotto)
- Levi Leipheimer (Astana)
- Roman Kreuziger (Liguigas)
- Tony Martin (Team Columbia - HTC)
- Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas)
- Lance Amstrong (Astana)
Just from looking at today’s stage, we can see who this race is going to be between - and like many believe, it does not look like Cadel Evans will be a part if that race. Thank God, he’s an ugly fucker.
It really looks like the race is going to be between to teams - Team Saxo Bank and Astana. Although Fabian Cancellara may not hold the yellow for long - he doesn’t have the necessary mountain strength to do so - there is a possibility he could hold on to it until the mountain stages. In the top twenty there was three Saxo Bank riders and four Astana riders. My pick for the riders that will be pushed to win - Andy Schleck from Team Saxo Bank and Alberto Contador from Astana.
My big supprise for the day - and it serves me right for not following what’s been happening on the Giro d’Italia - was that this year team Saxo Banks leader is Andy, not Frank, Schleck. Frank is the older of the two brothers, and until this year out shined his brother. Andy this year won the Luxembourg Road Race champion, which Frank was defending. Last year he won the White young riders jersey in le Tour de France. Still, he is very good in the mountains, and a decent sprinter which makes him a perfect candidate from the Yellow jersey.
Just out of interest, Hayden Roulston and Julian Dean came 111 and 131 out of 180 respectively - not bad for a track racer and a road racer.