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Lance Armstrong just missed his chance to cap off his 2009 comeback Tour with a Maillot Jaune presented by Ben Stiller. Instead, Fabian Cancellara had to accept Greg Focker’s kisses on the podium. Maybe it was a calculated move to not have the guy who cost him an $85 fine for lingering at a French coffee shop put a yellow jersey on his back. Plus, you don’t want to tire out your Astana team too soon with the job of defending the Jersey for more time than necessary. One cyclist “in the know” noted that Lance was the fifth person across the line and let up every so slightly to maybe cause the close micro-second difference.
But who has that much presence of mind after rocketing through 39km on a twisty TTT course that caused some top riders and half the Bbox Bouyges Team to crash?
The prospect of donning the Yellow and stamping his authority on the team as they head into the tougher stages would be tempting. But the true GC leaders don’t worry about wearing the Yellow in the fourth stage of the Tour, they would rather wait until the last day.
For Bjarne Riis, keeping the Yellow after another battle in the TTT with Johan Bruyneel and Lance Armstrong must be sweet. In 2005 Team CSC was defending the Yellow Jersey vs. the Discovery Channel team when David Zabriske mysteriously crashed in the last kilometer. Zabriske lost the jersey to Lance Armstrong and probably left the CSC squad stinging from the bad luck. Today Saxo Bank pulled back one second in the last section to keep Cancellara in Yellow. Cancellara could be seen at the front for most of the final sector pulling his team along to a respectable finish. This is no small task since the Andy and Franck Schleck are not very good Time Trialers, while Astana is stacked with TT experts.
(Photo from flickr user Darcy McCarty)
Defending Milan San Remo winner Fabian Cancellara and World Champion Alessandro Ballan will miss the start of Milan San Remo. Cancellara is battling poor form and sickness that has been reoccuring since his prologue win at the Tour of California. Cancellara dropped out of Tirreno Adriatico this week and is trying to establish a program that will allow him to return to top form for the Classics in the next few weeks. Cancellara will race in next weeks Settimana Coppi e Bartali.
I regret not being able to do Milano-Sanremo which for obvious reasons is a race that has a special place in my heart, but I need to be realistic. It’s the best decision based on the form I have right now and more importantly, for family reasons, I wasn’t able to do the race on Saturday either way. I want to stay focused and since I had to exit Tirreno-Adriatico, I need to get more stability and I can only get that from racing and continue my work. I look forward to be gaining more form in the Italian stage race and hopefully, that will help me get some progress and form.
Meanwhile World Champion Alessandro Ballan has been sick with Citomegalovirus which means that he will have to stop racing for 15 days to recuperate from the infection.
Interestingly one of the transmission methods of Cytomegalovirus is through blood transfusions. Hopefully this is not the way Ballan contracted the infection. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytomegalovirus
Ballan has been having a tough early season so far having to miss Kuurne Brussels Kuurne and Het Volk due to lack of form/sickness. Could this be the curse of the Rainbow Jersey taking hold again?
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Cancellara has the form now with a Gold medal performance at the Olympic Time Trial in Beijing. The Gold follows a Bronze in the Olympic Road Race where Cancellara used his devastating burst of speed to bridge a gap from the peloton to the winning breakway group.
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After twice being beaten by Stefan Schumacher in the Tour de France Cancellara must be particularly happy to pass the German racer on the way to scoring a Gold medal.
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Stefan Schumacher did not have the same luck/form/ etc. that produced two TT wins at the Tour de France.
AP Photo/Ivan Sekretarev
Leipheimer added to the US medal tally with a well deserved Bronze medal.
(AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan)
Kristin Armstrong takes the Gold in the women’s TT.
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The four musketeers were giving French cycling renewed hope in today’s stage 2 in the Tour de France. You could not get a better mix to please the French public than Thomas Voekler, Sylvain Cavanal, David Le Lay and Christophe Moreau in a long breakaway. It’s been a long time since the Tour experienced such a sign of French virility at the Tour. Racing in the region of the last Tour de France winner Bernard Hinault you could get a sense that maybe just maybe the Tour is getting over the doping plague of the past few seasons. Then reality hots as you remember that Aleandro Valverde was riding for Kelme and had his name mixed up in the Operation Puerto, but only peripherally. Hopefully no one finds anything incriminating during or after the Tour just as Valverde’s Tour hopes start to get real.
Today’s stage almost up ended the sprinters. Pippo Pozzato won here years ago riding for Fassa Bortolo taking advantage of the climbs to the finish in a well timed break. This year it looked like he could repeat the feat as he bridged up to an attacking Fabian Cancellara. But they did not have the extra gas as the peloton roared up with Thor Hushovd taking first place and two Team Columbia’s in second and third.
Race highlights from Velonews.tv
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After the late crash on Stage 2 many racers were staying up late tending to wounds. After such a long stage and late night many of the racers felt a bit lethargic. You know the feeling you wake up sore and just don’t have the same intensity. Most of the peloton felt this way and was more than content to let a French duo go for a long breakaway while the rest of the racers took a “working vacation” day. Sometimes going slow on a bike is not too much fun especially when you end up riding for seven hours. The lethargy turned into a grueling march into Compeigne. Whether the group is riding fast or slow, it is still painful.
More painful was the heartbreaking finish for the lead four Frederik Willems, Matthieu Ladagnous, Stephane Auge, and Freddy Bichot who were working hard in the break only to watch the pack swoop by in the final few hundred meters. If they just kept it together a little longer….
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Tom Boonen was the name on everyone’s lips of potential winners as the Tour hit Belgium. Boonen managed to escape a crash and had most of his team still in tact driving a sprint train to the finish. The timing was all set except for the last leadout man Geert Steegmans who was told not to sprint until the final 200 meters because of the uphill nature of the finish. The last second sprint was too much for Boonen to come around giving the domestique a rare moment to shine. Quick Step can take solace in a One-Two home soil victory. Boonen seemed just as happy for Steegman’s win as Steegman’s himself. So Quick Step should not mind too much of the last secong blunder. For a few moments it looked as if the Yellow Jersey might be up for grabs as a crash on narrow road looked to have injured several racers and held back most of the peloton. However, the whole group was marked as finishing at the same time since the last kilometer rule was used.
One by one racers limped into the finish with Alexandre Vinokourov signing the cross on himself thanking the man upstairs for saving him from getting injured. Not that God cares more about a Tour victory or Super Bowl Touchdown or any of those things. Vino is happy that he escaped one dangerous moment unscathed. In the first week of the Tour you take each day as it comes and try to stay away from crashes and try not to lose any time before you hit the mountains.
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The Tour de France’s English jaunt has come to an end after a very successful prologue and stage one. The prologue through London brought out great weather and huge crowds who lined up along some of London’s biggest monuments to take in a bike race. Fabian Cancellara took the win by burning up the course in under 9 minutes for a five mile time trial. The course was not super fast with “chip and seal” type pavement, lots of “traffic furniture” remnants which required racers to bunny hop their bikes at certain points.
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Paris Roubaix awaits the tough men. My bet is for a Cancellara repeat this year. Cancellara has the form as he tried to get the action going at Flanders last weekend.
Others to watch for would be a very much on form Alessandro Ballan. He is on a hot streak after winning Flanders last week. He hung tough with Boonen last year and looks like he has the winning formula set. Ballan will be danergous but will be tough to mark since there are so man y favorites this year.
Tom Boonen does not have that extra gear this year. He was spoked at Flanders after a crash, but he did win several smaller races this year. Can Boonen make up for his lack of big results?
Magnus Backstedt is back and supposedly in great form, can he jump into racing and perform well enough to win? Or can it be Liquigas teammate Pippo Pozzatto? He has no pressure really and has already won Het Volk early in the season. He could be an outside contender. If he is near the front at the end, do not bet against the very cagey Italian.
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Tom Boonen looks to be ready for the upcoming Classics. Boonen is always in contention for winning no matter what time of year it is, but his money is made in early April. The Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix are Boonen’s bread and butter races, so he needs to be on form and ready. This is why the E3 Prijs Vlaanderen win is important. E3 Prijs Vlaanderen (say that quickly) is an important appetizer race for the action that is to come in the next few weeks.
Fabian Cancellara showed very good form, but just was beat by the sprint of Boonen. No problem since Cancellara basically rode everyone off his wheel in Paris-Roubaix last year and looks like he can do the same again this year.
Cancellara actually thought he had a chance against Boonen in te sprint as he told cyclingnews.
The Time Trial World Champion was expected to launch an attack during the final kilometres but he waited for the sprint. “I wanted to play my cards in a sprint because I noticed Boonen wasn’t pedalling like normal, we’ve known each other since 1998 so you can see if something’s different.
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“We are not looking for another leader, we are already strong” explains Bjarne Riis manager of Team CSC. After the departure of Ivan Basso due to the fallout of Operation Puerto Team CSC was left without a main man for the Grand Tours. Bjarne is not really looking for Ivan’s replacement.
Carlos Sastre had a very good year and I am convinced that Frank Schleck is the man of the future.
Bjarne Riis will be counting on a four pronged approach next year with Sastre, Schleck, Cancellara and Voight being leaders for various races throughout the year.
Frank Schleck had a very good 2006 winning the Amstel Gold Race and the L’Alpe D’Huez stage in the Tour de France. Fabian Cancellara won Paris Roubaix and the World Time Trial Championship. Carlos Sastre found himself in the unexpected role of leader for the Toru de France and finished fourth. He followed that up with another fourth in the Vuelta while riding all three Grand Tours. Jens Voight looked unstoppable for a stretch winning just about every race in site. So this core of riders are probably balanced enough to keep CSC near the front of the peloton.
