happypervert
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Considering that cycling commentator Phil Liggett has called it "a viciously cruel sport" and that riders often refer to their “suffering”, I figure that I can't be the only person with an interest in cycling hanging around this site. So for folks who don’t follow it as closely as I do, here’s a preview of the Tour de France which starts on Sat 7/2. We'll start with an overview of the race followed by comments about the contenders.
The Tour de France is the most prestigious and therefore most competitive of the 3 "Grand Tours" which are 3 week cycling races; the other two are the Giro d'Italia in May and Vuelta a Espana in Sept. Basically, these races are a series of individual races called “stages” for sprinters, climbers, and time trialists. Teams that have no contender for an overall win can still find glory if their riders can win a stage. The overall winner will be the rider who combines strong climbing and time trialing along with the ability to recover quickly and repeatedly from the efforts; a strong team is important too so contenders don't lose time during the team time trial. Some basic info on sprints, time trials and climbing follows.
Sprints: 6 the first 8 stages are for the sprinters. Sprinters special skill is explosive power to get top speed in the final 200 meters of a race; however, they don't gain much time on anybody in those last few hundred meters so none of the heroes of the first week will be contenders for the overall win. On these flat stages you might see some breakaway riders ahead of the pack, but the sprinters' teams will usually keep the distance reasonable so they can catch them before the end. Then the final 5 minutes are nuts as teams start jockeying for position and sprinters are leaning on others, nudging with elbows and shoulders, and otherwise trying to muscle their way into the best position for the win. Wanna try that on a bike going 30-40 mph? Le Tour will end with the riders coasting into Paris and then winding it up for the final bunch sprint.
Individual Time Trial: Called "the race of truth" because it is each man racing individually against the clock. On other days riders are in the pack (or peloton) and save energy by drafting on the riders ahead of them. The time trials are what separate the strongest overall riders from pretenders who are merely good climbers. This year there are 2; actually 1 1/3 because the race starts with a short time trial of 19 km which is puny compared with the other at 55 km. The second time trial comes on Stage 20 (July 23) and could decide the winner as it will be the day before the race ends in Paris.
Team Time Trial: Stage 4 on July 5. This is one of the most important stages as a poor performance by the team can hurt the chances of a contender. Here each team goes together, and it is choreographed so they rotate through the leading position briefly letting their teammates follow their draft. It is really neat to watch. The first 5 riders of each team get the same time as the 5th guy across the finish line; others may or may not have kept up. By rule, the most time a team can lose is 2 1/2 minutes; in other words, if the fastest team finishes 4 minutes ahead of the slowest team, the riders in the slowest team only lose 2 1/2 minutes.
Mountains: The key to being a good climber is power/weight ratio; in other words, you've got to overcome gravity to get up the hills so light weight and lots of power works the best. Tactically, the decisive moves usually come on stages that end at the top of climbs; if a stage finishes after descending that makes it riskier to expend a lot of energy escaping alone going up because rivals may band together and catch you going down. The second week is basically all mountains; first the Alps and then the Pyrenees. There are 3 stages with mountaintop finishes, with 2 coming back-to-back on stages 14-15 (July 16-17) to end the mountains week. That means stage 15 is the last chance for climbers to gain an advantage and that will really murder the racers -- it should be fun to watch!
Here are some of the top competitors:
Lance Armstrong (USA)
He's the favorite after winning the last 6. His whole team is dedicated to his success and serve a variety of roles, such as: keeping him near the front of the pack which reduces the chance of getting mixed up with crashes that occur further back; letting him conserve energy by "drafting" behind them like a stock car; climbing specialists that pace him up the final climbs like booster rockets, each peeling off when their job is done until he is left to attack any opponents who could keep up with the pace. Also, his team has won the team time trial two years in a row. There are 2 changes to his team this year; Floyd Landis has changed teams and strongman Viatcheslav Ekimov was injured in a crash; they have been replaced by Yaroslav Popovych and 2 time Giro d'Italia winner Paolo Savoldelli. The team is hoping that Popovych develops into Lance's successor.
The three headed pink monster of Team T-Mobile:
Jan Ullrich (Ger) -- winner in '97, 4th last year, 2nd five times, and the overwhelming favorite to finish 2nd again.
Andreas Kloden (Ger) -- an unexpected 2nd place last year; was it a fluke? In April it was reported that he had problems with his conditioning, and he hasn't looked impressive yet.
Alexandre Vinokourov (Kaz) -- Finished 3rd in '03 but missed last year's race recovering from a crash. He is just a strong all around attacking rider without excelling in either the mountains or time trials. He’s looking stronger in the mountains this year, though.
Here’s a cute story – these 3 were professional teammates in 2000 and went to the Sydney Olympics, though Vino obviously rode for Kazakhstan. They escaped from the pack and rode alone to the finish; along the way Vino thought Ullrich didn’t look so strong and suggested to Kloden they drop him. Kloden explained that Ullrich was their team leader, so Vino could either choose to work with them and get a silver medal or he could attack and they would make sure he got the bronze. Vino chose silver.
Ivan Basso (Italy)
Finished 7th in '03 and 3rd last year; at age 26 he was relatively young for a Tour podium. His team director Bjarne Riis won this race in '96, and has a knack for getting the best performances out of his riders. Basso has greatly improved his time trial performance since last year as shown when he won a time trial during the Giro d'Italia. He looked poised to win that race until he got puking sick in the mountains and lost huge time.
Team Phonak
Santiago Botero (Col) and Floyd Landis (USA) -- Botero is a former World time trial champion and has 3 top 10 finishes in the Tour including 4th in 2002. Floyd was a key helper of Armstrong's the past 3 years; we already know he's a strong time trialer and climber and now we may get to see what else he can do assuming Phonak paid him the big bucks to have him do more than just ride support for Botero. Their team is strong too; they finished 2nd in last year's team time trial in spite of numerous flat tires and other problems. An interesting note on Floyd -- he's from the Amish country around Lancaster PA, and when he rode his first Tour his mom didn't own a tv so she went to the neighbor's to watch.
Iban Mayo (Spain)
Finished 6th in 2003 and is an outstanding climber; last year he had a great early season only to be burnt out by the time he got to the Tour; he was the focus of some drama one day as he got spit out the back on a climb, got demoralized and tried to quit only to be urged on for more suffering by his team director -- it wasn't pretty. This year he could be a serious threat as he has been building up his conditioning to peak in July. However, expect his team to do poorly in the team time trial and leave him with a 2 minute disadvantage or more to other contenders; paradoxically, that means the others will let him escape for potential stage wins until he has made up enough time to become a threat again.
Levi Leipheimer (USA)
He's the American everyone forgets about, but he has finished 3rd in the Vuelta a Espana and has two top 10 finishes in the Tour; two years ago fractured his pelvis in the same pile-up that broke Tyler Hamilton's collarbone. He is on a team that had a poor team time trial last year; still teammate Georg Totschnig managed to finish 7th overall, so maybe they'll try to improve so Levi and Georg aren't handicapped so much.
The Liberty Seguros pair of Joseba Beloki (Spain) and Roberto Heras (Spain)
Beloki has finished on the podium 3 times and could be expected to be a contender again. But we last saw him in Le Tour in 2003 when he was lying on the road with a broken femur and Lance had to go through a field to avoid crashing into him. He started this year's Giro d'Italia with the intention of using it to train for Le Tour but ended up dropping out half way through; now it looks like his team doesn't have much confidence in him because Heras was named team leader for July. Heras has finished as high 5th place while he was one of Armstrong's helpers, but last year he joined this team and was invisible in Le Tour until he dropped out; perhaps he was training to peak in Sept when he won the Vuelta a Espana for the 3rd time. Heras is a great climber but a weak time trialer, so it will be amusing when we see their crazy team director following in time trials yelling "Venga, venga, venga" from a megaphone.
Rising Stars?:
Alejandro Valverde (Spa) -- He's only 25 and he is a good climber and time trialer as shown when finished 4th last year in the Vuelta a Espana. This is his first Tour de France and his team has other leaders so there is no pressure on him, so he could threaten for stage wins and this experience should prepare him for possible greatness in the future.
Michael Rogers -- Also 25, his 2nd place (and a minute ahead of Ullrich) recently in the 9 day Tour de Suisse suggests he has a bright future ahead of him as a stage racer. However, his team's ambitions in France lie in getting stage wins so he'll get little if any support from them.
past contenders gone:
Tyler Hamilton (USA) -- he's had some "irregularities" with new tests for doping controls and is appealing his suspension from the sport.
You can get more detailed information and daily reports here:
cyclingnews.com
or here’s a tv schedule for US viewers:
OLN tv schedule
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"Get a bicycle. You will not regret it if you live." . . . Mark Twain
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