I know, it's not really beer related. But what the hell.
2005 Final Standings
Yellow Jersey: Lance ARMSTRONG - Discovery
Green Jersey: Thor HUSHOVD - Credit Agricole
Polka-dot Jersey: Mickael RASMUSSEN - Rabobank
White Jersey: Yaroslav POPOVYCH - Discovery
Overall Team: TEAM T-MOBILE
Then again, maybe not. Rabobank dropped to 8th place in the team standings. Ouch.
Speaking of ouch, I think Vino was definitely "wearing the mask of pain" today. This is the look of a guy who lost over 5 minutes to Lance...
Ullrich doesn't appear to be wearing the mask of pain. He appears to be wearing the mask of "I can't believe this a**hole is going to crush me again!"
Possible caption should be:
And I'm going to do it again tomorrow!
Or, "I can't believe you suckers believed that our team was in trouble! I so want to play poker with you guys!"
Although that's a little long for a caption.
"Well, it's Darwin time in the Tour. No place to hide, the weak are being culled from the heard(sic), just like in a show from... the Discovery Channel! Hey, I get it now!"
See what we missed with DailyPeloton being down? :)
"Ullrich looks like he's getting his prostate checked, poor man."
"Ullrich dying a thousand deaths on his bike, trying to claw up the climb."
More quotes from DP, go read the whole thing, my sides hurt.
holy christ....are some of the prerace favorites just screwed!!!
A lot of racing left..but today had to be a major stake in the heart against some of the best...
And we still have a beyond category climb yet to come today.
I started sweating just looking at the map.
Dario Frigo (ITA-FAS) won't start the race. He has been arrested by the police after drugs were discovered in a car driven by his wife.
Somebody else got booted yesterday because he failed the drug test. Dumbasses.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2841-1692409,00.html
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same guy??
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somewhere I read 3yrs for doping drugs...holy cow...
Different guy, Evgeni Petrov. He actually failed the blood test.
http://sports.yahoo.com/sc/news;_ylc=X3oDMTBpcWU3ZWcyBF9TAzk1OTEyNTc0BHNlYwN0aA--?slug=ap-tourdefrance-petrov&prov=ap&type=lgns
Did Vinokourov let Botero catch him to improve his slipstream? I haven't watched enough to know all the chess match games...
Alexandre Vinokourov outsprints Santiago Botero to win the stage in Briancon. Armstrong crosses the finish line 1m15s behind the winner.
[Edited by on Jul 13, 2005 at 08:11am.]
I think Botero is a better downhiller than Vino is. During the previous descents, Vino hung at the back of the pack and didn't seem to go as fast as the rest of his group did.
I might have to buy the DVD when it comes out, so I can watch the whole thing. I'm missing too much being at damn work all the time. :)
This Saturday and Sunday morning they're showing live Tour coverage at 7:30am in The Riverview Theater. It's pretty cool, and it's free. The owner does this for a lot of local sporting events, like Gopher and Wild playoff games.
[Edited by on Jul 13, 2005 at 06:36pm.]
Hunh. That's pretty early to be venturing outside the home in public on a weekend. :)
Beltran has abandoned. He crashed, aggravated an existing knee injury, and whacked his head. Sucks.
Looks like it could be a french victory on Bastille Day. If Moncoutie can hold on he'll be a national hero.
Moncoutie held on. He'll have no trouble getting laid in France from here on.
The bigger news of the day is that Tom Boonen withdrew from the race this morning. He was the clear leader of the green jersey, but now it will fall to Thor Hushovd. Hushovd yesterday had 128 points and third place O'Grady had 109. Both have picked up a handful today, but not enough to move Thor out of the jersey. Interesting...
French Winners On Bastille Day
Since 1947, 14 French riders have won a stage of the Tour de France on the national holiday for Bastille Day. Those winners are:
Emile Idée in 1949 in Nîmes
Jean Robic in 1953 in Luchon
Jacques Vivier in 1954 in Vannes
Jean Bourles in 1957 in Ax-les-Thermes
Jacques Anquetil in 1961 in Périgueux and in a time trial in Paris in 1964
Roger Pingeon in 1968 in Albi
Raymond Delisle in 1969 in Luchon
Bernard Thévenet in 1970 in La Mongie and again in 1975 in Serre-Chevalier
Bernard Labourdette in 1971 in Gourette
Mariano Martinez in 1980 in Morzine
Vincent Barteau in 1989 in Marseille
Laurent Jalabert in 1995 in Mende and again in 2001 in Colmar
Laurent Brochard in 1997 in Loudenvielle
Richard Virenque in 2004 in Saint-Flour.
[Edited by on Jul 14, 2005 at 07:37am.]
and everyone of them has gotten laid for life..
No. 2 finisher today was French as well.
Hope Disco will be okay in the mountains without Beltran.
Special surprise today, Richard Virenque was the presenter for the polka dot jersey. Virenque won the thing 7 times and is a cycling legend.
And he got busted for having a moving pharmacy in the wife's car too! Whee.
Yep, too bad about Beltran. This will be the first time since 2001 that Discovery/US Postal has not finished with all 9 riders.
does that mean they can't win the team event???
I don't think so, but I'm not sure how that works for the team award.
Nothing about the team contest here, but good info about the remaining jerseys:
Scoring the Tour: What do the colored jerseys mean?
Active.com
June 22, 2005
The guy with the fastest time wins the Tour de France -- it's a pretty simple scoring system.
Well, not exactly.
The rider with the lowest cumulative time from Stage 1 to Stage 20 wins, but along the way a lot of things happen, making it easy to get boggled by all the talk about differently colored jerseys, inter-race competitions and time deficits.
In addition to the yellow jersey -- signifying the overall race leader -- there are also the polka dot, green and white jersey competitions. Confused? Don't be. We've simplified the process with a "Scoring the Tour for Dummies" guide.
Tour for dummies article
Good stuff about climbing categories here too:
In general terms, Category 4 climbs are short and easy. Category 3 climbs last approximately 5 kilometers (3.1 miles), have an average grade of 5 percent, and ascend 150 meters (500 feet). Category 2 climbs are the same length or longer at an 8 percent grade and ascend 500 meters (1,600 feet). Category 1 climbs last 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) with an average 6 percent grade and ascend 1,500 meters. Beyond category climbs include an altitude difference of at least 1,000 meters (3,280 feet) from start to finish and have an average grade of at least 7 percent.
A 1 percent grade means a road ascends 1 meter (3.28 feet) for every 100 meters (328 feet) it advances.
Chris Horner has a chance...
Horner and Chavanel are now 10s ahead of the remnants of the breakaway and 25s ahead of the pack with less than 10k to go.
Chavanel and Horner are still in the clear. The remnants of the breakaway has been caught by the peloton, 25s behind the two leaders.
5k to go for the two leaders. The peloton is 15s in the rear.
Horner finishes in 10th place. :)
Stage Results:
1. McEwen
2. O'Grady
3. Rodriguez
4. Trenti
5. Hushovd
6. Geslin
7. Förster
8. Backstedt
9. Bortolami
10. Horner.
The peloton toyed with them in the last kilometers. Bastards. Caught them at the line.
what I read is they screwed up by not starting their sprint until the real sprinters showed...
A few gems from Locutus at dailypeloton.com
On Thor Hushovd:
Now, watching a big guy like Hushovd "attack" in the mountains is not pretty... I keep getting the image of the Big Engine that Might Not...
On Stuart O'Grady:
Stuey has emerged as the biggest threat to Hushovd, and watching these two duel up the climbs today for a sprinting competition was kind of like watching pigs try to ice skate.
On David Moncoutie:
But on Bastille Day, Moncoutie stormed his own fortress and made himself a national hero. He'll never have to buy a beer in France again.
they drink beer in france???
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cool...I learn something everyday...---this is a beer folder...
omg - you guys are all CUTTERS!
Who the fuck is Randy Rust? I ask in the midst of my inebriation...
Randy Rust, medallion hunter extraordinaire!
Great stage today! Lots of interesting things happened, but most of them have been covered to death. The big story is that Lance was isolated early as T-mobile put on attack after attack. The rest of the Discovery team seemed to fade away and left their leader alone, similar to the first climbing stage in the Alps. Which makes me wonder, is this a strategy? Perhaps Lance, knowing he is strong enough to go it alone on any one stage, knowingly gives his guys a "day off" from protecting him when they first enter the mountains. This would allow the team to be fresher and ready to help him through the next few stages of climbs. Either that or Discovery is not quite as strong as we've been led to believe.
Speaking of T-mobile, what in the world is their strategy?? They led out early, with Kloden, Ullrich and Vinokourov working together to attack Lance. And it paid off, T-mobile moved into first place in the overall team classification today, edging out team CSC. But, on the second to last climb Vino fell off the back, unable to keep pace with the leaders. However, Vino isn't one to give up. He descended like a madman and caught the lead group as they approached the final climb. Not only did he catch them, but he kept on riding and attacked, breaking away from the group. But for reasons known only to T-mobile, Kloden and Ullrich lead the group out and hunted down their own teammate's break. This seemed to completely deflate Vino, who ultimately finished in 11th place. Look for Vino to abandon team T-mobile sometime in the next 6 months, possibly to join Discovery.
And today, fantastic stage. Gorgeous George scores his first TDF stage win, Lance maintains the yellow and puts time on everyone but Basso - great fun.
Hope that wasn't a spoiler for you, Frosti - remembered you were out sailing and didn't catch the morning showing.
Here's a nice quote showing the pain Lance, Basso, & Ulrich were bringing:
"Not having his best day was American Floyd Landis, who finished 19th, 9:34 behind Hincapie. "I don't even know what happened," he said. "I was cross-eyed the entire last mountain. I was dropped on the second-to-last climb. It was just Lance and Ullrich and Basso and the rest of us trying to get back on in the descent. Everyone pretty much just rode their own speed up the last climb. Nothing anybody can do then. [The pace] was out of hand.""
Not a spoiler at all, I haven't been on the computer all day. But I agree, a great day for Disco and The Big Hink. First time since 1999 that any teammate of Lance's has been allowed to win a stage. And surely nobody deserves it more than Georgie Boy.
Did you see the crowds on those climbs?? It was complete madness. One spectator even got ran over by one of the media motorcycles, and it happened probably 2 feet from some of the cyclists. I was more nervous about the crowds than any of the other riders today.