A plethora of small items after stage 13
The hopes that the cat 1 & 2 climbs in stage 13 would shake things up among the contenders fizzled out. There was no change today, except for Levi Leipheimer dropping out because of a broken wrist. That sucks. It's also the second time in his career he crashed out of the Tour. Vuelta for Levi in September?
Rinaldo Nocentini still has the yellow jersey. He's had it more days than Cancellara did, if you can believe it.
Despite the lack of yellow jersey drama today, two jerseys changed hands today. The mountains relegated Mark Cavendish to the autobus, but THOR! stayed in the peloton and was 6th to the line, good for 15 points to Cavendish's goose egg. THOR! now has a 5 pt. lead. There aren't a lot of sprint finished remaining; it might still be a close race on the last day.
The polka dot jersey moved from Egoi Martinez to Franco Pellizotti. Franco leads 98-95, and the third place guy is 60 points back. Pellizotti was a tad bit stronger than Martinez on all the little climbs in stage 12 and a lot stronger on stage 13. I was thinking that it would be ironic that a Euskaltel rider finally getting the KoM jersey would cough it up as soon as the race got to the Alps, but Egoi did one better and lost it before the Alps.
I don't care how much the TV commentators kiss his butt, Sylvain Chavanel is weak.
Finally, more fun from Bernard Hinault. ESPN reports from an interview he gave with L'Equipe. "I couldn't care less about Armstrong. If he's at the Tour or not, it changes nothing. We have nothing in common. There's also the language barrier, so we've never been able to speak man to man," Hinault said. "He would have impressed me if at the height of his career, he raced the Giro [d'Italia], the classics. He is the champion of the Tour, nothing more."
OK, this is really, really similar to my translation of his previous interview. I've never even met Hinault, and I'm no psychologist, but it's almost like he ghost-wrote that post for me. Hinault is definitely a petty and bitter man who is either a pathological liar or delusional. Over the years Armstrong learned French. He's not great at it, but I've seen him answer questions in French in post-race interviews. All those years when Lance was winning stages and yellow jerseys, Hinault was there shaking his hand and chatting with him at the presentations.
There's no denying that Lance didn't race the Giro or Vuelta while winning all those Tours, but it's not as though he's unique in that. Can you name anyone who contends for multiple Grand Tours in the same season. In the last 20 years only 3 men have won two Grand Tours in the same year and one of them (Marco Pantani) was caught doping shortly thereafter. But planning to skip one Grand Tour to focus on another isn't new. Eddy Mercks used to do it back in the 60s & 70s.
And as for Armstrong only being champion of the Tour, nothing more (like that's no significant accomplishment!), someone should tell Hinault that Armstrong also won The Tour of Switzerland, the Dauphine Libere, the World Championship, the Fleche Wallon, and the San Sebastian Classic.
Hinault is such a putz.
Rinaldo Nocentini still has the yellow jersey. He's had it more days than Cancellara did, if you can believe it.
Despite the lack of yellow jersey drama today, two jerseys changed hands today. The mountains relegated Mark Cavendish to the autobus, but THOR! stayed in the peloton and was 6th to the line, good for 15 points to Cavendish's goose egg. THOR! now has a 5 pt. lead. There aren't a lot of sprint finished remaining; it might still be a close race on the last day.
The polka dot jersey moved from Egoi Martinez to Franco Pellizotti. Franco leads 98-95, and the third place guy is 60 points back. Pellizotti was a tad bit stronger than Martinez on all the little climbs in stage 12 and a lot stronger on stage 13. I was thinking that it would be ironic that a Euskaltel rider finally getting the KoM jersey would cough it up as soon as the race got to the Alps, but Egoi did one better and lost it before the Alps.
I don't care how much the TV commentators kiss his butt, Sylvain Chavanel is weak.
Finally, more fun from Bernard Hinault. ESPN reports from an interview he gave with L'Equipe. "I couldn't care less about Armstrong. If he's at the Tour or not, it changes nothing. We have nothing in common. There's also the language barrier, so we've never been able to speak man to man," Hinault said. "He would have impressed me if at the height of his career, he raced the Giro [d'Italia], the classics. He is the champion of the Tour, nothing more."
OK, this is really, really similar to my translation of his previous interview. I've never even met Hinault, and I'm no psychologist, but it's almost like he ghost-wrote that post for me. Hinault is definitely a petty and bitter man who is either a pathological liar or delusional. Over the years Armstrong learned French. He's not great at it, but I've seen him answer questions in French in post-race interviews. All those years when Lance was winning stages and yellow jerseys, Hinault was there shaking his hand and chatting with him at the presentations.
There's no denying that Lance didn't race the Giro or Vuelta while winning all those Tours, but it's not as though he's unique in that. Can you name anyone who contends for multiple Grand Tours in the same season. In the last 20 years only 3 men have won two Grand Tours in the same year and one of them (Marco Pantani) was caught doping shortly thereafter. But planning to skip one Grand Tour to focus on another isn't new. Eddy Mercks used to do it back in the 60s & 70s.
And as for Armstrong only being champion of the Tour, nothing more (like that's no significant accomplishment!), someone should tell Hinault that Armstrong also won The Tour of Switzerland, the Dauphine Libere, the World Championship, the Fleche Wallon, and the San Sebastian Classic.
Hinault is such a putz.
posted by uberschuck at 8:45 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home