Randall Butler Was Right About Stage 10 Blowing the Race Apart

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I read the article Randall Rides Courchevel last night on PezCyclingNews.com and really looked forward to what we were going to see this morning on OLN. Randall Butler rode the climb to the Courchevel helicopter station on Saturday and said, “This thing is gonna blow the tour apart!”

Some people thought that Lance Armstrong wouldn’t attack today, because tomorrow’s stage into Briancon has even more difficult climbs. I wasn’t sure. Although the Discovery Channel Pro Cycling Team controlled the pace into Mulhouse rather than try to win the stage, the profile of today’s stage is quite different. What makes this stage so different from the last?

Well, there are only three real mountain top finishes this year: today, Stage 14 into Ax-3 Domaines, and Stage 15 to Pla d’Adet. Anyone who’s followed the Tour during Armstrong’s reign should know that mountain top finishes have been minimized the Tour in recent years because Lance has had such an advantage in them.

So far the Tour de France is shaping up as Lance Armstrong’s Greatest Hits in the sense that he’s reusing many of the tactics that made him a six-time Tour champion in the first place. In his early Tour victories, Lance attacked in the first big mountain stage. Today Discovery attacked with a vengeance pretty early on, launching Lance into a four man breakaway that stayed away.

Alejandro Valverde of Illes Balears-Caisse d’Epargne outsprinted Armstrong to take the stage victory, winning in similar fashion to the way that Ivan Basso did in the first big mountain stage last year. Valverde and Armstrong finished with the same time, gapping Mickael Rassmussen and Francisco Mancebo. The real damage was done to the pre-race contenders:

  • Ivan Basso lost 1 minute and 2 seconds,
  • Levi Leipheimer lost 1 minute 15 seconds,
  • Andreas Kloden, Floyd Landis, and Jan Ullrich lost 2 minutes 14 seconds,
  • Santiago Botero lost 2 minutes 50,
  • Roberto Heras lost more than 10 minutes,
  • Jens Voigt, the yellow jersey in today’s race, lost 31 minutes

Mickael Rassmussen has emerged as a threat to the yellow jersey, at least as long as the race stays in the mountains. He’s currently 38 seconds behind Armstrong in the General Classification. I don’t think he’s a long term threat because he doesn’t appear to be able to time trial. Basso’s third in the G.C., 2 minutes and 40 seconds down on Armstrong. Wow.

Aren’t the tactics of the Discovery Channel Pro Cycling Team amazing?

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