Thursday, July 21, 2005

 

TdF Stage 18

LIBERTY RIDER WINS A YAWNER. On hot, muggy day and with most of the spoils of the race divied up, the contestants of the Tour de France completed a rather uneventful 189 km jaunt from Albi to Mende. A 10-rider breakaway group got well clear of the peloton and out of this group a Spanish rider from the Liberty-Seguros team, Marcos Serano, attacked his breakaway compatriots and won stage 18.

ULLRICH CLOSING IN ON RASMUSSEN. Of particular note in the stage: Jan Ullrich was able to pick up a little time from current General Classification third-place rider Michael Rasmussen. Ullrich, currently in fourth place, is now just 2'12" behind Rasmussen. This is pointing toward a very interesting individual time trial on Saturday. Ullrich is a former time trial world champion and he could very well ride himself into third place--possibly second place--with a great TT. Rasmussen and current second-place holder Ivan Basso have questionable capabilities in time trialing. Basso was 2oth (-1'26" behind) and Rasmussen was 174th (-3'14" behind) in the stage 1 individual time trial.

JUST ONE MORE STAGE, LANCE. Whatever happens with changes in the top ten on Saturday's stage-20 individual time trial, I am looking for Lance Armstrong to best them all and win his only stage of this year's tour and his last stage in any Tour de France.

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