Tour de France 2007

one more point I wanted to make, I think Rabobank worked REALLY hard today to keep Ras in yellow. Boogard was just amazing and looked like he was in lala land when he finished. Also, Menchov was cooked. Discovery saved a TON of guys today. Thats signficant. This thing is so much about you supporting cast its ridiculous....and though Ras has the stones in the mts for sure, Contador is just incredible. If they wanted to finish Rabobank/Ras today, they would have set a higher tempo to control. As it was, Rabo did all day today. The only move i didn't understand was Popo's burst which never put Rabobank in any kind of distress. They just kept in with the tempo. That again, shows me, Brunyeel has something up his sleeve. Wed. will be fascinating to watch. Contador though better than Ras in the TT isn't going to makeup huge margins on him. It, IMO, HAS to happen on Wed. Get ready for a Pummeling in the Pyrenees! We all have lots of questions and Wed. we get to find out the answers.

It's funny how many of you seem to think that Discovery left something on the road today. Why the hell would they do that? You don't just ride around the Pyrenees thinking, yeah we could probably nail the yellow jersey today but we'll have another chance. Let's not ride ourselves out today.

Face it, Levi is done. He's got just enough to hang with Sastre but that's it. When it was his turn to attack today, he was cooked. He can't help Contador if he just sits there, but he's not strong enough to make a difference.

The only way this race is not over is if Rasmussen has a bad case of diarrhea or something on Wednesday.

Contador had an incredible time trial for him too. Contador and Ras are both pure climbers. I think both of them need time on the field to hold the possition in the last tt which I think they get watching them today drop the field like that.

Anyways about ras getting away and the field just letting him, did they just let Landis get away last year? Were they letting Michael Rodgers get that time too? remember he is a very good time trialist but had an unfortunate crash but the guys back chasing didn't know that would happen. Saying they just let him get that time is rediculous he earned every second he had going into the final climb that day he broke away it was a very gutsy ride and you have to respect when they a guy just throws the tactical guides away like that and go for it from that far out. My money is on ras wining by about 1:30 in paris over contador.

Here is how it is goin to happen. There are basically 4 climbs on the stage on Wednesday. Discover will use their men and do the best they can to break Rass. On the first climb which is by no means an easy one to start Hincappie will push the pace dropping a large amount of the field. Popo will then push the second (which isn't too bad) and the third going extremely hard up the 3rd. This one is not real long but is extremely steep. The hope by here is that Rass will be isolated and the key. Now this is where it gets interesting. Even though Levi does not have the surge to really cause a breakaway like is needed all week he has also been the one guy who hasn't been dropped on the mountains and he is one who seems to be able to grind the pedals and this is where his role comes. He will pound the bottom of the climb trying to wear out Rass and possibly also killing his own man. If he drops them both then he goes and tries for the victory (this is not likely in my opinion but could happen) with a few kilos left Contador will attack and go after it hoping the earlier climbs will have been enough to kill Rass. With all of this though Evans and Kloden have to know this is their last shot and will probably have their guys pushing the pace from the get go as well. I would not be suprised to see only the GT left and their teams after the first climbs. The key will be to try and get rid of Rass' guys early on and make him feel as though he is alone and make him have to cover move after move after move early and often. The team that has the most guys left late in the day I think will have the best shot for their GT. I would not be suprised to see Kloden possibly doing something big. He will have Vino which is a big man to have at your side. I think one of the reasons that Contador moved today so much was this. Those short bursts build up large amounts of lactic acid. The age thing and the rest day will actually play in his favor I think. Normally the day after a hard effort the stiffness is not as great as the next day. A 24 year old will handle it better than an older guy. The key will actually be the rest day and how well that helps them to both recover.

Wishful thinking, but it ain't gonna happen. Boogerd has looked indestructible and he will hang on at least as long as Popovych or Hincapie are there. And should Rasmussen find himself isolated on the last climb, then he'll just go and only Contador and Soler can hang on.

Don't listen to Liggett and Sherwen. Rasmussen was not really close to getting dropped today. I've watched it 3 times now and on each of Contador's attacks, as soon as he was done with his little anaerobic burst and sat down, Rasmussen easily caught up. Contador beats Ras in a sprint any day, but he simply cannot ride away from him. In this field, nobody can.

This is what I predict will happen. Discovery and Rabobank will each put a man down the road early for the last climbs, probably being Thomas Dekker and Sergio Paulinho/Gusev, Astana will send anyone as their domestiques seem to have been in every break this week.

The Disco and Astana teams will then sit behind the Rabobank team until only Boogerd and Menchov are left. This is where the battle begins, Kasheckin and Levi attack probably on the Col de Marie Blanque; leaving Rasmussen isolated as HE WILL have to respond to Levi. The GC contenders then sit in Rasmussen's wheel on the descent making him work, if Boogerd returns then Popovych, Savodelli and hopefully Hincapie will go to the front and make the pace high therefore taking the legs out of Boogerd leaving Rasmussen exposed.

On the final climb I expect the domestiques to try and set a pace which hurts Rasmussen, with Vino going off the front for Kloden to help in the later kilometres. I expect Cadel Evans to attack first with only Kloden, Valverde, Rasmussen and Contador able to respond (Soler would be on a long break picking up Mountain Points). After about 6 kilometres the Aubisque flattens and Kloden goes, Valverde is out the back door. Leaving Rasmussen, Evans and Contador looking at each other; Rasmussen with Levi and Kloden up the road has to respond. Contador then attacks bridging the gap to Levi. Levi then sets tempo hopefully hurting Rasmussen and Contador jumps gaining 1 minute on Rasmussen and the following time bonus for winning the stage.

This is how I see it playing out, personally would like to see Levi, Kloden, Cadel, Rasmussen, Contador go mano a mano and attack each other on the Port de Larrau and ride from there with their domestiques and other riders up the road. Why wait?

Really, save your breath. Ras will stick to Contador. That's it, end of story. Since he's the best climber anyway it's not that complicated.

what? contador is NOT a pure climber. he's a classic all-arounder and had a TT that was well within his range. he'll have another good one on Saturday, too, but it won't be enough to catch chicken unless he can get 35-45" on him on wednesday. only way that happens is with a levi attack on the penultimate climb to try and rattle rasmussen. but i don't see that happening because levi is too focused on his own close-but-not-quite podium pursuit to think about the team. levi needs to blow himself up on the penultimate climb and probably lose his GC altogether, but that's what it's gonna take for disco.

saursoor wrote:

what? contador is NOT a pure climber. he's a classic all-arounder and had a TT that was well within his range. he'll have another good one on Saturday, too, but it won't be enough to catch chicken unless he can get 35-45" on him on wednesday. only way that happens is with a levi attack on the penultimate climb to try and rattle rasmussen. but i don't see that happening because levi is too focused on his own close-but-not-quite podium pursuit to think about the team. levi needs to blow himself up on the penultimate climb and probably lose his GC altogether, but that's what it's gonna take for disco.

Yes

Yup, basically the only way Contador can catch Rasmussen is if Contador gains about 30 seconds tomorrow. I definitely not impossible. I think it'll be hard for both of them. Hard for Contador tomorrow and hard for Rasmussen on Saturday.

Either way it will be an epic duel, between the probable champion and the future champion.

right, because LeviL has the ability to shift gear so suddenly....please, if they pull that as a tactic, they won't put Ras in any distress. Discovery is going to have to attack earlier than the last climb. And good luck "rattling" Ras. He won't be. Its too late for that. They are going to have to put him in a serious state of hurt. And to me, it looked like Contador did that yesterday. A couple of times, he almost looked like he backed off when he was getting away....which was smart that late in the climb....because any advantage he would have had would have been covered on the downhill. Granted Ras isn't a great downhiller (as Sherwen keeps saying....i dont think he's that bad) but when in yellow and under fire, i would think you would take a few calculated risks on the descent. My prediction, watch for Discovery to try to put Ras in trouble relatively early. The uphill finish will be Rasmussen's achilles heel...(hard to believe that anyone is as good as Ras in the mountains, but Disco found him)

Runningart2004 wrote:

"The other 3 flat stages have only cat. 4 climbs. But, because Disco has a better team overall, than Rabobank, I'll give Contador another 30secs or so over those stages."

No, the peleton will finish in a pack over those other 3 stages. Those are basically sprinter stages. NO ONE of importance gets any time during those flat stages. Cat 3 and 4 climbs aren't climbs. Breakaways only happen on 1s and HCs, maybe 2s. So, if anyone wants to beat Rassy they have one mountain stage and one TT to do it. That's it, that's how the Tour works.

Contador was only 37 seconds ahead of Razzy in the last TT. That's NOT close to a minute. Razzy was the KOM. He's the better climber. Contador is too young. He'll fold, but he'll win it next year.

Alan

I think you might underestimating what wanting to win the Tour can do to a rider. After tomorrow everyone will be hurting. If someone simply limits their losses but doesn't loose too much time, compared to those riding all out, then on the flat stages a guy like Kloden with the help of Vino and others could attack Rasmussen. Everyone is going to see that target that Ras is wearing and not just Astana, but ALL the riders are going to try their hardest to crack him, EVERY stage that's left. If he falters even a little on the flat stages or the TT it's his race to lose.

El Guerrouj says.. wrote:

I think you might underestimating what wanting to win the Tour can do to a rider. After tomorrow everyone will be hurting. If someone simply limits their losses but doesn't loose too much time, compared to those riding all out, then on the flat stages a guy like Kloden with the help of Vino and others could attack Rasmussen. Everyone is going to see that target that Ras is wearing and not just Astana, but ALL the riders are going to try their hardest to crack him, EVERY stage that's left. If he falters even a little on the flat stages or the TT it's his race to lose.

well, they may certainly try to attack in the remaining stages, and i've no doubt they will be nervous, edgy days, but the parcours just simply does not favor gaining time on rasmussen. rasmussen has the rouleurs to pull back those attacks - and don't forget that rabobank doesn't even have to control attacks on it's own, other GC teams like disco will want to preserve their standing and, late in the stages the sprinters teams will take over to pull back any attacks.

sorry, but tomorrow is only GC chance to his rasmussen before the TT.

hmm, do you know what penultimate means?

Rasmussen is former mtb world champion, he is an excellent bike handler, and thus an excellent downhiller. His weight is hardly a concern, the descents are very technical and require balls & bike handling skills. I saw him last year near St Sorlin d' Arves on the downhill from Croix de Fer, he looked fantastic, a man possessed. He was all alone out front, the day that Landis cracked.

Leipheimer can help Contador by attacking, it's just that simple. Rabobank has been surprisingly strong defending in the mountains. Menchov as domestique along with Boogerd et al may be able to answer Discovery with Leipheimer/Popo/Hincapie/Gusev and Astana with Vino now in the role of helper for Kloden to add to an already strong support. But maybe not, we will see.

Hypnotoad, why are you so convinced that Levi is "cooked?" Although he hasn't tried to attack, he's at least been very consistent and hasn't really lost ground in the mountains except to Rasmussen and Contrador, who are obviously exceptional climbers.

I do think Rasmussen is going to be tough to beat at this point, but I do think he was hurting a bit yesterday. He was able to counter every move, but it didn't look like it came easily.

Accelerating while climbing is not Ras' strong point, but he held Contador on each of his attacks. Even after Ligget and Sherwen proclaimed that Rasmussen 'cracked'. Heck, even after the descent, Contador attacked again and Rasmussen pulled him right in, and almost went flying by him.

A lot of people seem to think that Rasmussen is cooked and Contador is somehow going to throw down like nothing else on Wednesday. Did he not just hurt himself to constantly attack Ras on Monday???

Rabobank might be a tad smoked from defending the jersey for the last week, but if Disco wants to do anything, they're gonna have to set the high pace. All Rasmussen has to do is follow. Levi's attacks aren't dangerous at all, and Ras can let Popovych do whatever he wants. And when it all comes down to it, it's going to be Contador and Rasmussen alone anyway. No one else can hold their wheels. I'll admit that Contador is very dangerous though. Had he started his attacking a little sooner, he just may have gapped Rasmussen yesterday.

how do you even watch this shit knowing that as soon as you get excited about a rider he will test positive. Get rid of testing and let's just watch. Let them dope legally under doc supervision and let's watch some good riding without wondering who will be nabbed. Vino is just a cock bag. Ugh I can't stand this crap any more.

Wow Vino got caught. Another sad day for cycling.

myboyblue wrote:

Wow Vino got caught. Another sad day for cycling.

Wow...can't wait to see how energy Phil and Paul spend trying to ignore it.

The only upside is that viewership may actually go up as the common Joe might want to see why everyone is doped.

Is Contador next? The only ones amongst the leaders that seem human are Evans, Leipheimer, Kloden and Sastre. Iban Mayo is looking pretty drug free these days also.

Did you see the article about the president of the UCI hoping Rasmussen doesn't win? This sport is on the verge of being cooked. Can't wait til they try to clean up the NFL...