Armstrong attacks in Alps
COURCHEVEL, France – Lance Armstrong is wearing yellow again and talking as if he wants to keep the famous jersey for good this time.
The Tour de France hit the high Alps Tuesday. It is where Armstrong has historically ridden his best, and where he loves to leave his challengers behind – which is exactly what the six-time defending champion did.
The 33-year-old Texan, hoping to win one final Tour before he retires, finished second in Stage 10 to reclaim first place overall.
Armstrong finished less than a wheel behind Alejandro Valverde, a 25-year-old Spaniard tabbed by many as cycling’s next charismatic star. Both covered the 111-mile ride in 4 hours, 50 minutes and 35 seconds.
Overall, Armstrong leads Denmark’s Mickael Rasmussen by 38 seconds. Ivan Basso, last year’s third-place finisher, is third again, 2:40 behind. Frenchman Christophe Moreau is fourth, 2:42 behind.
Meanwhile, Armstrong’s top challengers, men who had proclaimed themselves ready and eager to take Armstrong’s yellow jersey while the retiring American was still racing, have fallen far behind.
Jan Ullrich, the 1997 champion and a five-time runner-up, is eighth, 4:02 behind. His T-Mobile teammate, Andreas Kloeden, who was runner up last year, is ninth, 4:16 back. Alexandre Vinokourov, a third-place finisher two years ago who was suggesting he should be the T-Mobile team leader, came in 6:32 behind Armstrong and is in 16th place. He had been fifth going into the day.
By the time Armstrong and Valverde roared through the snaking roads of this ski station at an altitude of more than 6,000 feet, the most danger came from uncontrollable fans running into the road and hindering the riders with their flags. Rasmussen shoved one of them aside.
“Today I had good legs,” Armstrong said. “We’re in a good position now with regard to the main rivals so maybe we’ll have to protect that. It might mean protecting the yellow jersey and hopefully retiring it. We’ll see.”
Armstrong certainly seems in shape to keep the jersey from now until the end.
First, he dropped Vinokourov and Bobby Julich, who had been fifth and sixth going into Tuesday’s racing. At the beginning of the final 13.8-mile climb, Julich, from Glenwood, Colo., and Vinokourov, from Kazakhstan, began riding as if they were carrying logs on their backs.
Ullrich had rivulets of sweat hanging from his lip and looked glassy-eyed while staring at nothing but Armstrong’s back. His legs were pumping, but his bike barely moved. Kloeden couldn’t raise his head. He just followed Ullrich.
“We were really looking forward to today’s stage,” Ullrich said. “But it was too much for my legs.”
Ullrich said his ribs hurt from a crash Sunday. “But it didn’t matter,” he said. “I would have lost 2 minutes anyway.”
Jens Voigt, who held the yellow jersey at the start of the stage, fell five minutes behind, then 10, 15, 17. … The more Voigt pedaled, the longer the road seemed to grow. He’s in 72nd place, 29:23 behind Armstrong.
Basso, the Italian from CSC whose team director, Bjarn Riis, had engaged in some gamesmanship over the first week of the Tour de France, was on Armstrong’s back for a while. But in the final pull, Basso dropped away too.
The only men left with Armstrong in the final few kilometers were former mountain bike champion Rasmussen, who won last Saturday’s stage, and two Spaniards from the Illes Balears team, Valverde and Francisco Mancebo.
Armstrong said the hard work had been done earlier by his hard-riding and maligned Discovery Channel teammates. After last Saturday’s stage, when Armstrong found himself unprotected on an ending climb, whispers had begun. Maybe the lieutenants had lost their fight.
Riis suggested Discovery Channel had also benefited from good luck, especially when CSC’s David Zabriskie crashed during the final moments of last Tuesday’s team time trial.
“We’re not the team that says a guy that has won the Tour de France six times is lucky again to take the yellow jersey,” Armstrong said. “How can you say those things? At the end of the day we have to race against the riders, not the director, and the riders are some of the classiest guys in the peloton when you talk about Voigt, Julich, Basso … great guys. But for sure, I can’t lie. I saved that one on the hard drive when I read it.”
Armstrong praised his youngest teammate, Yaroslav Popovych, 25.
Popovych had crashed on a big descent Tuesday, but it was Popovych who was the last Discovery Channel rider escorting Armstrong.
The U.S. team led the peloton almost all day. Pavel Padrnos, Manuel Beltran and Benjamin Noval took turns up front before peeling off. Jose Luis Rubiera and Paolo Savoldelli moved up, worked hard and moved back. Jose Azevedo came next, then George Hincapie jumped up. Finally, only Popovych was left.
With about 12 kilometers left, Armstrong leaned over and spoke to Popovych. “I told him to go hard,” Armstrong said. “And he did. Almost too fast. It was almost a sprint.”
It was that move that dropped all but six riders, including Armstrong.
When Basso couldn’t keep up, Armstrong talked to the three riders left.
“I was trying to get everybody to keep riding because I had heard the time gaps between Jan and certain other guys, Basso,” Armstrong said. “I told them anybody who is in the front of this climb today has to be considered a contender so it was in their interest to ride as hard as they could, to put as much time into Ullrich as possible because he’s going to catch them in the Pyrenees and the final time trial.
“I was trying everything. I used all the best (stuff) I had to get them to ride.”
Typical Armstrong, thinking ahead. He was relentless. Get the minutes today. Get some more tomorrow.
After Armstrong called him a great hope for the future, Valverde gave a teary thumbs up to the afternoon.
“I had a dream to win a stage,” Valverde said, “and I did. Now I stand with the guy who won the race six times and that’s another dream.”
When Armstrong won his first tour in 1999 it was his stage win up to Sestrieres in the Italian Alps that cemented his hold on the yellow jersey he’d won the day before in a time trial. In 2000, he raced up Hautacam in a breathtaking display of strength that has become famous.
The next year, Armstrong and his team director, Johan Bruyneel, concocted the “possum play” – in which Armstrong acted as if he were struggling up l’Alpe d’Huez, until Ullrich thought the stage was won. That’s when Armstrong shot ahead and gave one last look over his shoulder to the stunned and beaten Ullrich.