CYCLING TOUR DE FRANCE:BASTILLE DAY is still 24 hours away, but already the French have much to celebrate. Only a flint-hearted observer would point out the indifference of the major teams, who have their eyes on bigger prizes, contributed to the success of Thomas Voeckler in Perpignan on Wednesday, Brice Feillu in Andorra on Friday and yesterday's winner, Pierrick Fedrigo, a 30-year-old from Marmande in his seventh Tour who shared a long break over the Col du Tourmalet with Franco Pellizotti before outsprinting the Italian to win a Pyrenean stage that began in Saint-Gaudens and ended in the outskirts of Tarbes.
It was after reaching the 2,115 metre summit of the Tourmalet in the lead of the 1910 Tour that Octave Lapize, a 22-year-old Parisian, uttered the words which are still heard whenever the race takes to the mountains. “You are all assassins,” he shouted at the organisers, who had introduced a major climb for the first time. Lapize went on to win the race. Seven years later he took off in his Nieuport fighter one July morning to attack German planes over the Western front, and was killed.
This year’s riders passed a statue of Lapize at the top of the Tourmalet but no one was shouting at the race directors after a stage which saw the end of three days in the Pyrenees that delivered only one moment of high drama. When Alberto Contador exploded out of the peloton shortly before the mountain-top finish at Arcalis on Friday, the simmering struggle for supremacy at the heart of the Astana team, in which Contador is vying for leadership with Lance Armstrong, was laid bare.
“It’s really a battle between Alberto and me now,” Armstrong said last night after the two men had spent a second consecutive day following in each other’s wheeltracks near the front of the peloton, biding their time and allowing Rinaldo Nocentini, the Italian journeyman who claimed the yellow jersey on Friday, to continue enjoying the experience.
The obligation to defend the yellow jersey means Nocentini’s colleagues in the AG2R-La Mondiale team had to share the work at the front of the bunch with Astana, guarding against attacks by other contenders for the overall leadership. “There’s a little tension at the table,” Armstrong said. “Alberto is very strong, very ambitious, and I understand that. I’ve won this race a lot so I don’t care if I come second or third or fifth. It’s okay. I try to relax and keep the atmosphere as cool as I can.”
Asked if he would settle for his present position of third in Paris, he replied: “Probably not. No.” Could he win the Tour? “It will be difficult. But we’re in a good position after the team time trial and there are only two seconds between Alberto and me.”
“Not bad” was his verdict on the team’s performance in the first week. “Now we’re going to have three or four days that probably won’t change the classification.”
After today’s jour de repos, a series of stages passing through the Haute-Vienne, the Indre, the Cher, the Yonne, the Haute-Marne, the Vosges and the Haut-Rhin are likely to deliver more of the kind of thing seen in the last few days, including breaks made by riders who pose no threat to those at the top of the general classification, and the possibility of bunch finishes to please the sprinters.
Guardian Service
Irish rider Nicolas Roche was to the fore in the sprint and netted an excellent 10th on the stage, adding to his eighth and 12th places earlier in the Tour, writes Shane Stokes. He had spent much of the day riding for team-mate Rinaldo Nocentini but still had some gas left for the gallop, making up for a loss of time on Saturday.
“On yesterday’s stage, I had to ride on the first climb as a group of 25 riders including Andy Schleck were ahead,” he said. “I rode full gas to try to keep the gap small, then in the valley there was a lot of attacking. I did a lot of work for the team and missed being in the main group because of that. I was pretty disappointed as I think I would otherwise have been capable of aiming for a top-20 place in the general classification.
“Today I felt a lot better. I rode a bit on the Tourmalet and had a go in the sprint. I got 10th but was a bit disappointed with that – I was hoping to get a top five, but had to slam on the brakes when [Sylvain] Chavanel and [Alessandro] Ballan had a bit of a tangle. I then took maximum risks on the last bend and tried to make up some ground, but it was too late.”
Roche was fourth young rider over the line and is 50th overall and ninth in the best young rider classification. Ag2r La Mondiale remain best team in the race. Nocentini is expected to lose the jersey in the Alps and Roche feels this will enable him to chase personal goals again. “I think it is more open for me now to go in one of those breaks on the last week.”
160.5-km from Saint-Gaudens to Tarbes
1, Pierrick Fedrigo (BBOX Bouygues Telecom) 160.5 kilometres in 4 hours 5 mins 31 secs; 2, Franco Pellizotti (Liquigas) same time; 3, Oscar Freire Gomez (Rabobank) at 34 secs; 4, Serguei Ivanov (Team Katusha); 5, Peter Velits (Team Milram); 6, Jose Joaquin Rojas Gil (Caisse d’Epargne) all same time. Irish: 10, Nicolas Roche (AG2R La Mondiale) same time.
Best young rider: 1, Peter Velits (Team Milram) 4 hours 6 mins 5 secs 2, Jose Joaquin Rojas (Caisse d’Epargne) 3, Greg Van Avermaet (Silence Lotto) both same time. Irish: 4, Roche, same time.
Teams: 1, BBox Bouygues Telecom, 12 hours 17 mins 41 secs 2, Liquigas, same time 3, Team Milram, at 34 secs Other; 5, Ag2r La Mondiale, at 34 secs.
General classification: after stage 9: 1, Rinaldo Nocentini (AG2R La Mondiale); 2, Alberto Contador Velasco (Astana) at 6 secs; 3, Lance Armstrong (Astana) at 8 secs; 4, Levi Leipheimer (Astana) at 39 secs; 5, Bradley Wiggins (Garmin) at 46 secs 6, Andreas Klöden (Astana) at 54 secs; 7. Tony Martin (Germany) +1:00; 8. Christian Vande Velde (Garmin ) +1:24; 9. Andy Schleck (Luxembourg) +1:49; 10. Vincenzo Nibali (Italy, Liquigas) +1:54; 11. Luis Leon Sanchez (Caisse dEpargne) +2:16; 12. Maxime Monfort (Columbia) +2:21; 13. Fraenk Schleck (Saxo Bank) +2:25; 14. Roman Kreuziger (Liquigas ) +2:40; 15. Vladimir Efimkin (AG2R) +2:45; 16. Carlos Sastre (Cervelo) +2:52; 17. Mikel Astarloza (Euskaltel) +3:02; 18. Cadel Evans (Silence - Lotto ) +3:07; 19. Kim Kirchen (Columbia) +3:16; 20. Vladimir Karpets (Katusha) +3:49. Irish: 50, Roche, at 16 mins 45 secs.
Points classification: 1, Thor Hushovd (Cervelo Test Team) 117 pts 2, Mark Cavendish (Team Columbia — HTC) 106 3, Jose Joaquin Rojas Gil (Caisse d’Epargne) 75. Irish: 12, Roche, 38.
Mountains classification: 1, Egoi Martinez De Esteban (Euskaltel — Euskadi) 78 pts 2, Christophe Kern (Cofidis, Le Credit en Ligne) 59 3, Franco Pellizotti (Liquigas) 55.
Young rider: 1, Tony Martin (Team Columbia — HTC) 34 hours 25 mins 21 secs 2, Andy Schleck (Team Saxo Bank) at 49 secs 3, Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas) at 54 secs. Irish: 9, Roche, at 15 mins 45 secs.
Teams: 1, AG2R-La Mondiale, 101 hours 39 mins 15 secs; 2, Astana, at 3 secs; 3, Team Columbia — HTC, at 4 mins 45 secs; 4. Milram +5:20; 5. Saxo Bank +5:24; 6. Garmin +5:56; 7. Caisse dEpargne +7:05; 8. Cofidis +10:00; 9. Rabobank +11:11; 10. Francaise des Jeux +12:59.
