Tour de France - Stage 13 ITT - July 21

Tour Website ^ | 7/21/07 | Aeronaut

[Aeronaut]

Individual time trials today. This should shake up the leader board.

[Aeronaut]

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[Aeronaut]

“Versus” TV schedule:

Stage 13: Saturday, July 21, 2007 - Albi to Albi
8:00am to 11:30am: LIVE Daily Coverage
12:00pm to 2:00pm: Race Action Replay
2:30pm to 4:30pm: Race Action Replay
5:00pm to 7:00pm: Race Action Replay
8:00pm to 11:00pm: Expanded Primetime Coverage
12:00am to 3:00am: Race Action Replay

[PeteB570]

Light rain today with water on the road. First third of the rides are riding a little cautious. Be a while before the big dogs start.

[PeteB570]

42 riders in so far. Wiggens (COF) 1h 8’ 48” and Hoste (PRL) +42”.

[laconic]

Are Oscar Perreiro and Gonchar in this year’s race? Haven’t heard a word about them.

[leilani]

Perreiro

I don't know where Gonchar went off to though. He was T-Mo, right? And really good in the TT's, IIRC?

[leilani]

Oops, Gonchar. (Sigh)

[miele man]

Does anyone know if the Tour is covered on radio, specifically on shortwave radio, and if so, which frequency? Merci.

[Vision]

I don’t know how these guys do this in the rain. The race is insane, to do it in the rain is nuts.

[laconic]

Thanks. I’d be most concerned today about hitting that rail crossing at the wrong angle in the rain; done that before on racing tires and the bike went out of control. I do not understand what is going on with the Danish authorities and German tv, who are supposedly trying to undermine the Tour. Makes no sense to me; their races could never take the place of this classic.

[Joy in the Journey]

The pictures ya’ll posted yesterday were fabulous!

Thank goodness only my 12 year-old saw thong man.

Did anyone see antler dude during the stage on Friday??? How much did those babies weigh?

C’mon, Levi—just keep it on course today. . .

[ScaniaBoy]

Hincapie is doing pretty well. Passed third time check as #3 and is starting to pick up some seconds on the leaders. However, the 15 best placed still to start....

[ScaniaBoy]

Vino has taken the lead by 10” at the first time check!!!

[Vision]

I bet those plastic disks in back tire used in time trials get heavier when wet.

[ScaniaBoy]

You are probably right, but that does not seem to stop Vino who is flying....

[PeteB570]

Vino takes the stage and Rasmussen makes the time trial ride of his life and keeps the Yellow Jersey for another day. Did you see him coughing as he put on the Yellow Jersey?

Well done riders.

[ScaniaBoy]

Yes, and as always in the Tour one wonders who will or will not be able to recover for the next day. Tomorrow it is 197 km between Mazamet and Plateau-de-Beille finsihing off with 2 haut categorie (HC) climbs. Ouch!!

[Steve_Seattle]

After stage 13, Pereiro is in 14th place, about 7 minutes off the pace, which means he's almost but not quite out of contention for the yellow jersey. Rasmussen was impressive today, his best ever time trial kept him in the lead by one minute. He actually overtook Valverde in the TT, which would have been unthinkable prior to today. Valverde and Mayo and Moreau were today's big losers.

Despite Vino's big win today, he is still somewhat off the pace with several big names in front of him, including two teammates. At some point will Astana have to align themselves behind Kloden rather than Vino? And will Disco have to work for Contador rather than Leipheimer?

Evans looked great, but I'm not sure he has the team around him to win. Astana and Discovery are both looking strong.

My question about Vino and Rasmussen is will they suffer in the mountains tomorrow because of their yeoman efforts today. VeloNews is also reporting doping allegations against Rasmussen from a former American cyclist who was buddies with the Chicken a few years ago. The story seemed credible to me, and was corroborated by a second man.

The good news is that the Tour is still wide open past the half-way mark. Based on how things stand now, Kloden looks to me like the man to beat - good position, veteran, strong team. Tomorrow will be very interesting.

[PeteB570]

I believe the allegations are from 2001.

I do find it funny that allegations attack the wearer of the Yellow Jersey so often. 2001 Blood doping? Why now. Missed/wrong fill in of location schedule and dropped from the national team? Again, Why now. The TdF director thought the timing on that last one was a little odd.

Last year Floyd L tests positive on one day only for something that should be in his system for a number of days. Here today, gone tomorrow?

Is a racing tiff between the European race organization (don’t remember it’s title) and the Tour de France organizers broken out into open warfare?