Tour de France Through Stage 4 — All You Really Need To Know
There’s little exciting about a time trial unless you’re the guy on the bike. For fans, it’s just “there goes one, there goes another.”
But we all know the Tour actually started today. Everything before has been about pageantry and trying not to fall off the bike or otherwise embarrass yourself with stinkin’ thinkin’ (ahem, Menchov).
Not to dwell further, we’ll break this down for you quickly into a Time Trial recap and some sage prognostication that will keep you sounding like a savant around the bikeshop — and quite possibly finance your kids’ college education if you put down some spare change as we suggest.
Stage 4 Time trial recap. Let’s break the results into four easy-to-understand categories.
Category 1 - “So Nervous I Soiled Myself And Stank Up The Road”
CSC’s Carlos Sastre needed to to limit his losses on this day - he’s a supposed mountains guy, after all, not a time trialer - except when he time trials okay, but that’s another matter - to keep up the charade that he’s a serious GC podium threat.
Instead, he pedaled either softly or backwards or one-legged and finished the stage almost 2 minutes behind Schumacher, and more importantly lost more than a minute on names like Cadel Evans, Kim Kirchen, Denis Menchov, Jens Voight, VandeVelde, and Hincapie (whom, collectively, we’ll call “good riders”).
Now Carlos sits 23rd in the GC and if I were Riis I’d change my name - oops, sorry, I drifted for a moment - I’d tell Carlos to ride his legs off for the rest of the tour AS WATERBOY AND WINDBREAK FOR JENS VOIGT, his teammate sitting quite nicely in 12th and mere seconds down on the overall leaders.
More about Jens in a moment, and in a prettier light.
Alejandro Valverde also needed to limit his losses, but wait, he IS A GREAT TIME TRIALER and just won the Dauphene, so to hell with that — he should have been looking for a top 5 on today’s stage, and nothing less.
Instead, he rode virtually sitting up and came in 23rd on the day, earning himself an embarrassing 17th position in the GC, where presumably he’ll become handmaiden for teammate Jose Ivan Gutierrez who managed to bring his A-Game today. More about Ivan below.
Roman Feillu - All that yellow on his jersey made his bowels loose, big time. But don’t worry about seeing a repeat performance — as far as Versus is concerned, you’ve heard the last of him in this year’s Tour.
Category 2 - Good Day, Sure, But Do You Simply Not Want To Win?
Cadel “Surprise, I got second!” Evans has applied for a patent on the strategy of nearly winning every stage, but not winning any of them. Someday they’ll say he’s nearly the best there never was.
David Millar - Okay, Davey, you can’t toss the bike this time. Third place is fine for anyone else, but this is your event and you got beat (soundly) by Kirchen and Schumacher. Any comments, or would you rather get back on your anti-doping high-horse and ride into the sunset?
Category 3 - Clearly Didn’t Bring Their A-Game
Fabian “My Chainring Is Bigger Than Your Car Tire” Cancellaria - 58 teeth? And high revs? What planet do you come from? Anyway, you were in first place for a few moments. Great ride but we expected one that would stand the test of time.
Ricardo “I Left Everything But My Mouth At The Tour of Italy” Ricco — Maybe riding for Rock Racing next year? Seems to have right amount of attitude, trash talk, and ability to deliver mediocre performances.
Frank Schleck “There I was, wandering peacefully in the woods” …and getting 46th on the day. You’ve got a competitive spirit that screams for retirement living. Now get up front with Carlos and help pull for Andy and Jens!
Category 4 - Look At Me, Ma, I’m Riding!
Stephan Schumacher taught a course in time trialing to prodigal students named Cancellara, Evans, and Millar — three guys who already know how the basics. What got into this man? Let’s just hope it’s all him.
Jens Voight brought a jumbo can of whoopass with him and rode like it was exploding in his own pocket! The hardest working guy who ever plopped butt on a bike seat notched a 7th place performance, completing the course only 2 seconds behind world time trial champ Cancellara.
In short, we want to party with this guy sometime!
Jose Ivan Gutierrez gave teammate and supposed Tour favorite Valverde a little lesson of his own in how to time trial, coming in 12th on the day and now sitting pretty at #10 in the overall GC. Bravo!
Kim Kirchen - a teammate of our beloved Mr. Hincapie who copped 9th place on the day himself - has been on a tear since the Tour started. He’s always challenging for stage wins. As we’ve said from the start — keep an eye on this guy.
Kirchen grabbed second place for the second time in four tour stages, and you’ve gotta think the new sponsors are quite pleased.
Ivan Gutierrez will presumably now be asking Valverde to fetch him bottles from the team car, after showing his boss how to ride a time trial like you mean it.
If you watched the stage on Versus, you almost didn’t hear the name Andy Schleck, but that’s their mistake.
The youngster came in 20th on the day and now sits 18th overall, less than a minute and a half from overall leader Schumacher and about a minute back from Evans.
We keep saying Andy’s packing some fireworks in his jersey pockets and plans to toss fire crackers at Cadel on the slopes.
Note to big brother Frank: You’re now working for Andy. That’s a good lad.
Denis “I Promise I’ll Never Loaf At Back Of Peleton Again” Menchov made partial reparations for yesterday’s brainfart that cost him 38 seconds and possibly next year’s contract.
At 6th place on the day, he essentially proved he can run with all the big dogs — so long as he doesn’t get distracted by any shiny objects or have to think too much. Maybe he could be president of a big country, if you know what I mean, but he’s not showing enough IQ to win the Tour.
Now for the fun….More Brilliant Prognostications!
No need ticking off our bets from yesterday and before….you already know we’re amazingly near 100% with every prediction to date. Who else can say that?
Our biggest disappointment thus far was to depend on Fabian Cancellara to win today’s TT. What can we say — he let you down and owes all of you a sincere apology.
Going into tomorrow’s Stage 5, the Tour’s longest stage, we anticipate Stage 3 all over again. As a matter of fact, Versus will probably just replay footage from Monday and we’ll be none the wiser.
Anyhow, expect early breakaways, attacks, and the pack giving some leash — but less than they did on Stage 3.
The favorites will be resting up from the TT, except Sastre and Valverde who rested during it, but we expect some strong guys to try to go with the attacks and hope to stay away.
Could Andy Schleck or Jens Voight be among them — it would be surprising if Riis kept them both bottled up all day. Also keep an eye on guys like Devolder, Lang, Pozzato, and anyone else sitting in 20th-50th place and hoping for a Periero-like gift from the peleton.
Otherwise, the real fireworks begin in coming days as we start climbing and see who really wants to shake up the GC.
That’s it for now. Feel free to leave a comment below and we’ll respond lickety-split.
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