I know I’m not the only American who likes the Tour de France… but there aren’t many of us! Since the readers of this blog are typically more “cultured” than the general population… I’m probably OK to keep posting about “le Tour”.
Anyway… after what could only be called (in very technical cycling terms) a DISASTER in stage 16… Floyd Landis had the ride of his life and this tour and perhaps of ANY tour in stage 17… you can read about it here if you are interested… but I’ll spare you the details in this post except to say that he went out alone on the first climb and no one ever caught him… such a thing is VERY rare in professional cycling.
He made up nearly all the time he lost on stage 16 and then today… stage 19… he made up the rest of the time and he is now nearly 1 minute ahead of his closest rival with only one stage to go. As long as his hip doesn’t give up completely (Landis suffers from the same hip problem which forced Bo Jackson into retirement) he’ll be at the top of the podium on Sunday.
Congrats to Landis… this will make the 8th time in a row that an American has won the Tour. Landis is a great rider in his own right… but now he’ll always be able to say to his grandkids: “Yup… over an 8 year period, either Lance or I won every Tour!”
Kinda like that time Chicago Bulls forward Stacy King said “I’ll always remember it as the night Michael Jordan and I combined to score seventy points.” Jordan got 69 and King (a rookie) made a free throw.
2 responses so far ↓
1 [don furnaloni] // Jul 22, 2006 at 5:53 pm
my forwarding agents told me today that Lance would be riding through iowa for ragbraix (i dont know how its spelled). anyway, people can pay money to ride with him. if i were back in iowa, i would get a moped and ride next to him. maybe try to get a picture with Lance, much like that moped pic of me and you…
2 Sean Chaffee // Jul 27, 2006 at 1:07 pm
I hope the latest accusations aren’t true.
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