Michael Rasmussen and Alberto Contador put their stamp on this stage, declaring once and for all their dominance in the mountains on this year's Tour de France, with Contador winning the stage for Team Discovery Channel and Rasmussen putting huge gaps on all other riders for the overall victory, making him the odds-on favorite to win this year's Tour, even with 1 more long individual time trial remaining. And Vino's great surge yesterday? Gone. He didn't finish within 20 minutes of Contador's blistering race-winning pace. What a stage.
Two HC climbs concluded Stage 14, and at the start of the second one, the Plateau de Beille, a five-man breakaway group still had about a 3 minute advantage over the peloton. The peloton had already by then been whittled to about a 25 man group, with Vino the only favorite not part of the festivities. He just didn't have it in him today after yesterday's great effort and no one on Team Astana attempted to keep him up with the leaders. There's a chance he may retire from the race tomorrow. Astana did have something to cheer about early, though, as Toni Colom took off from the breakaway group and put a big gap on the rest of them, holding the lead up most of the final mountain. The other riders were one by one eaten up by the charging remainder of the peloton.
Team Discovery had a few cards to play too, though, and they put Yaroslav Popovych - who is having by far his best Tour ever - at the front of the race, pressing hard up the mountain and shedding major favorites from the lead chase group. Alejandro Valverde dropped off, joined by teammate Oscar Pereiro, Iban Mayo, and then later... somewhat shockingly, yesterday's 3rd-place finisher, Astana teammate Andreas Kloden, dropped off. A select group of exactly 9 riders were holding on until Popovych finally gave way to attacks by first, his teammate Levi Leipheimer and then teammate Contador, along with race leader Rasmussen. Dropped from the select group was Astana's last challenger Andrey Kasheckin. Only 6 men remained in the elite group -- Rasmussen, Contador, Leipheimer, Cadel Evans, Mauricio Soler, and CSC (and Vague Space) team leader Carlos Sastre.
Rasmussen and Contador started trading attacks and only Evans could stay with them, as Leipheimer, Sastre, and Soler could not keep pace with the accelerations. Rasmussen kept turning off the engine when he saw Evans with them, though, as his only goal on the stage appeared to be to take time from Evans - 1:00 back in 2nd place coming into the stage - needing more distance between them before the final ITT. Eventually Sastre pulled the group back together, and Soler used the opportunity to attack hard. Since he was the only one of the group of 6 who was not an overall contender, everyone let him go, until eventually, Contador went after them. The chase group, led by Sastre, slowly followed, breezing past Soler, who had been passed by Contador. But the accelerations left Evans behind for the first time of the day, and only Rasmussen could catch up with Contador. Seeing his main rival in trouble, Rasmussen put the pressure on and Contador, trying to win the stage for Team Discovery, worked with him, and they began to move away from the original pack of 6. They were only 30 seconds behind still soloing Toni Colom for the stage lead.
The four chasers were organized and doing well, but soon Evans could not hang on and dropped back. Sastre, Leipheimer, and Soler were doing their best, but the Rasmussen/Contador pairing proved unstoppable. They passed Colom with about 3 km to go to the top of the mountain (and the end of the race). Then with about 1.5 km to go, Contador stopped working with the Dutchman, hoping to conserve to win the stage. Rasmussen had to press forward to gain overall time, and did so begrudgingly, but kept the pressure on. Behind them, Soler took off and Sastre/Leipheimer could not keep up, but Evans was dropping further back, caught at around the 4 km mark by the Kloden/Kascheckin group. Team Caisse D'Epargne (Pereiro, Valverde, and David Arroyo) were the next group on the mountain, but several minutes behind. There was no sign of any other racers.
At the finish, Rasmussen did his best to win the stage (admitting afterward he really wanted the stage win - doesn't this guy realize he's the odds-on favorite to win the overall race now - stop going for stages!), but Contador wheeled around him easily and took home the victory for Discovery, its first of this year's Tour (first since Lance retired?) The win in the Pyrenees at the edge of Spain was especially exciting for Contador, who moved up into 2nd overall and will not only win this year's White Jersey for best young rider, but has a very strong chance to finish on the podium in Paris. An amazing revelation for Discovery.
His teammate Leipheimer broke off from Sastre in the final km, nearly catching Soler at the line for third, finishing only :40 back of Contador. A great ride for the top American, and he has shown incredible form so far, but I don't think his time trialing skills are all that great and he is certainly not the climber of Rasmussen or Contador's skill, so I don't know how he'll make up the gap to try to win overall, without a major slipup by Rasmussen. He is in 4th overall, though. Sastre ended in 5th, at 53 seconds back, but with even worse ITT skills than Levi (or Contador or Rasmussen this year), he also doesn't seem like he has a chance to move up any further. He's currently 6th overall.
Kloden and Evans finished together, 6th and 7th in the stage, and still are within striking distance of Rasmussen in the overall standings. They are the best two ITT riders left among the overall leaders (2nd and 3rd yesterday), and could potentially put big gaps between themselves and Rasmussen on Saturday, but at this point, with two more mountain stages left, that seems unlikely. Either Contador has a massive run in the next two mountain stages to close the gap to Rasmussen and potentially overtake him in the time trial, or Rasmussen collapses somewhere this week, or this race appears over. The strange Dutchman with skinny legs who nobody thought could time trial and therefore could never actually win this race is about to put all the naysayers wrong. Of course, if he pulls a Landis in a drug test sometime soon, all this is rather moot.
Stage 14
| 1. |  CONTADOR Alberto |
112 | DISCOVERY CHANNEL TEAM | 5h 25' 48" | |
| 2. |  RASMUSSEN Michael |
58 | RABOBANK | 5h 25' 48" | |
| 3. |  SOLER HERNANDEZ Juan Mauricio |
219 | BARLOWORLD | 5h 26' 25" | + 00' 37" |
| 4. |  LEIPHEIMER Levi |
111 | DISCOVERY CHANNEL TEAM | 5h 26' 28" | + 00' 40" |
| 5. | SASTRE Carlos |
31 | TEAM CSC | 5h 26' 41" | + 00' 53" |
| 6. |  KLÖDEN Andréas |
196 | ASTANA | 5h 27' 40" | + 01' 52" |
| 7. |  EVANS Cadel |
41 | PREDICTOR - LOTTO | 5h 27' 40" | + 01' 52" |
| 8. | COLOM Antonio |
192 | ASTANA | 5h 28' 11" | + 02' 23" |
| 9. |  KASHECHKIN Andrey |
195 | ASTANA | 5h 28' 11" | + 02' 23" |
| 10. |  POPOVYCH Yaroslav |
118 | DISCOVERY CHANNEL TEAM | 5h 28' 54" | + 03' 06" |
| 11. |  BOOGERD Michael |
52 | RABOBANK | 5h 28' 54" | + 03' 06" |
| 12. | ASTARLOZA Mikel |
73 | EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI | 5h 28' 54" | + 03' 06" |
| 13. | PEREIRO SIO Oscar |
11 | CAISSE D’EPARGNE | 5h 29' 33" | + 03' 45" |
| 14. | VALVERDE Alejandro |
18 | CAISSE D’EPARGNE | 5h 29' 33" | + 03' 45" |
| 15. | ZUBELDIA Haimar |
71 | EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI | 5h 29' 33" | + 03' 45" |
| 16. |  KOHL Bernhard |
95 | GEROLSTEINER | 5h 29' 33" | + 03' 45" |
| 17. | ARROYO David |
12 | CAISSE D’EPARGNE | 5h 29' 35" | + 03' 47" |
| 18. | GUTIERREZ José Ivan |
14 | CAISSE D’EPARGNE | 5h 29' 52" | + 04' 04" |
| 19. | TXURRUKA Amets |
78 | EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI | 5h 29' 52" | + 04' 04" |
| 20. |  GADRET John |
66 | AG2R PREVOYANCE | 5h 30' 36" | + 04' 48" |
It appears that Vino finshed 28'50" back, in 81st place, the same time as Linus Gerdemann. Denis Menchov lost 11 minutes (I can't believe some Rasmussen-haters were angry at him taking over the team leader from the worthless Russian), Iban Mayo 9'30", Kim Kirchen 7 and a half (bye bye top 10 for T-Mobile), and Frank Schleck 16'55" (the same "I can't believe" idiocy to those who thought he was in better form than Sastre). This stage has now put huge, huge gaps in the field outside of the top 6 (five of which were in the final 6 in the big moves on the mountain - with only Kloden clawing his way back to striking distance, and Soler the only one not so highly placed overall). Among these 6 will come this year's Tour de France champion. Oh, and by the way, Team Vague Space has three of them. woo hoo!
| 1. | RASMUSSEN Michael |
58 | RABOBANK | 64h 12' 15" | |
| 2. | CONTADOR Alberto |
112 | DISCOVERY CHANNEL TEAM | 64h 14' 38" | + 02' 23" |
| 3. | EVANS Cadel |
41 | PREDICTOR - LOTTO | 64h 15' 19" | + 03' 04" |
| 4. | LEIPHEIMER Levi |
111 | DISCOVERY CHANNEL TEAM | 64h 16' 44" | + 04' 29" |
| 5. | KLÖDEN Andréas |
196 | ASTANA | 64h 16' 53" | + 04' 38" |
| 6. | SASTRE Carlos |
31 | TEAM CSC | 64h 18' 05" | + 05' 50" |
| 7. | KASHECHKIN Andrey |
195 | ASTANA | 64h 19' 13" | + 06' 58" |
| 8. | ASTARLOZA Mikel |
73 | EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI | 64h 20' 40" | + 08' 25" |
| 9. | VALVERDE Alejandro |
18 | CAISSE D’EPARGNE | 64h 22' 00" | + 09' 45" |
| 10. | POPOVYCH Yaroslav |
118 | DISCOVERY CHANNEL TEAM | 64h 23' 10" | + 10' 55" |
| 11. | PEREIRO SIO Oscar |
11 | CAISSE D’EPARGNE | 64h 23' 16" | + 11' 01" |
| 12. | SOLER HERNANDEZ Juan Mauricio |
219 | BARLOWORLD | 64h 23' 46" | + 11' 31" |
| 13. | ZUBELDIA Haimar |
71 | EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI | 64h 24' 30" | + 12' 15" |
| 14. |  KIRCHEN Kim |
27 | T-MOBILE TEAM | 64h 25' 31" | + 13' 16" |
| 15. |  KARPETS Vladimir |
15 | CAISSE D’EPARGNE | 64h 27' 13" | + 14' 58" |
| 16. | MAYO Iban |
207 | SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR | 64h 27' 46" | + 15' 31" |
| 17. | HORNER Christopher |
44 | PREDICTOR - LOTTO | 64h 29' 38" | + 17' 23" |
| 18. | MENCHOV Denis |
51 | RABOBANK | 64h 31' 12" | + 18' 57" |
| 19. | ARROYO David |
12 | CAISSE D’EPARGNE | 64h 31' 34" | + 19' 19" |
| 20. | GUTIERREZ José Ivan |
14 | CAISSE D’EPARGNE | 64h 31' 48" | + 19' 33" |
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