Astana Wins Team Time Trial, Spartacus Keeps Yellow

After what has been the most exciting race I have ever watched this early in a Tour de France, there is a virtual tie at the top of the standings between Fabian Cancellara, who has held yellow since the opening stage, and an unknown rider who we've never seen before named Lance Armstrong.  By fractions of a second, Fabian "Tony Spartacus" Cancellara (pictured at right showing his margin of lead "00") kept the yellow jersey just ahead of Lance,  but it was an absolutely wonderful stage today after a wonderful stage yesterday and we're just getting started.  Team Astana -- the super-team of Lance, Levi Leipheimer, and pre-Tour favorite Alberto Contador - won today's team time trial in Montpelier by 18 seconds over Garmin-Slipstream and 40 seconds over third place Saxo Bank, which just so happened to be the exact margin that Cancellara held over Armstrong going into the stage.  As a result, the race officials had to take hundreds of seconds into account from the first stage and Cance ended up on top.  For today at least.  Overall, it's looking like an Astana domination...

1. CANCELLARA Fabian 33 TEAM SAXO BANK 10h 38’ 07"
2. ARMSTRONG Lance 22 ASTANA 10h 38’ 07" + 00’ 00"
3. CONTADOR Alberto 21 ASTANA 10h 38’ 26" + 00’ 19"
4. KLÖDEN Andréas 23 ASTANA 10h 38’ 30" + 00’ 23"
5. LEIPHEIMER Levi 24 ASTANA 10h 38’ 38" + 00’ 31"
6. WIGGINS Bradley 58 GARMIN – SLIPSTREAM 10h 38’ 45" + 00’ 38"
7. ZUBELDIA Haimar 29 ASTANA 10h 38’ 58" + 00’ 51"
8. MARTIN Tony 76 TEAM COLUMBIA – HTC 10h 38’ 59" + 00’ 52"
9. ZABRISKIE David 59 GARMIN – SLIPSTREAM 10h 39’ 13" + 01’ 06"
10. MILLAR David 56 GARMIN – SLIPSTREAM 10h 39’ 14" + 01’ 07"
11. PAULINHO Sergio 26 ASTANA 10h 39’ 23" + 01’ 16"
12. VANDE VELDE Christian 51 GARMIN – SLIPSTREAM 10h 39’ 23" + 01’ 16"
13. LARSSON Gustav 34 TEAM SAXO BANK 10h 39’ 29" + 01’ 22"
14. MONFORT Maxime 77 TEAM COLUMBIA – HTC 10h 39’ 36" + 01’ 29"
15. KREUZIGER Roman 93 LIQUIGAS 10h 39’ 38" + 01’ 31"
16. ROGERS Michael 79 TEAM COLUMBIA – HTC 10h 39’ 39" + 01’ 32"
17. HINCAPIE George 74 TEAM COLUMBIA – HTC 10h 39’ 43" + 01’ 36"
18. POPOVYCH Yaroslav 27 ASTANA 10h 39’ 43" + 01’ 36"
19. NIBALI Vincenzo 95 LIQUIGAS 10h 39’ 43" + 01’ 36"
20. SCHLECK Andy 31 TEAM SAXO BANK 10h 39’ 48" + 01’ 41"

Yes, that's 2 through 5 for Team Astana, and Cancellara, no matter how much he is loved in the world of cycling, is not a mountain climber and will not be competing once the road turns upwards.  So it's four Astana teammates -- all four with serious Tour de France repertoires -- in the top positions for the overall win.  Their closest GC competitors are Christian ValdeVelde in 12th (1:16 back), Roman Kreuziger in 15th, Mick Rogers in 16th, Vincenzo Nibali in 19th, and Andy Schleck (my pre-race 2nd favorite) in 20th, 1:41 behind.  Defending champion Carlos Sastre is 2:44 back, in 29th place, seemingly out of the race (although he could shock us in the mountains), while two-time defending 2nd place Cadel Evans is in 35th, 2:59 back.  It seems like he is definitely out of this race.

So the drama on Team Astana will play out for the rest of the week, at least until we get to the mountains of the Pyrenees on Stage 7 (and perhaps for longer than that).  In yesterday's exhilarating flat stage 3, Armstrong made the front of a split in the field caused by Team Columbia's pressing pace and a massive crosswind that caught the main peloton out and unable to regain the wheels of the Columbia train.  Lance and Cancellara were among the 27 men who made the break (including all 9 Columbia riders), while Astana team leader Contador did not.  According to George Hincapie (Lance's former teammate), Columbia were pissed that for the second straight day, they were doing all the work by themselves to help bring back an early breakaway, with no other sprinters' teams helping them.  As a result, they decided to put the hammer down and see if they could punish the other teams, which they did.  But in the end, Lance was in the right place, right time, and ended up with a huge advantage, one that almost put him in yellow today.

The interesting thing is that Columbia was still doing all the work at the front of the break yesterday and had the lead on the peloton out to 30 seconds, but the gap had dropped to 22 seconds when all of the sudden, the Versus cameras caught Lance Armstrong himself helping at the front.  Then we see Lance waving for his teammates Yaroslav Popovych and Haimer Zubeldia (who both made the break) to come to the front and help him.  Popo, a long-time Lance teammate on those champion USPS/Discovery Channel teams, came up immediately and started pulling at the front with the Team Columbia boys.  Then Lance disappeared, perhaps to go yell at Zubeldia, and eventually you see the Spanish rider (and long-time Euskatel-Euskadi team leader, in his first year with Johan Bruyneel's Astana boys) come to the front.  He didn't do as many turns as Popo and seemed reluctant (Contador is a fellow Spaniard) but their work along with Columbia helped stretch the margin back out to 30 seconds and break the spirit of the chasing peloton.  Mark Cavendish (pictured at right) ended up winning the stage (his second in a row) over Thor Hushovd (the only other premier sprinter who'd made the break) to make Columbia's efforts pay off.  But Lance and the group gained 41 seconds on everyone else in the field, pushing Armstrong up to third, 19 seconds ahead of his Astana teammate Contador.  All of the sudden, the divisions in the team which seemed silenced by Contador's impressive 1st stage performance were back in full force, no matter how diplomatic everybody is being in interviews.  Armstrong is here to win the Tour.  And Contador knows it.  And at this point, the two of them have to be considered the prohibitive favorites, given the time gaps they've put on everyone else.  I don't think Armstrong can keep up with Bert in the mountains, but I do think that Lance thinks he can.  And maybe that's all that matters.  This is shaping up to be one of the great battles in Tour history, even as only teammates are involved.  Sadly, I fear Schleck, Sastre, Kreuziger, and Evans will be battling for third.  Along with Levi and Kloden.  And anyone else Astana throws out.  A very impressive display today.  Very impressive indeed.

Comments

[LegFuJohnson]

I give you my word as a Spaniard.

No good, I've known too many Spaniards.

[Bill]

I do not think that means what you think it means.

[Manny]

Just wait ubtil team Astana gets drug tested. Then we will see if they dominate

[Chief Hairy Pits]

ooga booga...

[Erin]

Drug test, yadda yadda.... That is all done with. I think Astana has what it takes to win this thing. And Lance, he'll show us if he has it or not by the mountain stages. He's known to be a climber, and a lot of the leaders right now are not. The good thing about all this is that Lance knows how difficult it will be, not like before when he was a typical cocky man.