Schleck Brothers, Contador Dominate the Queen Stage

Stage 17 featured 5 brutal climbs, including four Cat-1s, and Saxo Bank flexed its muscles about halfway through in honor of injured teammate Jens Voigt (who is recovering nicely in the hospital).  Then when the road shot up for the 2nd to last climb of the day, the difficult Col de Romme (a first for the Tour), the Shleck brothers began attack after relentless attack and cleared the already small leading group to only four elite riders -- themselves and Astana teammates Alberto Contador and Andreas Kloden.  Saxo's worker boys, mainly Nikki and Chris Sorensen (no relation), had already thinned the field, and an attack by defending champion Carlos Sastre at the bottom of the climb went nowhere, at which point Frank attacked, Lance went with him; then Andy attacked, Contador went with him; and eventually, Andy and Frank attacked together and only Contador and Kloden could stay.  Armstrong fell back into a second group that included 3rd place Bradley Wiggins and 6th place Vincenzo Nibali.  The lead grew slowly but steadily, reaching close to the 40 second lead that Wiggins had over Andy Schleck coming into the stage, but there was still another major climb ahead.  Lance tried to bridge once, but Wiggins went with him, and when he saw that he couldn't shake the British rider in 3rd overall, he played the good teammate and backed off.  Truly, I think Lance could have hung much closer to the lead group (or even with them), but instead just marked Wiggins, who Contador was trying to gain a gap on before tomorrow's time trial.  Excellent teamwork by Astana, or at least by Armstrong.  Contador wasn't such a good teammate himself, later on. 

The four leaders cleared the Col de Romme together with a pretty big gap over the Wiggins group, which had been joined by his Garmin teammate Christian Vandevelde, who did excellent work pacing Wiggo up the rest of the climb.  The Schlecks took turns driving up the lead on the downhill while Contador and Kloden simply trailed in their slipstreams, but Andy ended up taking over the lead, since his brother is a pretty bad downhill rider.  Nibali opened up a gap on the group behind with some excellent downhill work himself, but the four of them came together at the base of the final climb of the day, close to a minute behind the four leaders.  The mountain shot back up very quickly with the Cat-1 Col de la Colombiere that was an absolute beast, especially after the climb the riders just suffered through.  The Schlecks kept the pressure on up front, hard and heavy until Contador attacked.  Andy responded first, and Frank stayed with him, but Kloden could not keep pace.  Once Alberto saw that he couldn't open a gap on the Schlecks, he let off the gas, but the damage to his teammate was done.  For the next km, Contador kept looking back for Kloden -- who was still ahead of both Schlecks in the overall standing at that point -- but it was too late.  He'd been blown.  Contador had knocked him off the podium, all for naught.  The Schlecks were still driving the race.

The tempo was strong but steady and at a couple points, I kind of thought Contador might be in a little spot of bother, but Andy was doing about 80% of the work at the front at this point (with Frank doing the other 20%) and I don't think he had anything left for another burst of energy to try to dislodge the yellow jersey.  The Schlecks seemed content to open up the gap on the other contenders, who were falling well behind.  Vandevelde did all he could for Wiggins until he finally gave up and fell back, leaving Wiggo to do all the pace making while Lance sat on his wheel.  Finally, when the road shot upward for a steeper incline, Lance realized that Brad was spent and sprinted away from him.  Nibali went with him for a bit but couldn't keep pace and at that point, Lance proved that he still has quite a bit of the old champion still in him as he basically sprinted the last 2-3 km to the top of the mountain.  I would have liked to have seen if he had gone earlier just how much closer to the leaders he could have gotten.  But he couldn't do it until he was sure that Wiggins couldn't stay with him, since two of his teammates were up the road.

The Schlecks led Contador over the peak of the Colombiere, with Kloden trailing by well over a minute over the top.  Lance cleared at something around 2:11 or so, but the cameras lost track of Wiggins, since they stayed with Lance, and there were no other motorbikes nearby with cameras to stay on Wiggo.  He was clearly losing his podium place on the stage, though.  By quite a bit.  Andy Schleck again led the way downhill toward the finish, which was less than 15 kms from the summit, almost entirely straight downhill.  He kept the pace very, very high, and it was obvious that Kloden was losing big amounts of time at that point.  I don't know if he's not a good downhiller either, or if he was just exhausted at this point, but Lance was charging up to him from behind, along with Nibali, who'd zoomed downhill yet again, and was with Lance as the third group on the course. 

During the last 10 km, Lance and Nibali caught up to Kloden and the three of them tried to keep pace with the leaders to limit their losses on the stage.  Up ahead, Contador spoke to both Schlecks and told them he wasn't going to contest the stage, which was the honorable thing to do, since he'd done none of the work on any of the mountains (or the downhill) and the work of the Saxo boys had opened up major gaps for Contador over Armstrong and Wiggins, his closest competitors coming into the stage.  Coming down the home stretch, it was pretty obvious that Andy was going to let his big brother win the stage and he dropped back to third, but he was cheering with his arms raised as Frank came home with the victory, his second stage in a Tour de France, and Saxo Bank honored their fallen teammate Voigt in the best way possible.  With a win.  A dominating win.  The Schleck brothers were truly the best on today's stage, and opened major gaps on everyone in the field who isn't superhuman like Contador. 

Nibali sprinted away from Astana teammates Kloden and Armstrong in the closing 500 meters and only Lance could stay with him, but the gap to the leaders was 2:18, with Kloden finishing 9 seconds later.  Wiggins was the next to come home, all alone at 3:07, limiting his losses enough to still have an outside chance at a podium with a super race in tomorrow's time trial (his strength).  Christian Vandevelde finished at 4:09 along with Christophe Moreau, who came from behind (unseen on cameras all day), while the main remaining "pack" ended 6:10 back, led by Remi Pauriol, who'd been in the day-long breakaway (that I didn't have time to mention) but finished in 10th on the stage.  Overall, the standings now look like this:

1.	CONTADOR Alberto	21	ASTANA	72h 27' 09"
2.	SCHLECK Andy	31	TEAM SAXO BANK	72h 29' 35"	+ 02' 26"
3.	SCHLECK Frank	36	TEAM SAXO BANK	72h 30' 34"	+ 03' 25"
4.	ARMSTRONG Lance	22	ASTANA	72h 31' 04"	+ 03' 55"
5.	KLÖDEN Andréas	23	ASTANA	72h 31' 53"	+ 04' 44"
6.	WIGGINS Bradley	58	GARMIN - SLIPSTREAM	72h 32' 02"	+ 04' 53"
7.	NIBALI Vincenzo	95	LIQUIGAS	72h 32' 18"	+ 05' 09"
8.	VANDE VELDE Christian	51	GARMIN - SLIPSTREAM	72h 35' 17"	+ 08' 08"
9.	LE MEVEL Christophe	106	FRANCAISE DES JEUX	72h 36' 28"	+ 09' 19"
10.	ASTARLOZA Mikel	61	EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI	72h 37' 59"	+ 10' 50"
11.	KREUZIGER Roman	93	LIQUIGAS	72h 38' 01"	+ 10' 52"
12.	NOCENTINI Rinaldo	87	AG2R LA MONDIALE	72h 38' 47"	+ 11' 38"
13.	SASTRE Carlos	1	CERVELO TEST TEAM	72h 38' 48"	+ 11' 39"
14.	CASAR Sandy	101	FRANCAISE DES JEUX	72h 39' 01"	+ 11' 52"
15.	KARPETS Vladimir	161	TEAM KATUSHA	72h 39' 17"	+ 12' 08"
16.	GOUBERT Stephane	85	AG2R LA MONDIALE	72h 42' 38"	+ 15' 29"
17.	VAN DEN BROECK Jurgen	17	SILENCE - LOTTO	72h 44' 32"	+ 17' 23"

Big, big day for the Schleck brothers and Saxo Bank, as they moved from 5th and 8th coming into the day, to 2nd and 3rd in the overall standings.  Neither of them can time trial - especially not Frank - and Stage 18 will probably mix these standings up again, but for now, they are the best in the world for those not named Alberto Contador.  My pre-race prediction, remember, was a Contador/Andy Schleck 1-2 finish and that's looking quite likely right now.  Andy has 1:29 on Lance and 2:18 on Kloden, 2:27 on Wiggins going into the time trial.  I think Lance could maybe bridge that gap, but Andy should be safe from the other two, which would guarantee his spot on the podium.  There is still a final mountain stage Saturday, on Mont Ventoux, and Andy (and Frank) could open similar gaps on the other contenders to make up any time lost in the time trial.  But I'm pretty sure we're going to go into Ventoux with a Contador/Schleck/Armstrong top 3, with Kloden, Wiggins, and Frank Schleck (and Nibali) trailing not far behind.  There may not be fireworks for first place this year, but there will be some crazy fireworks going on for 2nd and 3rd.  It's not everything one might have hoped for, but when Contador is as dominant as we all knew he would be, you gotta take what you can get.  And what we got was one hell of a stage from the Schleck brothers.  Bravo.

(And oh yeah, Contador had a great day too...)