Contador wins as expected. Andy Schleck comes in 2nd, as hoped. And Lance Armstrong -- the ageless one, apparently -- comes in a remarkable 3rd. Thor holds off Cav for the Green Jersey. Franco Pellizotti wins the polkadot for mountain climbing. Schleck the younger also wins the White Jersey for best young rider. And Astana wins the team competition. Mark Cavendish of Team Columbia-High Road wins the most stages (6!) including today's stage on the Champs Elysees. The results were actually all pretty predictable -- only Pellizotti would have been seen as any kind of surprise among the final jersey holders, and only because he came in with higher sights than simply the mountain jersey. But it was still a wonderful Tour, full of intrigue, full of attacks by the Schleck brothers, and full of some really great racing, especially in the first few stages and the final week. The rest was kind of meh. But 2009 was clearly one of the best Tours in recent memory. And no one's been caught doping! (yet)
Alberto Contador showed he is the class of the field with a dominating win, including on the long time trial on Stage 18, which combined with his "best mountain climber in the race" pedigree makes him a little impossible to defeat. But Andy Schleck not only held his own with Bert in the mountains this year, he actually was arguably better. Andy put in attack after attack on Saturday's stage up the legendary Mont Ventoux, and while he didn't dislodge Contador, he did seem to put him in a spot of bother once or twice, and he dislodged everyone else. Unfortunately, Andy was over 4 minutes behind and harbored no hopes of breaking Bert, but was instead trying to get his older brother Frank on the podium with him. So he kept dropping back to help his teammate instead of going all-out for the stage win. The attacks ended up dislodging Andreas Kloden from the top of the leaderboard, but Frank could only move up to 5th, the same finish as a year ago. But two Schlecks in the top 5 is certainly something to be excited about for Team Saxo Bank. And next year? Andy will be right there with Bert, in my opinion. Remember, he's two years younger than the yellow jersey winner, and the only thing separating them this year was Contador's superior time trialing. But Contador wasn't a great time trialer when he won his first yellow jersey in 2007; that only came with intense training over the past 2 years. Andy now has to have the same focus on his own time trialing in training over the offseason and next year, and he can definitely challenge Alberto for the overall lead. This could really be an exciting duel shaping up (and for years to come -- they're both under 26 years old).
The other big story of the Tour was the renaissance of 7-time Tour champion Lance Armstrong, who finished in 3rd overall. He couldn't keep pace with Contador and Andy Schleck in the mountains, but no one else could either. And Lance was best of the rest. Not bad for a 37-year-old who took three years off from the sport. And although he was controversial (and hated on the Podium Cafe, the blog I read religiously during the Tour), he definitely brought a whole boatload of excitement to this year's Tour and sparked a resurgence in ratings and fan interest a la Tiger Woods on a golfing Sunday. There were 1 million spectators on Mont Ventoux Saturday. One million. On a mountain that you had to walk or bike up just to stand on the side of the road and watch the cyclists pass by. Plus, there were at least that many along the route for the day. I've really never seen crowds like I've seen this year. And if that had to do with Lance, then his comeback has to be deemed a huge success.
The other revelation in this year's Tour was 4th place Bradley Wiggins, who had never finished high up in a Tour before and was known primarily for his exploits in track racing, where he won Olympic golds last fall. But Wiggo supposedly lost a lot of weight and re-trained his body for the mountains over the winter, to great effect. His time trialing suffered a bit, but when you're riding up Mont Ventoux on Stage 20 of the Tour with Lance Armstrong and Frank Schleck by your side, you're doing something right. Garmin teammate Christian Vandevelde also had an impressive ride, finishing 8th overall after last year's 3rd, but he recovered nicely from a serious injury in the Giro in May and will hopefully be part of a two-pronged attack at the leaderboard for Garmin in next year's Tour.
Astana, Saxo Bank, and Garmin each had two riders in the top 8 (3 for Astana - Klodi ended up 6th), while Liquigas got the 7th and 9th place riders. Along with Columbia (who had the most stage wins) and small French team AG2R (who had the yellow jersey for over a week), these teams dominated the Tour de France this year. As for Rabobank, Caisse d'Epargne, and the lesser teams in the race, they had to be satisfied with stage wins (Juan Manuel Garate's win on Mont Ventoux was the absolute only highlight for Rabobank). But on Liquigas, they have a potential future contender in 7th place Vincenzo Nibali, got the polkadot for Pellizotti, and had Roman Kreuziger move into the top 10 at 9th with a great ride on Ventoux Saturday. Christophe LeMevel of Francaise des Jeux finished in 10th overall, the top Frenchman in the race.
And a discussion of this year's Tour would be remiss without a mention of the Green Jersey competition, which came down to the wire in a massive battle between Mark Cavendish and Thor Hushovd. Cav beat Thor in every sprint that they ended together, but Thor's efforts in the uphill finish in Barcelona (where Cav came in 15h), along with a Cavendish relegation in a sprint for a lesser place on a stage last week gave Thor a lead. Yet it was the big Norwegian's amazing ride, all alone at the front during the big early mountains on Stage 17, that gave him an insurmountable lead by picking up all the 1st place intermediate sprint points on that stage before fading into the background as the yellow jersey fireworks took place on the final climbs. Cav won on the Champs Elysees -- and he was the dominant sprinter in this race. But Thor came home with his second green jersey, by being the dominant strong man among the sprinters. Well done.
Here are the final standings:
| 1. |  CONTADOR Alberto |
21 | ASTANA | 85h 48' 35" | |
| 2. |  SCHLECK Andy |
31 | TEAM SAXO BANK | 85h 52' 46" | + 04' 11" |
| 3. |  ARMSTRONG Lance |
22 | ASTANA | 85h 53' 59" | + 05' 24" |
| 4. |  WIGGINS Bradley |
58 | GARMIN - SLIPSTREAM | 85h 54' 36" | + 06' 01" |
| 5. | SCHLECK Frank |
36 | TEAM SAXO BANK | 85h 54' 39" | + 06' 04" |
| 6. |  KLÖDEN Andréas |
23 | ASTANA | 85h 55' 17" | + 06' 42" |
| 7. |  NIBALI Vincenzo |
95 | LIQUIGAS | 85h 56' 10" | + 07' 35" |
| 8. | VANDE VELDE Christian |
51 | GARMIN - SLIPSTREAM | 86h 00' 39" | + 12' 04" |
| 9. |  KREUZIGER Roman |
93 | LIQUIGAS | 86h 02' 51" | + 14' 16" |
| 10. |  LE MEVEL Christophe |
106 | FRANCAISE DES JEUX | 86h 03' 00" | + 14' 25" |
| 11. | ASTARLOZA Mikel |
61 | EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI | 86h 03' 19" | + 14' 44" |
| 12. | CASAR Sandy |
101 | FRANCAISE DES JEUX | 86h 05' 54" | + 17' 19" |
| 13. |  KARPETS Vladimir |
161 | TEAM KATUSHA | 86h 07' 09" | + 18' 34" |
| 14. | NOCENTINI Rinaldo |
87 | AG2R LA MONDIALE | 86h 09' 20" | + 20' 45" |
| 15. |  VAN DEN BROECK Jurgen |
17 | SILENCE - LOTTO | 86h 09' 25" | + 20' 50" |
| 16. | GOUBERT Stephane |
85 | AG2R LA MONDIALE | 86h 11' 04" | + 22' 29" |
| 17. | SASTRE Carlos |
1 | CERVELO TEST TEAM | 86h 14' 56" | + 26' 21" |
| 18. | BOTCHAROV Alexandre |
162 | TEAM KATUSHA | 86h 18' 08" | + 29' 33" |
| 19. | HINCAPIE George |
74 | TEAM COLUMBIA - HTC | 86h 22' 02" | + 33' 27" |
| 20. | CHAVANEL Sylvain |
151 | QUICK STEP | 86h 22' 44" | + 34' 09" |
| 21. | KNEES Christian |
185 | TEAM MILRAM | 86h 23' 23" | + 34' 48" |
| 22. | ROLLAND Pierre |
148 | BBOX BOUYGUES TELECOM | 86h 26' 19" | + 37' 44" |
| 23. |  ROCHE Nicolas |
89 | AG2R LA MONDIALE | 86h 26' 55" | + 38' 20" |
| 24. | GERDEMANN Linus |
181 | TEAM MILRAM | 86h 27' 10" | + 38' 35" |
| 25. | FEILLU Brice |
174 | AGRITUBEL | 86h 29' 49" | + 41' 14" |
Contador, A. Schleck, Nibali, and Kreuziger are all under 26. Wiggins, F. Schleck, and Vandevelde are in the primes of their careers. And Lance and Kloden will be on different teams next year than Contador (or at least Lance will, probably joined by Levi Leipheimer on the new American Team Radio Shack). No one knows yet where Contador will go (Spanish team Caisse d'Epargne is the most obvious answer) and Cadel Evans is leaving Silence-Lotto after their abandonment of him in this year's race. But things are shaping up for a massive battle between Saxo Bank, Radio Shack, Garmin, Liquigas and whatever team Contador winds up on for the overall title next year. He was unbeatable this year, but if he's expecting a run of victories like Lance did at the start of this decade, he's not going to get a free pass from the Schleck brothers, the Garmin boys, Vincenzo Nibali, or Lance himself. The top three from this year, in fact, are pretty damn likely to be the top three next year (barring injuries). Except they will all be on separate teams. And they may not finish in that order. I, for one, can't believe we have to wait 11 months for the next Tour to start. Who's riding in the Vuelta this year?
Is Lance coming back next year?
Posted by: Nick | July 27, 2009 at 12:51 PM
Yes, Lance is definitely coming back. He's been signed to team Radio Shack, a new American team.
Posted by: Bill | July 27, 2009 at 04:40 PM
I found Jan's birthday party much more interesting than the Tour de Fraaaaaance.
Posted by: Ira | July 28, 2009 at 02:12 PM