Tension on Le Tourmalet.

Previously mentioned a few posts back was the idea of a 'brown jersey' competition for the worst/unluckiest rider in the Tour. It was an idea from the women's Tour where it exists already, maillot malchance.
Well my older brother came up with some more ideas for jerseys, so i thought I'd share his ideas.....
.........and claim the credit!

Maillot Brun/Malchance: Given to the unluckiest rider
Nominations: Lance Armstrong/Robbie McEwan

Maillot roue de la fortune:
Best bike part related incident.
Nominations: Rui Costa (see earlier post)
Andy Schlecks chain for coming off and costing him the Tour.
Sylvain Chavanel for two bike swaps on the cobbles costing him the Yellow Jersey.

Maillot Plume: Best animal intervention:
Nominations: David Millar for crashing due to a dog
Team Astana for almost running down some sheep on Col du Tourmalet

Maillot Combattant: Most aggressive rider
Nominations:
Rui Costa for brandishing a wheel
Mark Renshaw for head-butting Julian Dean
Julian Dean for elbowing Renshaw

Other possible jersey's are the Maillot Richard Tete: jersey for the dumbest spectator incident (mainly relating to the incident mentioned below)
The Maillot Meconnu hero: the unsung hero jersey, I definately nominate Jens Voigt and Fabian Cancellara for this!

Anyway the Maillot Richard Tete holder is Robbie McEwan for this reason: (quote from Procycling site)

"Being in the gruppetto?" he asked rhetorically. "[On Stage 12 to Mende] I was with one other bloke – that's not a gruppetto. F***king alone every day, I've hardly been in the gruppetto. [Stage 12], it was me and Bert Grabsch for 120k, just two of us.

"I've had two bad crashes, lost a lot of blood in the first one because I severed a small artery – the UCI anti-doping people said they could see it in my blood profile that I'd lost a hell of a lot of blood. After that, I was given a tetanus vaccination at the hospital which I told them I didn't need; they slid it in there without me knowing, which gave me fever for four days, so I'm absolutely f***king terrible just as I started to feel better.

"That dickhead jumped out in front of me and ran into me after Stage 6 – that's when I hurt my back. Since then, it's just been suffering day after day, trying to make the time limit. When it's flat, I've been trying to sprint, but maybe sprinting at 70, 75 percent because my whole right side's blocked; my hip, my leg and my back are all black and blue. So it's been far from enjoyable."

As you will have read before I am a great advocate of the job these guys do day in day out. This year seems to have been especially tough for the Peleton.
Anyway onto stages 17 and 18

Stage 17: Pau > Col du Tourmalet: Thursday 22nd

You get the feeling that the organisers had planned it to all come down to the final mountain stage. As a fitting tribute to the centenary of the Pyrenees, Andy Schleck needed to make the most of the Col du Tourmalet ascent to get the yellow jersey back and put time into Contador.
However before that there was the small matter of the Col de Marie-Blanque, a 9.3km category 1 climb (7.6%) and the Col de Soulor and 11.9km climb at 7.8%, also category 1.
The stage ends at the summit of the Col du Tourmalet, a Hors category 18.6km slog @ 7.5%
So a tough day ahead for the Peleton, not a nice day for the remaining sprinters, who must surely be yearning for the flat stage tomorrow. A difficult day for those carrying injuries as well with a lot of rocking about on the bike on the mountain ascents.

The stage starts with a nice change in the weather, wet and cold, after days of sun and heat, this could be seen as welcome......unless you have to descend from 2 category climbs in it!
It remains to be seen whether Denis Menchov will be descending like an old lady on a shopping bike ala last year or whether he's improved and can stay up right. If his form so far is anything to go by he'll be fine. Definitely need to keep an eye on that battle between him and Sammy Sanchez for 3rd place.

On another note the King of the Mountains will be decided on today's stage, a straight fight between two Frenchmen, Christophe Moreau, the oldest man in the race at 39 (yes even older than Lance!!) and Anthony Charteau.

The early break is allowed to go and Team Sky have two riders in it!! Boasson Hagen and Flecha. Well done Team Sky so good airtime awaits IF it can stay away, which is unlikely.
Sammy Sanchez takes a big smash and looks to be out sparko! Could this hand Menchov 3rd place?
The Peleton slows to allow Sanchez to ride back (Contador take note, that's the way it's done), he appears to be winded but still functioning, just grimacing a lot.
Due to this the break away gets up to 9 and a half minutes on the Peleton.
By the summit of the Col de Soulor the break is beginning to get reeled in. Interestingly the King of the Mountains points only go to the first 8 riders so the break will eat them all leaving the standings as they were.
Astana are driving hard on the front, some mountain sheep scramble up and run across the road, almost catching the riders unaware. That could have been dangerous especially for Contador, seems his luck was in today.
The break away hits the slopes of the Tourmalet and Boasson Hagen is swift unhitched. He's done very well considering he's a sprinter by nature. Good tour for him thus far. The Peleton is reducing the gap down to 4 minutes as they ascend the mountain.
Schleck is driving the Peleton on using his Saxo Bank team mates to great effect. Cancellara is absolutely giving it everything, so much so that when he peels off the front he almost comes to a complete standstill on the road. LEGEND.
The Peleton has been decimated by the pace and is scattered over the mountain. Its now just the leading few riders for the last 11km of climbing.
Bang! Schleck gives a spurt of acceleration and Contador follows him, everyone else is blown away.
Just Schleck and Contador locked into a duel up the Tourmalet.
The last of the break away are caught by the leading duo. Schleck still upping and changing the pace as they climb through the clouds (literally).
Further down the slopes Sammy Sanchez has hauled is bruised and broken body up to Menchov with the help of some team mates. The battle for 3rd is alive again.
Schleck is continuing to ride varying tempo's as Contador dutifully follows him up the mountain. Schleck is staring at Contador and saying things to him, are mind games coming into play, is he goading him?
Contador attacks!
Obviously something Schleck said rattled him, Schlecks back on his wheel with a few seconds though and normal service resumes.
A tired looking Contador is holding onto Schlecks wheel whilst Schleck ups his pace again.
Schleck emerges from the mist and cloud to see the finish line. Contador doesn't really contest the stage win, and rightly so, he's done no work today.
A valiant effort by Schleck but Contador still holds an 8 second lead.
Sammy Sanchez comes in 5th and has managed to take another 8 seconds advantage over Menchov, magnificent riding considering he was horizontal early on. He increases his lead by 21 seconds over Menchov.
Menchov comes in along side team mate Gesink, with Radioshack's Chris Horner coming in just behind after an excellent ride to put him 10th in the GC. Nicholas Roche is also right up there, as is Van Den Broeck.
Even Armstrong has had a good day, coming in 17th just 4 minutes down on the two leaders.
The Brit's fair less well however.
Wiggo comes in 88th 23 minutes down and Geraint 114th 29 minutes down.
Cav comes in 165th near the back and David Millar dragged himself across the line second from last 32 minutes after the leaders. One rider pulled out early on in the stage so only 171 remain.
The King of the Mountains jersey was won by Charteau as neither of them scored any points today!
A calm sprinters stage tomorrow, we get to see just who's made it over the mountains and still has enough left to sprint!

Stage 18: Salies-de-Bearn > Bordeaux: Friday 23rd

The Tours most visited city also signals the end of the mountains and the beginning of the sprinters dual.
A flat stage with no hills and two sprint points, most likely to be taken by the inevitable break away.
The early break goes and only 4 riders are in it, no one particularly note worthy.
David Millar spoke to the press earlier, currently lying 161st out of 171 riders he's had a torrid Tour:
"It's horrific, I've hated it. It's been miserable. I just want to get to Paris. Once I get to Paris I'll enjoy it, but at the moment it's just been excruciating. I am in no physical shape for Saturday's time trial. I'll do it at 100% but there won't be a result, not a hope. Finishing here is the number one goal, in whatever state that is."
The break have a 3 minute lead and its staying around that.
Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz are out on the course today, not sure why, but the only thing interesting in the bulk of today's stage. No ones even crashed today!
50km to go and the TV cameras are on Cav who's in a jovial mood as he pretends to crack a whip at the Peleton to hurry them up. Guess who my moneys on for the stage win then!
Contador has had to change bike due to a mechanical, now why couldn't that happen in the time trial tomorrow?
Schleck has been to the doctors car for some treatment for, ahem, saddle sores! Ouch!
Reda of Quikstep abandons leaving 170 riders, from the 196 that started (one dropped out before the Prologue!) 26 couldn't take the pain!
Daniel Oss has broken off the front of the break, as the gap is rapidly reducing. The sprinters want this.
Wiggo is doing a stint on the front for Team Sky's Boasson Hagen. HTC, Lampre, Milram and Cervelo are all jostling around the front end ready for their respective sprinters to be led out.
Just inside the last 2km Oss is swallowed up by the Peleton, he'd been away for 176km of the days 198km, a cracking effort by the young rider.
Petacchi, Dean, Hushovd, Cav and Boasson Hagen are all around the front, not many team mates or lead out men left. How Cav must be missing Renshaw in a situation like this.
At 275m to go Pettachi bursts out of the pack swiftly followed by Cav.
Cav's power takes him past Pettachi, and past the other sprinters to take his 4th stage of the Tour and his 14th so far in his Tour career.
Victory for Cav!
Dean takes 2nd, Pettachi finishes 3rd ahead of McEwan in 4th and Boasson Hagen in 6th. Hushovd finishes a lowly 14th thus taking the Green Jersey competition down to the Champs-Elysees.
The rest roll in en-mass (139 riders including David Millar all get +0 seconds)
Wiggo and Oss roll in a minute late after expending their energy earlier and Jesus Hernandez rounds the bunch off 6 minutes later.

So just the time trial to come and then the roll into Paris and there's still all to play for in the Green Jersey, Team competition, GC and battle for the podium.
Final words from stage winner Cav
"I wasn’t sure if I was going to even start the stage. I’ve been sick the last four days with bronchitis – actually, there are a hell of a lot of guys in the peloton with the same thing so I’m not only one. But I finally had the fever yesterday and I was dead last night and never thought I could start today. We decided, ‘Oh, okay I’ll go. If it works, it works. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t…’ Even during the stage, I was speaking with Brad [Wiggins] and he said, ‘Are you sprinting today?’ And I told him, ‘Yeah.’"
"when I saw Pettachi go, I thought b****cks I've left it too late again"

The time trial awaits and all will change, trust me!!