Garmin-Chipotle has framework to make impact at Tour de France
By Rick Polito, Special to the Rocky
Friday, July 4, 2008
Doug Pensinger
PASADENA, CA - FEBRUARY 24: Christian Vande Velde (C) of the USA and riding for Slipstream Chipotle, Chris Horner (R) of the USA and riding for Astana and Fabian Cancellara (L) of Switzerland and riding for Team CSC clear the top of the Millcreek Summit during Stage 7 and secured the overall win of the Amgen Tour of California on February 24, 2008 from Santa Clarita to Pasadena, California. (Photo by Doug Pensinger/Getty Images)
When: Today through July 27.
Start: From Brest to Plumelec.
Finish: Champs-Elysees, Paris.
Stages: 21, covering 3,559.5 kilometers (2,211.8 miles).
TV: Versus.
Home: Boulder.
Team manager: Jonathan Vaughters
Team members: Magnus Backstedt, Sweden; Julian Dean, New Zealand; Will Frischkorn, U.S.; Ryder Hesjedal, Canada; Trent Lowe, Australia; Martijn Maaskant, the Netherlands; David Millar, Great Britain; Danny Pate, U.S.; Christian Vande Velde, U.S.; Tyler Farrar (substitute), U.S.; Christophe Laurent (substitute), France.
Photo by LAURENT REBOURS
TDF123 - Team manager Jonathan Vaughters of the U.S., left, gestures at David Millar of Great Britain, center, as John Cassat, vice president, communications, of Garmin, right, looks on, as the new clothing of the Slipstream-Chipotle cycling team was presented during a press conference in Brest, western France, Thursday July 3, 2008. (AP Photo/Laurent Rebours)
How interested are you in the Tour de France?
Stage 4, Cholet: This time trial could be the first opportunity to gauge the favorites' relative strengths, but the 29.5-kilometer loop out of Cholet might not be long enough or hard enough for any game-changing efforts.
Stage 6, Aigurande-Super-Besse: The mountains come early this year with a summit finish, but the route could be too rolling for a pure climber to lay down a definitive stamp.
Stage 10, Pau-Hautacam: Look for a stronger declaration of dominance here with jaunts up the Col Du Tourmalet and the knee-popping summit finish in Hautacam. On the eve of a rest day, the racers will have all the incentives they need to go for broke.
Stage 17, Embrun- L'Alpe-d'Huez: The 13-kilometer set of switchbacks up the L'Alpe-d'Huez is a fan favorite and perhaps the most storied stretch in Tour history. It also could be the story of this Tour, with the favorites hitting that first switchback with their legs already ravaged by two staggering climbs.
Stage 20, Cerilly-Saint-Amand-Montrond: The second and final time trial is the last opportunity for a showdown. If Evans or Valverde have lost time in the mountains, they might be able to scrape together enough seconds to wear yellow into Paris the next day.
Cadel Evans: Duh! Evans wheeled into Paris last year in second place clustered in the improbably tight podium, the three top finishers sharing only 31 seconds among them. He can climb. He can time trial. With Leipheimer and Contador sidelined, the Australian is the peloton's closest thing to a sure bet.
Alejandro Valverde: Valverde is another all-arounder who has been deemed a future champ since he edged out Lance Armstrong on a mountaintop finish in 2005. He's coming off a victory in the Tour warm-up, the Dauphine Libere, but he has only finished the Tour once in three tries. That hasn't stopped oddsmakers from placing Valverde second only to Evans.
Carlos Sastre: The Spaniard, a notable climber who has honed his time-trial skills, finished fourth last year, leaving his overall time closest to Evans' among competitors this year. He went on to finish second in the 2007 Vuelta a Espana, putting his grand tour credentials in impeccable order.
Damiano Cunego: The Italian has yet to live up to his 2004 Giro, when he wore the pink jersey home with four stage victories at the startling age of 22. With the 2008 route perhaps better suited to climbers than time-trial specialists, this could be his year.
Denis Menchov: The two-time Vuelta champion pulled himself out of the 2007 Tour when Rabobank teammate Rasmussen was yanked from the peloton and fired by team management under doping suspicions. Redemption might be motivation enough to put Menchov on the podium.
Photo by Jasper Juinen
81811368BREST - JULY 03: Cadel Evans of Austrialia and team Silence - Lotto during the presentation of the team on July 3, 2008 in Brest, France. Evens will compete in the 95th edition of the Tour de France cycling race which will start on July 5 in Brest, France. (Photo by Jasper Juinen/Getty Images)
Photo by Jasper Juinen
81811368BREST - JULY 03: Alejandro Valverde of Spain and team Caisse d'Epargne waves during the team presentation on July 3, 2008 in Brest, France. Valverde will compete in the 95th edition of the Tour de France cycling race which will start on July 5 in Brest, France. (Photo by Jasper Juinen/Getty Images)
Hard-core fans desperate for some on-the-road redemption in this year's running of the scandal-splattered Tour de France might not have to look much further than bike-crazed Boulder.
From a Victorian home on a residential side street, Denver native Jonathan Vaughters' Garmin-Chipotle squad is racing to prove that A-list cyclists can race drug free. And win.
"Our goal is to take the yellow jersey for a few days," Vaughters, told Reuters. "We will ride an aggressive race. I think our strategy is to take as many chances as we can and ride every stage as if it's a race in itself.
"We're hoping to pick up the yellow jersey in the first 10 days," Vaughters said. "That would be a dream."
Scores of test tubes and blood draws ahead of the standard controls instituted by the World Anti-Doping Agency, the team that until last month raced as Slipstream-Chipotle but has has added title sponsorship from a GPS maker, instituted a "biological passport" scheme on its own, establishing base blood indicators for each rider so sudden spikes will be immediately tagged. The sport's governing body won't roll out anything similar until next year.
That high-profile, anti-drug stance, and an impressive roster, have earned Garmin-Chipotle a quick ascent onto the world stage. The Tour invite follows an impressive debut at the Giro d'Italia, cycling's second greatest race, at which it won the team time trial and put the leader's jersey on American standout Christian Vande Velde for a day.
Prospects for the Tour might be more modest. Scenarios seem slim for the Colorado team taking a credible run at an overall victory. Aero ace David Zabriskie, who rode in yellow three years ago, is out because of a cracked vertebra from a Giro crash, but look for moves from these opportunists:
* David Millar holds the Tour record for the fastest long time trial and might find either solo test to his taste.
* With sprint phenoms Tom Boonen and Alessandro Petacchi out on drug offenses, bruiser Magnus Backstedt could figure in the melee for the flatter finishes.
* The mountains tower early, and the team could be looking to put somebody like climbing specialists Trent Lowe or Vande Velde into a breakaway for a taste of yellow while the favorites still are marking one another's feints.
"It is true that we are ahead of schedule and we're happy about it for sure, but it's been hard and we've grown very fast," Vaughters told Reuters.
THE OVERALL ARC
Few events in sports come emblazoned with an asterisk before the starter's pistol even is loaded. But for this Tour de France, organizers might as well start embroidering that asterisk on the yellow jersey now. Even in a sport with as many looming question marks as professional cycling, this Tour stands out.
The 2007 event was no gleam of sportsmanship:
* The race leader got yanked out of the yellow jersey and sent home amid looming doping suspicions.
* The prerace favorite was sent home because of a positive blood doping test.
* The 2006 champ, Floyd Landis, was out on suspension (he lost his latest appeal Monday).
For this 95th running of cycling's premier epic, French organizers opted to leach even more credibility from the sport by denying entry to the 2007 winner and his third-place-finishing teammate.
Reigning champ Alberto Contador and Levi Leipheimer of the Astana team won't be at the starting line today, their team denied entry with Tour organizers forwarding a perception-of-impropriety argument that Astana hasn't cleaned up its act, though most of the management and the roster is new. Never mind the fact they invited back Rabobank after its yellow jersey- clad Michael Rasmussen got sent home after the 16th stage last year.
So with two-thirds of the 2007 podium sidelined by a largely political squabble, the second-place finisher last year, Cadel Evans, could be seen as soft-pedaling to victory. With an asterisk stuck in his spokes.
AN AMERICAN IN PARIS? DON'T COUNT ON IT
The 2008 Tour is likely to be the first time since 1997 that no American has stood on the podium in Paris (while Landis was stripped of his 2006 title, he did climb the podium). If it makes you feel any better, 1997 also was the last time France had a rider with a podium placing.
THE ROUTE STUFF
If anything can help fans forget the debacles of last year and the decimated podium this year, it might be the route. For the first time in decades, the race starts without a prologue, the traditional short time trial that serves as a scene-setting metric for the favorites.
This year, the peloton steers directly into a road stage with four rated climbs that could keep the expected breakaways intact. A smaller team might be able to get a lesser-known rider into the yellow jersey and shake up the race for the first week.
TWO WHEELS ON THE TUBE
Ratings might be down from the Lance Armstrong-fueled peak, but doping scandals haven't scared advertisers away from cycling's affluent demographic. Ad revenue for the Versus network last year was up 8 percent from 2006. And daily coverage has changed the way we experience the Tour. Trade the bean dip for brie, the Bud for Bordeaux, and you've got a three-week Super Bowl party. Some tips:
* The L'Alpe-d'Huez painfest previously mentioned might be the best stage for group viewing.
* The flatter stages, where all the action comes in the last 1,000 meters, is why they invented TiVo.
* If you can't get a group together, drop by Amante in Boulder for big-screen viewings. It's like a sports bar with cappuccino, and, typically, an appropriately themed drink special.
* Also, look for Millar's journey from doping scandal to anti-dope crusader on HBO's Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel this week.
* Former pro Ron Kiefel, a seven-time Tour veteran, will host a breakfast viewing at his Wheat Ridge Cyclery at 6:30 a.m. on July 23.
ETC.
* In a group setting, it's never "the Tour de France," it's "The Tour."
* Bone up on your trivia so you'll be cool; Bernard Hinault was the last French winner, in 1985; the closest finish was Greg LeMond's 8-second edge in 1989.
* Actor Jake Gyllenhaal climbed the L'Alpe-d'Huez two years ago. He also has been seen riding with Lance Armstrong and Lance-pal Matthew McConaughey in Malibu, Calif. Robin Williams has been a frequent sight at Tour finishes and is said to own dozens of high-end bikes. Grey's Anatomy actor Patrick Dempsey brought his racing bike to the Tour last year and got out with the Quick Step team.
Rocky wire reports contributed to this story.
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July 5, 2008
9:11 a.m.
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R8R_H8R writes:
I had zero interest in Cycling until I read Lance Armstrong's book "It's not about the Bike". It was not about the bike, but it did give great detail of how incredibly difficult Cycling is. I watched the race in 2000, and I was hooked. Then later, disgusted with the endless drug scandals. After last year, I thought I would never watch again. It is ONLY because of this new American team, working hard to prove drug-free, that I am once again interested in the tour. So far so good with day one. But dang!, I wish this was televised in H.D.!