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Little suspense Armstrong full of confidence before Tour hits AlpsPosted: Monday July 22, 2002 2:11 PMUpdated: Monday July 22, 2002 2:48 PM
VAISON-LA-ROMAINE, France (Reuters) -- After outclassing his Tour de France rivals in the Pyrenees and up Mont Ventoux, Lance Armstrong will be full of confidence as he tackles the Alps. The American three-time Tour champion will start Tuesday's 15th stage from Vaison-la-Romaine to Les Deux Alpes with a four-minute, 21-second lead over nearest rival, Spaniard Joseba Beloki. The stage is the longest in the Tour and ends with a first-category climb to the ski resort of Les Deux Alpes. Two other shorter mountain stages will take place in the Alps, a 179.5-km ride from Les Deux alpes to La Plagne on Wednesday, with three super-category passes -- Galibier, Madeleine and La Plagne. On Thursday, over 142 kilometers between Aime and Cluses, the bunch will take in four more climbs, including three first-category passes. "I think I have the team it takes to help me in the Alps," said Armstrong, who can count on the support of Spaniards Roberto Heras and Jose-Luis Rubiera in the Pyrenees. The U.S. Postal team leader said promising American Floyd Landis would probably be his best aide in the Alps. But despite his confidence, the arch-favorite to win a fourth Tour de France victory at the end of the week said he mostly feared Friday's 18th stage from Cluses to Bourg-en-Bresse, which despite leaving the Alps to return to the valleys, includes seven more climbs. ONCE almost concedes defeat "Look at the road book and you'll see there is not a kilometer of flat in this stage," said Armstrong. And the U.S. Postal leader insisted the Tour was far from over and he was not yet sure of taking the yellow jersey all the way to Paris. "I always worry about something," he said. The climbs to Les Deux Alpes and to La Plagne are not Tour classics. The bunch visited to Les Deux Alpes only in 1998 when Italian Marco Pantani won the stage and eventually the Tour. The Tour has been to La Plagne three times. Frenchman Laurent Fignon won twice at the ski resort, while Swiss Alex Zuelle was the last rider to win a stage there in 1995. Outclassed in the first two weeks of the Tour, Armstrong's rivals and especially Beloki's ONCE team almost conceded defeat before the first Alpine climbs. "Of course, we'll continue doing our best hoping for Armstrong to have a bad day," said ONCE team chief Manolo Saiz. "But let's face it, Beloki is 4:21 behind and will lose about 1:30 to Armstrong in the last time trial. "We're talking about six minutes. It would take a really bad, bad day for us to catch him," he added. The Alps will also be decisive in the race for the king of the mountains classification. Frenchman Laurent Jalabert, winner of the climbers polka-dot jersey last year, has a comfortable lead, but five times king of the mountains Richard Virenque, his compatriot and good friend, has real ambitions since winning the Mont Ventoux stage on Sunday. Armstrong takes suspense out of TourVAISON-LA-ROMAINE, France (AP) -- Lance Armstrong is taking the suspense out of the Tour de France. For the fourth straight year, his rivals are stranded long before the finish. His early success is angering French fans and ruining organizers' plans to make the Tour less predictable. But don't blame Armstrong: He's only doing his job. "It is what they pay me to do," the Texan said Sunday. "They say, 'Lance, we want you to win the Tour de France.'" "I can't really concern myself with, 'Is it bad for the event?'" After Monday's rest day, six stages remained in the world's toughest cycling race, including three grueling stretches in the Alps. Nevertheless, a fourth consecutive title seemed easily within Armstrong's reach, thanks to his performance in the Pyrenees and on the formidable Mont Ventoux. The U.S. Postal Service rider leads his biggest challenger, Joseba Beloki of the ONCE team, by nearly 4 1/2 minutes in the overall standings. Barring injury or illness, or a sudden and drastic loss of form, that advantage is likely to grow in the coming days. "Armstrong has shown he has the blood of champions flowing through his veins," ONCE team director, Manolo Saiz, told French daily Le Parisien. "He is much stronger than us, we see it day after day. "Of course, we will still do the maximum and hope Armstrong has an 'off' day," Saiz said. "But it would really have to be a big 'off' day for us to catch up." Tour organizers saved some of this year's toughest stages for last in a bid to make the race more suspenseful. In 2001, almost the whole final week was made up of flat stretches, in which rivals had nearly no chance of reducing Armstrong's lead. Mountain stages are often unpredictable, but Armstrong looked so strong in the first three that a serious challenge in the Alps seems highly unlikely. He won the opening two mountain stages in the Pyrenees, finishing with a sprint both times. Although he didn't win Sunday's stage on Mont Ventoux, he made the fastest climb to the summit in Tour history. He climbed 1,600 meters (5,280 feet) over 21 kilometers (13 miles) in 58 minutes, knocking 53 seconds off the previous best set by Marco Pantani two years ago. Frenchman Richard Virenque took the stage, but his victory had almost no impact on Armstrong's title bid. After the leg, Virenque was 10th overall, 13:12 behind Armstrong. Meanwhile, Beloki's deficit grew from 2:28 to 4:21. During Armstrong's incredible climb to the top, French fans fearing Virenque would be overtaken jeered the American, and some branded him a drug-user by shouting "Dop-AY! Dop-AY!" ("Doped! Doped!"). Armstrong, who has never failed a drug test and repeatedly denied taking banned substances, said his four-year domination of the Tour was likely to blame for the fans' hostility. "Perhaps that's part of the reason the people are so angry on the climbs," he said. "They would rather have a new winner every year, a new winner every day, a constant evolution. "But I care too much about the event, I care too much about winning to factor that in."
The Associated Press contributed to this report. |
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