Tour de France

Stage 9: Morzine to Saint-Jean-De-Maurienne, 204.5km/127mi

By Cathy Meh

The yellow jersey is the most valued prize in the world of cycling and BMC’s Cadel Evans was determined to honor the position and do his best to defend in the Tour de France.   But the World champion lost contact on the climb of the Col de la Madelein on Stage 9 Tuesday  and arrived at the finish area more than nine minutes after stage winner Sandy Casar (Francaise des Jeux) before revealing that he rode with a broken elbow and found it too difficult to follow the moves on the climb.  Casar was part of an original 14-man break that saw four of the riders stay clear to the end.  Second and third places went to Luis León Sánchez  (Caisse d’Epargne) and Damiano Cunego (Lampre).

Saxo Bank’s Andy Schleck moved into the maillot jaune for the first time in his young career, a long-term objective for the 25-year old Luxembourger.  Sitting only 41-seconds behind in the classification is Alberto Contador (Astana), followed by Olympic champion Samuel Sánchez of Euskaltel-Euskadi another two minutes down.

Team RadioShack’s Levi Leipheimer rode well on the stage and climbed up into sixth place with a gap of 3:59 to the race leader. Asked about the difficulty of the stage, Levi replied, “That was one of the harder finals I’ve had in the Alps in awhile because they went full gas on the climb, yet it was so far to the finish.  I think Andy saw that Alberto wasn’t good the other day so he knew he had to try now instead of waiting for the Pyrenees where Alberto might be better.  I don’t know what happened in the front but I assume Alberto was there because he looked good , he was a lot better than the other day.  It just made for a brutal final.  You saw it was in pieces and everybody suffered today.”  Leipheimer felt satisfied with his ride, saying, “I tried to stay there a little too long with Alberto and Andy and I paid for that on the climb.  I suffered the rest of the way up but luckily I found a good group with (Robert) Gesink and (Denis) Menchov (Rabobank) who were working as teammates so thankfully I was able to hitch on to their wagon.  I felt better and better on the flats here at the end and by the finish I felt strong again so it’s a good sign.” 

After Sunday’s crash-filled stage that saw Lance Armstrong’s 8th Tour dreams fade away, he looked for good legs on the day after the rest day.  “ I feel better.  I guess the rest day was good,” Lance said to the press after the stage.  “I felt better than I did the other day so that was a good sign.  I found myself in a position where I was with two guys who are a threat to Levi  [ed. Jurgen Van Den Broeck and Ivan Basso] so there wasn’t much else I could do but sit there.  I wasn’t exactly ready to jump away either.”  Lance was asked about Levi’s chances in the overall and he replied, “Levi has the fortune of knowing that at the end of the race he has 50km on a good course for him that is flat and straight forward.  He can use his position, he can use his power, he can use his recovery.  He’ll be good in the last TT.”  Lance was also asked about his own feelings concerning his final Tour, and he said, “I think the most important thing is that I leave with a good attitude.  I’ve had bad luck, I know that.  I can’t change that.  But at the same time if I look over two decades of my career and when I won seven in a row, I had no bad luck.  Seven years with hardly a flat and hardly a crash.  That’s almost unheard of.  It’s logical that luck catches up with you.  I can’t change it.  I wish I could but I can’t.  I’ll hold my head high and ride strong, ride for the team and go out having fun.   This is a fun bunch.  They are always goofing around, stealing each other’s phones, doing little fraternity-type jokes.    I try to avoid all that.  I told them they can do whatever they want to each other but I said ‘Don’t touch my phone and don’t touch the wine.’ 

Team Director Johan Bruyneel also weighed in after the stage, saying, “I’m pretty happy about the stage.  Obviously Levi couldn’t stay with Contador and Schleck but he stayed with Menchov and Gesink, and he moved up a few places in GC.  Also Lance was good.  I think today was an important test for him to see how he can ride in the next few stages.  We were pretty well represented with Levi in the second group, then Lance in the third and Klödi in the fourth.   I think for now Levi is in a good spot.   If he can stay where he is, he has a good shot at the podium but the Pyrenees stages are still to come and in my opinion those are a lot harder than the Alp stages.  So there is still a lot of work to be done.”

Andreas

A 14-man group originally broke away that included Casar, Christophe Moreau, Sanchez, Cunego, Jens Voigt (Saxo Bank), and Jerome Pineau (Quick Step).  The group stayed mostly together until the climb up the Madeleine when gaps opened up and it was every man for himself.  Schleck knew he needed to start opening up time gaps on Contador if he hopes to stay in front of the defending champion all the way to Paris so he attacked on the climb but Contador easily followed and so did Sanchez.  Back and forth the trio went, swapping leads as they tried to reach the foursome still out front.  Sanchez seemed to cramp on the descent and lost contact with Schleck and Contador, but the other two were on a mission to catch the escapees.  The gap looked fairly secure until the 2km to go sign showed only 20 seconds in hand, a time advantage further reduced to ten-seconds with 1000 meters to go.  The catch was made and seven riders sprinted for the line with Frenchman Casar the best on the day. 

A visit from young son Max Armstrong was a welcome site to daddy Lance as he regroups and leads Team RadioShack to plan two.  Commenting on leaving his son to go race the stage, Lance replied, “The hardest part, not just for me but for every bike racer, is to leave their family for three weeks.  It makes a big difference when they can pop in on rest days.”

Stage 10 on Wednesday is 179km/111mi from Chambery to Gap.  There is a category 1 climb midway through the stage, followed by two more categorized climbs before a final fun into Gap.  Remember Gap?  Lance took to the fields in a cross-country ride in the 2003 Tour on the way to his record-tying fifth win. “I hope I stay out of the fields.  There is no way I could pull that off twice,” said Armstrong.

Beyond the Finish Line:  Grotte de la Madelaine is the only public cave, located directly at the Ardèche gorge. The cave has a parking lot on top of the plateau, at the Ardèche road. From here a path leads down into the valley to the entrance of the cave. From this path, the visitor has a very nice view on the Ardèche, 200 meters below. Many people canoe down the Ardèche. It is rather easy to make stop and walk up to the cave.

Top Ten Results

1              Sandy Casar (Fra) Française des Jeux      5:38:10                   

2              Luis León Sánchez Gil (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne                        

3              Damiano Cunego (Ita) Lampre-Farnese Vini                          

4              Christophe Moreau (Fra) Caisse d'Epargne           0:00:02  

5              Anthony Charteau (Fra) Bbox Bouygues Telecom                              

6              Alberto Contador Velasco (Spa) Astana                                  

7              Andy Schleck (Lux) Team Saxo Bank                         

8              Samuel Sánchez Gonzalez (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi          0:00:52  

9              Joaquin Rodriguez (Spa) Team Katusha 0:02:07  

10            Levi Leipheimer (USA) Team Radioshack

Team RadioShack Results

18           Lance Armstrong (USA)  0:02:50

21           Andreas Klöden (Ger) 0:03:48

33           Christopher Horner (USA)  0:04:55

45           Jani Brajkovic (Slo)  0:08:09

56           Sergio Paulinho (Por) 0:15:17

89           Gregory Rast (Swi) 0:25:56

109         Yaroslav Popovych (Ukr)

112         Dmitriy Muravyev (Kaz)

General Classification after Stage 9

1              Andy Schleck (Lux) Team Saxo Bank        43:35:41                

2              Alberto Contador Velasco (Spa) Astana                 0:00:41  

3              Samuel Sánchez Gonzalez (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi          0:02:45  

4              Denis Menchov (Rus) Rabobank               0:02:58  

5              Jurgen Van Den Broeck (Bel) Omega Pharma-Lotto          0:03:31  

6              Levi Leipheimer (USA) Team Radioshack               0:03:59  

7              Robert Gesink (Ned) Rabobank                 0:04:22  

8              Luis León Sánchez Gil (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne       0:04:41  

9              Joaquin Rodriguez (Spa) Team Katusha 0:05:08  

10            Ivan Basso (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo                 0:05:09

Team RadioShack on General Classification

20           Andreas Klöden (Ger)   0:09:05

25           Christopher Horner (USA)   0:11:06

31           Lance Armstrong (USA)   0:15:54 

35           Jani  Brajkovic (Slo)  0:21:43

69           Yaroslav Popovych (Ukr)   0:53:14            

77           Sergio Paulinho (Por)   0:56:10   

135         Gregory Rast (Swi)   1:27:04

177         Dmitriy Muravyev (Kaz)   1:53:32