Stage 4

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Stage 4

Cambrai-Arras TTT

Results

In today's team time trial, US Postal, Phonak, and T-Mobile all did very well while Liberty and Euskaltel lost a little too much time. What you have to do at this point is weed out the riders on GC who are not long term GC contenders to get an accurate idea of where the race is. don't worry about the riders who won?t be there in the mountains and time trials. They will sort out of the top standings very quickly when the race reaches the mountains. The riders I sorted out to look at are:

1. Armstrong USP --
4. Azevedo USP 22?
8. Hamilton PHO 36?
12. Sevilla PHO 44?
16. Ullrich TMO 55?
18. Julich CSC 1?00?
19. Mancebo IBB 1?01?
21. Leipheimer RAB 1?08?
26. Basso CSC 1?17?
29. Galdeano, Igor LST 1?29?
34. Heras LST 1?45?
70. Simoni SAE 3?22?
92. Mayo EUS 5?27?
95. Zubeldia EUS 5?33?

You can better see the power structures and challenges faced this way. Notice that Armstrong is in excellent position with his number two GC rider to play the tactic I referred to earlier at any time he wants. He can simply position on his competitions? wheels and make every one else race against Azevedo for Second while Lance rests until he is ready to crush his competition. Also note that Azevedo has an excellent chance of finishing top three to five and even in second place.

That is the strength of his position. The weakness of his position is that his team has to defend the lead for the next 5 days of flat racing before they even reach the mountains and then they must defend the lead for another 2 flat days and 6 days in the mountains before the final time trial. That is even longer than last year when they had to modify their team tactics to keep their team in the game. It is almost twice as long.

One way I expect USP to try to handle this for the next five stages is to take control of the peloton very early and let a break go up the road very quickly until it is far enough off to be a serious threat to the sprinter teams so that they have to take over the work at the front of the peloton. They have done this before with good results but 13 days defending the lead is still a very, very long time for any team to do it. It could easily break USP if anything goes wrong or is done wrong.

Another tactic Lance can use in the mountains that I have seen him use is to let Mayo and Zubeldia go early on the last of the significant climbs in each mountain stage so they can gain back that five minutes and move up into the top five. At some point, they will become a threat to the other GC contenders before they become a threat to Lance and those riders, Hamilton, Ullrich, and Heras, will be forced to chase Mayo and Zubeldia while Lance rests on their wheels. Expect both of these tactics to be used often.

Note that Hamilton also has a very strong position with he and his team mate, Sevilla, both within 44 seconds of Lance. This provides Hamilton with very strong potential for team leverage and gives him an excellent opportunity to finish top three or even upset Lance. Remember what I told you in my analysis of the riders and teams, that an incident could easily cause my picks of Heras, Mayo, Hamilton, and Zubeldia to change order. Two of those incidents occurred yesterday and today putting Hamilton in an excellent spot for a top placing or even the win.

Ullrich is well placed but he doesn?t have Vinokorov for team leverage. He is still a favorite to attempt an upset against Lance and could easily play off of the battle that should take place between USP and Phonak, which, by the way, is very promising (drool, drool.) If Ullrich plays off of this battle well enough, he could upset Lance. Watch him closely.

Behind these five riders are four other riders who will add to the imminent battle for top five. Julich is only one minute down and will provide Basso, who is only 1?17? down, an excellent team mate for that battle. Basso could even finish as high as top three but I doubt it. Mancebo and Leipheimer are just well positioned and, if they are strong enough and ride smart enough, have an excellent chance of finishing top five. They should almost certainly finish top ten.

Heras and Galdeano are in a bit of a hole but are still close enough to have a chance to make a bid and give good battle for first place. It will be a tough battle but very interesting, especially if they play off of the battles between USP, Phonak, and T-Mobile. With two strong riders like this being at least this well placed and riding on the same team, they can do what most riders only dream of doing. Keep an eye on them. They are still a threat.

Simoni is almost out of the race but not quite and, as long as he rides better this year in the Tour than he did last year, he should have a good chance to challenge for the top three to five places, maybe even upset and win the race. At this time, the latter is a long shot.

Mayo and Zubeldia are virtually out of the race for first but are good enough and strong enough that, with them riding together, they could get one or both of them into the top three to five. It will be a very tough uphill battle but they can do it. They will definitely play a major role in the action. Watch these guys.

A lesson here is that when you find yourself this far down in a stage race so that you are virtually out of contention for the win, the best psychology is to keep racing for first. This will mean you will be much more likely to be ready for and make any openings that occur. Keep your head in the game. Besides, anything can happen and be ready to take advantage of it when it does. If you are not looking for it when it does occur, you will miss it.

That was almost all that changed today except that Kessler of T-Mobile took over the lead for the White Jersey from Cancelara, who dropped to third. Will T-Mobile try to defend this lead? It makes things a little more interesting. don't you just love bike chess?

Tomorrow

Amiens-Chartres is 200.5 kilometers of extremely flat racing. The only KOM prime is 70 kilometers into the stage and the first road prime is 57.5 kilometers into the stage. This means that they will ride for over one hour before there is a prime. USP will take control early and their will be no mad dashes to set up for a prime so a sizeable break could just roll off the front tomorrow to quickly gain a very large lead.

Bettini shouldn?t be threatened for his lead in KOM by anyone getting in the break except Tombak. Their team should be relatively quiet tomorrow and should let just about anything go up the road. All of the top five riders in the Points Title standings are end-of-the-stage sprinters who should not feel threatened by a break so they could be relaxed enough to accidentally let a group get too much of a lead too late in the stage to pull them back in for the sprint. Tomorrow may be the best chance for a break to win a stage so far and you can bet that a few riders will realize this and go for it. If they get enough of the right riders in the control break tomorrow and they open enough ground quick enough, the break could win the stage. This could be another fun stage.

See you again tomorrow here on ?As The Wheel Turns!? :)
For those of you not from the US, we have a day time soap opera called ?As The World Turns?. It is a pun. We have to have fun.

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