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Stage 20
Day 22 Le Creusot - Montceau les Mines TT 56 km
Analysis
It was another interesting day of racing with more surprises. Landis
rode the way we (the US) hoped he would and took the lead back.
Pereiro rode the way I figured he would and finished just 11 seconds
faster or closer to Landis than I had calculated finishing only 59"
behind on GC instead of the 1'10" I had figured he would be. Not
bad.
From there things changed some with Kloden riding significantly
faster than his first time trial showed he would finishing only
1'29" behind Landis on GC instead of the 2'40" I had figured so he
had a pretty good day. The rest of the top six didn't fare so well
in spite of many predictions by riders and coaches at the Tour to
the opposite.
Sastre had a bad day finishing about 2.5 minutes further behind
Landis than I had figured and actually got passed by Kloden for
third place and permitting Pereiro to keep second place. That is one
ride I bet Sastre wishes he had back to ride again. He didn't even
make podium when he should have.
Both Evans and Menchov had worse days than was expected but managed
to hold their positions on GC. Evans rode about 1.5 minutes slower
than expected and Menchov rode about 2.5 minutes slower than
expected.
I guess it wasn't too bad of a guess for top six considering that
only one rider finished out of relative position because of a good
day and a bad day with Sastre giving up second and third to Pereiro
and Kloden with a bad day and Kloden taking third from Sastre with a
good day. Kloden taking third from Sastre was a combination of
both Sastre having a bad day and Kloden having a good day.
A really interesting surprise was Cunego beat the defending under-23
World Time Trial Champion by enough to keep his lead in the White
Jersey in spite of the fact that EVERYONE just knew Fothen would
regain the lead. It just shows that you shouldn't believe what
everyone else believes just because everyone else believes it
because everyone can be wrong. Question everything and do your best
to win even when everyone else thinks you can't. Cunego did. It
works.
So, it wasn't too bad of a day with only two major surprises today;
Sastre dropping to fourth and Cunego keeping the White Jersey.
Tomorrow
Tomorrow is the last stage for this Tour at a short 154.5 km and
none of the primes should be important to any title. As a matter of
fact, all of the titles have been settled and everyone should feel
free, except for a few domestiques assigned to protect their team
leaders for titles, to race their butts off for the stage win. And,
since it is the last stage, expect a good old free-for-all with a
lot of great team tactics, attacking, big breakaways, chases, and a
really fast pace. When watching this stage, watch it as if it is a
single stage road race which could be won with a break since there
are fewer top sprinters who will have their teams chasing the breaks
in for a sprint win and more teams working for a break win. At least
three of the best sprinters are out of the race and their teams will
MOST LIKELY ride for a break win though a few may ride for a leadout
rider to be the team sprinter. Expect them to ride this stage like
it is the last bike race of the year because it is the last race for
this Tour. It should be fun.
Don't forget that Monday, I will have my post Tour analysis and do a
coach's performance analysis for you.
