[Le Tour 2003]Stage 5 - Sprint-fest

[Tour Reporter]

Stage 5 - Troyes - Nevers - 196 km

Victor Hugo Pena wears the yellow jersey on his 29th birthday.  A 
beautiful and stunningly warm day as the stage continues to move 
inexorably toward the mountains. After a stunningly strong and smooth 
team time trial, the US Postal Service have executed the second step of 
their march to the finish. ONCE seems a bit stunned by the result, but 
they may have been paying more attention to the history of the TTT than 
yesterday's task at hand.

On the roadway, aching Tyler Hamilton from CSC rolls along in tow of the 
doctor's vehicle. He seems to be suffering a bit more today, and the 
hard effort in the different position of the time trial bike couldn't 
have assisted.

A break continues slicing through the 85 degree heat a bit more than 2 
minutes ahead of the bunch.

The importance of the team time trial cannot be overstated in this 
year's tour - with the lack of mountaintop finishes, the time gaps will 
be harder to come by.  Saeco's effort has put Simoni more than 3 minutes 
back before any of the serious climbs, while Telekom's time moved 
Santiago Botero adrift by 1:30. As mentioned before, Team Bianchi's Jan 
Ullrich sits 38 seconds back, while ONCE's Joseba Beloki has only lost 
30 seconds.

Breakaway member Laszlo Bodogri from QuickStep-Davitamon snagged the 
sprint points at the first spot but continues to work well with CSC's 
Nicholas Jalabert, Credit Agricole's Jens Voigt, Jean Delatour's 
Frederic Fino who has managed to place himself into his second serious 
break of this year's race, and Ag2R's Ludovic Turpin.  They edge up to a 
gap at 2:15.

14 riders had edged away early in the race, and these five escaped just 
as the peleton moved to capture them.  They are edging up a bit, 
FDJuex.com has been raising the pace soas not to lose the spotted 
climbers jersey, and bring things under 2 minutes. They are on the 
climbing a slight rise which have a slight amount of climbers' points on it.

Bodrogi begins to dose his efforts as they move toward the second sprint 
point at Baily - He does so with little fanfare.  The peleton rolls 
through 1:40 behind.

----------------------
Daily Trivia Question:
What two riders won both the Leader's yellow jersey and the green Points 
jersey in the same year?
----------------------

FDJeux.com continue to work with Fassa Bortolo and the odd Rabobank 
rider.  They have lost out on the Climber's points on the day, as Finot 
moved through at the top of the rise to snag the 5 points (and take over 
the jersey from their man Christophe Mengin), but feel as though the 
finish favors their fast man Baden Cooke. With 58 km to go, they 
maintain the gap of 1:40 to the break.

With about 40 km to go, the slow-cooking breakaway has lost about a 
minute of their lead.  The peleton eases slightly, secure in the 
knowledge that they can grasp them at will. The slightly widening group 
let the bunch back out to 53 seconds as Fassa Bortolo seems to have lost 
most of their help. Another kilometer gets them back out to over a minute.

Finot whisks past the devel as the catch occurs - They pull the riders
Jens Voigt slides back into the fold while Finot hopes that everyone has 
forgotten about him.  Not bloody likely.  Particularly when surrounded 
by a couple dozen press motorcycles. Nevertheless, a French rider on a 
French team who will pull on the spotted jersey at the end of the day - 
20 km to go.

Of course, if you have watched any racing, you know that the catch of a 
breakaway will be followed by a counterattack. A quick move and muscle 
contraction brings about that event - but the members are a bit 
surprising - none other than Italian National Champion and UCI Points 
Leader Paolo Bettini of QuickStep-Davitamon and the ever-dangerous 
Alexandre Vinokourov of Telekom.  Sebastien Hinault tacks himself onto 
their tires and the gap quickly grows out to 16 seconds.

However, the quality of these riders gets US Postal's attention, and 
they assist to raise the pace and begin cutting down the gap.  Other 
teams take over and Axel Merkcx hammers the pedals to get Lotto teammate 
Robbie McEwen into sprint position.  The course continues undulating and 
Bettini continues to hammer as they have about 11 km to go.  A quick 
catch of the trio occurs suddenly at the top of a rise, followed by 
attack from Jerome Pineau from Brioches La Boulangerie - he screams 
under the 10 km to go banner dangling 8 or 9 seconds ahead - thankfully 
under the shade of some trees as the temperature continues to hover in 
the high 80's. The sprinters' teams make some mental calculations and 
begin to assemble themselves.

6.5 km to go, Pineau with a 12 second lead.

FDJeux.com push tehmselves along at the front, while Credit Agricole and 
   Vini-Caldorola muscle themselves up in their immediate slipstream. 
It's a relatively straight finish, though a sweeping turn sits to 
suprise the unwary at about 750 meters. FDJeux.com melt the gap and make 
the catch as they begin to head down a bit of a rise  Fassa Bortolo push 
past them, then Ag2R takes up the efforts to ensure the appearance of 
their Estonian sprinter, Jan Kirsipuu.

Under 2 km to go.

Fassa Bortolians take up the charge. Behind their efforts, Stuart 
O'Grady and Erik Zabel are marking one another closely and maintaining 
their postitions.

  - Crash at the back -

The cameras find a disoriented ONCE rider sitting on the roadside.  It 
looks like the ONCE sprinter Angel Vicioso touched wheels and was 
frisbeed onto the sidelines. Although he doesn't seem to particularly 
want help yet, he is brough upright by a Gendarme and the very plump 
french woman who was kind enough to fetch his lost water bottle.

The howling hounds of Sprinterville approach the last km -

Lotto asserts their dominance and Mcewen shows himself briefly in their 
wake.  They roar safely around the left hand turn and set sights on the 
finish line. As they straighten, FJJeux.com's Bradley McGee moves to the 
front, leading out Baden Cooke.  Behind him sits Stuart O'Grady followed 
by Zabel.  Petacchi and McEwen are both further back. McGee's pursuit 
background lets him set an extremely fast pace, and it appears as though 
the others will be caught out. Mcgee punishes himself to keep the pace 
high for his sprint man Baden Cooke.

Cooke senses that McGee has cooked himself out and begins to 
accellerate.  Mcewen seems to be boxed slightly behind the shuffling 
bunch. Suddenly, they are all passed by a supersonic Alessandro 
Petacchi! Moving out and around to the left, he flies past riders as 
though they are running on airless tires.  He gains an open gap on 
everyone and crosses the finish arms aloft to signal "3" at the cameras 
- Petacchi wins his third stage of this year's Tour.

Kirsipuu follows him across the line, while 4 or 5 riders fan out to 
challenge for third  place - it looks like a well-timed bike throw from 
Zabel just nips McEwen at the line.

What an incredible turn of speed for this supremely talented Italian 
spinter!  Replays show him in 6th or 7th position in the single file 
line until the last 200 yards, when he just stomps it to rocket past 
everyone for the victory. Exceptional effort and tremendous speed.

On the other end of the spectrum, a battered Angel Vicioso rolls in 
about 2:50 down, holding his left arm close to his body, happy to finish.

Stage 5 - Results
1 - Alessandro Petachhi - Fassa Bortolo - 4:09:47
2 - Jan Kirsipuu - Ag2R-Prevoyance
3 - Baden Cooke - FDJeux.com
4 - Erik Zabel - Team Telekom
5 - Robbie McEwen - Lotto
6 - Luca Paolini - QuickStep-Davitamon
7 - Thor Hushovd - Credit Agricole
8 - Stuart O'Grady - Credit Agricole
9 - Fred Rodriguez - Vini Caldirola
10 - Jean Patrick Nazon - Jean Delatour

All riders s.t.

Overall Standings - no changes
M.J. - Victor Hugo Pena - USPS - 13:44:44
2 - Lance Armstrong - USPS - @ :01
3 - Vlatchislav Ekimov - USPS - @ :05
4 - George Hincapie - USPS - @ :05
5 - Jose Rubiera - USPS - @ :23
6 - Roberto Heras - USPS - @ :27
7 - Pavel Padrnos - USPS - @ :27
8 - Floyd Landis - USPS - @ :33
9 - Joseba Beloki - ONCE - @ :33
10 - Jorge Jaksche - ONCE - @ :38


Tomorrow's Stage -
Nevers - Lyon - 230 km
The longest stage so far will begin to see who has some cracks in the 
armor.  After the third of three sprint points on the flatter part of 
the course, the roadway kicks upwards on the first Category 3 climb on 
this year's course. A long descent should bring things back together, 
but another sharp climb looms just outside the finishing town of Lyon - 
while the actual finish is flat, the topography could favor a well-timed 
breakaway.



--------------
Trivia Answer:
Eddy Merkcx 1969 (and won the Climber's jersey), 1971 & 1972 and Bernard 
Hinault who won in 1979.
--------------

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