[Le Tour 2003]Stage 9 - More Drama in the Alps

[Tour Reporter]

Stage 9 - Borug D'Oisans - Gap 184 km

Today the riders hike themselves up over the 2nd highest point of the 
race - the 2360 meter tall Col D'Izoard.  The riders have now covered 
just over half the distance in distance, although they have not reached 
the mid-stage of the race yet.

Attacks began right from the start today, as the riders immediately 
began climbing on the way to the Category 1 Col du Lautaret. 16 riders 
moved up and away  - and Saeco's Danilo Diluca rolls over the first 
climb in first - he must be feeling a bit better now.

On  the climb up the Hors Categorie Col d'Izoard, riders begin to get 
nipped off.  The breakaway gets whittled down a bit, and with 106 km to 
go, there is about 4 and a half minutes up to the now seven member 
breakaway:
15 - Jorge Jaksche - ONCE
54 - DAnilo DiLuca - Saeco
107 - Ivan Parra - Kelme
133 - Angel Casero - Team Bianchi
135 - Aitor Garamendia - Team Bianchi
177 - Alberto Lopez de Munain - Euskatel-Euskadi
209 - Franco Pellizotti - Alessio

The cameras find Lance Armstrong thrumming along in the small ring, very 
little expression upon his face.  He and the rest of the gang are 
working their way up the Col D'Izoard.

We don't get a specific update on who has withdrawn, but only 179 riders 
start today.

In the main group, iBanesto.com 's Juan Mercado moves strongly away past
someone who has brought their inflatable killer whale pool toy. They 
decided to bring that to the race.  Go figure.

We spend some time rolling up through the stragglers on the climb
The gap to the breakaway down to 2:30 - the climbers are suffering on
this day of overcast skies and dry roads.

Fassa Bortolo's team manager, Giancarlo Feretti actually went over to 
Jean Marie LeBlanc last evening to apologize for the nearly wholesale 
abandonment of his team members.

Lance has 6 riders around him who are tapping out a brisk climbing 
tempo, while polka-dotted Richard Virenque out of the saddle  next to
Ullrich who sits back and methodically rolls his big gear.

Diluca continues to show his spunkiness, pushing the pace with Munian 
and forcing the others to scramble back up to them.  Now Garamendia 
makes a move and streaks clear with 1 km to the top of the climb. 
Behind him, teammate Angel Casero remains in the tail of the group - the 
celeste jersey and bike giving a classic feel to this historic climb - 
Now Jaksche moves clear and Ivan Parra marks him, trying hard to close 
the gap.

Garamendia rolls over the top of the Col d'Izoard first with about a 
half minute ahead of Jaksche and then Parra.  Glimmers of sunlight hit 
the barren expanses of the sheer dropoffs. There are no guardrails - 
this is not where you want to skip over the edge.

Floyd Landis of the USPS sits up front in the main group, knocking over 
the pedals and keeping the pace appropriate.  iBanesto's Francisco 
Mancebo moves away suddenly, but Virenque will not lose the points on 
this big climb.  Virenque pushes ahead and is the 13th rider over the 
summit, the other spots being nabbed by the remnants of the original 
breakaway.

Garamendia continues his descent alone, his gap now 5:16 over the
Armstrong group.  He as almost 1:45 over the 6 chasers whom he left behind.

USPS brings in the Mancebo/Virenque pair and leads the long snake of the
peleton through the constant switchbacks of the descent.  Vlatchislav
Ekimov leads the USPS team and Lance through the sinuous twists of the
roadway. Official split puts them at 6:03 behind, which does put Jaksche
into the yellow jersey on the road today.  But, they do not seem to be
panicking - they know that 80-odd kilometers is a long way to go.

Again looking stragegically, it wouldn't be an extremely bad thing for
Jaksche to take over the yellow jersey - it might force ONCE into a bit
more of an aggressive defense.

The riders continue descending on the twisting roads alongside of the
cascading river in this rocky gorge.

Garamendia does win the day's "Wha-Tha-Fa?" award for continuing to
press his attack.  With a teammate in the immediate chase group, they
could be biding their time and moderating their energy expenditure a bit
more by having a strongly workiing 7 man break. Instead, he continues to 
press on alone.

Another day of scorching temperatures, as the temperatures push into the 
mid-90's.

About 68 km still to go. 6:23 from the leader to the big bunch. 
Garamendia finally wised up and let the rest of the breakaway


=====================
Today's Trivia Teaser:
Which country leads the way with victories on the L'Alpe d'Huez?
---------------------

Now onto an uncategorized but noticeable climb, the lead group splinters 
slightly as the Euskatel-Euskadi rider Munian moves away. But, they 
realize they still have some real climbs to go yet, and collect 
themselves before expending too much sweat and energy.

The group of seven roll over the sprint point in the town of Embrun 
without changing their pace, with the luck of the rotation putting 
Casero over the line first, followed by DiLuca.

44 km to go on the day, this group is drawing a bead on the short but 
sharp climb up the Cote de St. Apollinaire. They are currently moving 
through with short and crisp pulls, working very well together. The gap 
has been squeezed down to about 4 and half minutes.

Before too many kilometers roll under the wheels, the gap edges down to 
3:15.  Floyd Landis continues to hammer out the pace for the USPS, who 
have effectively brought the yellow jersey back onto the shoulders of 
Lance Armstrong.  Even before we go to another commercial break, the 
time slips under three minutes.

Garamendia slides away as Jaksche hammers up the climb of Cote de St. 
Apollinaire, with Casero and Ivan.  DiLuca, Pellizotti and Munian lose 
touch with the accelleration.

Back in the bunch, David Millar decides to move off the front, deciding 
that the topography of the final 40 kilometers suits his style - if he 
can get clear, his time-trialing skill could keep him away.

Parra dances out of the saddle as he follows Casero and Jaksche upwards. 
   31.9 km to go, the gap at 2:17

Garamendia wiggles back to the bunch, and as a true domestique, has the 
prescense of mind to supply teammate Jan Ullrich a fresh bottle of water 
he'd nabbed.  DiLuca gets lassoed back in short order.  Continuing 
smoothly up the climb, Millar continues to cut down the gap to the trio 
who remain 1:41 ahead.  On the othe end of the bunch, Garamendia cracks 
and falters - literally falling out the back of the Armstrong group.

The peak begins to seriously bite, kicking strongly up and narrowing 
dramatically as it hits the final 1 km.  Jaksche and Parra continue 
together up the steep bit.

Armstrong hits the steep bit with Ullrich, Beloki, Moreau and Basso 
sitting right behind him. Here comes the move! Beloki makes a hard move, 
which immediately gets a response from Armstrong.  It looks like Iban 
Mayo has bridged up as well, as they distance themselves from the rest 
of the bunch. Beloki has continued to show such tenacity!

Jacksche nips over the top of this nasty little climb, Parra just 
behind. DiLuca, Casero and Garamendia have dropped away.

Ullrich has rolled back up to the  bunch, aloing with Hamilton, Basso 
another Euskatel-Euskadi rider who looks to be Etxebarria and  a Telekom 
rider tacked onto the end who is more than likely Alexandre Vinokourov.

Credit Agricole's Christophe Moreau is in a bit of difficulty, clawing 
back as they crest the climb - riders have split into a variety of 
groups under the pitch of this short but difficult climb.

Millar has been hammering up to the breakaway, who feel the need to dink 
around with less than 15 km to go.  The Armstrong group is at 1:04 as 
they his the 15 km to go banner, and seem to be closing down the gap on 
to Millar, who looks to be driving into a headwind.

Euskatel-Euskadi assists the USPS in the capture, while up front in the 
break, Parra counters on a move by Pelizzotti hammering up but unable to 
break one another.  The chase forms an echelon against a crosswind - 
Millar probably couldn't have chosen a tougher place to bridge.

The four up front have collected themselves back togther but no longer 
even pretend to work with one another.  Millar can be no more than 20 
seconds behind, but others chase him...  Suddenly Parra squeezes up the 
gutter before the start of the final climb, almost knocked off by Casero 
who had swerved off after taking a short pull at the front.  Parra has 
gained an immediate gap and flies up the roadway.  The remaining trio 
visibly deflate, although first Casero and then Jaksche again try to 
move one last time - if they could hold...

Parra has vehicles flying past him as the gap continues to drop - Millar 
is caught suddenly as he can no longer hold the pace on the incline.

David Etxebarria hammers away from the Armstrong group, but the huge 
effort he is making is clearly evident - the USPS methodically close the 
gap, coming back up on him like the Borg...

Millar has continued sliding back and lost contact with the Armstrong 
group, falling back behind the first set of team cars.

Etxebarria is pulled back in, and Vinokourov seizes the lull to roar 
immediately past Angel Casero.  Jaksche has clawed himself back to 
Parra, but both are in a world of hurt on this final climb. Vinokourov 
has crossed the gap and fires past the two now ex-leaders.  The narrow, 
  twisty roads have him out of sight of the bunch. Jaksche somehow hurls 
himself up and attaches to his wheel, but Parra can no longer make the 
pace and wonders who poured the cement into his shoes.

Heras paces Armstrong, with Beloki sitting in his pocket.  Vinoukourov 
is 20 seconds up and has now cracked Jaksche, who seemingly turns 
himself inside out to stay in touch.  Parra finds himself in the sights 
of the Armstrong group and disappears behind them.

Armstrong on the move - driving harder now, Heras has fallen away, 
followed immediately by Beloki and Jan Ullrich and Ivan Basso and Iban 
Mayo.  They pickup Jaksche without a second glance, and the pace 
continues to increase to reduce the gap to the streaking Vinokourov. 
Vino crests the summit while only 15 seconds behind, Arstrong moves 
easily out of the saddle. He and the select group in his wake crest the 
climb. Now comes the drop into the city of Gap.  While the gap remain?

They are pushing extremely hard down the kilometers which remain - 
trying to get Vinokourov back in control -

Beloki sudedenly swerves and goes down!

- he must have hit a heat-softened patch of the terrible French tarmac, 
putting him briefly sideways which causes him to roll his rear tire and 
smack the pavement hard with his right side - hitting hip, dragging 
elbow and whip-cracking his shoulder and head against the roadway. It is 
a serious fall!

Armstrong rides directly behind him, watching it all at a high rate of 
speed - Beloki continues to slide and tumble toward the outside of the 
sharp right hand horseshoe Armstrong has nowhere to go! But he rumbles 
cross-country, carefully arcing through the steeply pitched fields and 
finding his way back to the paved course. He actually has to dismount to 
leap across a wide ditch and regains his bike with a true cyclocross 
remount.  As he gets back, the others who had been behind, negotiating 
the double horseshoe curve, roll back up to him.  They clearly are not 
taking advantage of either the crash or Armstrong's cross-country romp.

But, behind them all, the damage has clearly been inflicted upon Beloki. 
  A teammate crouches nearby.  Beloki wails in anger, pain and 
frustration, crumpled in a twisted heap and beyond words. His 
ONCE-Eroski teammates look at one antoher uneasily, rising from his side 
and sadly knowing that they need to press on without him.

The race continues, Vinokourov benefitting from the confusion of the 
crash.  He hammers under the 1 km to go banner, riding up the edge of 
the French Tricolor, the painting of which covers the entire last 
kilometer.  He the takes the stage with a broad wave.

Now back up to serious speed, the select group containing the 
unflappable Armstrong eyes each other and the finish line.  Paolo 
Bettini is in the bunch, having somehow snuck into this select bunch.

Bettini moves sharply away and will not be caught, while Armstrong 
follows Mayo's surge, not willing to allow a gap in Gap.

The unstoppable Vinokourov has now added a stage victory in the Tour de 
France to his 2003 palmares of wins in Paris-Nice, the Tour of 
Switzerland and the Amstel Gold race.

Stage 9 Results -
1 - Alexandre Vinokourov - Telekom - 5:02:00
2 - Paolo Bettini - Quick Step - @ :36
3 - Iban Mayo - Euskatel-Euskadi - s.t.
4 - Lance Armstrong - USPS - s.t.
5 - Jan Ullrich - Team Bianchi - s.t.
6 - Ivan Basso - Fasso Bortolo - s.t.
7 - Georg Totschnig - Gerolsteiner - s.t.
8 - Francisco Mancebo - iBanesto.com - s.t.
9 - Haimar Zubeldia - Euskatel-Euskadi - s.t.
10 - Tyler Hamilton - CSC - s.t.

General Classification -
Mailliot Juane - Lance Armstrong - 40:15:26
2 - Alexandre Vinokourov - @ :21
3 - Iban Mayo - @ 1:02
4 - Fracisco Mancebo - @ 1:37
5 - Tyler Hamilton - @ 1:52
6 - Jan Ullrich - @ 2:10
7 - Ivan Basso - @ 2:25
8 - Roberto Heras - @ 2:28
9 - Haimar Zubeldia - @ 3:25
10 - Denis Menchov - @ 3:45


Tomorrow's Stage -
Stage 10 - Gap - Marseille - 219 km

A long stage again, but this time steadily dropping to the Mediterranean 
  Sea with only a couple of Cat 4 climbs in the way.  They will drop 
from the 624 meter altitude of Gap to near sea level. With the sudden 
departure of Beloki, maybe the riders will choose to recover a bit 
tomorrow.  But, that has not been the tone so far.  If the right 
combination moves away, the USPS may be content to let them romp and 
frolic on this  stage before the rest day.


=====================
Today's Trivia Answer
Holland and Italy are tied with 7 wins each on L'Alpe d'Heuz
---------------------



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