I want to smoke a cigarette...
...and then fall asleep. The 2006 Tour was just that good.
Of course there was the day Landis ascended to heaven: Stage 17.
But Mickael Rasmussen rode a masterful breakaway in Stage 16 that could only have been eclipsed on the next day by Landis' legendary, Merckx-like ride. David de la Fuente, the Tour's overall most aggressive rider, accounted for gritty breakaways over the 2,000 miles, Robbie McEwen won three stages to seize his third green jersey, Thor Hushovd bookended the Tour with wins in the Prologue and yesterday's finish, and Viatcheslav Ekimov, a rock of cycling, closed out his career. Add in Eki's Olympic (two golds and a silver over 16 years) and other stage and race victories, and cycling is losing a steady giant. In a nod to his stature, the rider whose career I've followed since Perestroika led the peloton yesterday onto the Champ Elysees: fifteen starts in the Tour and fifteen finishes, a measure surpassed only once.
Here's a quick photo essay of the Tour, day by day, from BBC.
No analysis or commentary necessary. Vive Landis, Vive le Tour!
Of course there was the day Landis ascended to heaven: Stage 17.
But Mickael Rasmussen rode a masterful breakaway in Stage 16 that could only have been eclipsed on the next day by Landis' legendary, Merckx-like ride. David de la Fuente, the Tour's overall most aggressive rider, accounted for gritty breakaways over the 2,000 miles, Robbie McEwen won three stages to seize his third green jersey, Thor Hushovd bookended the Tour with wins in the Prologue and yesterday's finish, and Viatcheslav Ekimov, a rock of cycling, closed out his career. Add in Eki's Olympic (two golds and a silver over 16 years) and other stage and race victories, and cycling is losing a steady giant. In a nod to his stature, the rider whose career I've followed since Perestroika led the peloton yesterday onto the Champ Elysees: fifteen starts in the Tour and fifteen finishes, a measure surpassed only once.
Here's a quick photo essay of the Tour, day by day, from BBC.
No analysis or commentary necessary. Vive Landis, Vive le Tour!
posted by jim at 7/24/2006 07:44:00 PM
1 Comments:
There were some amazing performances in the Tour this year, and it was all so unpredictable. As the VeloNews live report said sometime last week, the Armstrong years never made for such an exciting three weeks of racing as these were.
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