Lance Armstrong's Bid For Coveted Sixth Tour de France
Foiled By Joe King, Dullard Trite, and Richard Longwood
Special to ESPN, MTV, MIT, and CYCLINGNEWS.COM
PARIS, FRANCE -- Heading into the final stages of the 2004
Tour de France, Lance Armstrong looked destined to be in
clear and eternal glory. Another victory and he would create
a new cycling pantheon. But long shot Tyler Hamilton was
coming on steadily, and suddenly Lance began to look weary.
There would be no six-time Tour de France champion.
Even when he still was in front by minutes, Johan Bruyneel,
Lance Armstrong's coach, knew he was in trouble. "When I
looked back and saw the way Tyler Hamilton was coming at us,
yeah, I thought we were going to get beat," Bruyneel said.
Tyler Hamilton, coached by Urs Freuler, had Lance Armstrong
in his sights, and 7 stages from the last stage, Urs
Freuler's stallion went by the five time Tour de France
champion en route to a commanding victory before a crowd of
millions, the largest ever to see a sporting event in
France. For the first time in five years, Lance Armstrong
didn't win.
Freuler and the other Phonak managers Alvaro Pino, Jacques
Michaud, and René Savary and Tyler's parents had mixed
emotions after last year's situation when Tyler emerged from
obscurity last July to become Massachusetts' favorite son
and an international celebrity.
As Tyler Hamilton and Lance Armstrong galloped out, Freuler
got on Bruyneel' s radio frequency and told him, "Better
luck next time jackass! You were a fool for letting your
pretty boy do all those OLN segments and all those other car
commercials." It surprised Bruyneel, who undoubtedly was in
an agitated state.
"He said he was sorry," Bruyneel said. "I said, 'What are
you going to do? That's bike racing.'"
Freuler was thrilled over finally beating his jinx race and
completing his personal goal. Besides winning 15 stages of
the Giro d'Italia, 3 stages of the Tour de France, 5 stages
of the Tour de Romandie, 9 stages of the Tour de Suisse, Urs
Freuler also took 10 World Track titles. After not making
the podium last year at the Tour de France, the Swiss native
not only won this year's Tour de France but also did it
without Tyler using any performance enhancing drugs. Still,
he felt for those who yearned for a Lance victory.
"What can I say?" Freuler said. "I feel great, the jihad
worked and it was an emotional thing. It's sad because Lance
was great for racing."
Emma O'Reilly, Ireland's leading big mouth, was weepy and
overjoyed. Her feelings were confusing. "This means so much
to me," she said.
"This is a homebred champion. My husband [Mr. Hamilton,
Tyler's father] is the one who decided that we breed and
produce this year's Tour de France champion. But we do feel
bad for Lance (wink, wink). It's bittersweet. We were
rooting for Lance (wink, wink). We love Lance. I think
Lance has done more for the racing community and people who
love cycling."
Love hurts, and Lance went down because he was judged badly
by David Walsh and Pierre Ballester at the end of a glorious
ride through France. Bruyneel, the only Belgian coach Lance
has ever known, asked far too much of him in the most
grueling race Lance will ever run.
Lance never got a breather in an exhausting stage to the top
of Plateau de Beille. He was 30 seconds behind at the first
feed zone and two minutes back at the base of the last climb
while always battling just to stay in the peloton. His
pharmacist was worried a long way out, and he looked more
angry than disappointed seconds after Tyler Hamilton crossed
the finish line to win the stage.
"We just weren't able to manage his hematocrit," Bruyneel
said minutes later. "You can't win a 23 day stage race
without getting that stabilized. I knew when we didn't
win Plateau de Beille that we were in a little trouble.
He just wasn't stabilized the way he was in the previous
two stages."
After taking constant pressure from Roberto Heras and Oscar
Sevilla while chasing Jan Ullrich and Iban Mayo, Lance
Armstrong took the early lead on the L'Alpe d'Huez stage by
10 seconds half way to the top. Bruyneel had him kick for
home early -- too early -- and opened a 20 second lead 6
kilometers from the finish. Heras, Sevilla, Mayo and Ullrich
were done, but Tyler Hamilton proved to have the biggest
schlong of the day and won big time.
The next day, Freuler let Tyler Hamilton move comfortably to
the finish in Le Grand Bornand while Lance took the heat
down the backstretch, and although Tyler was far back,
Freuler still wasn't worried. Tyler Hamilton was on cruise
control, and Lance wasn't home free.
"At the top of the Col de la Madeleine, I still thought we
had a good shot," Bruyneel said, "but then I looked over and
saw Tyler Hamilton smoking a cigarette and thought we might
be in trouble."
He was. Tyler Hamilton ground Lance down and took the lead
for good, and Lance had nothing left to throw at him. Tyler
Hamilton lost only 12 seconds in the descent into the Le
Grand Bornand finish while Lance Armstrong rode at 60
kilometers per hour in the last 2 kilometers, way too fast
to recover for the next day.
Millions of American people were seriously bummed out
because Lance got beat in Paris. Jay Leno had called to ask
if Lance would come to California to appear on his show.
President Bush issued an open invitation for Lance to visit
the Rose Garden. One woman wrote to Bruyneel and asked if
she could have a nude photo shoot taken with Lance. All were
turned down.
"It's unbelievable how it's taken off," Bruyneel said
Friday. "It's just kind of snowballed. It seems like the
story is flowing across the country and everyone has
kind of adopted him as the feel-good story and their
favorite Texan."
"I think the timing has a lot to do with it. There are so
many bad things going on in the world," Jonathan Vaughters
of Boulder said when he came to the Paris finish of the Tour
de France. "People get tired of looking at the bad things on
the front page and they skip to the sports page. They get to
read a feel-good story about a little drug using Texas
cyclist who's doing swell."
"It has been great for the drug companies, and hopefully it
continues."
Unfortunately for Lance and his connections, it didn't.
Bruyneel tried to accentuate the positive while taking the
pain with class and grace. While Freuler was being
interviewed after the race, Bruyneel congratulated him with
a crushing Belgian handshake.
"Well, it's tough," Bruyneel said. "We had a shot to make
big history here. We didn't do it. We've had a great
year. I'm not going to put my head down. I'm proud of the
whole team and everybody needs to be happy. They don't
need to be sad."
Too bad it didn't feel that way Sunday night in Paris, and
that wouldn't change Monday morning.
"David Off" <[email hidden]> wrote in
message news:40e5295d$0$17617$79c14f64@nan-newsreader-
05.noos.net...
Quoted message said:news.bbc.co.uk385Open ↗
8759.stm
Lance Armstrong will fail to become the first man to win
six Tours de France, according to 1987 winner Stephen
Roche. Armstrong is the race favourite in 2004, but
Irishman Roche believes 1997 Tour winner Jan Ullrich will
halt the Texan's historic bid.
"I would be really surprised if Armstrong won," Roche told
BBC Sport.
"He may be mentally tougher than he's ever been and
tactically more astute, but I don't believe he's the same
rider physically anymore."
He added: "If I were to pick it, I'd go Ullrich first,
Tyler Hamilton second and Armstrong third." Armstrong does
not appear to be at his best going into the 2004 race.
He was outridden by Iban Mayo and Hamilton on the Dauphine
Libere and looked as though he was struggling at crucial
times. In contrast, Ullrich appears to be in good shape,
close to the sort of form that won him the race seven
years ago.
And Roche believes the German has even more "bite" after
his runner-up spot 12 months ago. "People have been
talking about him carrying too much weight and not
looking as sharp in races as before, but that's
nonsense," said Roche.
"He looked better and better in his final warm-up - the
Tour of Switzerland - and I think he's hitting top form at
exactly the right
time."
Quoted message said:
Armstrong endured his toughest Tour in 2003.
Although he won - matching the achievements of five-time
champions Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault
and Miguel Indurain - he lacked the invincibility of
previous seasons.
He suffered from malnutrition and dehydration, fell on the
final ascent on stage 15, and was repeatedly attacked by
his rivals. "Last year, the cracks started to show," said
Roche. "Those cracks are only going to get wider."
