They think its all over ...it is now! After two weeks of follow-the-leader in the 2009 Tour de France, Alberto Contador put paid to the race with one dynamic attack. It came on stage 15, a 207.5km journey from Pontarlier in France to Verbier in Switzerland. The blistering move, around 6km from the mountain summit could not be matched by any of the Spaniard's rivals. By the summit, Contador had a 43 second advantage over his nearest rival, Andy Schleck. Contador will win the 2009 Tour de France. Young Italian Vincenzo Nibali filled the podium finishing third on the stage.
All the action of the days stage played out on the final climb to Verbier. After a 10 man breakaway was peeled back the peleton exploded into action on the category 1 climb. Saxobank's infernal pace was enough to drop the majority of the peleton, before continued hard riding from Frank Schleck reduced the main group to an elite combination of just Frank and Andy Schleck, Alberto Contador, Lance Armstrong, Bradley Wiggins, Nibali and Roman Kreuziger. Contador chose this moment to strike. With a blistering burst of acceleration he cleared out. Andy Schleck partially matched him for a moment but could could only get halfway across the gap. Behind was chaos. Armstrong refused to chase down his teammate and the loss of momentum allowed Andreas Kloden to rejoin. Frank Schleck refused to chase down his brother leaving the work to Nibali and Wiggins. They didn't have the strength to do so and were eventually joined by Cadel Evans and Carlos Sastre who had been blown away by the early pace with which the main group attacked the climb. The elder Schleck lept up the rode to chase his brother. Only Nibali and Wiggins could go with him, and for the first time in his last 8 attempts at the Tour de France the 37 year old legs of Armstrong finally gave out on him. Lance was left behind, to be paced back to the finish by teammate Kloden.
But up ahead Contador was riding to immortality. His lead increased the further and further he went up the mountain. By the end he had gained mega time over all his rivals. 43 seconds over Andy Schleck, 1:06 over Frank Schleck and Sastre, 1:26 over Evans, and 1:35 over Armstrong. The result is a major shake up of the GC. Contador now inherits the yellow jersey by 1:37 from Armstrong. Wiggins is up to third @ 1:46 followed by Kloden (2:17), and Andy Schleck (2:26). Nibali is up to 7th.
Outside of Contador's utter dominance the big surprise packet has to be Wiggins. A former Olympic pursuit champion, who was better known for his short time-trialing ability - he is now somehow able to get over the mega-mountains at this years tour. This is a little surprising to say the least and in terms of dodgy looking performances at this years event this has to be right up there. You don't see world class riders such as Fabian Cancellara all of a sudden being able to climb with the best of them.
In terms of the competitions, the only change was the White Jersey with Andy Schleck taking the jersey off Tony Martin who could only manage 12th on the stage. He now leads the Best Young Rider classification by 25 seconds from Nibali. In the King of the Mountains Franco Pellizotti garnered himself a few extra points over his rival Egoi Martinez by leading an early break over the earlier cols. He now has an 8 point lead.
In concluding, the organisers wanted an exciting final week. As a result they made the first fortnight of the race pretty much as boring as hell quite frankly. Now we have had one mountain stage and Contador has blown the field to pieces, and barring hunger flats will win the event. Pretty moronic programming if you ask me. Especially with no more mountain top finishes in the Alps for Alberto's rivals to try and take time back off him.
Yellow Jersey - Alberto Contador
Green Jersery - Thor Hushovd
Polka Dot Jersey - Franco Pellizotti
White Jersey - Andy Schleck
Photo courtesy of Yahoo Sports.
PS - SBS - Your coverage of the race last night was f**ing disgraceful. What kind of moron do you have up there planning your commericals. Your coverage goes for over three hours and you found it necessary to whack an ad break in 2 kilometres into the final climb on one of only three mountain top finishes this year...YOU IDIOTS!!!
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