The Tour of the Living Dead rolled on toward the Alps today, and I’ll be damned if I have any idea what the hell was going on. So many stories, so little time. Tell you what, though — these guys can’t be too tuckered out, ’cause a bunch of ’em were anaerobically jacking their foaming jaws post-stage.
Columbia-HTC’s George Hincapie got into an early break and just missed taking the yellow by five seconds; depending upon whom you read, he was screwed out of it by either Ag2r, Astana or Garmin-Slipstream. Teammate Mark Cavendish, meanwhile, got relegated for slamming the door on green jersey Thor Hushovd (Cervélo) in the bunch sprint.
Hinc’ initially blamed Astana for chasing before stalking into the team bus and refusing to speak to the press. But Big Tex and Johan Bruyneel say they wanted Hincapie in yellow so that Columbia would have to defend against the Schleck brothers, Cuddles Evans, et al., in the Alps. The team was on the front, yes, but merely riding tempo with the goal of getting Tex’s former chief lieutenant into the maillot jaune with two minutes to spare. So much for Tex’s policy against granting gifts in the Tour.
Tex and Bruyneel, along with a very irate Columbia honch’ Bob Stapleton, blame Garmin for spoiling Hincapie’s party, though Tex adds that Ag2r shares some of the blame for saying it would not defend Rinaldo Nocentini’s overall lead, then abruptly starting to ride as though their shorts were on fire.
Garmin’s Jonathan Vaughters, meanwhile, says it looked to him as though his boys were merely rotating through at the front of the peloton, trying to protect the GC positions of Bradley Wiggins and Christian Vande Velde. I like JV, but I’m not buying that one. I was watching TV, too, and that didn’t look anything like a casual rotation to me. The argyle boys were drilling it, along with Ag2r, and I don’t imagine director Matt White will have a whole lot of pals in the peloton going forward.
The Cavendish-Hushovd deal was an easier call. Cav’ simply tried to ride Hushovd into the barriers on a slight bend. Case closed. And now he’s gonna have a tougher time getting that green jersey back from the big Norwegian. Cav’ may win the points, but I bet Hushovd wins the fight in the parking lot afterward.
Tomorrow brings the 207km stage from Pontarlier to Verbier, with four Category 3s, one Cat. 2 and the Cat. 1 climb to the finish. Think that might get the big dogs to stop their monotonous barking and finally jump off that comfy porch? VeloNews editor at large John Wilcockson predicts that Nocentini will finally lose that yellow jersey — but he’s not expecting much in the way of an early challenge to the nut-lock Astana has on the GC.
Ho hum. Paging Bernard Hinault … Monsieur Hinault, to the yellow courtesy phone, please. . . .
• Late update: VeloNews Euro’ correspondent Andrew Hood advises via Twitter: “ChaseGate continues to churn; circus outside Garmin bus tomorrow; by 5 p.m. tomorrow, all will be forgotten. AC-LA duel is real story.”
• Even Later Update: The NYT gives Garmin-Slipstream a little positive press with a slideshow on how (and what) the team eats.
Mad Blog Media 
Can they relegate some of these big dogs to the back of the bus for not doing jack shit?
Dude! Generally, dontcha agree that when a team has a guy in a break, it’s just not kosher to chase the break down. Garmin had
a guy in that break. As far as Hinault goes, he is just an angry little troll….. Love reading your shit, please don’t stop!
Pete.
Radios must been on the fritz today then I guess? Seeing as how when I raced, it was every man, woman and child for themselves. Bring back those late 90s.
If I cared about this Tour thing, then I’d have more to say. But I have read one complete story about it since July 3, and skimmed the stories on other days. The only two times I read anything more than that was yesterday and today about the pellet gun, and moto/spectator death. If it bleeds it leads.
Oh well, only two more months tell cross season starts….Now there’s excitement!!!!
I love it when someone cries about someone else riding fast. You can explain it away by saying it wasn’t a smart tactical move, but it still boils down to: “I didn’t like it that they went fast in a bike race/”
@cyclepath: there’s a difference between chasing down a break containing your own guy and simply controlling the time gap between the break and the main group. Chasing but not catching … little bit of a difference there.
Okay, now that I’ve defended Garmin … I don’t get it. Giving Columbia the yellow the day before the Alps doesn’t change how any of the big teams approach Sunday.
On the slideshow: If Chef Sean Fowler is the Garmin man behind the burners, then is Willy Balmat retired or is he working for Astana this year?
Well, the Hincapie flap is moot now. George can sit back in the peloton and watch the contenders dispense with the pretenders.
Tex looking like he was running on fumes towards the top of that last climb? Makes me wonder if he is going be up to the task of getting to the top of Ventoux without pedaling squares.
I believe Lance will ride for AC now, because he’s a savvy PR guy and now he can say he helped AC win the Tour. So no more pressue on him and he enjoys the rest of the race. He doesn’t even need to huff and puff up Ventoux very quick. And I doubt he returns next year unless he buys the Le Tour.
JV has no love for the Posties. I’ll bet if JV could have let George have 4 more seconds, he would have.
If George wanted yellow, maybe he should have tried following the wheel of the guy that rode away from him to win the stage. Is this a bike race or a food bank? These guys whine more than my kids when I say no to ice cream!