Sports

Tour de France -- Yellow Jersey Passes to Frank Schleck

by Barbara McPherson | July 20, 2008 at 08:43 am

417 views | 17 Recommendations | 4 comments

The Lords of Chaos attended stage 15 of the Tour de France. Stormy weather, slick roads, spectacular crashes and surprise wins bedeviled the riders.

The pelloton failed to reel in an early breakaway to give Australian rider, Simon Gerrans, the stage win. A surprise third place winner was Danny Pate riding for Garmin-Chipotle in his first Tour.

The Italian section of the Alps was a disaster for serious contender Oscar Pereiro who crashed out on a hairpin descent. He hit the guard rail and plummeted to the road below. He was medivaced out with a broken shoulder. At first it was thought that he had broken his leg as well. On a flatter section, a roundabout brought down many riders on both sides. Fortunately for those riders, they were able to continue only sacrificing some skin.

In the end, Frank Schleck won the yellow jersey for best overall time in the race. Cadel Evans slipped to third place. The ultimate winner of the race is still very much in question as after 15 days of racing only 49 seconds separate the top six cyclists.

Mark Cavendish has withdrawn from the race to rest and train for the upcoming Olympics.

More bad news for Team BarloWorld. It was announced that they will be losing their team sponsorship after this Tour. More fallout from the drug scandal involving Ricardo Ricco. They have been a real hardluck team since their successful wildcard Tour last year. One of their promising young riders died of a burst artery shortly after surgery, their Tour contender Hernandez Soler crashed early in the race and retired from it three days later with a broken wrist, and of course Ricco was disqualified for cheating.

Tomorrow is a rest day for the riders. Tuesday will be another grueling stage in the Alps.

2 See all footage | View Slideshow

Share: email story | add to any | | facebook | stumbleupon

recommend This comment thread is now closed

Jordan Yerman

flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 09:06 on July 20th, 2008

Barbara McPherson, I like this story. It's good stuff.

armchairsports

at 12:05 on July 20th, 2008

This was one of the best Tour stages in recent history. Who knows how it would have ended if Denis Menchov hadn't of slipped down while he was trying to escape with a couple of kilometers to go on the final climb up to Prato Nevoso> It looked like Andy Schleck had the move covered - but the fal must surely have taken some of the power out of Menchov's legs.

Tuesday and Wednesday will hopefully be more of the same, perhas with team CSC putting the hurt on the top of the field with three strong riders - though they will now have to protect the yellow jesrey, and the tactics may change.

Just a note of correction though - the Barloworld rider who tested positive for drugs was actually Moises Duenas, which is a separate incident from that of Ricardo Ricco. Ricco and his team mate Leonardo Piepoli (who has now confessed to "doing the same as Ricco" without testing positive) ride for the Saunier Duval team, which has been withdrawn from the race.