Saint Louis University Cycling Team

Here is an update about yesterday’s doping scandal. La Gazzetta dello Sport says that Ricco has been fired by the Saunier Duval team for violating the team’s ethics code. Leonardo Piepoli has also been let go amid rumors of another positive doping test. Due to this news, Saunier Duval is considering withdrasing its sponsorship. Ricco insists that he is innocent and has never doped.

Another sprint stage, another breakaway, this one contains Niki Terpstra (Milram) and Florent Brard (Cofidis). They have about eight minutes on the chasing peloton. They had an advantage of 10 minutes at 21km into the stage, but it’s starting to fall.

At the feed zone, the break still had a 6:18 advantage, with about 100km to go.

74km to go and the two-rider break continues, Brard and Terpstra have 4:41 to the field.

The break was passed, and the sprint starts to pan out in the last 2.5 km. Here is the finish… Mark Cavendish takes his fourth stage of the 08 Tour! Second was McEwen, third was Romain Feillu. So Cavendish moves into second in the points competition. The jerseys and standings remain the same, with no problems or crashes to speak about.

Log on tomorrow for MATT FAVOINO’s triumphant return to the blogging world as the race heads into the Alps. Don’t give him too hard of a time.

First off, wow. I am stunned, if you haven’t heard the news, you had better sit down. Ricardo Ricco has tested positive for EPO on two stages and is in police custody, and his team, Saunier Duval-Scott, has dropped out of the Tour. Wow. I didn’t know anyone who liked Ricco, but he was a great rider. I loved how he attacked like Marco Pantani, in the drops while climbing. This is the third positive doping test this Tour, with yesterday’s scandal and earlier Manuel Beltran (one of my all time favorite riders, since his days with team US Postal). Ricco was in ninth place, had won two stages earlier in the Tour, and had a podium finish in this years Giro d’Italia.

Spoiler Alert: Now for some lighter news, Mark Cavendish (Columbia) became the first British rider to win three Tour de France stages in a single edition. He won today’s sprint, below are the details.

Today’s racing was uneventful, considering the action before the start of the stage. A breakaway formed as it always does on sprint stages, but it was caught under the 10km to go banner. Team Columbia lacked the leadout train they had in stages five and eight, possibly due to the toll the mountains had taken. Mark Cavendish once again beat top names including Robbie McEwen, Oscar Freire, Gert Steegmans and Erik Zabel. Cavendish’s speed is undeniable.

“It was a difficult finish and there was a lot of wind at the end but that just shows the strength of our team,” said Cavendish, who admitted that getting over the Pyrenees had left him depleted. “I didn’t win with the same margin I did on my previous stage wins, and that shows how tired I am now, but I still managed to win nonetheless. I’m really happy.”

There were jersey changes today, seeing as how Ricco held both the KOM and young rider jerseys. Sebastian Lang (Gerolsteiner) now leads the KOM competition, and Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas) is the best young rider.

Before coverage, I have important news to tell all you readers. Sorry to distract from the Tour, but this deals with all pro races in the coming years. During the rest day, 17 teams announced that they wouldn’t be purchasing a Pro Tour license for the 2009 season. The UCI and Pro Tour are at an end. This means that race organizers will be able to invite whoever they want to their races, instead of the auto invite to major races that the Pro Tour teams recieved. More details will come in the following weeks.

Also before coverage, Moises Duenas Nevado (Barloworld) has tested positive for EPO in the stage 4 ITT. He has been withdrawn from the race. 

Today was a warm ride for the group, as they rode through the last stage of the Pyrenees, with one major climb midway through the race. Amael Moinard (Cofidis) attacked on the climb, and he went on to build a lead of 15 minutes. He took about seven riders with him up the climb.

2006 Tour winner Oscar Pereiro attacked the group on the climb over the Col du Portel, and team CSC took over the chase. CSC’s efforts had no effect and the break was able to stick today. The seven riders who had earlier been with Moinard tried to close the gap to the Cofidis rider, who broke away from his own group.

At 20km to race, the break had about a minute on the chase. Eventually he was overtaken, and the chase had become the breakaway. They held off the pack by 15 minutes and ended the stage with a sprint. Kurt Asle Arvesen (CSC) won the stage. The GC, white, green, and KOM jerseys did not change riders. CSC still leads the team competition.

Happy Bastille Day! Big mountains today, the riders go up the Hautacam, preceded by the Tourmalet. Today we should see some shake up in the overall classification. Today’s condition’s were sunny and a little windy. First, there’s a group of 24 riders who broke away early in the stage and had about a minute on the pack. Garmin-Chipotle  is leading the chase.

The chase is slowly wound in, but some riders stay out, about seven of the riders are still away. The main field is not letting anyone go today, as the mountains loom ahead. The seven remaining breakaway riders are: Cancellara, Freire, Markus Fothen (Gerolsteiner), Remy di Gregorio (Francaise des Jeux), Herbert Dupont (Ag2r), Leonardo Duque and Gregorio’s teamate Jeremy Roy.

The chase seems to have stopped, and the break now has 4:40 on the main field. Ricco starts to attack and string out the main contenders at the base of the Tourmalet.

Remy Di Gregorio has broken away from the break and has got eight minutes up on the main field. Towards the top of the climb there are maybe 40 riders still in the main group with the GC, and Valverde drops off the back.

Jens Voigt steps up the pace and the field is down to maybe 20 riders at the top of the Tourmalet.

As they start the Hautacam, the group starts attacking each other. Kirchen is off the back. Di Gregorio is caught. Saunier Duval has three climbers up on the group! Cobo, Ricco, and Piepoli… a great group, amazing talent. Frank Schleck is with them.

Schelck is dropped as Piepoli and Cobo ride off together.

Piepoli wins, Cobo second, Schleck, Kohl, and the GC group. Evans will wear yellow his next ride. Ricco leads the KOM, Friere is in green, and Ricco also leads the young rider competition.

We will return to coverage after tomorrow’s rest day, thanks for reading.

The first real mountain stage is today, and with it come GC changes. As with every day, a break formed and had some lead time. The break was able to stay away for quite some time. At about 25k to go, the break is loosing steam, and Ricardo Ricco goes on the attack. All the big names start to go too, they don’t care about the stage, just the few seconds they could gain on the others. Ricco takes the win off his grand attack. Top 10 on today’s stage are in this order: Ricco, Efimkin @ 1:04, Dessel @ 1:17, Dmitri Fofonov, Christian Knees, Monfort, Valverde, Krueziger, Cunego, and Popovych. Kirchen still wears yellow. Andy Schleck is in white tomorrow.

Today was a rainy ride for the teams of the 2008 Tour De France. Early attacks on the main group were kept close and no one got away until Laurent Lefevre (Bouygues Telecom) broke the peloton. Lefevre broke away alone after the second small climb of the day at Macarou. He went over two more medium sized climbs on his own before Amets Txurruka (Euskaltel), Bouygues teammate Jerome Pineau, and Christophe Riblon (Ag2r) finally joined him. By midway through the race the breakaway had built a five minute lead on the peloton, but that began to drop once team Credit Agricole took up the chase for their sprinter, Thor Hushovd.

Team Rabobank  joined in the chase and by the time the peloton had reached 130km to go, the gap was down to less than a minute.

A number of counter attacks were attempted in the closing 30 km, but none could get away from the pack.

Rain and wind made the chase after the break tough and with 19km remaining their advantage was still at 45sec.

Finally the break was caught and the group sprint to the line started. 23 year old Mark Cavendish (Columbia) won his second stage of the Tour, his first being stage 5’s sprint finish. No changes in GC today. Kim Kirchen (Columbia) still wears yellow, KOM and young rider was unchanged, and Oscar Freire (Rabobank) wears green again. The team GC is now led by CSC-Saxobank.

Check out our updates tomorrow for the results of the first high mountain stage.

The first doping scandal of this year has happened. Manuel Beltran of team Liquigas tested positive for EPO in stage 1 of this year’s Tour. The French police have taken him away for questioning about the positive test, and he has been kicked out of the race of course. Liquigas will continue to race, Beltran was in 26th place. In an unrelated note, Christophe Moreau retired from the race today. 

Second day in the medium mountains. The peloton didn’t let any breaks go early on, but David Millar (Garmin) attacked one kilometer from the summit of the category four climb at Villedieu. A four-man break had formed, but Millar began the stage in fifth overall at just 47 seconds behind Kirchen (Columbia), and so was always watched.

The group had a 24 second lead on the chasing bunch, but that was quickly reduced after several teams joined team Columbia in reeling them in. The break was caught minutes later, and a solo attack by Luis Leon Sanchez (Caisse d’Epargne) caused an acceleration by team CSC to catch him. Damiano Cunego (Lampre) fell in a crash soon after the chase started again.

Sanchez then launched another attack on the Col d’Entremont, prompting Josep Jufre Pou (Saunier Duval) to follow. The pair was joined by David de la Fuente (Saunier Duval) and Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas), and they went over the summit of the category two Pas de Peyrol with a lead of 1min 30sec on the peloton.

With 20km to the finish they held a lead of one minute on the peloton but in the end Sanchez was the only one capable of holding on. He came in over 6 sec. before the field. GC top spots stayed the same and Kirchen still leads. De la Fuente now leads the KOM competition by one point, and Thomas Lovkvist (Columbia) is the best young rider. 

Today’s stage seemed to be the one that everyone was looking forward to since the start of the Tour because of the GC shake-up it would inevitably bring. With 2 fairly significant climbs and a mountaintop finish on top of Super Besse, GC hopefuls knew they had to stay near the front if they wanted to maintain their position.

French riders continued to race like they haven’t won a Tour in 23 years and formed the break of the day. 3 riders made up the break: Sylvain Chavanel (Cofidis), Freddy Bichot (Agritubel) and Benoît Vaugrenard (Française des Jeux). These 3 riders would eat up the KOM points as well as the sprint points throughout the stage. Chavanel was a man seeking the KOM jersey and ended up closely taking it off the back of Thomas Voeckler (Bouyges Telecom) by the end of the day.

With Stefan Schumacher still in yellow, Gerolsteiner set the tempo up front once the peloton decided it would try to reel the break in. The peloton got to the bottom of the first of the two major climbs only behind by a couple of minutes and ready to pounce. Chavanel and Bichot were alone at this point when they started hammering up the climb, but Chavanel conceded on the descent. Bichot stayed out front with under 20k to go in the stage and would eventually be eaten up by a now Caisse d’Epargne led main group. The tempo stayed fairly relaxed until there was about 10k left in the stage and the favorites were all in the lead group going up Super Besse.

Several attacks went off the front while Caisse d’Epargne played it cool. Most notably, Leonardo Piepoli (Saunier Duval-Scott) and Christian Vande Velde (Garmin-Chipotle) countered after several riders attacked before the steep section of Super Besse. They got a good gap but simply didn’t have the strength to stay away and were caught with under 2k to go. By this point, the road got really steep and all of the big boys except Damiano Cunego (Lampre) were flying up to the finish. When the sprint to the line opened up with about 300 meters to go, Schumacher went down after hitting the wheel of Kim Kirchen (Columbia). This would cause him to lose enough time to Kirchen who would slip into the yellow jersey with another very solid 5th place. Piepoli’s attack had set up teammate Riccardo Ricco really well, allowing him to sit a few wheels back and then launching a powerful acceleration over Valverde and Cadel Evans (Silence-Lotto) to win the stage. As much as I can’t stand him, Ricco is truly a talented climber.

It was a rather wild finish considering Schumacher and his team had defended the jersey very well up until the last 300 meters. Kirchen moves into the top spot in the GC and I think that’s well deserved after several strong performances this week. He also still owns the green points jersey. Team Columbia will be riding on a high tomorrow after taking the stage yesterday and winning the yellow jersey today.

Tomorrow I see a breakaway with no GC hopefuls forming and staying away. I just pray that it isn’t full of overly ambitious French riders as it has been most of the week.

Today’s stage is flat with a likely tailwind, no catagorized climbs, and the longest stage in this year’s Tour. 232 km is roughly 143 miles, long enough to be the distance for some of the classics. Yesterday, Robbie McEwen (Silence-Lotto) complained to the press about the fact that there is no team this year built around a sprinter, so no one is taking charge to catch breakaways. It is true that most teams at the Tour this year are going for GC or stage wins. With Boonen being a crackhead and Pettachi banned for 6 months, the Tour is missing its usual leadout trains. And many of the sprinters at the Tour use the these trains to jump from without helping, like McEwen, Freire, and Hushovd.

Today we have Lilian Jegou (Francaise des Jeux), French national champion Nicolas Vogondy (Agritubel) and Florent Brard (Cofidis) in a break; they held a lead of 8′15 at the 52km mark. Now that gap is down to 5′24″ with 99km to go. Gerolsteiner, Credit Agricole and Columbia have all taken up the chase.

Big news I just learned of: last year’s mountains leader Maurizio Soler (Barloworld) abandoned at 15km today. Soler has had to put up with an injured wrist since his crash in stage one. That is a serious blow to team Barloworld. Liquigas has taken up the charge with 12km to go.

Here comes the pack, it looks to be a sprint finish. Vogondy has attacked headed into the last kilometer, he was passed where the “Skoda” logo appears on the pavement surrounding the finish line. Mark Cavendish (Columbia) wins! Cavendish took that from a long way out, battling Thor Hushovd to the line. Hushovd faded in the last meters while Cavandish accelerated. Oscar Freire and Eric Zabel  passed Hushovd at the line, but no one came passed Cavendish. So today it was Cavendish, Freire, Zabel, Hushovd, and in fifth was Baden Cooke (Barloworld). With that performance Hushovd will wear green tomorrow, GC didn’t change.

Congrats to Matt, who yesterday called it for Cav to win today. Make sure to visit us tomorrow and all this month for SLU cycling’s Tour coverage.

Today marked the first of two TTs in this year’s Tour. The course seemed to be fairly straightforward without too many technical sections and some rolling hills. Definitely one for the TT specialist, right?

Wrong. I thought Fabian Cancellara (CSC-Saxobank) would be invincible, or perhaps a motivated David Millar (Garmin-Chipotle) would surprise the World Champ with a great great, but an unlikely rider took the stage convincingly. Stefan Schumacher (Gerolsteiner) rode wonderfully and netted the fastest time by 18 seconds over Kim Kirchen (Columbia) and Millar. His unbelievable ride puts him in yellow for the night. Schumacher has been known to win a TT now and then, but no one could have predicted this. He is known as more of a rouleur than a TT specialist with wins in the Giro and Amstel Gold Race in the past.

Aside from the surprising winner, several performances are worth noting. Looking at GC guys, Cadel Evans (Silence-Lotto) had a great ride for 4th and put himself in the position he needs to be to try and win yellow. Dennis Menchov (Rabobank) also put in a great ride for 6th. Cancellara ended up 5th and that would be considered a bad day for him. Oh well, he’ll just have to take the next TT or launch another solo attack and the end of a flatter stage. Andy Schleck (CSC-Saxobank) had a pretty good ride and Damiano Cunego (Lampre) limited his losses very well. Alejandro Valverde (Caisse d’Epargne) didn’t ride the way he probably hoped for, finishing 23rd. Garmin-Chipotle must be a bit disappointed because it seems like they were counting on Millar to take the stage, but they can’t be too upset considering they put 3 riders in the top 15. Only if there was a TTT this year…

The race got its first real shake-up and time gaps are beginning to widen. With Schumacher in yellow, Kim Kirchen sits 2nd at 12 seconds back with Millar at the same time. Evans now sits in 4th, Christian Vande Velde (Garmin-Chipotle) is in 6th, and Menchov is in 11th at 1:13 back. Other notables include Cunego in 16th, Valverde in 17th, Andy Schleck in 18th, Carlos Sastre (CSC-Saxobank) in 23rd, and Frank Schleck (CSC-Saxobank) in 28th.

Tomorrow should finally be a day for the sprinters if their teams can get the catch right this time. Team Columbia has consistently come so close in every stage and I have to go with Mark Cavendish tomorrow. I don’t even like him and his attitude, but this team deserves a win.