Tour De France: A two-horse race

CEBU, Philippines - After that brutal stage 9, two riders have stood out: defending champion Alberto Contador and last years runner-up Andy Schleck, the winner of stage 8. Cadel Evans, the erstwhile yellow jersey, was defrocked after it was revealed that he had sustained a broken elbow during a crash on stage 8. He toughed it out though but finished 8 minutes in arrears, and now sits at 18th place.

All the other favorites lost today with, Jurgen Van den Broeck, Samuel Sanchez, teammates Robert Gesink and Denis Menchov and Levi Leipheimmer, coming home at 2min. These four riders, unless they crack in the upcoming stages in the Pyrenees, will now be fighting for the final podium spot.

The biggest losers and probably trying to hold on to a top 10 spot include 2008 champion Carlos Sastre, Michael Rogers, Bradley Wiggins, Ivan Basso and Roman Kreuziger.

Schleck and Contador were on equal terms today with Schleck doing the attacking and the Contador doing the checking. When they realized that they’d just end up flogging themselves for nothing, they decided to work together to distance the other pretenders. In fact, Schleck said that if he made one more attack, he’d “drop himself”.

Schleck holds a 41sec lead over Contador in the general classification. If Schleck can’t ramp up his lead to more than 2 minutes going into the final 52km ITT on the penultimate day, he’d find himself a step below the podium come Paris. Contador is probably the 2nd best time-triallist in the world today, after Schleck’s teammate Fabian Cancellara, so a 41sec deficit wouldn’t mean much with a long time trial ahead. If you recall,Schleck lost 42 seconds to Contador in the 8.9km Rotterdam prologue. Last year, he lost 1:45 to the Spaniard during the 40km final time trial.

As for Lance Armstrong, he did pretty well today after that debacle on stage 8. To the surprise of many, he helped his teammate Leipheimer, who is now the best-positioned rider with RADIO SHACK. He says that he’ll be lowering his sights with a stage win instead of a top 3 finish. But will the peloton (meaning the Schleck’s team, SAXO BANK and Contador’s team, ASTANA) allow him the courtesy of a stage win when he isn’t the “patron” of the race anymore?

BTW, a “patron” is a rider who has the character and the strength to dictate the goings on of the race, just like brigada mayor in a prison. A “patron” will give the unofficial “permission” as to who will get into a breakaway, dictate the pace of the race or when to speed it up. LA was considered a “patron” but he never accepted the role publicly. The last real “patron” of the TdF was the 5-time champion, Bernard Hinault. - THE FREEMAN