I also hate to see Lance not place in the tour, much less abandon it. He is not a sprinter and I do think that perhaps if he had not had such rough luck with crashes, flats, etc he might be looking at a podium finish, though he is not as hungry as some. Who knows. It apparently is not his year and hopefully he finishes without more incident.
mary _____ From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of [email protected] Sent: Friday, July 16, 2010 6:33 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [Gyros: 16056] Lance's Tour...what might we expect? Lance has signed onto 2 new sponsors -- Gerital and Grecian Formula. But on a more serious note Lance has finally seen the writing on the wall. He will be 39 in a couple months and he is up against much younger and very hungry young men. Lance will not be set up by Radio Shack to do a sprint -- Lance is no sprinter -- it's not his job. As long as he finishes the TdF then he will have done his job. The idea of Lance doing something special during the TdF should be that he (at 38 almost 39 yrs. old) is at the TdF and finishing a very tough race series. Nobody past the age of 33 has won the TdF since post WWII. My comments are not to take anything away from Lance but just from following the TdF for over 30 years. Gary Smith TLC for Bikes -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] To: Gyros <[email protected]> Sent: Fri, Jul 16, 2010 4:34 pm Subject: [Gyros: 16054] Lance's Tour...what might we expect? Being a true Lance fan it pains me to see how his Tour hopes have come undone. The reasons are many and a bit complicated, but suffice it to say even the most pessimistic predictions of his chances to win would have been much too lenient. Now, Lance fans are left to wonder what to expect of him. Will he work for Levi, and, if he does what exactly would he be working towards? Levi cannot make up the time deficit on Schleck and Contador, barring tragedy. Is it worth using the entire team to help Levi to a possible podium finish? I really thought that Lance still feels as though he can do something special in his final tour, and, this would mean winning a stage and wearing yellow one final time. But, he has lost time to the main field in the last 2 stages, which is not a great sign. If he is in good form you would think that he would at least stay in contact with the main field. Yesterday, he lost 29 seconds to the main field on a sprinters stage. Why would he do this? Are you going to tell me that Lance cannot stay with the peloton in the final miles of a sprinter's race? And, he was well behind in today's stage. I cannot rationalize this. It is unimagineable that Lance would drop out of the tour...but, he certainly is not riding like someone who is into it. I am hoping that Radio Shack is focusing on a particular stage for Lance to win, but I am unable to see which one that would be. Scheck and Contador will be fighting it out in the Pyrenees, so those stages will be difficult to win...the sprinters will be gearing up for the final sprint stages, and I can't see Radio Shack setting him up for a win in a sprint stage; and, Contador will have much more at stake in the final Time Trial and will certainly outride Lance. Right now, what is Lance riding for? His motivation has always been to win; can he handle just going through the motions and waiting for this thing to end? Or, is he going to do something very special? I am hoping that he gives us something pretty quick! Today he left without talking to any reporters, which he has not done thus far. Please, oh God of cycling, do not provide us with the worst case scenario which has Lance quitting the tour. Give him a stage win. -- You received this message because you subscribed to the Gyro email group. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected] To unsubscribe, send an email to [email protected] -- You received this message because you subscribed to the Gyro email group. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected] To unsubscribe, send an email to [email protected] -- You received this message because you subscribed to the Gyro email group. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected] To unsubscribe, send an email to [email protected]
