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Tyler tunes: Teamwork smooths out bumps in a tough Tour

By Tyler Hamilton, Team CSC
Published: Aug. 4, 2003

Most of you have probably stopped waiting for my Tour de France wrapup. But for those who might still be interested, here goes.

I don't know where to begin, really. It was a wild month for me. I can't remember any other time in my life that was more jam-packed with highs and lows. I talk a lot about living through the suffering cycling offers up, and how the bad days outnumber the good. But it's those one or two elusive good days that make it all worthwhile.

Rarely do you experience the depths of disappointment and heights of success in one race. But the Tour de France is unique. You never quite know what will be thrown your way. Sometimes it's as much about surviving as it is about racing.

I arrived in France in the best shape of my life. I had high hopes, and also believed in myself. I had worked hard all spring to be ready for our team's major objective of the year. We went into the race with two GC leaders and the primary goal of seeing Carlos Sastre and me in the top 10 overall by race end. If other opportunities showed themselves, we would go after them. But beyond that, there was no other major game plan.

The prologue went pretty well, and we felt like things kicked off to a good start. But stage 1 threw us all for a loop. It’s difficult whenever a team faces losing one of its leaders. But having to contend with something like this so early in the race was a major crisis for every rider and staff member on our team.

As the news of my fractured collarbone spread through the organization, morale started to fly out the window. Not only was it disappointing, it didn't seem fair. As a friend of mine put it, it was like being the unluckiest winner of a lottery. But when a crash happens in a big bunch, like it did that day, there is little you can do to protect yourself. Guys go down like dominoes.

When we decided I would try to ride the next day, I really didn't think I'd make it more than 10 or 20 kilometers. But I felt like I had to prove to myself I couldn't ride. I didn't want to look back on the race and wonder "what if?" Honestly, I was the last guy who thought I would make it through the day. But my team did an excellent job of protecting me, and the roads were mercifully smooth. I knew after finishing that stage that it would take another crisis to send me home. After stage 2 everyone was back in the game mentally. We agreed to take it day by day, but none of us turned back after the finish in Sedan.

There were a few bumps in the road, so to speak. I favored my collarbone injury, which shifted my natural position on the bike. The twisted way I was riding did a number on my back, and - I hope I'm not over-sharing here – gave me the worst saddle sores I've ever encountered in my professional career. For those of you who don't know what I mean, call a friend who rides a bike and ask them. They'll probably make some kind of pinched-up face and cringe. I know that look. It was on my face for about three weeks.

Other guys on the team were suffering as well. Jacob Piil had a rough first week. It was tough for him to find his legs at first because he was pretty sick a couple of weeks before the race started. And Michael Blaudzen was hampered by nasty tendonitis in his wrist. This develops out of the blue sometimes, and the only thing you can do to help it is rest. But at the Tour, there's no time for that. So he had to immobilize his wrist off the bike, and ride through the pain on the bike. But both guys rallied. Jacob bounced back in a big way and won his first stage in Marsielle. Michael hung tough, and was super strong during the third week of the race – he really went for it on the Champs-Elysées. It was easy to see by the way he was riding that day that he was fighting with all he had.

Carlos Sastre managed to find success before suffering, however. He attacked and won on the finish to Plateau du Bonascre. But on the cold and foggy descent of Luz Ardiden after the finish, he managed to pick up a pretty serious case of influenza. At first, my wife and I were worried that he was having an allergic reaction to our dog, who had been at the Tour for nearly two weeks by that point. But our efforts to keep them apart paid off, and luckily the dog was not the problem – especially since a major part of Carlos’s reaction to dogs is swelling in the legs.

We had two newcomers on our Tour team this year. This is rather unique, since normally the guys who get selected for the Tour are working together all spring in anticipation of July. But CSC picked up Peter Luttenberger and Bekim Christiansen a month or so before the race. Both showed a lot of strength at races in June, which led to their being selected. And they didn't disappoint.

Peter was instrumental in CSC's ability to win the team GC with his strong showing in every stage. And Bekim was one of my saviors during stage 16, when I got caught behind a gap early on and wound up in the second group. He buried himself to help bridge me back up to the front, and as a result got dropped by more than five minutes before we even made it to the halfway point. He had to fight hard to make the time cut, but he did it – which was impressive in itself since he spent the previous few days suffering from a major stomach upset, which weakened him considerably.

Andrea Peron and Nicki Sorensen worked tirelessly for the team as well. Andrea nearly found victory in Loudenville after being in the break all day. It would have been a nice payoff for all his selfless riding. Nicki was the motorbike that decimated the breakaway group I bridged up to after being towed back into contention in stage 16. He ripped the legs off the guys in the group and set me up for the attack that ultimately led to my stage victory. Thinking about what he and my other teammates had done for me that day was my motivation to keep riding hard to the finish. If I had been caught, it would have been tough to face them all at the dinner table that night.

Nicolas Jalabert had the distinct honor of riding the race while knowing his brother Laurent was doing commentary from a motorbike that traveled with the peloton. Talk about pressure. No one wants to mess up while his brother has a live camera and microphone pointed at him. That whole situation gave new meaning to the phrase "big brother is watching.” But he managed well under the pressure and rode an incredibly strong race in support of the team.

It's safe to say we didn't know what was ahead of us when we entered this year's Tour. It was a nail-biter, from start to finish. We would have never predicted three stage wins, achieving the team GC title and putting three guys in the top 15. It would have seemed too broad and almost impossible – especially after the crash in stage 1. But if there's anything I remind people of, it's that good days are always around the corner. As bike racers we have to believe this, or we would pack up and go home more often than we raced. We took a big chance with my staying in the race. But I believe the decision to do so was rooted in our believing that anything is possible. This is vintage Bjarne Riis. He is the eternal optimist. And he is the only director who could have led a team to do what we did at this year's Tour.

Behind the scenes, the team staff was as busy as an ant farm keeping us going throughout the race. Ole, our physiotherapist, went above and beyond in every way possible to keep me and my teammates going. Our soigneurs, Alex, Sabine, Geert and Fritz, also bent over backwards for all of us under the circumstances. Sabine even let my wife and dog room with her throughout the race. Our mechanics Frederick, Craig, Cyrille and Johnny did such great work with the equipment, there were no technical problems whatsoever. Our physicians Joost and Piet spent more time doling out pep talks and support that they did bandages and were instrumental in keeping our minds and bodies going throughout the Tour. And finally, the detail men - Norbert, our chef, Brian, our communications director, and Lolo, our bus driver – all did what they needed to do to make sure we ate, interviewed and arrived on time. These are all critical things concerning the rider's quality of life on the road.

In summary, it was a special race because of everyone involved.

Thanks for reading.