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Throwback course should produce throwback Tour
Whenever a dominant Tour de France champion like Lance Armstrong retires or is absent because of injury, the vacuum is nearly always filled by at least one, probably two, very open, exciting editions of the race. That should be the case in 2006, which might recall the dramatic Tours of 1987 and 1989 (post Bernard Hinault), or 1997 and 1998 (post Miguel Induráin). Perhaps that’s why the Tour organizers, ASO, have chosen for the emblem of their 2006 edition a yellow jersey pulled into the hexagonal shape of France by six gloved hands.
Figuring out whose grip is the strongest on that yellow jersey should produce some good old-fashioned drama at the 93rd Tour, which takes place next July 1-23. That expectation was reinforced Thursday when ASO announced a 3639km course that is a throwback to the pre-Armstrong era. There’s no team time trial, four fewer transfers between stages, two long individual time trials, lots of stages for the sprinters, and five challenging mountain stages.
It’s a course that favors neither a time trialist nor a climber, yet offers openings for both types of rider. Because of this, it will be hard to identify who will win the tug of war for the yellow jersey. The obvious favorite is the only former winner still active, Jan Ullrich. The continued time-trial strength of the charismatic German, who will soon be 32, is undeniable, but he has faltered badly on the opening climbs of recent Tours (remember Courchevel and La Mongie?).
Behind Ullrich — who should benefit from a more united T-Mobile squad in 2006, headed by Andreas Klöden, Oscar Sevilla, Michael Rogers and Kim Kirchen — there is a host of candidates to challenge him. At the top of this list is Ivan Basso, whose CSC team has been strengthened by the arrival of power riders Fabian Cancellara and Stuart O’Grady, while retaining the experienced Bobby Julich, Carlos Sastre, Jens Voigt and Jakob Piil.
After placing third and second the past two years, Basso will focus everything on the Tour next year, not diluting his ambitions with a tilt at the Giro d’Italia. The Italian, who will soon be 28, is a born climber, but he still has to vastly improve his time-trial skills to match Ullrich.
Riders on the list of likely challengers to the "big two" are Americans Floyd Landis (Phonak) and Levi Leipheimer (Gerolsteiner), Spaniards Francisco Mancebo (AG2R) and Alejandro Valverde (Caisse d’Épargne-Illes Balears), Kazakh Alexander Vinokourov (Liberty Seguros), Australian Cadel Evans (Davitamon-Lotto), and perhaps Ukrainian Yaroslav Popovych (Discovery Channel), Italian Damiano Cunego (Lampre-Valsir), Spaniard Iban Mayo (Euskaltel) or Dane Michael Rasmussen (Rabobank).
Three time trials
The three individual time trials all suit Ullrich. He should have tremendous support at the 7km prologue from the German fans, who will stream across the nearby border into Strasbourg. The completely flat course is similar to the courses that produced the three fastest Tour prologues: Lille in 1994 (won by Chris Boardman at 55.152 kph), Dublin in 1998 (Boardman at 54.193 kph) and Liège in 2004 (Fabian Cancellara at 53.560 kph).
Expect specialists like Britons David Millar (Saunier Duval) or Brad Wiggins (Cofidis) to challenge Cancellara for the first post-Armstrong yellow jersey. A record speed could be posted on a panhandle-shaped loop that uses wide streets in the eastern part of the city.
The stage 7 time trial at Rennes is even better for Ullrich. The 52km stage will loop though the slightly rolling terrain of eastern Brittany, with a finish similar to the 1989 time trial into Rennes that saw Greg LeMond score a shocking victory in his comeback year. That was the time trial where aerobars were first used at the Tour — by LeMond and a few members of the 7-Eleven team.
The third of the 2006 Tour time trials, on the penultimate day, is between Le Creusot and Montceau-les-Mines. Ullrich has mixed memories of this part of Burgundy because he won a 1998 Tour time trial between the same two towns (in the opposite direction). He beat runner-up Julich by 1:01 that day, but it was third-placed Marco Pantani, beaten by 2:35, who won the Tour after Ullrich faltered in the Alps.
Now it is another Italian, Basso, who could foil Ullrich’s hopes of snagging a second Tour. The temporary absence of a team time trial doesn’t favor Basso, as his CSC squad would likely have won it, but the other climbers are rejoicing that they won’t be handicapped by their traditional losses in this stage.
Decisive mountain stages
The downside of this Tour is that, whereas in 2005 the first mountain climbs came on the eighth day, the climbers will have to wait a further four days in 2006. That means there will be a higher chance for the climbers to lose time to crashes, injuries or simply missing splits in the peloton on the long and windy flat stages across the north of France.
For the climbers not yet banged up or ailing, their chance to shine first comes in the Pyrénées. Stage 10 from Cambo-les-Bains to Pau is similar to the opening mountain stage of the 1986 Tour, when defending champion Hinault made a long escape with Spanish climber Pedro Delgado. They took more than five minutes out of their main challengers, except for Hinault’s teammate LeMond, who wasn’t allowed to attack the others until the final climb, the ultra-steep Marie-Blanque — which is again on the route in 2006.
Twenty years ago, LeMond took third on that stage, 4:37 back. Hinault attacked again the next day, on a stage similar to next year’s, but blew up on the final climb to Superbagnères, where LeMond took the win and moved to within 40 seconds of Hinault on GC.
Stage 11 next year crosses the same Tourmalet, Aspin and Peyresourde climbs as in 1986. But instead of finishing on Superbagnères it crosses the rugged Col du Portillon (8km at 8.4 percent) into Spain for a mountaintop finish new to the Tour, Pla de Beret, which averages 6 percent for the final 10km. The climb may not be that selective, but this six-hour stage will definitely show who will be challenging for the final yellow jersey.
There are three transitional stages and a rest day before the Tour enters the Alps, where the race will certainly be decided. Stage 15 is a classic, crossing the legendary Izoard and Lautaret climbs before the finish up to L’Alpe d’Huez. Basso and Ullrich will have to be at their very best here to withstand the attacks likely to come from Vinokourov and Mayo, while Evans, Landis, Leipheimer and Valverde are also likely to be battling for the yellow jersey.
That battle will continue on the next stage, which should be the most decisive of this Tour. It starts at the foot of L’Alpe d’Huez, heads east, back to the top of the Lautaret, and then shoots up to the Galibier summit at 8677 feet, the highest point of the three weeks. After the long plunging descent through Valloire and over the hairpinned Col du Télégraphe, the stage heads down the Maurienne valley.
After 92km of racing, and probably with a large group still together, the stage reaches the town of St. Jean-de-Maurienne. If the riders look to their left here and raise their eyes past a thick-forested side valley, they will see the stage finish at the ski resort of La Toussuire, 3600 feet above them. But first they have to make a 72km loop around Tête de Bellard mountain above La Toussuire, where the French ski team trains in the winter.
The Tour riders will first head farther down the main valley before turning left to tackle the Col du Glandon. This is one of the most difficult climbs in the Alps, with several sections at 10 and 11 percent in its 20km. Once at the summit they take a left to continue climbing for an extra 2.5km to the eastern crest of the Col de la Croix de Fer.
From here, the racers will speed down a narrow, switchback road to the small town of St. Jean d’Arves, but instead of then taking the main road back to the Maurienne valley, the course heads to the right over the 5.8km, 7-percent ascent of the Col du Mollard, and down its precipitous descent through the trees back to St. Jean-de-Maurienne.
Immediately, the race turns left onto the final 18.4km uphill to La Toussuire. A Tour stage has never finished here, but being 4.5km longer than the Alpe d’Huez climb, averaging 6 percent, with a few pitches twice that steep, it will be a severe challenge at the end of a day that totals 17,290 vertical feet of climbing!
La Toussuire (pronounced "Too-sweer") might prove as a dramatic a climb as that to La Plagne in 1987 when Stephen Roche rode himself into oblivion to take back a minute on race leader Delgado. Roche continued his effort the next day, which like stage 17 of next year’s Tour, headed over the Colombière and Joux-Pane climbs to Morzine. In ’97, Delgado couldn’t hang with Roche on the final swooshing descent and conceded 18 seconds to the flying Irishman — who went on to win that Tour in the penultimate day’s time trial, finishing 40 seconds ahead of Delgado in the final GC.
Don’t forget the sprinters
Several sprinters should do well enough in the Strasbourg prologue to bring into play the time bonuses that are available on the opening road stages, which will likely lead to a quick change in race leadership. Perhaps that will come as early as stage 1, which loops to the north and south of Strasbourg before making a 30km dash into Germany before re-crossing the Rhine River to a flat finish in Strasbourg. Racing on home roads may inspire Erik Zabel to chalk up a stage win for his new team, Milram, as his Italian teammate Alessandro Petacchi is not scheduled to ride the 2006 Tour.
From Strasbourg, stage 2 will head northwest across the rolling terrain of Alsace and Lorraine to Esch-sur-Alzette, just across the border in Luxembourg. Being 223km long and with four categorized climbs, it will be a stage that will indicate the relative strengths of the various sprinters’ teams and whether they’ll be strong enough to keep the peloton together for a bunch finish.
Zabel, Tom Boonen (Quick Step), Robbie McEwen (Davitamon-Lotto), Thor Hushovd (Crédit Agricole) and Jean-Patrick Nazon (AG2R) should all be involved in the likely field sprints the first two stages, but none of them are likely to contest the win on stage 3. This 216km race heads north through Luxembourg and southeast Belgium into the Dutch province of Limburg.
The stage will pass through the Ardennes, duplicating parts of Liège-Bastogne-Liège with the Haute-Levée climb, before heading to roads used in the Amstel Gold Race. Should a team like CSC spice up the racing on this hilly finale, and with no Discovery Channel team willing to close things down for Armstrong, perhaps this (or a subsequent stage) will produce one of those breakaways that gain a lot of time and maybe define the race until it reaches the mountains a week later.
The stage 3 finish comes a kilometer or so after the steep Cauberg climb, similar to the 1998 world’s finale in Valkenburg. This stage gives classics-type riders Vinokourov, Valverde, Davide Rebellin (Gerolsteiner) and Michael Boogerd (Rabobank) a good shot at a stage win.
Stage 4 starts in Huy, Belgium, the city where the Flèche Wallonne finishes, and heads west on a rolling course back into France. The finish is at St. Quentin, which last hosted a stage in 1938, a time trial on the Tour’s penultimate stage. This would be another day for the sprinters.
With no team time trial next year, stage 5 starts in the cathedral city of Beauvais and heads southwest into Normandy to a finish in Caen — which last greeted the Tour in 1978. Again, the sprinters are favored to take this stage, as they will be on stage 7. This crosses the low hills of Normandy to Vitré, whose three Tour finishes were taken by sprinters, Marcel Wüst (2000), Mario Cipollini (1995) and Rudy Matthys (1985).
After the individual time trial in the area to the west of the Breton capital of Rennes, stage 8 starts in St. Méen-le-Grand, hometown of three-time Tour winner Louison Bobet, who died 22 years ago. This stage brings to an end the opening (flat) part of the 2006 Tour with a medium hilly route across Brittany to Lorient — perhaps incorporating parts of the Plouay circuit, which hosts the annual GP Ouest-France, won this year by Discovery’s George Hincapie.
After the transfer by chartered jet from Lorient to Bordeaux for the Tour’s first rest day, the second phase of the Tour opens with a flat stage through the Landes pine forest to Dax, where Paolo Bettini won a stage of the 2000 Tour. Expect what could be one of the final field sprints of this Tour.
After two rugged days in the Pyrénées, the breakaway specialists will likely hold the upper hand on three rolling, sometimes hilly stages across the Midi region to Carcassonne (on Bastille Day), Montélimar and Gap. Then comes the Alps.
The sprinters’ last hopes of glory come on stage 18, from Morzine to Mâcon, and, after the final time trial, the traditional sprint into the Champs-Elysées. It’s too early to say who will be standing on the podium of the 93rd Tour de France. The only certainty is that the rider wearing the yellow jersey won’t be the same guy who has claimed it for the past seven years.
