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Menchov's woes continue

Published: Jul. 9, 2009

Rabobank's Denis Menchov saw his yellow jersey hopes all but evaporate in the rain of Barcelona where he ended the sixth stage of the Tour de France nearly five minutes in arrears.

Menchov, the recent Giro d'Italia champion who began this year's Tour as a contender, is now 4:54 behind race leader Fabian Cancellara after Thursday's 181.5km crash-marred ride to Barcelona.

Cancellara's grip on the yellow jersey could loosen on Friday's seventh stage which heads up to Andorra in the Pyrenees, where Lance Armstrong, only 0.22secs behind in second place, could be the man to replace him.

Menchov, meanwhile, is virtually out of the race.

His team manager at Rabobank, Erik Breukink, is not throwing in the towel yet, but the Dutchman, growing unhappier by the day, may do so after the climb to the Arcalis ski station on Friday.

Perplexed by Menchov being left trailing by most of his rivals in the latter stages of the race Thursday, Breukink refused to criticize his team leader, although his mood was obvious.

"Tomorrow is a totally different day and after that we will be able to assess Denis's chances far better," he said.

All in all it has been a disastrous Tour so far for the former two-time Tour of Spain winner, whose best result on the world's toughest bike race was fourth in 2008.

In Monaco Menchov flattered to deceive on the opening stage time trial in which he finished 1:32 down on winner Cancellara, losing over a minute to his more immediate rivals.

On the third stage he was among the many favorites to lose 41 seconds to Armstrong after the American joined an echelon created by Mark Cavendish's powerful Columbia team and which split the peloton into pieces.

A day later Menchov's Tour hopes suffered a bigger blow when he crashed on the first corner of the team time trial, in which Rabobank finished 11th at 2:20 behind Armstrong's winning Astana team.