What's a family compared to this........?
Posted on 07/07/2004 9:53:51 AM PDT by nutmeg
Armstrong Takes Tour de France Lead Thanks to Team
By Francois Thomazeau
ARRAS, France (Reuters) - Lance Armstrong claimed back his familiar Tour de France leader's yellow jersey when U.S. Postal won a 40-mile team time trial in Arras Wednesday.
The American outfit clocked one hour 12 minutes three second in the fourth stage from Cambrai to hand the five-time Tour winner the 54th yellow jersey in his career.
Armstrong now leads his team mates George Hincapie and Floyd Landis in the overall rankings by 10 and 16 seconds respectively.
Swiss team Phonak, led by American Tyler Hamilton, were second more than one minute behind in 1:13:10 while Spain's Illes Baleares were third, a further eight seconds adrift.
U.S. Postal were impressive, clocking the third best ever average speed in a Tour de France team time trial at 53.71 kph (33.3 mph).
The stage was held in dreadful conditions, rain falling steadily on a windswept course.
Phonak's result was a feat in itself as they endured five punctures and dropped three riders.
Times in team time trials are taken on the fifth rider to cross the line.
Three riders from Ivan Basso's team CSC, also expected to feature among the best, slid on the slippery tarmac and lost crucial time.
The Euskaltel team of Spanish favorite Iban Mayo, who lost nearly four minutes and most of his Tour chances in a crash in Tuesday's third stage, fought back bravely, clocking the eighth best time of 1:14:38.
New regulations in force Wednesday limited gaps between teams to 10 seconds according to their finish, the team placed last losing a maximum of three minutes.
Updated on Wednesday, Jul 7, 2004 11:41 am EDT
Please let me know your thoughts about my comment in post #1. Thanks!
Please FReepmail me if you want on or off my Tour de France 2004 list. *Warning: This may be a high-volume ping list at times during July 2004.
Oops, meant to add "Stage 4" to the title...
. Please let me know if you would prefer that I keep winners' names out of the titles, please! :-)
I'd prefer not to see the leaders name in the title.
i prefer live broadcasts on velonews, the only other news source i regularily read. here is a good link for todays timetrial http://www.velonews.com/tour2004/details/articles/6476.0.html
You can freepmail the admin moderator to change it. Thanks for the threads!
I thought I heard his team sponsor wasnt USPS anymore? Was I mistaken, its obvious it is now....
The new TTT rules blow. Lance should have an additional 47" on Hamilton and around 1' on Ullrich. That could play a pivotal role in the ending.
This is Postal's last year as primary sponsor.
You have Freepmail
Thanks so much for your comments. I have FReepmailed the Admin Moderator and asked to have the title of this thread changed in order to hide today's winner. I'll do my very best to keep winners' names out of the thread titles in the future!
What's a family compared to this........?
Yeah! Armstrong takes another step toward six in a row! In a way I feel sorry for Lance, being caught in the political struggle between the Axis of Weasels and the United States of America. But I can't think of anyone who can handle it better.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1166215/posts
I don't like Lances political views but I hope he wins the tour for the 6th time.
Would love to rub this into the frogs faces.
Thank you so much for fixing that title. I should've used better judgment. No more winners in the titles of my threads! ;-)
Welcome ;)
Please see post 15. I'm really sorry to have blown any surprise tonight for you! It won't happen again. :-)
I think you should leave out all status ("regains" etc.) and just have a daily thread with a generic title that people can ignore if they want.
Bump for comment.
agreed
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