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Tour de France, France

Stage 17, Pau - Revel, 239.5K

20 July

The Dust Devil's Daily Wrap
Il Falco Swoops In For Victory

Stages and Maps, The Dust Devil's Daily Wrap

I have to take moment to say how happy I am for Paolo Savoldelli and his succes in stage 17. He is a rider that I have liked ever since he came to the fore of the racing scene in the 1999 Giro d'Italia. And how glad I am to see him on a team where he is clearly thriving! Back from two dark and forgettable years in the T-Mobile (Telekom) doldrums to be at the top of his game.

And what a Tour for Discovery Channel! The Yellow Jersey, white jersey, TTT victory and 2 individual stage victories! Perhaps Armstrong is loosening up in his last Tour, letting some of his boys grab a little glory for themselves in payment for all their years of service. I can't remember a Tour where a Postal Service rider was seen in a break before this year.

Johan Bruyneel has to be utterly pleased! This man cannot do anything wrong, although it helps having Armstrong as your main man. But, he clearly has the brains to pull off some genius from the team car. I don't know what else you can say about him. I wonder if he is going to try to win the Vuelta as well (assuming Armstrong will win this coming Sunday)?. Imagine one team taking victory in all 3 Grand Tours in one season! I don't think that has ever been done.

The thing that stops me thinking occasionally is, how strange will next year's Tour be with no Armstrong? It will seem utterly bizarre to have no LA at the start line, and no Discovery Channel team flocked around him controlling the race. The last time somebody who was not named Lance Armstrong won the Tour was 1998! That's quite a dominant run on affairs.

As I was saying the other day, I believe it will be Ivan Basso. He has all the componentry for a grand tour winner. But, that's next year, we are still in the here and now. There are some difficult stages left, especially with everybody being tired after two and a half weeks of hard racing. It must be a real challenge for people like Ullrich and Leipheimer at this stage to not lose momentum and remain focused. They have been beat, but there is always the outside chance that Armstrong could crash and boom-the whole race looks totally different. But, I wonder how they keep focused on continuing to work as hard as possible even though the likelihood of victory is slim to none?
- The Dust Devil