Tour de France feat. Lance
Written by MC Homer, Tuesday July 14 2009
Soccer might be the most popular sport in the world, with hundreds of millions of people worldwide who enjoy it, but no single sporting event draws more fans to witness it live, in person, than the Tour de France. What these cyclists do for 20+ days over a span of 1,800-2,500 miles is astounding. Well into this, the 96th running, or riding, of the prestigious race, I bet the French are happier than a kid at
On July 4th of 2009, the Tour de France began. This year, 20 teams were invited, each has nine riders, making for 180 participants. With 10 of the 21 stages complete, the leader is Rinaldo Nocentini, who has yet to win a stage. Astana teammates Alberto Contador and Lance Armstrong sit in second (-:06) and third (-:08) respectively (and two more Astana riders are fourth and fifth, also).
Riders will stray into six countries during their trek to the Champs-Elysees in
Only two rest days are given to the riders, making this race “the toughest sporting event in the world,” as dubbed by the New York Times in 2006. The race has been compared to running a marathon everyday for three weeks with only a couple days of rest. And the mountain stages? Nothing in sports is as grueling as climbing the seemingly straight up roads of the Pyrenees (added to the Tour in 1910) and
Every year during the Tour, riders not only strive to be the overall leader, but to wear one of the main four, special-colored jerseys. Almost everyone knows the overall leader wears the yellow, but there is also a green, white, and polka dot (white with red dots). The green is worn by the best sprinter, the white by the best rider under the age of 25, and the polka dot is given to the all-important leader of the mountain stages, which is usually the tell-all sign of who will win the legendary race.
During Lance Armstrong’s seven year’s of domination from 1999-2005, he routinely performed well in the mountains, but instead of the red and white polka dot, he mostly donned the yellow leader’s jersey. After a three-year hiatus, Lance is back, trying for an unprecedented eighth title, as if you haven’t heard. So what if no one else has won more than five times (four different men), and three guys have won it three times. The oldest winner was 36, in 1922, and the youngest was 19, in 1904. If Lance wins, he will be able to claim that ‘oldest’ spot, at 37.
Cycling has been plagued by doping in recent years, like most sports. The 2007 winner of the race, Alberto Contador, did not race last year because of doping allegations related to his team. Then there was the Floyd Landis mess. The list goes on and on. Supposedly, ‘cheating’ has been going on since the first Tour de France was held. Back in those days, instead of EPO, they used alcohol and ether to dull the pain. Cyclists have also been known to use cocaine, chloroform, aspirin, and strychnine, among other ‘PEDs.’ Of course, they also had single gear bicycles and rode with spare tires over their shoulders and tools, food, and water hanging from their bike. Sounds fun. Not.
Since the Tour began, there have been eight deaths, four cyclists and four non-participants. No one has been killed since 2002 when a seven year-old was hit by a caravan. The riders who lost their lives include a French racer, in 1910, who drowned during a rest day. A Spaniard died after going into a ravine in 1935. Thirty-two years later, in 1967, a rider died while climbing in a mountain stage. Amphetamines were found in his system during the autopsy. Finally in 1995, a cyclist crashed going about 55mph, coming down a mountain. On a bike, 55mph, really? With the really-wide one inch tires and only a little tiny helmet for protection? No thank you.
July 26th will mark the culmination of all the hard work each of the 180 men have put in, over the span of 22 days. It is customary to let the leader enjoy the final stage instead of making it a sprint to the finish. It is usually seen as a ‘victory lap’ of sorts. As riders leave from Montereau-Fault-Yonne and make their way to Paris Champs-Elysees during the 21st stage of the race, hundreds of thousands of fans are sure to line the route, cheering on whoever is sporting the leader’s yellow. The winner will receive a monetary prize (as they have since the race’s inception), but much more than that, winning this race is about honor.
Next time you throw your leg over the frame of your huffy, try riding it 10 miles, if you don’t already. It is not extremely difficult to do that. Now do that 10 times, in a day, let alone the three or four hours it takes the professionals. Then try it eight or nine days in a row. Looking at the itinerary for the race, it may not seem like much, but 2,141 miles is a really long ways to propel yourself. It’s like riding a bike, and not a motorcycle which can sometimes be confused with a ‘bike,’ from
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