Separating le wheat from le chaff

Yesterday on the monster stage to l'Alpe D'Huez Floyd Landis showed that it's his race to lose. He gained time on all but one of the other GC contenders, and looked strong enough to have won the stage if he wanted to. He beat the remaining GC contenders by about 40 seconds, and should beat them in the similar length stage 19 time-trial. There are two more mountain stages to defend, with today's stage being possibly harder than yesterday's, and a fairly mild stage tomorrow. If he comes out of the mountains in yellow, he won't give it up.

Biggest Surprises
1) Oscar Pereiro coming in within 10 seconds of keeping the yellow jersey
2) CSC blowing up Voigt and Zabriskie launching Frank Schleck to a monster stage win. This was a brilliant tactical move, and Bjarne Riis might be the smartest manager at the Tour, no disrespect to Bruyneel
3) David de la Fuente keeping (and extending) the lead in the mountains, when no one gave him a chance once they hit the big alpine stages
4) Rabobank likely giving up on the polka-dot jersey to support Denis Menchov. Mickael Rasmussen is 35 points down, and he would have to win one of the remaining mountain stages with de la Fuente finishing out of the money, that seems unlikely the way the Spanish rookie is hanging on.
5) Landis can win despite having a somewhat weak (albeit complete) team
6) Landis can win without winning a single stage, although if he comes out of the Alps in yellow, he'll probably win the Stage 19 time-trial

Biggest Unsurprises
1) Tom Boonan abandoning in the first Alpine stage. He hasn't beat McEwan in anything that mattered so far, there's no reason to suspect he could beat him on the other side of the Alps
2) Thomas Voeckler
3) It was most obvious today that cycling is a team sport. Axel Merckx falling back to pace Landis, CSC using everything it had to win the stage, and Jens Voigt (only a couple of days after a huge break in stage 13) had enough strength after launching Schleck, and then crashing, to fall back and help Sastre crack Cadel Evans, Michael Rasmussen catching and pacing Denis Menchov up the last few kilometers, et cetera.
4) The French press are mad at Armstrong, this time because he called the losing French World Cup team a bunch of a-holes, when everyone knows that it is the French press that are all a-holes

Observations
1) Levi Leipheimer can jump as high as sixth, but that's probably it unless someone crashes. He deserves a top ten finish, but not a podium, because of the terrible time trial and first Pyrenean stage. Remember, he was 62nd overall at one time.
2) Likely top five are Landis, Denis Menchov, Carlos Sastre, Andreas Klöden and Cadel Evans, with Landis winning oveer Menchov, but the final podium position is in dispute
3) With Booden out, McEwan has won the green jersey, he's only got to mark Oscar Freire, and even then he's got a 45 point cushion with three sprinting stages left
4) Jan Ullrich and Oscar Sevilla may be kicked off the T-Mobile team, missing the team's July 13 deadline for explaining their role in the Operation Puerto scandal
5) George Hincapie arrived for the Tour at 155 pounds, against his usual 175 (he's 6'3") and reportedly is having trouble eating enough to keep up with the massive energy expenditures that the Tour exacts. I could possible have a new gig as Discovery's new eating coach.
6) Vive les American, no all-American podium like Bob Roll predicted, but probably an American in yellow. SUCK ON THAT, FRENCHY AMERICAN HATERS!

Read more in my series on the 2006 Tour de France:

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