Tuesday, July 05, 2005

TdF Stage 4: Team Time Trial


discchan_logo
Originally uploaded by terpkristin.
It was a crazy day of team time trialing today at the Tour de France. As is becoming a familiar routine, Team Discovery started out fairly slowly, but sped up considerably as they raced through the course. They started second to last, with Team CSC starting last, 5 minutes behind them.

This wasn't exactly a surprise, as it was expected that DSC and CSC would be battling it out for first place in the TTT. The big surprise, though, was that CSC's Dave Zabriskie, wearing the yellow jersey, took a spill almost literally within spitting distance of the finish (with 1.5 km to go).

At the finish, though, DSC finished 2 seconds faster than CSC. Zabriskie's crash means he won't get the same time as the rest of his team, thus Lance takes over the overall lead of the TdF, and will don the yellow jersey.

Top 5 Team Finishes
Discovery Channel 1:10:39
CSC +00:02
T-Mobile +00:35
Liberty Seguros +00:53
Phonak +01:31

Top 5 in General Classification After Stage 4
1. Lance Armstrong (USA), Discovery Channel 9:59:12
2. George Hincapie (USA), Disocvery Channel +00:55
3. Jens Voigt (GER), CSC +01:04
4. Bobby Julich (USA), CSC +01:07
5. Jose Luis Rubiera (ESP), Discovery Channel +01:14

(Image from http://www.mikecreed.com/)

UPDATE!
Because of the crash, there is a rumor circulating that David Zabriskie has broken some ribs and may have to pull out of the TdF. I'll try and get confirmation on that. If it's true, it's sort of sad. Zabriskie was having a great start to his Tour, and to have to pull out for such a weird crash...

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