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The Tour de France Continues To Thrill Fans

by Barbara McPherson | July 11, 2008 at 12:24 pm | 138 views | add comment

Those of us on the west coast of Canada with cable TV have been treated to another day of incredible racing. It's well worth getting up at 5 am to watch these superb athletes. If you miss the live action from France, you can catch it again in the evening. The two North American teams -- GarmenChipotle and Columbia are right up there with the leaders. This is especially gratifying in light of their strong stand for drug free cycling.

Sanchez Powers Through Stage

By Bob Roll
July 11, 2008

Raw power was on display in today’s stage of the 2008 Tour de France courtesy of Luis-Leon Sanchez. He found himself in a similar situation early this year winning a stage in Paris-Nice. Today’s win was not a complete surprise, but for Sanchez it was a real thrill.

The whole stage was thrilling because of how aggressive and explosive the attacks were. It seemed as if this stage, although not a high mountain, was as hard as any stage of the Tour. The field split into three pelotons early in the stage and, if it had been in the mountains, each group would have ridden steadily to the finish. However, because it would have been easy to miss the time cutoff, every single group rode desperately throughout the day.

Thankfully, there is a flat stage tomorrow because I’m certain there will be some very tired legs. The Tour marches on, but now the real pain begins.