Tour day Schmalz Stage 17

by schmalz

Section head text.

Schmalz in a jealous rage over a fellow graphic designer’s success.

 

 

 

‘It should’ve been me!’ screams Dan ‘Chikin Phat’ 2000, as he fires his publicist.

 

 

Stage 17

 

 

July 20, Claire is sleeping pretty well through the night, from 11 or so until 5 am, so it’s pretty easy so far – that’s quality parenting!

 

 

Here’s a little gem from Sean Kelly talking about Domina being last in the prize in this year’s Tour:

 

 

"Domina Vacanze will have to be careful they don’t pick up too many penalties before the finish in Paris," said Eurosport co-commentator Sean Kelly.

 

"They could end up owing money back to the race."

 

 

Rafael Nuritdinov better get on the ball and start earning.

 

 

The war or words between Lance and Floyd is a tempest in a tea cup, no big deal at all. Floyd said that Lance ran the team like a boss and sometimes people don’t like their bosses. Whoa! News flash! He also mentioned people from Wisconsin like beer, and that getting kicked in the crotch feels “bad.”

 

 

Here’s Philippe Gilbert getting pissy about Cadel Evans:

 

 

“Everyone in the group asked him several times to ease up so that he didn’t not ruin the break’s chances of making it to the finish, but he didn’t want to know anything about it. But then, as we persisted, he promised that if the peloton didn’t allow us six or seven minutes’ advantage he would drop back. But he never did it. In addition, from the bottom of the Aubisque he set a pace that most of us struggled to follow. Order was restored… but a kilometre from the summit he really took off and left two-thirds of us behind.

 

 

“For me, a promise is a promise. He took us for idiots. I guarantee that one day I will have him. And when I do it I will make sure I take advantage of the work he has done. I’ve already let him know how I feel but I’m happy to let him know.”

 

 

Waaah! Cadel dropped us! He tried to win! You’d think Philippe was French or Spanish instead of Belgian.

 

 

Big news of the day is that Vino is going to leave T-Mobile, I could’ve told you that days ago. Perhaps on the mountain stage when Kloeden and Ullrich chased down his attack? Rumors have him going to Disco or CA. I don’t think he would fit in well at Disco; I am prayin g for him to go to CA, so I can watch the look on Moreau’s face when he’s forced to ride for Vino.

 

 

Today’s stage will most likely be a sprint and thank God! The mountains were duller than dry cleaning this year (with the exception of George’s win). All we saw was Lance and his lieutenants Ivan and Jan riding tempo.

 

 

The break has 12 minutes on the peloton, the action won’t start for 60 more kilos.

 

 

You can tell when Lance thinks he has the Tour wrapped up because he brings out the fancy “Tour-only” stuff. Today he has a big star on his helmet. For tomorrow he has special shorts from Nike that have a photo of his hand flipping the bird on the back. He’s going to ride in front of Floyd all day.

 

 

The only race left is for the green jersey, I’m hoping my boy Thor can pull it off. THOR WILL SMASH! I was thinking that Thor and Stuey would try to get into a move and get away from Robbie, but they probably got marked pretty well. I wonder if Cadel will have to chase for Robbie today. Sure, Cadel, you’re our team leader; could you wait for Robbie while he takes a dump?

 

 

Here’s a shot of Lance chewing his lunch.

 

 

Here’s a shot of Lance chewing his lunch in slow motion.

 

 

Padrnos and Popovych have stretched a hammock between their bikes and are carrying Lance to the finish.

 

 

There’s still sprint points left if the break makes it, so maybe Thor can get some points. THOR WILL SMASH! It’ll be rough for him to take points from Robbie in a bunch sprint.

 

 

Nice shot of Salvatore Commesso at the very back of the race working on his tan with his sleeves rolled up. I guess since Flecha didn’t make the break, he has the day off. But he’s only 2 hours 33 minutes behind, why doesn’t he attack to move up to 110th on the GC? Go Sal, go!

 

 

France television has named Carlos Da Cruz as being the rider that is “Most French” – cursing him forever into second place finishes.

 

 

CA is chasing to preserve Moreau’s 10th place? Or perhaps for Thor? LET THOR SMASH!

 

 

Dekker attacks the break, did anyone not see this coming?

 

 

The break gets spread all over the road like Basque spectators before the Davitamon director’s car.

 

 

Now 8 guys at the front, Dekker attacks to get to the front group, sensing there are too many French riders near him.

 

 

Lance moment #26: the painful-to-look-at photo of him as a teenage tri-athlete in that awful Speedo.

 

 

Do you think we’ll be able to purchase Nike’s Lance stickers? I’d say the chances are “inevitable.”

 

 

Just having just been named the “Most French” rider, Da Cruz misses the move.

 

 

It looks like one of these eight riders at the front will win, and that win will become a trivia question answer. Much like the answer: Frederic Guesdon. Can you name the question?

 

 

The race is now to see whether any team cars get t-boned at the train crossing.

 

 

Because there are 2 Discos in the front, T-Mobile now has to ride to save their lead in the team competition, as if we care. Angered at having to do so much math, Godefroot fires Steinhauser and calls Schreck a poodle-walker.

 

 

Hinault (no relation) attacks on the hill and Savoldelli gets up to him, we will see if on the descent “Il Falco” can live up to his nick name. Der Kommissar is in town, indeed.

 

 

On the flat, the four are about to get together, but Savoldelli jumps at 2k and nothing happens.

 

 

Kurt-Asle Arvesen jumps and gets a gap. Savoldelli is chasing with a lot of dead French weight on his wheel. He looks at Hinault to see if he can pull through and Hinault replies, “I’m French – what do you think?”

 

 

Savoldelli drops Hinault and comes around KAA for the win like a mother-animal.

 

 

We now have to wade through 15-20 minutes of promos for BBQ before the sprint.

 

 

Savoldelli will be the second Disco in history to shower before Lance; with the time gap he may even get a nice haircut.

 

 

I’m hoping THOR WILL GET A CHANCE TO SMASH in the finish.

 

 

Floyd forgets he’s in a bike race and misses the move at the front.

 

 

Vino is hunting for time and attacks the lead group. He then gets off the front and attacks the lead motorcycle.

 

 

Evans, Moreau and Floyd may each lose their places. Moreau will be able to explain to the other two exactly how this feels.

 

 

Thor is sitting on Stuey in case they catch. THOR WILL SMASH!

 

 

Vino hastens Cadel Evans’ drop down the GC by a day.

 

 

Savoldelli calls from Italy to congratulate his teammates on their sprint finish.

 

112 Comments

Incident on 33rd. Street

I have always wanted other Discovery/Postal riders to win with Lance. No one deserved a chance more than Hincapie, and he won the queen bitch stage 15. After that, Rubiera should get the next shot.

That said, it was another champion (Savodelli) who powered to the win today

THE BEST EVER

Anyone who says this is not the best tour ever is crazy — every rider seems so human, guys cracking, dudes making up 30 mminutes, landis is an F….ing STUD……I hope he CRUSHES THE TT

Niko

Without question the best tour stage in my lifetime – this is Greg L in 1989 x 100 They should toss the favorites EVERY year just for the hell of it even if they didn’t take dope

Anonymous

I only read on the online play but play but holy shit. Must get drunk enough tonight to black out my memory and watch it for real. Its like the drama of the 1980 olympic hockey team winning but spread over 3 hours. Best commentary ever too, there must be a good 10 T-shirts in the making out of that one.

K King- VB

Phonak couldn’t have asked for more. One day the guy cracks and spends an extra 10 minutes in front of the camera going up hill slower than I do. The next he rides 160K by himself.

I’d say Discovery F’d up letting this guy get away. The best they could do was Pardnos getting dropped from the break 100K out.

mikem

make a shirt out of the american gothic crop-job. i’ll buy. …schmalz, when you paused and said "aah," did you wet yourself?

mikem

this puts a lot of pressure on the phonak mechanics NOT to screw up floyd’s TT ride this time around. 3rd time’s the charm…

lee3

One guy against 3 teams and he crushed them!! I loved his reaction to winning the stage. Sheer friggen focus. Hey, I wrote that this would happen yesterday! Do I get a star on the four head?

etsu

Lance who?
The French media criticizing for Floyd’s lack of panache? They need to go fill up his water bottles and put cream on his chamois. Wow

AA

That was amazing to see….and I’m not talking about Floyd but the about face that Schamlz did in reference to TT’s. I think he’s actually gonna watch it. I bet Dan is out at this very moment buying a dedicated TT bike and IM’ing Andy for TT tips.

Anonymous

Talk about irony if Pereiro could hold on and Floyd gets 2nd overall. If you were CSC and Caisse d’ Crapbag would you team up to make tomorrow as fast as possible to keep Floyd from recovering?

"keep floyd from recovering"?

No way, their guys will have to recover too. I doubt sastre and Pererro will be in any condition to ride hard tomorrow. CSC and the magically medicated T-Mobiles might have some neat recovery aids tho

jon hicks

parallel to LeMond and Indurain in 1990 in the final mountain stage dropping the hammer on Chiappucci when he had the yellow jersey. it set up LeMond for the TT win and the yellow jersey. but that is a pale comparison to what Floyd did today. unreal. can’t wait to see it tonight. will be permanantly saved on DVR, video, etc.

Neu

Wow, just great, what a rider! I was going back and forth btw velonews and cyclingnews to see who had the latest update. Panache, Lancaster County style.

Yep, Lee you get big credit. You called what most figured was impossible.

Alan Atwood

I’ve got two words for ya………….

HOLY SH!T!!!!!!!!

Game on!

Pray for me that my Sprint modem works on Saturday when I’m at Owasco timing the TT. How in the hell am I supposed to work under these conditions?

I am watching it for the 2nd time on OLN

It actually gets better….Landis looks so pissed and fired up at teh end, I think he is actually going to CRUSH dudes on Saturday…….I agree after 7 years, this is so refreshing

jesus perera

this is incredible!!!!!!!! i could not belive it after yesterday.what a race!!!!! bigggg cojones!
go for it landis on Sat!!!!!!!!

Genius from Texas

Genius – waiting for the book signings and the guest appearance on OLN. Sherwin has Ligget, Bobke needs Schmalz. Frankie sucks, replace him.

Anonymous

Overlooked within all this – Commesso 29th coming in ahead of all the Discos. Disco needs some boom boom and Toto’s guns might be the answer.

lee3

Cervelo already has the Shleck victory posted front and center on all or most of thier web ads. BMC will do the same with Floyd hopefully, however, he looks pretty pissed off and quite frankly the msg may read like "Buy this bike or this guy will kick yer arse!!"
I love it!!! Floyd will slay’em all in the ITT. I bet that T-mobile attacks on the last stage.

Podium: Floyd
Cadel
Kloden

Its pretty close between Cadel and Andreas. They could possibly swap steps since Kloden seems to be TT’ing well this year. Cadel has always been good @ the ITT though.

to I am watching it for the 2nd time on OLN

You won’t be saying that if Pereiro or Sastre holds on to win.

Without the last 2 stages this was like the Vuelta.

Lets face it accept for last year Lance did some crushing of his own.

Baldwin

MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS MY NAME IS FLOYD LANDIS

lee3

The only riders still in this thing that are good @ the Crono is Cadel and Kloden. Pereiro is sort of an unknown however, he will not have the guns to keep the jersey and quite possibly fall way down the leader board on a 57k ITT.

ewe idiot

I’m going to try to grow a moustache so I can look like Floyd. Did you see the shot of ‘TOTO’ painted on the road? I think I’m going to paint that on the road in front of my apartment.

Alex

Next year we have to get Dan a live feed so he can do some kind of live audio an we can mute our TVs, he is getting better every year. I dunno why no one has stolen him from us.

tango

no question – single greatest stage since lemond/hinault and lemond/fignon – landis is godlike – best tour since the 80’s – no question – finally a bike race!!

tango

no question – single greatest stage since lemond/hinault and lemond/fignon – landis is godlike – best tour since the 80’s – no question – finally a bike race!!

Andy

Anthony, hell will freeze over before Schmalz asks me for a bike related tip. Except for wrenching. He’s hopeless at that.

Riis is a skeezy hooker..

"I demand an explanation!!" says the man who immaculately bleach cleans his team’s needles before throwing them away…skeezy morning pastry ho..

schmalz

I think if you read the whole Bjarne quote, he doesn’t sound like he’s calling Floyd out:

Bjarne Riis

Anonymous

Riis su**ks. Maybe he should explain why his team leader is tossed but he still has a job. He knows all about everything except that his team leader goes to Spain to get doped up!

Tourwatcher

Most amazing ride in many years of tour watching! I’m naming my next child ‘Floyd’…..boy or girl. Great commentary Schmaltz.

lee3

This morning it was mentioned by Paul or Phil that Landis had a press conference the evening after his stage implosion. It was determined that he didnt just bonk out. I believe the term "heat stroke" was thrown around. So there’s Riis’ expanation given to’em without difficulty. I guess heat strokes dont kill the legs.

K King- VB

Even if he didn’t mean anything by it he should know better…..casual fans and outsiders will look at that quote and say "yeah, how’d he do that, must be dope"

He’s the DS, CSC waited too long to help Pereiro. 9 minutes! Once Landis caught the 1 st break in such a short time they should have realized the previous day was a fluke and got to it. I think Riis knows it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. He’s just too much of a dick to give Landis credit for a great ride.

Not only that

…..but the great Bjarne Riis would never want to admint he made a mistake by letting Floyd stay out there for so long…..I mean, he is the best DS out there…..he’s just being a sore is loser……woe is you Bjanre..woe is you.

😉

lee3

Yea…with Phonak’s not so squeaky clean past, that statement could be easily taken out of context. He should know better.

Andy

I don’t know if you can call it a mistake. I think everyone expected Floyd to crack a bit more on the last climb. CSC got Voigt and VandeVelde to pull like crazy before the Joux Plane, and Sastre put time into everyone else. Floyd was just too good.

As far as doping insinuations, I’d look at powerhouse teams that are underperforming.

lee3

….especially with the lightning rod French! They’re always lookin for a angle to bring down all things not French!

chris y

"Lemond just emailed Lance a photo of his ass"
all the flow max in the world couldn’t stop me from PISSING MY PANTS!!…when I read that

BOO RACE RADIOS.......HOORAY BEER!

imagine how time floyd would have gotten if the peloton were not allowed to use race radios….

KaliDurga

Did anyone else notice during the OLN extended post-race coverage that Al and Bobke were left speechless once Floyd crossed the finish? A good three minutes went by with nothing but the occasional, sputtered single-word comment. Any rider who can cause dead air time on OLN damned well deserves to win the Tour.

lee3

The radio advantage goes both ways. I’m sure Floyd recvd info on who headed the chasing, the whereabouts of the team car, of Halgand, that spoke issue went pretty smooth, and he got splits just like that useless chase.

Faber

Props to Bobke and Trautwig (For once). Roll for Calling Liggett to the carpet when in response to Trautwig’s entreaty for a glimmer of hope for Floyd Phil said "No Way". Bob said hell yes way!!. As I watched Floyd slice and dice his way down the hill on the way to bridge the breakaway I said to myself it doesn’t get better than this and then Trautwig (like a freak mind reader) says the exact same thing. Al is starting to get the hang of this bike racing thing. The silence was deafening in the final 5k. I kept thinking they were about to go to yet another commercail break that never came. Yeahhhh Beeeer!

RG

Dude, I’ve been reading your Tour posts since last year. The "Who’s your elder?" bit of snarkiness was the best to date. Laugh out loud funny.

Oh, and yeah. This was the freakin’ best stage of any race, anywhere. I was freaking out so bad this morning (California time) it took me almost half an hour to dig my dog out from under my bed. Vive le Landis!!

mikem

faber, i have to grudgingly agree (though i haven’t seen yesterday’s stage yet) that trautwig is improving. i think he called rasmussen’s shot the other day, pre-stage, and has shown a few times that he has more than just a dim glimmer of understanding of what’s going on, finally. the eurosport announcers were speechless yesterday, too–they just ran out of stuff to say. so damn cool!! …and i agree that the "who’s your elder" bit is priceless–put it on the t-shirt with the american gothic picture. perfect.

mandrapa

good quote from that o’grady guy at velonews:

Then, at a press conference on Thursday, after Landis chased down an 11-man breakaway, killed them and ate them, built a new bicycle out of their bones, and roared away in a pillar of fire to win the stage to Morzine and jump back to within 30 seconds of the yellow jersey, he mentioned beer once again.

mandrapa

I also loved the part where you said they should show the tape of the last two stages in classrooms, courtrooms, etc. That was classic

Katie

For whoever asked, the "whose your elder" comment is a parody of "whose your daddy" except using the term for a bishop in a Mennonite church. – so it’s a "Mennonite taunt" for the riders he bested.

Anonymous

i wish they would have kept razzy in the tour until this time trial- that would have added some comedy to the tour and we would all get to enjoy schmalz’s snarktastic analysis of this TT skillzz

Rick

How stupid is it to not want to know the winner of a bike race, then go look at a cycling website? Is it really that impossible to not look at NYVC for a few hours?

g.g.

. . .it was an unfortunate disconnect with the world at large. Really didn’t know I was spoiling anything. Andy, Dan, why don’t you pull that post? I don’t want any more love letters from TiVoids.

g.g.

or TiVo, I guess it is. . . the spoiler was inadvertent.
et, l’andalou, c’est le chien, pas le coureur, imbecile. . .
au revior.

Anonymous

I don’t think it matters that it was unintentional; I think a harsh rebuke is a good reminder to be vigilant.

So, Mr Anti-Spoiler, please go flagellate yourself. Because with your yapping and two other posts on this board, I’ll bet you $100 I know who won the stage. And I specifically didn’t pull up that picture in case it spoiled it.

So unless that was some deep meta-ironic $hit, you just did to me what GG did to you.

Anonymous

g.g: do you understand the concept of ‘no spoilers’?
Do not give away the name of winner of the day’s stage.
Yes, that would include leaving a link to a pic of the winner captioned: “XXXX looked pretty banged up, but recovered well to win the stage.”
Fuck you.
Also, are we supposed to be impressed by your knowledge of Salvador Dali/ Luis Bunuel cinematic collaborations?
Because I certainly am not.
Maybe if the winner of the stage were from Andalusia. That would be clever. Titling your post ‘andalusian dog’ would then make sense. But the winner is not from Spain, but from….
Now. See what i did there? I stopped myself from potentially ruining someone’s enjoyment of tonight’s stage.
And again, fuck you.

710

And Bobby Julich aka Sean Penn’s sultry insouciance is almost too much to bear. Ripped straight of the cover of Tiger Beat magazine. He’s staring right through me.

Anonymous

anybody else see casar and the liquigas dude ram into the dog?? that was friggin narly..liquigas fell hard. like really hard.

vinophile

I am glad to see Vino continuing with his ill-advised, futile, and most likely final attack. Keep fighting, Vino, mebbe they’ll f-ck up the B sample! Attack!

Anonymous

it’s still a great race. these guys getting caught is the sport going through growing pains and cleaning itself up. if you can’t appreciate that or schmaltz’s hilarious commentary, then you’re a dolt

Anonymous

I agree 100% – I want Hopeful Friday, the Hangover, and all that is local cycling. Who cares about this years Tour de big steaming pile of shit.

Angry Guy

Where is hopeful Friday?! I hate all these doping cheats and liars. When teams are run by ex-pros like Riis, Bruyneel, etc is it any wonder that their riders cheat? No!

Comments are closed.