CyclingRevealed's First Impressions '05

Stage 8 - Pforzheim (Ger) to Gérardmer, 231.5 km

Big Mistake

Sending George Hincapie up the road to cover an early break that included CSC's Jens Voigt was a big tactical error on the part of the Discovery team. Admittedly Voigt is a gifted rider but he will not win the Tour. Having George battle him for the six seconds bonus at an intermediate sprint was a waste of a valuable resource.

This became apparent on the Category 2 Col de la Schlucht. At 16.8 km and 4.4% average it topped out at 1139m (3736ft) and was just 15 km from the finish.

Normally we would have expected to see Hincapie power his way up such a climb with Armstrong on his wheel. Instead he and the rest of the team were nowhere to be seen after about the halfway point. The last man standing was Paolo Savoldelli who managed to reel in Alex Vinokourov after the first two of his series of terrifying accelerations. After that Armstrong was on his own and the weary peloton was in shreds.

Sensing Armstrong's situation it became open season as rider after rider attacked the six time Tour winner. A surprising Andreas Kloden (T-Mobile), who has shown no form so far this year, opened a gap to chase down lone leader Peter Weening (Rabobank). The two crested the climb and held on to the finish with Weening taking the sprint by no more than 2mm.

The next group of 32 riders came in 27 seconds later containing Armstrong, Ullrich and Vinokourov but no other Discovery riders. Advantage T-Mobile – or is it? Unlike Discovery, T-Mobile has no clear leader. Ullrich, Vinokourov and Kloden are each capable of winning the Tour. What's more each of them is hungry for personal victory and in-fighting between them could well be the savior of Discovery.

Schlucht means canyon in the German language and while the Discovery team was not ambushed there, they were certainly decimated by the intense speed and incessant attacks. There will be some serious discussions in the Discovery camp tonight. Tomorrow's tough climbing stage will be critical for if Armstrong again loses his team on the road not only T-Mobile, but everyone else will be gunning for him.

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