Lance Armstrong tore through a 9.6-mile individual time trial course in Monaco at 20:12 on Saturday morning, finishing in 10th place on the first stage of the 2009 Tour de France.

It followed by nearly four years Armstrong's declaration of "Vive Le Tour" as he bade farewell to professional cycling from the top step of the podium in Paris with his 7th Tour de France win in 2005.

Armstrong was the 18th cyclist on the course and set an early best time. By the end of the day, after all 180 riders had finished, he had only dropped to 10th. 

Swiss time trial phenom Fabian Cancellara had the best time of 19:32. He'll start in yellow to start Stage 2, a 116-mile race from Monaco to Brignoles ...   more »

It will be all Lance all the time on the Versus cable network when the 2009 Tour de France kicks off in Monaco on Saturday.

After a series of 10 one-hour shows on Friday highlighting the all-time best Lance Armstrong stages, Versus will launch its live coverage for Stage 1 at 9:30 a.m. (ET) Saturday.

There will be live coverage in the morning, followed by three two-hour replays throughout the afternoon, followed by a 3-hour "expanded" primetime show in the evening that  will be repeated once.

That's 14 hours a day for the "routine" stages. Mountain stages could get 17 hours of coverage in a 24-hour period.

I'm sure that's OK with most cycling fans. Although I try to watch as much of the live show as possible in the morning, I'm often hooked in the evening by the primetime show ...   more »

This 2009 Tour de France -- starting Saturday in Monaco -- might seem like old times for viewers, as many of the seven cyclists from the US are blasts from the past.

In fact, the seven spread across three teams has tallied 47 Tours de France among them.

The biggest name is of course Lance Armstrong, 37, who returns to the peloton after a three-year hiatus. A winner of seven straight Tours de France between 1999 and 2005, he needs no introduction. This is Armstrong's 12th Tour start.

Returning to the Tour de France in 2009 for his seventh start is Armstrong teammate Levi Leipheimer, 35, who had to sit out last year because he happened to be a member of the banned Astana team. Remember Let Levi Ride ...   more »

"I got the call -- from Johan Bruyneel, our team manager at Astana -- that I had been waiting for. As I had feared, his message was that I wasn't going to the Tour this year. Many reasons were given, but all I really heard was that there would be no Tour de France for me.

"Politics seemed to once again be what was holding me back from doing what I love, racing at the top of my sport. Johan gave me many reasons why he couldn't take me, and all of them made sense to me from a political standpoint, but absolutely no sense from a straight up who deserves to go standpoint."

-- Chris Horner writing about his disappointment in not being chosen to ride alongside Alberto Contador, Lance Armstrong and Levi Leipheimer in the 2009 Tour de France. A native of Bend, Oregon, Horner's Freewheeling column appears in the Oregonian.

Horner doesn't blame Bruyneel, whose "hands were tied....   more »

Spanish cyclist Alberto Contador is the choice to lead Team Astana's 9-man squad at the 2009 Tour de France this year.

Citing his 2007 Tour de France championship and victories at all three Grand Tours, team manager Johan Bruyneel writes at the Astana website:

 "... It's hard to find a better stage race rider than Alberto. He has worked very hard, earning the right to represent our team as the leader this July." ....   more »

Lance Armstrong peers from the cover of the VeloNews Tour de France Guide: "7-time champ and his team of superstars defy all challengers."

Alberto Contador looks out from Cycle Sport America: "Don't mess with the Spanish stage race superstar."

It's only 1-1/2 weeks until the beginning of this year's Tour de France in Monaco on July 4, and it's still unclear whether Astana will start the race with an absolute team leader. If you were in charge of Astana and facing this decision, who would you pick? See the poll at right. ...   more »

The teams of US cyclists Lance Armstrong, Levi Leipheimer, Christian Vande Velde, David Zabriskie and George Hincapie have all been chosen for the 2009 Tour de France, which starts July 4.

Astana (Armstrong and Leipheimer) was omitted from the Tour de France in 2008 because of the previous years' doping transgressions. Remember Let Levi Ride? He didn't last year.

This year that distinction falls to Fuji-Servetto ...   more »

Reading through Lance Armstrong's quotes from a press release regarding the upcoming Tour de France route, I'd have to say he's looking forward to the upcoming bike race.

Armstrong was busy preparing for the Lance Armstrong Foundation's Ride for the Roses bicycling event in Austin this weekend, so he couldn't appear at the route unveiling in Paris. Who knows. He might not have shown up anyway.

The 7-time Tour winner has had a turbulent relationship with organizers in France and might have cold feet about racing the Tour again if he doesn't feel welcome ...   more »

The 2009 Tour de France sounds a lot like one of those old-fashioned Cook's tours of Europe -- 6 countries in 21 days.

Of course, the racing bicyclists will spend most of their time in France, where the peloton will battle on the legendary Mont Ventoux on the next to last day.

The bike race runs from July 4 - 26, and starts in the Principality of Monaco, before it takes detours into Spain, Andorra, Switzerland, and Italy along its 2,170-mile course through France ...   more »

Austria's Bernhard Kohl is the latest pro cyclist to be accused of doping at the Tour de France after a French lab retested his urine samples taken during the race in July.

Kohl finished in 3rd place overall, wearing the King of the Mountains jersey at the time.

He's the fourth Tour cyclist accused of using CERA, a new form of EPO, and the second one from the Gerolsteiner team to flunk the test ...   more »

For those of you keeping score at home, this year's doping dragnet of the Tour de France has netted a total of 6 cyclists. Book 'em, Danno.

Two suspects -- Germany's Stefan Schumacher (Gerolsteiner) and Italy's Leonardo Piepoli (Saunier Duval) -- were disclosed Monday after French laboratory technicians retested some urine samples that had originally tested negative.

If the accusations hold true, some rewriting of the record books will be in order. Schumacher won both individual time trials from Fabian Cancellara and spent a few days in the yellow jersey. Piepoli won a mountain stage in the Pyrenees.

Both were alleged to have used a new form of EPO called Continuous Erythropoiesis Receptor Activator, or CERA....   more »

Another doping accusation and rumors of a celebration party injury to Cadel Evans (he refutes the rumors) dominate the news after Carlos Sastre collects his yellow jersey at the 2008 Tour de France.

Dimitry Fofonov is the cyclist on Credit Agricole who's been accused of doping. The 31-year-old rider from Khazakhstan was immediately fired by the team. He finished the Tour in 19th place. ...   more »

Gert Steegmans won the final sprint on the Champs Élysées in Paris on Sunday, giving his QuickStep team its first win in the 2008 Tour de France.

In a picturesque, sunny finish on the streets of Paris, Steegmans was launched by his team and beat Gerald Ciolek of Team Columbia and green jersey Oscar Freire, neither of whom could catch up.

As expected Carlos Sastre of Team CSC finished the race in the yellow jersey, becoming the 7th Spanish cyclist ever, and the second in two years, to win the Tour de France. At 33, Sastre was riding in his 8th Tour....   more »

Forget what all the cycling experts said: Cadel Evans didn't have enough speed to catch Carlos Sastre.

2008 Tour de France favorite Evans picked up only 29 seconds on Sastre, when he needed 94 seconds. From the first time checks on Saturday, it was clear that Sastre wouldn't give up his yellow jersey. 

Stefan Schumacher of Gerolsteiner won the 32.9-mile individual time trial on Saturday from Cérilly to Saint Amand Montrond. US cyclist Christian Vande Velde finished in 4th place on the stage, climbing into 5th place in the general classification.

When the Tour de France ends in Paris on Sunday, Sastre will finish in first, Evans in second (for the second straight year), Bernard Kohl in third, Denis Menchov in fourth and Vande Velde in fifth, 1:12 behind Menchov and 3:12 behind Sastre ...   more »

After competing for eight years at the Tour de France, France's Sylvain Chavanel won the first stage victory in his career over a fellow countryman who was making his first visit to the Tour.

The 29-year-old Cofidis cyclist beat Jérémy Roy of Française des Jeux in a two-man sprint on Stage 19 in Montluçon. The pair had successfully attacked the peloton about 48 miles into the 102-mile stage.

Team Columbia's Gerald Ciolek of Germany beat the mass sprint in the peloton, which came across the line 1:13 later. Yellow jersey wearer Carlos Sastre and all the other leaders finished together, and there was no change in the top 10 on Friday. ...   more »

US-based Team Columbia posted its fifth stage win at the 2008 Tour de France on Thursday as Marcus Burghardt won a breakaway sprint to the finish in Saint Etienne.

It was the first Tour win for the 25-year-old German in what looked more like a sprint in a velodrome than the end of a 122-mile road race across the French countryside.

Meanwhile, Team CSC didn't have to field any threats to the yellow jersey held by Carlos Sastre. There were no changes among the Tour leaders as they conserve energy for the individual time trial on Saturday ...   more »

Veteran cyclist Carlos Sastre turned the Tour de France inside out on the slopes of l'Alpe d'Huez on Wednesday, gaining enough time on the other leaders to win the stage and possibly the Tour.

The Spaniard on Team CSC attacked at the bottom of the final climb and achieved a solo effort through the crowds to the finish, winning the stage by 2:03. We won't know until Saturday whether it is a big enough margin to offset Cadel Evans' expected strong showing at the individual time trial on the penultimate stage.

Team CSC worked at the front of the peloton all day Wednesday, seeming to protect the yellow jersey for teammate Frank Schleck. Yet the strategy may have been to keep all eyes on Schleck as Sastre secretly stole the show. ...   more »

It wasn't the final climb to the highest paved road in the Alps that decided Stage 16 and perhaps the Tour de France, it was the descent.

Christian Vande Velde, for instance, lost 35 seconds to the yellow jersey group going over the Cime de la Bonnette-Restefond, but a crash on the way down put him out of contention as he dropped to 6th place, 3:15 behind the yellow jersey.

Frenchman Cyril Dessel of AG2R won the four-man sprint going into Jausiers, after the eight men summiting the Cime de la Bonnette-Restefond split apart on the way down. The first one over, John-Lee Augustyn of Barloworld, actually tumbled off the road and his bike slid down the slope out of reach.

In the trailing yellow jersey group, 3rd overall Cadel Evans led the downhill charge that caused Denis Menchov -- considered Evans biggest rival -- to lose ground. ...   more »

After sitting in second place by 1-second for the better part of a week, Frank Schleck (left) gained the margin he needed on the final climb to wrest the yellow jersey away from Cadel Evans at the Tour de France on Sunday.

Schleck had the help of two other CSC teammates -- Carlos Sastre and Frank's brother Andy Schleck -- on Stage 15's final climb. Team CSC helped drop all but the leaders before the final climb, then they kept up the pressure to the summit.

Meanwhile, a four-man breakaway that included American Danny Pate of Garmin-Chipotle was trudging up Prato Nevoso, a 7-mile climb at 6.9%. Simon Gerrans of Credit Agricole won that, with Pate finishing third.

American Christian Vande Velde finished in 10th place on the day, falling to 5th place overall but gaining 7 seconds on Evans ...   more »

Spain's Oscar Freire has consistently been one of the top finisher in the sprints at the 2008 Tour de France. On Saturday he won the final sprint in Digne de Bains, which marked his fourth career Tour de France victory.

Mark Cavendish, the Team Columbia phenom who was looking for his fifth Tour win in Stage 14, lost contact with the peloton on the Col de l'Orme, a category 3 climb about 6 miles from the finish line.

That climb is the first indicator of the looming Alps, where Cadel Evans will be challenged to keep the yellow jersey as the Tour enters its final week. He's just one second ahead of Frank Schleck and 38 seconds ahead of Christian Vande Velde ...   more »

There's quite a bit of interest in US cyclist Christian Vande Velde since he climbed up to 3rd place in the Tour de France on Sunday. Until this year, you could say the 32-year-old cyclist has been pedaling under the radar as primarily a domestique since turning pro in 1998.

Those who knew him growing up in northern Illinois expected great things from him, but the rest of us have to do some digging to learn about his star of the Garmin-Chipotle cycling team.

For instance, I had noticed that he made his major mark in this year's Tour by finishing in 8th place at the Stage 4 time trial. That put him in 6th place overall, and he improved on that in the Massif Central last week and Pyrennes over the weekend.

How did he become such a good climber?

“I’m proof that you don’t have to ride hills to do well on hills ...   more »