Stage 10: Grenoble to Courchevel** 192.5km
**Stage will start in Brignoud because of planned protests in Grenoble.
This is the first mountain stage of the tour, and there are 2 major climbs in today's stage.....
- There was another early break away today. 7 riders (Posthuma, Brochard, Krivtsov, Bortolami, Isasi, Facci and Sanchez) were leading the peloton by as much as 10'40" at one point in today's stage.
- With about 7km left to go before the first climb's summit, there were multiple attacks from both the lead group and the peloton. The peloton caught the breakaways quickly but it still remembered the seven riders over 5 minutes ahead of them.
- The seven escapee riders crested the summit first and began the immediate descent.
- The young Discovery Channel Rider, Yaroslav Popovych, has crashed. He was cleaned up on his bike by the tour doctor in his white Audi convertible, and recovered quickly.
- As the riders approached the final climb, the peloton tried to reel in the 9 escapees.
- The Discovery Channel stepped it up in the last 25km and made sure that all the escapees were swallowed one by one in to the peloton. Their pace up this climb caused many riders to fall off the back, including the yellow jersey holder Jens Voigt.
- Lance Armstrong, 3 teammates and 13 other elite riders broke a gap with the rest of the peloton with about 14km left to ride.
- As Lance's Group slowly lost riders, he fought to bring back the single remaining escapee, Jorg Jaksche.
- With 7km togo, the group out front included only 4, Armstrong, Valverde, Mancebo and Rasmussen.
- These 4 worked together to stay ahead of the rest of the chasers. The Peloton was over 14 minutes back.
- Lance and Alejandro Valverde took off from the other two for the sprint to the finish
- Valverde wins the stage.
The top 6 in the 10th stage of the 2005 Tour de France is:
1. Alejandro Valverde (Spain) IBA
2. Lance Armstrong (USA) DSC - at same time
3. Mickael Rasmussen (Denmark) RAB at 9"
4. Francisco Mancebo (Spain) IBA at 9"
5. Ivan Basso (Italy) CSC at 1’02"
6. Levi Leipheimer (USA) GST at 1’15"
Top 8 Overall:
1. Lance Armstrong (USA) Discovery Channel 37h11’04"
2. Mickael Rasmussen (Denmark) Rabobank at 38"
3. Ivan Basso (Italy) CSC at 2’40"
4. Christophe Moreau (France) Credit Agricole at 2’42"
5. Alejandro Valverde (Spain) Illes Balears at 3’16"
6. Levi Leipheimer (USA) Gerolsteiner at 3’58"
7. Francisco Mancebo (Spain) Illes Balears at 4’00"
8. Jan Ullrich (Germany) T-Mobile at 4’02"
Jersey Holders:
Yellow: Lance Armstrong
White: Alejandro Valverde