Tour De France 2006

[Ben Lauer]

There was some contraversy over yesterday's finish...
- Thor Hushovd's 4th place finish was removed and he was given a 148th place finish. Apperently he had an irregular line when he was sprinting at the end. His points were taken away for thie sprint and he is no longer in contention for the green jersey. "We have watched the replay of the finish of yesterday’s stage and really couldn’t see where the irregularity in the sprint was," said Serge Beucherie. "Thor never strayed from his line! There’s no doubt that the finish was frantic but Eisel and Hushovd didn’t do anything wrong. We believe that the decision by the race jury is unfair, Thor is distressed because he is now well down in the rankings for the points classification. He lost 24 points and is out of contention for the green jersey now. It’s the same situation as what happened to McEwen in Tours last year. Now we can only wait to see if something happens to McEwen and Boonen but that’s not what we’re really wishing for. Today we will not cooperate in the pursuit of any escapees because we have no jersey to defend… nor the catalyst of chasing points in the race for the green jersey."

- Erik Zabel and Julian Dean where awarded with the same finishing time as McEwen yesterday. In cycling, if you finish the race in the same group as the first person, you recieve the same time, but the first few finishers often get bonuses. Zabel had a flat with 2 km to go yesterday, and becuase of his wait for a new wheel, he was awarded a better time. Dean had a crash in the final sprint, and because of the proximity of the two events to the finish, they were awarded the same time as the peloton.

Stage 5:

Stage 5 has 4 climbs and 3 sprints. It is 255 km and goes from Beauvais to Caen.

- At around the 20km mark 8 riders made an escape. The peloton began the chase of the group while 2 of the 8 had thier own attack. The 6 were caught and the two's lead continued to grow. The riders are Dumoulin (A2R) and Schroder (GST).
- At the 72km mark the two leaders where 8:40 in front of the peloton, 5 km later they had worked it up to a 10 minute lead.
- Sometime you don't expect everything to happen during the tour. The two lead riders stopped around the 80km mark. One needed to fix his bike, and the other relieve his bladder. They both got back on the bike and rode again, losing only a small fraction of thier lead.
- Halfway through, it starts to rain, and the leaders are being reeled back in after the greatest lead of over 11 minutes.
- There was a crash in the peloton after the last sprint, spliting it in two. Luckly all riders involved got back on thier bikes and continued.
- With 20km to go the leaders are still ahead by about 2:30, they were caught in the final kilometers of the stage.
- Egoi Martinez crashed today within 20 km of the finish.
- Another crash within 5 km of the finish caused several riders to fall. It didn't affect the top contenders however.
Top Five in this stage are:
1. Oscar Freire (ESP - RAB)
2. Tom Boonen (BEL - QSI)
3. Inaki Isasi (ESP - EUS)
4. David Kopp (GER - GST)
5. Robbie McEwen (AUS - DVL)

Jerome Pineau holds the Polka Dot climbing jersey, Robbie McEwen continues to hold the sprinters jersey, and Tom Boonen remains in yellow.