TOUR DE FRANCE: The mountains rear up tomorrow, seven days after the Tour started, leading to comments that this year's opening phase is unusually short. It has been quite long enough to sort out one thing, however: the Italian Alessandro Petacchi is head and shoulders above all the other sprinters.
True, Mario Cipollini is absent, but that may be to his advantage: he has avoided embarrassment.
It had been four years since any sprinter won three stages in the first week of the Tour and yesterday Petacchi emulated Cipollini with his third win in four road-race stages. Cipollini's tally in 1999 was four and there is every chance the "Gentleman Sprinter" will equal this today in Lyon.
The nickname might sound like a contradiction in terms given the skulduggery that is routine in any Tour sprint, but the Italian press consider that Petacchi bears a resemblance to Richard Gere and that his conduct and bella figura are similar to Gere's character in the film An Officer and a Gentleman.
This is more than patriotic indulgence; such is the form of Petacchi that he has no need to resort to ungentlemanly tactics. Yesterday, the acceleration that took him past Baden Cooke and over the line with more than a bike length to spare was worthy of Cipollini at his best.
Petacchi it was who destroyed Cipollini's morale in the opening week of this year's Giro d'Italia as the "Lion King" desperately looked for the two victories that would take him past the record for individual stage wins. Petacchi's current strike rate is spectacular: 15 victories in his past 19 sprints, including six stages of the Giro d'Italia and three here.
He may be the new Cipollini, but the giant from La Spezia is unlike his compatriot in character and behaviour. He is a mild-mannered fellow. There are no rock-star excesses in his past. Broken furniture does feature but the item in question was a sofa in the Petacchi home which gave way when Lucio, Alessandro's father, became overexcited at the victory of his hero, Giuseppe Saronni, in the 1982 world road-race championship at Goodwood.
Yesterday's finish ensured that Victor Hugo Pena retained the yellow jersey, despite Lance Armstrong's US Postal Service team-mates saying they would "not kill themselves" to defend Pena's lead, preferring to save themselves for the mountains.
Roberto Heras, Armstrong's deputy, made it into the most threatening escape of the day, a 14-man affair soon after the start, and none of the other teams with interest in the standings were keen to give him any leeway and the break was raced down.
Among the breakaway group was Frederic Finot, who eventually dragged away four of the 14 with much the same outcome heading south; any chance of victory for any of them went west once Petacchi's Fassa Bortolo and Robbie McEwen's Lotto decided to ensure the sprint finish.
Still, Finot is now wearing the polka-dot jersey of King of the Mountains. More substantially, however - but not much - he has nearly doubled his lead in the newspaper L'Equipe's classification of baroudeurs. This is a daily award for the rider who has spent most time "off the front". It was devised, one suspects, to make up for the fact that the home riders stand little chance of winning any of the Tour's four major prizes.
STAGE FIVE: LEADING PLACINGS (Troyes to Nevers 196km) 1 Alessandro Petacchi (Ita) Fassa Bortolo 4hr 9min 47sec, 2 Jaan Kirsipuu (Est) AG2R Prevoyance, 3 Baden Cooke (Aus) fdjeux.com, 4 Erik Zabel (Ger) Team Telekom, 5 Robbie McEwen (Aus) Lotto - Domo, 6 Luca Paolini (Ita) Quick Step - Davitamon, 7 Thor Hushovd (Nor) Credit Agricole, 8 Stuart O'Grady (Aus) Credit Agricole, 9 Fred Rodriguez (USA) Caldirola - So.Di, 10 Jean-Patrick Nazon (Fra) Jean Delatour.
KING OF THE MOUNTAINS (Polka-Dot jersey) STANDINGS: 1. F Finot (France) Jean Delatour 18 points 2. C Mengin (France) FDJeux.com 15 3. W Beneteau (France) Brioches 10 4. L Jegou (France) Credit Agricole 8 5. A Flickinger (France) AG2R 5
LEADING TEAM STANDINGS: 1. US Postal Service 51:06:45 2. ONCE 49 behind 3. Team Bianchi 51 4. iBanesto.com 1:35 5. Quick Step 1:45
OVERALL STANDINGS: 1 Victor Hugo Pena (Col) US Postal 17h 54min 31sec, 2 Lance Armstrong (USA) US Postal at 1sec, 3 Vjatceslav Ekimov (Rus) US Postal 5, 4 George Hincapie (USA) US Postal 5, 5 Jose Luis Rubiera (Spa) US Postal 23, 6 Roberto Heras (Spa) US Postal 27, 7 Pavel Padrnos (Cze) US Postal 27, 8 Floyd Landis (USA) US Postal 28, 9 Joseba Beloki (Spa) ONCE 33, 10 Jorg Jaksche (Ger) ONCE 38, 56 David Millar (Brit) Cofidis 2min 0sec
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