CYCLING/ Tour de France: The history of the Tour is marked with episodes that the French call coups de gueule. The term is untranslatable but it refers to the way a champion reacts to events - the combination of anger and desire that drove greats such as Fausto Coppi, Eddy Merckx and Bernard Hinault to turn destiny on its head after disasters on the road.
Yesterday in winning the stage here and putting himself back in the running for overall victory, Floyd Landis achieved a coup de gueule that stood comparison with anything his illustrious predecessors achieved, less than 24 hours after he had seemed to have lost all hope of victory in the Tour. His solo mountain escape began on the day's first climb, the Col des Saisies, and ended 84 miles and five passes later at the finish, with the second man, Carlos Sastre, over five minutes behind.
Having suffered appallingly on the previous day's final climb at La Toussuire, the American began the day out of the reckoning in 11th overall, eight minutes behind Oscar Pereiro, and he is now only 30 seconds adrift. Not surprisingly he is cautiously optimistic about his chances of clinching overall victory in tomorrow's time-trial. "I'm fairly confident unless I overdid it today, and there is a chance of that."
That was all that was cautious about Landis yesterday and, given the way the form book has been daily torn up in this race, he was probably wise. But he is back in the running, and the race has been boiled down, finally, to him and two others, Pereiro and Sastre, who fought their own duel on the final climb, the Col du Joux-Plane, as a result of which Sastre is now only 12 seconds behind his fellow Spaniard.
"After yesterday (Wednesday) I didn't have a choice," said Landis. "I thought I would show my team I would keep fighting no matter what, that I would prove I deserved to be a leader. I didn't expect it to work that well, although I thought (the other teams) might be disorganised if I attacked that early."
His manager John Lelangue added that the pride of his team and their leader had been wounded when they were criticised for their caution earlier in the race. The press had criticised the American for his timid riding when he seemed to have the whip hand on Tuesday at l'Alpe d'Huez; L'Équipe ran a cartoon of him in the guise of a mouse in yellow. Yesterday the mouse roared a yell of rage that took cycling back 35 years, to the days of Merckx's epic attack on the road to Marseille the day after he lost the Tour lead to the Spaniard Luis Ocana.
On the Saisies his team-mates had set the early pace, one of them - Miguel Angel Martin Perdiguero - with such gusto that he was unable to complete the stage.
Landis disappeared as if the finish were around the corner, sprinting up the gutter alongside the lead riders in the string. Ahead was a group of 10; by the ski lifts at the summit he had halved their six-minute lead. On the day's second major mountain, the Colombiere, he was alone, pouring vast amounts of water into his helmet every few minutes to counter the 30-degree heat, and on the descent his advantage reached nine minutes.
Today the Tour heads west out of the mountains and another long-range break can be expected.
Stage 17
Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne - Morzine (200.5 kilometres)
LEADING POSITIONS: 1 Floyd Landis (USA) Phonak 5hrs 23mins 36secs, 2 Carlos Sastre (Spa) Team CSC at 5mins 42secs, 3 Christophe Moreau (Fra) AG2R-Prevoyance at 5:58, 4 Damiano Cunego (Ita) Lampre-Fondital at 6:40, 5 Michael Boogerd (Ned) Rabobank at 7:08, 6 Frank Schleck (Lux) Team CSC, 7 Oscar Pereiro (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne-Illes Balears, 8 Andreas Kloden (Ger) T-Mobile, 9 Haimar Zubeldia (Spa) Euskaltel-Euskadi at same time, 10 Cadel Evans (Aus) Davitamon-Lotto at 7:20, 11 Michael Rasmussen (Den) Rabobank at 7:24, 12 Denis Menchov (Rus) Rabobank, 13 Patrik Sinkewitz (Ger) T-Mobile at same time, 14 Tadej Valjavec (Slo) Lampre-Fondital at 8:37, 15 Giuseppe Guerini (Ita) T-Mobile at same time, 16 Cyril Dessel (Fra) AG2R-Prevoyance at 8:49, 17 Jose Luis Arrieta (Spa) AG2R-Prevoyance at 9:27, 18 Marcus Fothen (Ger) Gerolsteiner, 19 Eddy Mazzoleni (Ita) T-Mobile, 20 Marzio Bruseghin (Ita) Lampre-Fondital at same time
GENERAL CLASSIFICATION: 1 Oscar Pereiro (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne-Illes Balears 80hrs 08mins 49secs, 2 Carlos Sastre (Spa) Team CSC at 0.12secs, 3 Floyd Landis (USA) Phonak at 0:30, 4 Andreas Kloden (Ger) T-Mobile at 2:29, 5 Cadel Evans (Aus) Davitamon-Lotto at 3:08, 6 Denis Menchov (Rus) Rabobank at 4:14, 7 Cyril Dessel (Fra) AG2R-Prevoyance at 4:24, 8 Christophe Moreau (Fra) AG2R-Prevoyance at 5:45, 9 Haimar Zubeldia (Spa) Euskaltel-Euskadi at 8:16, 10 Michael Rogers (Aus) T-Mobile at 12:13, 11 Frank Schleck (Lux) Team CSC at 13:48, 12 Michael Boogerd (Ned) Rabobank at 13:52, 13 Pietro Caucchioli (Ita) Credit Agricole at 15:46, 14 Damiano Cunego (Ita) Lampre-Fondital at 17:18, 15 Marcus Fothen (Ger) Gerolsteiner at 17:23, 16 Tadej Valjavec (Slo) Lampre-Fondital at 20:50, 17 Michael Rasmussen (Den) Rabobank at 21:04, 18 Levi Leipheimer (USA) Gerolsteiner at 22:01, 19 Jose Azevedo (Por) Discovery Channel at 34:01, 20 David Arroyo (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne-Illes Balears at 37:11.
