Chasing the Tour de France peloton at 70 mph

Tag : Stretch Lycra
hanging from the mirror as they approach the start.
"Copy, mate?" White says in a thick Aussie accent. All the cyclistsare accounted for. This stage will be hairy. It's short —only 95 miles and four hours — but it goes uphill for thefirst 6.6 and is up and down to the end, with the 5,200-foot Pas dePeyrol near the finish.
White gives his first instructions since the team meeting in thebus: "Look after each other. Don't relax until (the break) goes. Ifsomething big does go and we're not in it, David, Christian (VandeVelde), report back to me."
The peloton begins flying up the foothills of the Pyrenees. Thereare few more beautiful sights in sports than the tight peloton of abig bike race. From a distance the multicolored uniforms look likea parade in front of a French background of a green ravine, craggycliffs or mountain lakes.
Up close and personal, however, it's not nearly as serene. Ridersstart to grimace early on mountains. Stress of waiting for a break— or a crash — is constant. The race announcer in a carup front announces that eight riders have broken from the peloton.
"Anyone in the lead?" White asks.
"Millar," says Vande Velde in a tired voice. Millar missed a shotat the yellow jersey Thursday and the other goal of this rookieteam from Boulder is to win at least one stage. Today is the day.
It's not the day for Francesco Chicchi of Italy and Liquigas(Italy). He has fallen off the back of the pack and has the facialexpression of a man who bit into a rotten onion.
"He's in for a long day," White says as we pass him. "He'll have ashort Tour."
We pass another trailer but Frenchman Christophe Le Mevel of CreditAgricole (France) only has a flat. A mechanic jumps out and changesthe wheel in 13 seconds. He doesn't miss much time but the pelotonis beginning to break up. After one week on the Tour and themountain stages beginning, riders are tiring.
Racing to help
Everyone's wondering how long Kim Kirchen of Luxembourg and TeamColumbia (U.S.) will hold onto the yellow jersey. At this point,Millar still looks strong.
"Put a lot of pressure on Team Columbia, boys," White says."They're going to be very tired. They will crack eventually."
Near the village of Tejenac, about halfway through the race, Whitehears Millar's distress call. White shows the driving skills heobviously learned in Italy. The speedometer hits 120 kilometers perhour (72 mph) on a road with a recommended speed limit of 40. Heswerves to avoid a rider who nearly crashes into the back of theTeam Columbia car.
"Dave!" White says. "I can't get there yet. We're in the back ofthe peloton."
White weaves through cars and riders at 50-60 mph, somehow avoidingbloodshed and finding Millar in the back of the lead group.
"I hahve ah pahnk-chuh," Millar says in the same calm Britishaccent an early James Bond used when tied to a boat while beingcircled by sharks. Millar hops off, claps his hands once and smilesas Goiburu hands him a new bike.
With Millar off, White tends to the rest of the team in thepeloton. He catches up to Danny Pate, the Colorado Springs native,and hands him a water.
"How's it goin', mate?" White asks him. "Hard one, huh?"
"No, not at all," says Pate, munching an energy bar.
Tour cliffhanger
It's assumed he means it. The strength and skill of cyclists can'tbe appreciated on TV. Up close, going up mountains, they fly bycars with the look of men who want to kill the people or thingstorturing them. And they're all fascinating bike handlers. At onepoint Aleksandr Kuschynski, a little-known Belarussian forLiquigas, flies in and out between four speeding cars whilestuffing energy bars in the back of his jersey and opening a waterbottle with his teeth.
The finish in Aurillac is approaching and fog is covering thesurrounding Pyrenees. I can't see the bottom of the ravines we'resailing past. Millar has expended too much energy to chase downSpaniard Luis-Leon Sanchez of Caisse d'Epargne (Spain), who breaksfrom the pack. White races ahead to catch up with Millar, at onepoint reaching 72 mph going around turns.
"And people ask me if I miss racing," he says with a laugh. "Inever drive to the hotel. Ever."
Sanchez wins easily and Millar finishes 33 seconds back. TrentLowe, however, doesn't climb well and Garmin-Chipotle loses itslead in the team classification.
"We were going to be really aggressive today," Vaughters says. "Wedid everything we could. We basically disassembled Columbia pieceby piece. They still had one guy in the lead group: the wrong guy."
Garmin-Chipotle's riders file into the bus and aren't evenbreathing hard. In the peloton, it's just another day in France.
John Henderson: 303-954-1299 or jhenderson@denverpost.com