The Tour in a nutshell

According to Le Tour, here is the breakdown of the 2009 Tour de France...

The route

Running from Saturday July 4th to Sunday July 26th 2009, the 96th Tour de France will be made up of 21 stages and will cover a total distance of 3,500 kilometres.

These 21 stages have the following profiles:

* 10 flat stages,
* 7 mountain stages,
* 1 medium mountain stage,
* 2 individual time-trial stages,
* 1 team time-trial stage.


Distinctive aspects of the race

* 3 mountain finishes,
* 2 rest days,
* 55 kilometres of individual time-trials,
* 20 Category 1, Category 2 and highest level passes will be climbed.


8 new stop-over towns

Brignoles, Gérone (Espagne), Issoudun, Martigny (Suisse), Saint-Fargeau, Tonnerre, vatan, Verbier (Suisse).

20 Teams, not 21

The 189 riders I referenced in yesterday's post are actually going to be just 180. There are 20 teams in the Tour this year - while in past years there have been 21 teams.

The snafu between Astana and Alberto Contador seems to have been smoothed over and it looks like Lance and Alberto will be riding on the same team after all. *Yes, there was a danger that Alberto was going to jump ship and ride for another team. Which would have made Lance's chance of winning Tour title number eight more likely.

This year, Lance will be in a supporting role unless by some happenstance a contending teammate drops out. Another scenario where Lance would be the team leader might happen if Armstrong takes the yellow jersey early in the Tour and keeps it for a couple days.

Coming up, racers to watch and my predictions for the race.

I'll also be hosting at least one Boston-area Tour Tweet-up. Follow me on Twitter for details.

2009 Tour de France begins July 4

I was puttering around Boston recently and for some reason I thought the Tour was beginning on July 7 this year. Not wanting to leave readers in the lurch, I decided to take a closer look and realized the race begins a week from yesterday.

The first stage is an individual Time Trial of 15KM. According to Bicycling.com, here's the stage description...

The Tour hasn't visited Monaco in 45 years--partly because the principality is so small that wrapping 15km of racing into its 2 square kilometers is a trick. But what Monaco lacks in size it makes up for in star power--something the race also possesses for its 96th edition. Three former Tour winners will line up at the start. Look for the GC favorites to come out hard; Armstrong in particular has to send a message about his form. With no time bonuses on offer again this year, breakaway artists like Jens Voigt (Saxo Bank) will be motivated to turn in good times to position themselves for an early yellow jersey via a breakaway in the coming stages. *Only stages 8km or shorter are considered prologues, which is why this year's race begins with Stage 1.

That whole prologue thing is interesting to me, but aside from meaning the Tour has one fewer stage this year (meaning a real 21 instead of 21 and a prologue) there are still thousands of KMs to ride for the 189 riders in the tour.

Next post we'll examine some of the teams and favorites. Share your predictions for the race right here in the comments.