What about Julians teamate Christian Vande Velde. What a year, still gettiing over him wearing the pink jersey in the Giro. This kids dad had a wooden 53 degree 150m track erected in his back yard, we got are asses kicked regularly on it in Chicago by this kid back in the day. Good to see all those years going in circles is finally paying off. Christian was using this as warm up for Vuelta, this is Christians tour this year if he can fend off those hard charging Spanish riders and manage to stay upright. Midwest riders rock!
Vandevelde had a great Tour - if it hadn't been for the time he lost with his crash on the descent of the Restefond he would have been on the podium for sure. Great to see.
Last edited by Oli on Tue 29/Jul/08 5:25pm, edited 1 time in total.
for the record, he rode the climb in 39'31, the top five times are:
1 Marco Pantani 37'35 (1997)
2 Lance Armstrong 37'36 (2004)
3 Marco Pantani 38'00 (1994)
4 Lance Armstrong 38'01 (2001)
5 Marco Pantani 38'04 (1995)