Tour de France Update

Things went more or less as planned for Lance Armstrong over the weekend in the Pyrénées. On Saturday, with a long breakaway up the road ahead of him, Armstrong systematically countered everything his main competitors - Jan Ullrich of T-Mobile and Ivan Basso of CSC - tried to do, and then outraced them up the final climb of the day up to the ski resort at Ax-3-Domaines to finish behind the sole survivor of the breakaway, Georg Totschnig.

On Sunday, in the hardest day of the Tour, it was more of the same. Up the road, another long breakaway slowly dissolved (ultimately, Armstrong's teammate, George Hincapie, won the stage) and the champion matched everything his competitors tried. After those two brutal days in the mountains, Armstrong's lead only grew. Time is growing short for Ullrich, Basso, et al: Tuesday is the last mountain stage (and a tough one at that) before the race turns toward Paris, but it's unlikely that Basso or Mickael Rasmussen (Rabobank) can put three minutes or Ullrich six minutes into Armstrong to take the race lead. Certainly, this poor fool can't do anything to Armstrong. (Warning: graphic stupidity.)