Tour de France 2011 Route to suit climbers crasch

From Passage du Gois to Champs Elysees 3,471 km... Team Radio Shack Sports Director Johan Bruyneel Tweet: ''Back home from Paris. T de France 2011 is going 2 be very hard. Big mythical climbs all in the 2nd half of the race. Let's start preparing!'' (Türkçe versiyonu)

18. Etap: Pinerolo - Galibier Serre Chevalier, 189 km (Video)
17. Etap: Gap - Pinerolo (Italy), 179 km (Video)
16. Etap: St Paul Trois Chateaux - Gap, 163 km (Video)
15. Etap: Limoux - Montpellier, 187 km (Video)
14. Etap: St Gaudens - Plateau de Beille, 168 km (Video)
13. Etap: Pau - Lourdes, 156 km (Video)
12. Etap: Cugnaux - Luz Ardiden, 209 km (Video)
11. Etap: Blaye les Mines - Lavaur, 168 km (Video)
10. Etap: Aurillac - Carmaux, 161 km (Video)
Fransa Bisiklet Turu 1. Hafta Özeti (Video)
9. Etap: Bisikletçilere araba çarptı (Video)
9. Etap:  Issoire - Saint Flour, 208 km (Video)
8. Etap: Aigurande - Super Besse Sancy, 190 km (Video)
7. Etap: Le Mans - Chateauroux, 215 km (Video)
6. Etap: Dinan - Lisieux, 226 km (Video)
5. Etap: Carhaix - Cap Fréhel 164.5 (Video)
5. Etap: Nicki Sorensen kazası (Video)
5. Etap: Alberto Contador kazası (Video)
4. Etap: Lorient - Mur de Bretagne, 172 km (Video)
3. Etap: Olonne sur Mer - Redon, 198 km (Video)
2. Etap: Takım Zamana Karşı Les Essarts 23 km (Video)
1. Etap: Passage du Gois - Mont des Alouettes (Video)

* The Look: Armstrong&Ullrich
* The Boss VS Il Pirata Mont Ventoux
* Tour de Lance
* Mark Renshaw's Headbutts

The Tour started on July 2 in Brittany, the heartland of French cycling... First finish at Mur de Bretagne known as the Alpe d'Huez of Brittany. 

10. Walk On Water: This year’s Tour ditches the prologue and starts with a straight up road stage beginning at the Passage du Gois – a cobbled tidal causeway that sits between the Bay of Bourneuf and the Fromentine. Every year a select group of runners are chosen to race the length of the Passage du Gois (about 2.5 miles) once the road is covered by the high tide. The standing record is 12:08 by Olympian Dominique Chauvelier. Sound wild? Have a look: http://youtu.be/9wprAzPpTX4

9. So long, Marianne: Most people know that the Tour’s longstanding nickname is the “Grande Boucle,” or “The Big Loop.” But you might not know that until 2009 the women’s version of the Tour was also known by the same moniker. Organizational troubles led to the race’s eventual demise in 2009. We can’t imagine the French are too upset by this though. None of their riders have won the event since Jeannie Longo did it three times in a row in the late 80’s. First winner? American cyclist Marianne Martin.

8. Geeky TDF Stat #42: If you’re sitting around the TV with your buds during the stage 2 team time trial and want to impress them with your Tour trivia, throw this one out there: “How many times in the past 30 years has the race included a team time trial?” 22 you say? Wrong. 22 were scheduled, but the 1982 TTT from Orchies to Fontaine au Pire was cancelled when protesting steel workers blocked the road.

7. Big George, Big Record: American cycling fans are excited that Big George Hincapie is about to tie Joop Zoetemelk’s record for most Tour participations (16). Right now George shares the record of 15 with three other distinguished riders – Lucien Van Impe, Guy Nulens, and Viatcheslav Ekimov. But there is one distinction among them. Nulens is the only rider among the four to not have finished all his Tour starts and the only one to have never won a stage.

6. Tour du Vin: What would France be without wine? This year the Tour touches several wine producing areas of the country along the 2011 route including the Loire Valley (stage 3: Olonne-sur-Mer to Redon, stage 7: Le Mans to Chateauroux), the Languedoc (stage 15: Limoux to Montpellier), and the Rhone (stage 16: Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux to Gap) to name a few.

5. Where the Weary Rest: There are two rest days on order for the 2011 Tour. The first takes places on July 11th at the Le Lioran resort in the Massif Central following the hilly ride to Saint-Flour at the end of stage 9. This is top-shelf recreation as far as this part of the country is concerned, and one of the busiest locales for skiing during the season. The second rest day is in the Drome Department on the 18th of July, a key part of France as far as cycling tourism goes. More info here: http://www.lelioran.com and here: http://www.drome.fr

4. New Kid In Town: This year the Tour not only returns to the legendary L’Alpe D’Huez, but also features the highest Tour finish ever now that stage 18 goes up to the newly added portion of the Galibier at 2,645m. But there’s a category 1 mountain during stage 12, which is new to the race and getting some buzz. It’s called the Hourquette d'Ancizan (1538m), and is a 9.9km ascent that precedes the Tourmalet (2115m), and what’s sure to be an epic finish atop Luz-Ardiden (1715m). It might seem like a warm up, but the Hourquette actually features the highest gradient that the peloton will see that day at 7.5%.

3. Le Podiume: Okay, so we lied about “no predictions.” One of the subtexts of this year’s Tour is the fact that no one really expects to see anyone on the top two steps of the podium apart from Andy Schleck and Alberto Contador. As a result there is a lot of talk regarding who will occupy that third step. We’d like to believe that Jurgen Van den Broeck has the stuff to take that position but his time trial performance in this year’s Dauphine (2:39 off the winning time…) was lacking. Cadel? Hmmm…maybe. Gesink…possibly, but the other contendor that really sticks with us is old man Horner. He’s climbing is there and he wasn’t that far off the pace at the (albeit shorter…) Solvang time trial during the Amgen Tour of California. If the team rallys behind him, watch the 40 year-old family man pull off an unlikely performance.

2. Le Spectre: The issues surrounding Alberto Contador’s Clenbuterol positive from last year’s Tour are unresolved as this year’s race begins. Add to that FDA agent Jeff Novitzky’s investigation into doping allegations connected to the U.S. Postal team and it’s easy to see how the specter of doping hangs over the 2011 event and indeed the entire sport. There’s nothing to indicate that any new revelations will crop up before things get rolling on July 2nd, but then again no one expected the Operacion Puerto bomb to detonate just days before the 2006 Tour.

1. Le Vainqueur: Having already broken our word regarding predictions (see #3 above…), we may as well go ahead and lay it on the line before we get any closer to the Big Dance in France. We’ve heard Alberto Contador talk about how hard the Giro-Tour double will be to pull off, but we’re not buying it. Despite Andy Schleck’s talent, and the pressure the Spaniard is to do well despite the controversy surrounding him (see #2 above…), we think that it would be tricky, barring any tragic circumstance, to envision “El Pistolero” from coming out on top. Then again, with riders like Jens Voigt openly willing to do anything to help Andy win, perhaps we should look past the younger Schleck’s results thus far this year and trust in the strength of Team Leopard-Trek.

There are four mountaintop finishes - two in the Pyrenees, two in the Alps - for 2011 with a prestigious mountain finale on the Alpe d'Huez two days before the Champs Elysees parade. The peloton will then head south through the Pyrenees, where the riders will tackle the testing Col du Tourmalet and also the Col d'Aubisque. Organisers said they wanted to celebrate the centenary of the Alps in the Tour, with the punishing Col du Galibier section twice on the menu.

1 - Passage du Gois - Mont des Alouettes, 191 km
2 - Team time trial, Les Essarts, 23 km
3 - Olonne sur Mer - Redon, 198 km
4 - Lorient - Mur de Bretagne, 172 km
5 - Carhaix - Cap Frehel, 158 km
6 - Dinan - Lisieux, 226 km
7 - Le Mans - Chateauroux, 215 km
8 - Aigurande - Super Besse Sancy, 190 km
9 - Issoire - Saint Flour, 208 km
11 July Rest Day
10 - Aurillac - Carmaux, 161 km
11 - Blaye les Mines - Lavaur, 168 km
12 - Cugnaux - Luz Ardiden, 209 km
13 - Pau - Lourdes, 156 km
14 - St Gaudens - Plateau de Beille, 168 km
Etap 15 - Limoux - Montpellier, 187 km
18 July Rest Day
16 - St Paul Trois Chateaux - Gap, 163 km
17 - Gap - Pinerolo (Italy), 179 km
18 - Pinerolo - Galibier Serre Chevalier, 189 km
19 - Modane - Alpe d'Huez, 109 km
20 - Individual time trial, Grenoble, 41 km
21 - Creteil - Paris, Champs Elysees 160 km

Tour Videos:
* El Pistolero El Dopingero! Floyd Landis #1 Alberto Contador #2
* Stage 9: While Cadel Ewans gently weeps
* Stage 8: End of the Tour de Lance
* Stage 6: Historical ManXMan
* Stage 5: Return of the ManXMan
* Stage 4: Ale-Jet
* Stage 2: ProtesTOUR
* Stage 1: Crashing Last Km

 VİDEO