Monday, July 4, 2005

Below is a guide to live internet/web coverage of the 2005 Tour de France.

NOTE:  Added ESPN's "Tour de France Tracker" to the Live Ticker links in our "Live Guide" below.  Not sure how up-to-date they keep it but it may be worth a look.  The map is clickable allowing you to see who got points at intermediate sprint and king of the mountain locations on the route.  The map also indicates the "current" position of the race and allows you to view the stage profile.  This is a "Flash" application.  You may need to select the current stage yourself.

Guide to live race coverage on the internet/web

Notes:   Tom Boonen (Quick Step) photo © 2004, 2005 Pete Geyer

Tour de France 2005, France July 2-24, ProTour Stage 3: July 4 La Châtaigneraie to Tours, 212.5km Live video coverage: France 2/3 live streaming (available in France only) (other streaming options may soon appear in this space) Live audio coverage: Eurosport (English) Deutsch - Español Français - Italiano (24-hour audio feed) (14:35 CET (8:35am U.S. EST)) (times subject to change) (requires Windows Media Player or equivalent) Check schedule Live tickers: Official site ticker Eurosport (English) Deutsch - Español Français  - Italiano ESPN Tour de France Tracker Velonews Cyclingnews Daily Peloton Official site

---

Sunday, July 3, 2005

Guide to live race coverage on the internet/web

Notes:   CSC's Dave Zabriskie did it again, adding a Tour de France stage win to his 2004 Tour of Spain (Vuelta a España) and 2005 Tour of Italy (Giro d'Italia) stage wins.  This is Zabriskie's first Tour de France and to start it off with a win in the very first stage, taking this race's first yellow jersey and in the process breaking the record (previously held by fellow American Greg Lemond) for speed in a non-prologue Tour time trial is just phenomenal.  The former USPS rider couldn't have picked a better time to offer hope for the future of U.S. cycling, with Lance Armstrong retiring later this month. Dave Zabriskie, 2005 Paris-Nice , displaying perfect time trial position Speaking of Armstrong, he rode a great Stage 1 time trial himself, likely his fastest ever, just 2 seconds slower than Zabriskie.  Zabriskie and Armstrong dominated the field, with Alexandre Vinokourov in third place at 53 seconds.  Not surprisingly, the climbers such as Heras and Mayo lost significant time to Armstrong already, though Mayo finishing at a huge 3:15 behind Zabriskie over just 19km shows that he (Mayo) has not improved his time trialing.  But the big surprise of the day was T-Mobile's Jan Ullrich falling 1:06 behind Armstrong and finishing 12th.  Departing one minute after Ullrich, Armstrong actually passed him with under 4km to go, a humiliation on the road that no one expected to ever see involving these two great champions and an image destined to make it into all the 2005 Tour videos and photo albums.  It wasn't a total disaster for Ullrich, and it was probably due to his recovering from the previous day's crash while out training, but when you consider that the closest Ullrich has been to Armstrong at the finish of the latter's Tour wins was 1:01 (2003), losing 1:06 to Armstrong on just the first day of this race certainly complicates things for the German.  He also missed an opportunity to put even more time into other contenders for the podium, the climbing specialists in particular. Team CSC was best on the day, determined by taking the times of each team's top 3 finishers, followed by Discovery Channel at just 4 seconds back and Phonak at 1:33. photos © 2004, 2005 Pete Geyer

Tour de France 2005, France July 2-24, ProTour Stage 2: July 3 Challans to Les Essarts, 181.5km Live video coverage: France 2/3 live streaming (available in France only) (other streaming options may soon appear in this space) Live audio coverage: Eurosport (English) Deutsch - Español Français - Italiano (24-hour audio feed) (14:05 CET (8:05am U.S. EST)) (times subject to change) (requires Windows Media Player or equivalent) Check schedule Live tickers: Official site ticker Eurosport (English) Deutsch - Español Français  - Italiano Velonews Cyclingnews Daily Peloton Official site

---

Saturday, July 2, 2005

Below is a guide to live internet/web coverage of the 2005 Tour de France.

NOTE:  You need Windows Media Player or equivalent to play the Eurosport audio streams.

NOTE:  Eurosport Germany, Eurosport Spain and Eurosport Italy live audio coverage has begun (links below).

-----

NOTE:  Eurosport U.K. live audio (English) coverage has begun (link below).

-----

NOTE:  Eurosport France live audio (French) coverage has begun (link below).

-----

NOTE:  We are in the process of verifying links for various options for live coverage, including live audio.  More links are on the way too.  Some links may not work until race coverage actually begins.  Be sure to occasionally reload/refresh this page to get the latest links update.  

Guide to live race coverage on the internet/web

Notes:   The 2005 Tour de France gets underway with a 19km individual time trial from Fromentine to the island of Noirmoutier on the Atlantic coast.  This is called "Stage 1" instead of the usual "Prologue" because prologues by definition are 8km or less in distance. 19km is long enough for the top time trialists and overall contenders such as Lance Armstrong and Jan Ullrich to hope to gain significant time on the smaller climbers such as Iban Mayo and Roberto Heras, particularly given the expected headwinds along the coast.  Today is all the more important for the better time trialists given that there is only one really long time trial in this Tour, instead of the usual two, a 55km effort around Saint-Etienne on the penultimate day of the race.  So they need to make today count. The top teams for the overall victory such as Discovery Channel, Team CSC, Phonak and T-Mobile will all be looking to get great results today from all their good time trialists in view of earning a more favorable start position in Tuesday's Team Time Trial.  (The teams with riders performing best will depart last in the Team Time Trial on Tuesday, therefore benefitting from the knowledge of how other teams are doing on the course.) Time trial specialists such as Michael Rich (Gerolsteiner) and Fabian Cancellara (Fassa Bortolo) will also be looking for individual glory today. photo © 2004 Pete Geyer

Tour de France 2005, France July 2-24, ProTour Stage 1: July 2 Fromentine to Noirmoutier-en-l'Ile, Individual Time Trial, 19km Live video coverage: France 2/3 live streaming (available in France only) (other streaming options may soon appear in this space) Live audio coverage: Eurosport (English) Deutsch - Español Français - Italiano (24-hour audio feed) (17:05 CET (11:05am U.S. EST)) (times subject to change) Check schedule Live tickers: Official site ticker Eurosport (English) Deutsch - Español Français  - Italiano Velonews Cyclingnews Daily Peloton Official site

---

Wednesday, June 29, 2005


Lance Armstrong's quest for a seventh consecutive victory in the Tour de France begins this Saturday.  As we've done since the first race in the ProTour, Paris-Nice way back in March, and for many non-ProTour events as well, we'll have the links to live web and internet coverage right here.  If it's live on the internet (streaming video, audio, graphics, text), we'll make it all easily accessible from one place, right here.



In terms of pure excitement, this year's Tour de France has a tough act to follow in May's Giro d'Italia.  But by announcing this as his last race as a professional cyclist, win or lose, Lance Armstrong has invited his rivals to bring it on one last time, one last high stakes game of "king of the hill". And from Jan Ullrich and Alexandre Vinokourov to Ivan Basso, Iban Mayo, Roberto Heras, Floyd Landis, Santiago Botero and Levi Leipheimer, it appears the invitation has been accepted with enthusiasm.  Some of these riders are riding better than ever, better in the mountains and/or in the time trials.  Some have returned to the great form they had earlier in their careers.  Some have chosen to wait until the Tour to show what they've got.  All will attack Lance on the road or seek to profit from the attacks of others.

The powerful Discovery Channel team will seek to continue the annual Postal game-plan of controlling the race.  The rival teams just might make the race uncontrollable this year.

It could be epic.

-----
Meanwhile, in the women's "Tour de France".....