Tour de Frog

Their off!!!!

While its been going on for a week - the Tour de France really started today as the race finally enters the Alps. You can catch live updates at Velonews.

Overall Standings at the start:
Overall Standings
1. Jens Voigt (G), CSC, 32:18:23
2. Christophe Moreau (F), Credit Agricole, 01:50
3. Lance Armstrong (USA), Discovery Channel, 02:18
4. Mickael Rasmussen (Dk), Rabobank, 02:43
5. Alexandre Vinokourov (Kaz), T-Mobile, 03:20
6. Bobby Julich (USA), CSC, 03:25
7. Ivan Basso (I), CSC, 03:44
8. Jan Ullrich (G), T-Mobile, 03:54
9. Carlos Sastre (Sp), CSC, 03:54
10. George Hincapie (USA), Discovery Channel, 04:05

I expect Jens Voigt to lose the lead today, but whether Lance will regain it on the dramatic climb to Courchevel remains to be seen. In either case, this is simply the first of a number of mountain stages. You can expect a number of early breakaways as riders vie for the King of the Mountains and Sprint jerseys, but the climb up Catagory 1 Cormet de Roseland (1967 meters - 20km at 6%) will shake things up and seperate the wheat from the chaffe.

I expect the favorites and their teams top riders to remain fairly close on the descent from Cormet de Roseland with a furious dash up Courchevel later this morning (2000m - 22.2 km at 6.2%).