The first Alpine stage of the 2010 Tour de France witnessed the fall of a legend as Lance Armstrong declared: My Tour's finished.
The first Alpine stage of the 2010 Tour de France witnessed the fall of a legend as Lance Armstrong declared: "My Tour's finished".
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| NOTHING TO HIDE: Lance Armstrong |
Armstrong capitulated on the 189-kilometre eighth stage from Station des Rousses to Morzine-Avoriaz, finishing 11 minutes 45 seconds behind winner Andy Schleck (Team Saxo Bank).
Australian Cadel Evans (BMC Racing) finished in a group 10 seconds behind to become the first world champion to take the Tour race leader's yellow jersey since Greg LeMond in 1990 but Armstrong saw his dreams of winning another title fall into oblivion. "But I'll hang in there and enjoy my final Tour. I'm not going to complain.
This is just a bad day. It went from bad to worse," said Armstrong.
Armstrong (Team RadioShack) slipped to 39th place in the general classification rankings, 13 minutes 26 seconds behind two-time runner-up Evans, who assumed the maillot jaune from Sylvain Chavanel (QuickStep).
Armstrong endured a nightmare day from start to finish. First, 6km in, he veered on to a grass verge following a crash at the front of the peloton, then he hit the asphalt on the exit of a roundabout.
"I just came around a roundabout and touched pedal," said Armstrong of the fall which left him with a ripped jersey. "The front tyre rolled out. It's just hard to recover from something like that." Following the fall, Armstrong was paced back to the peloton by three teammates, but then came the Col de La Ramaz, the 2010 Tour's first category one climb. Perhaps the exertion of chasing affected Armstrong, but the Texan was left looking every bit two months short of his 39th birthday as he was spat out the back of the peloton by the relentless pace set by his former Astana team.
"I was behind and they started the Ramaz pretty well and it went from bad to worse," added Armstrong.
