Post Tour

The 2010 Tour de France is over, summer is on and I am heading back to my last year of law school in just over a week. Alberto's third Tour de France win was perhaps his least impressive and to me it left a little something "wanting." I'm sure this is how the rest of the world felt during the 7 tour victories of Lance Armstrong when they didn't want him to win either. However, last year I enjoyed the race more with the constant attacking of the Schleck brothers and actually seeing gaps emerge from the top riders....gaps not caused by a dropped chain.

While Contador and Andy were very evenly matched, I like a race that has a good chase on the climbs where one rider gets away and the other desperately makes the effort to cut their time losses or catch the guy off the front. But this didn't happen. Also, Contador didn't win a single stage and his showing on the final TT was, shall we say, pathetic. yeah, I know Cancellara is the big stud and wins all flat TT's by a huge margin. But you never saw Lance, Ulrich, Indurain, LeMond or Roche win without being near the top for the final TT.

Next year should be interesting (as always) with both Schleck brothers on a new team (Forming in their home country of Luxemburg) and Contador now riding for their former team SaxoBank/Sunguard.

Other takeaways from this Tour - The french won 5 or 6 stages and took the mtn jersey. This is a rare occurrence in the last 25 years and perhaps it's a sign that truly the peloton is now clean. Also, Team Sky put Brad Wiggins in the hot seat by piling all their tour expectations on his shoulders, to which he crumbled. But I still admire Brad and if he keeps his sights set high, we'll see him once again near the top.

Garmin again posted another gem with their Canadian star Ryder Hesjedal getting a top 10 result. This didn't come as a surprise to me as Ryder has shown good climbing in last years Giro and two years ago pacing Christian VV in the tour up the climbs. The big revelation and excitement for me this year was Chris Horner's top 10 finish. Chris was the highest placing Radioshack rider and his tour consisted of working for others. Chris is a true legend in USA cycling and he is a great interview as well. His strategic mind during a race is well known and it's just too bad that his great result has come so late in his career.

Next up - Vuelta a Espana, Tour of Utah and the US National Champs.