Impressive surprise

[hrotha]

Personally I wasn't surprised by Van den Broeck, he was right where I expected him to be. I was more surprised when I checked the 2009 results and found out that he was just 15th. His performance last year made a stronger impression on me than his GC standing, I guess.

 

[BrianLas]

Has there been a worse performance of a champion of the TdF in recent memory. No stage wins, spent extremely limited time leading on any stage, ran down a teammate who was set for a stage win, attacked the yellow jersey on a mechanical. . .

I am not saying that he didn't deserve to win it, I am not sure there are many people that would have waited with the mechanical, Armstrong himself kind of admitted he might have done the same. The problem I have is it seemed like Contador didn't win it. Gosh, I feel like Schleck actually deserved it more than he did.

Disappointing. Glad to see Lance is done. He went out with more class than I expeced. Well, I didn't actually see him even finishing. It was probably tough for him to roll in at 23rd. Basically the entire Radioshack team was a no show. Chris Horner? Really?

I hope Schleck can beat Contador and actually have a real "rivalry" and not a Jan Ullrich/Lance Armstrong one.

How electric is Mark Cavendish. Stage 18 to Bordeaux was one of the most impressive things I have ever seen in bike racing.

Who is clean and who cheated?

 

[marina36]

Charteau impressed me a lot.

Hesjedal is also a big surprise.

 

[ericthesportsman6]

Yet, the French keep lacking a real GC rider...

It will be waiting for Sicard.

A little off topic but, could someone explain to me why Euskaltel signed Sicard? I thought they only signed Basque riders, or at the very least Spanish riders. (For those who don't know, Sicard is French)

 

[hrotha]

A little off topic but, could someone explain to me why Euskaltel signed Sicard? I thought they only signed Basque riders, or at the very least Spanish riders. (For those who don't know, Sicard is French)

He's from the French Basque Country (known as Iparralde in Euskara).

For the record, Euskaltel doesn't only sign Basque riders: they sign riders who learned their trade in the Basque amateur circuit. That's why Samu Sánchez is there, and also why there were talks of signing Heras some years ago.

Cycling is insanely popular in the Basque Country, and they have some of the best amateur races and teams.