Armstrong favoured as 15th stage of Tour de France gets underway

Jul 17, 2005, 15:02 GMT

Lezat sur Leze, France - American Lance Armstrong was expected to take the decisive step toward his seventh consecutive Tour de France championship in the race's 15th stage, which got underway on Sunday in the town of Lezat sur Leze.

With four Pyrenees mountains rated first category in difficulty and a climb to the finish line rated beyond category, the most difficult, the 205.5-kilometre stage to Saint-Lary Soulan is considered the fifth-hardest in the history of the Tour.

In other words, a perfect stage for Armstrong, who has made a habit of winning the most difficult, and most prestigious Tour stages every year.

In addition, one of the mountains the riders will cross is the Col de Portet dAspet, where 10 years ago Italian Fabio Casartelli crashed while descending, striking his head on a stone barrier. He died two hours after being transferred to hospital by helicopter.

Casartelli was a close friend of Armstrong's and a member of the same Motorola team in that 1995 Tour. The 33-year-old American would no doubt love to win the stage and dedicate it to his friend.

Finally, in Saturday's first Pyrenees stage, Armstrong's Discovery Channel team-mates were nowhere to be seen as he dealt successfully, with a number of attacks by the German T-Mobile team. The reason may have been that he was saving his team for Sunday's gruelling stage.

At the start of Sunday's stage, Armstrong was leading Mickael Rasmussen of Denmark by 1:41 minutes in the overall standings, with Italian Ivan Basso in third, 2:46 adrift.