Jul 24, 2005, 16:26 GMT
American Lance Armstrong of Discovery Channel Team passes the Arc de Triomphe during the 21st stage of the 2005 Tour de France cycling race, Sunday 24 July 2005 in Paris. The 144.5km 21st and last stage of the 92nd Tour de France leads the cyclists from Corbeil-Essonnes to the finish on the Champs-Elysees in Paris. EPA/GERO BRELOER
Paris - Lance Armstrong ended his storybook career Sunday in Paris by winning a record seventh, consecutive Tour de France championship.
The 33-year-old American, who retired from racing after the stage, finished his last professional race with the main pack, and ended the Tour 4 minutes 40 seconds ahead of Ivan Basso of Italy, with Germany's Jan Ullrich 6 minutes 21 seconds behind.
Armstrong has already said he would be back at the Tour de France in 2006, as an advisor to his Discovery Channel team.
After the awards ceremony, Armstrong held a brief speech on the podium in which he criticized those who accused riders of taking illegal substances.
"For those who are cynical of this sport, I feel sorry for you," Armstrong told the thousands who lined the Champs Elysees in Paris. "It's a great sport. You have to believe in it. Vive le Tour."
Armstrong also saluted the two men who shared the podium with him, Basso and Ulrich, calling the German "a special rival and a special friend" and referring to Basso as "the future of the Tour".
While Armstrong's victory was not overpowering, it was never really in doubt since the very first stage of the Tour, on July 2, when he beat his main rivals by more than 1 minute in an individual time trial.
He spent the next three weeks controlling the race and gradually increased his lead without registering a stage win until Saturday's next-to-last stage, an individual time trial.
On Sunday, Armstrong spent much of the stage, which covered 144.5 kilometres from Corbeil-Essonnes to Paris, drinking champagne, accepting the congratulations of riders and team directors and trying to avoid crashing after persistent rain had left the pavement hazardous.
Because of the rain, Tour officials invoked a rule in which the race clock was stopped after the first of eight crossings of the finish line on the Champs Elysees, 52 kilometres before the official end of the stage.
In fact, the stage was marred by several crashes on the slick pavement, and Armstrong himself barely avoided disaster when team-mates George Hincapie and Yaroslav Popovych fell in front of him.
For the record, Alexandre Vinokourov of Kazakhstan won the stage after breaking away from the pack with a little more than 1 kilometre to go. His time for the stage was 3 hr 40:57 min.
Despite the rain, which slowed the riders on Sunday, this year's Tour was the fastest ever run, with an average speed of 41.654 kilometres per hour for the 3,608 kilometres run.
Other titles in this year's Tour were taken by Norway's Thor Hushovd, who won the sprinter's championship, Mickael Rasmussen of Denmark, who won the "King of the Mountains" title, and Popovych, who was the highest-ranked young rider.
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