The Tour's first week belongs to the sprinters

By Siegfried Mortkowitz Jul 11, 2006, 12:06 GMT

(L-R) Australian Michael Rogers (T-Mobile Team), Italian Eddy Mazzoleni (T-Mobile Team), Ukrainian Serhiy Honchar (T-Mobile Team) and German Andreas Kloeden (T-Mobile Team) ride during a training session on the first rest day of the Tour de France 2006 in Bordeaux, France, Monday 10 July 2006. EPA/GERO BRELOER

Paris - People watching the Tour de France for the first time this year must have wondered this past week what all the fuss is about.

Practically every stage was run identically: nothing of much consequence happened for five hours and then, a few hundred metres before the end of the stage, a dozen or so riders sprinted out of the main pack and made a furious dash for the finish.

Although the sprint finishes are often breathtakingly thrilling, many people feel that five hours of uneventful riding is a high price to pay for 10 seconds of excitement.

The French journalist Pierre Chany has compared these stages to Charlemagne's sword: 'They are long, straight and deadly.' He meant deadly with boredom.

Yves Mague, who comments on the Tour for France Bleu Normandie radio, said despairingly, 'It's like a Formula One auto race, but no one passes anyone.'

But for the riders who specialize in these sprints, such as world road race champion Tom Boonen or Australian Robbie McEwen, the first week of the Tour is their chance to shine and to compete for the green jersey signifying the Tour points champion.

Points are awarded to the first three finishers of intermediate sprints held during the stage, and again at the end, for the winner and numerous also-rans.

So specialized are sprinters in this particular art, and so trained are their muscles for the brief, explosive spurt of speed, that they are useless for any other role in the Tour de France.

And when the Tour reaches the mountains, as it will on Wednesday, their main battle will be to survive, for to win the green jersey a rider must make it over the Pyrenees and the Alps and still be riding when the race ends in Paris on July 23.

Since the sprint competition was introduced to the Tour in 1953, only one cyclist has won both the Tour's points title and the overall championship in the same year, Belgian Eddy Merckx. Widely considered the greatest road cyclist of all time, Merckx accomplished the feat three times.

Because they are so specialized, sprinters have a special mentality. According to Boonen, 'Knowing yourself, human psychology and the ability to assess the situation: these are the main aspects for a sprinter.'

A great deal of planning goes into preparing for those final 10 seconds of a race, he said.

'You have to be able to predict a sprint. How is the finish? The last kilometre? Who will do what? How is your competition moving around? If you have all those things under control, you have a few minutes' time to adjust your own position, maybe.'

Sprinters must also be able to calculate quickly and make split- second decisions, Boonen said.

'You have a hundred scenarios going through your head during those last few minutes. But only one is the right one, only one makes you win or lose.'

So far, in the 2006 Tour, Boonen has generally chosen the wrong scenario, for he has yet to win a stage, finishing second twice and third once.

McEwen, who won the Tour points championship in 2002 and 2004, has made mostly the right choices, winning three of the first seven stages, and he leads Boonen in the points competition by 17 points.

The 34-year-old Australian insists that teamwork is a vital part of a sprinter's success, and he has reserved special praise for fellow Davitamon-Lotto rider Gert Steegmans of Belgium, in whose powerful slipstream he rides until taking off on his own.

McEwen compared Steegmans to France's powerful high-speed TGV trains, and noted, 'I'm the only one with a ticket and all I have to do is get off at my station.'

Luck plays a big role in the final sprint, and for last year's Tour points champion, Thor Hushovd of Norway, it has been all bad this year.

After winning the Tour prologue on Saturday, a 7.2-km time trial, Hushovd suffered a freak accident in Sunday's first stage when his right arm was badly cut by a cardboard publicity placard in the shape of a hand that was held by a spectator.

Stitched up in hospital, Hushovd returned to the Tour, only to be disqualified in the fourth stage for impeding Austrian sprinter Bernhard Eisel in the dash to the finish. That penalty deprived him of 24 points and ended his quest to repeat as points champion.

Tuesday's stage is one of the last of this year's Tour tailor-made for the sprinters. On Wednesday, the Tour de France heads into the mountains, where for many cycling fans the real fun starts.