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Today the 3th etappe of the Tour it was a great day for Holland and Belgium.
Marc Wauters(belgium) won the etappe (with a finish in Antwerpen BTW) and gained the leader position in the general classement.
Hollander Servais Knaven finished 4th and became 3th in the classement.
Erik Dekker finished 10th (surprice he is also a Hollander )

Marc Wauters and Erik Dekker are both from the Dutch cycling team RaboBank so there was a great party for the RaboCrew.
So it was a good day for Holland and Belgium.

Btw anybody saw Wimbeldon finals??
Goran Ivanisevic Won for the first time from Ausie Patrick Rafter in a great final a 5 setter (6-3,3-6,6-2,2-6,9-7).
after losing the finals 3 times Ivanisevic finally got his victory.

I'm following Le Tour, I always do if I haven't travelled away from media coverage.

Congrats to Belgian and Dutch riders today And it's nice to hear Ivanisovic won the Wimbledon, he's been around a long time lacking a grand slam victory.

i also think it is great Goran won.
he diserved it after putting aside Rusedski and Henman.
but he also lost the finals 3 times (rafter only once) so he really diserved it.

he was the only prayer ever to win the tournament with a wildcard.
funny thing is he got it from a english organisation, don't know if they where that happy when they say Ivanisevic beat both the english favorites

No, the English might not be too happy

Do you think anybody has a chance against Lance Armstrong in the Tour? It's a pity Ullrich always get so fat during the winter, he's one of my favorite riders

i don't know if has a change.
i think after winnig the tour 2 times in a row most people are looking after him so that he will not win another time.

btw i think the tour gets more interesting in the mountains.
now it is only mass sprints.
And the Hollanders don't have great sprinters

I am English, and very happy that Ivanisevic won He deserved to.

Its All-Star Home run derby night!!!

How long has it been since the Englih won the Wimbeldon.

A very long time!

Originally posted by Georgi:
<STRONG>I am English, and very happy that Ivanisevic won He deserved to. </STRONG>

I'm Australian and I think Ivan deserved his win too, but it wasn't a very enthralling game, too much serve and not enough rallies

[ 07-10-2001: Message edited by: Mr Snow ]

Originally posted by ThorinOakensfield:
<STRONG>Its All-Star Home run derby night!!!

How long has it been since the Englih won the Wimbeldon.</STRONG>

Some 65 years IIRC or there about.

I like Ivanisevic so I was glad he won, great match.

Don't see much Tour de France anymore, all this EPO-buiesness has taken the fun out of bicyclesports. But when they reach the mountains I'd might watch a little, but I will not follow it everyday.
I have done this ealier years though, but stopped with it 2 years ago.

Tour Update:

tody was the 4th etappe From Antwerp to Seraing.

The RaboBank crew wanted to keep the yellow sweater in there group and made the etappe early on.
but after a while a big group from around 70 men escaped and these men made the rest of the game.
with the whole Telekom Group in it all working for Ulrich and Zabel.

in the end Zabel won the mass sprint:
1 Zabel (germany)
2 Magnien (french)
3 Garzelle (italian)
4 Baldato (italian)
5 Simon (french)
best Hollander 15 Boogerd

general classement now
1 O'grady (australian) 14;15;44
2 Moreau (french) 0;17
3 Verbrugge (belgian) 0;18
4 Voight (german) 0;20
5 Galdeano (spain) 0;20
6 Julich (US) 0;21
7 Armstrong (US) 0;21
8 Zabel (german) 0;23
9 Ulrich (german) 0;24
10 Brard (french) 0;24
Best Hollander: Michel Boogerd 0.54

so the RaboBank lost there yellow Sweater
but Boogerd is looking Good and maybe this time it is his tour .

ok so no one is actually following this??
anyway:
here is an other Tour Update:

today was an importend day the groups timeride.

this was very importend for many cyclers because if they didn't made it they where set out of the Tour.
Credit Agricole (the team of the yellow sweater O'grady)finished first.
2 Once
3 festina
4 US postel
5 Kelme
6 RaboBank
7 Telekom

so it was a good day for holland and O'grady is still the leader in the general classement.

I'm not interested in the Tour but i'm really happy Goran finally won Wimbledon!!!!

@TheDude: I'm following your updates, it's great since I don't have much time to watch the sports news. Thank you

I hope I'll have time to watch some of the mountain stages next week. Also, I enjoy the individual time trials.

What do you think about the reinstallment of the team time trial?

It's nice to see someone apriciates my work

i think the returning of the time trials (thnx for saying that i didn't know what that was is english )is great the team timetrials ad a lot of exitement to the Tour.

it becomes one of the importent etappe of all, because there is a good change many people will be set out of the Tour.
And i love to watch it, it looks really great when everybody in one team work well together.

The time trial yesterday where a good start for the end classement.

Credit Agricole looks very strong and Stuard O'Grady now has an advantage of the favorites Armstrong (1.53) and Ulrich (2.20).

It wasn't a good day for Ulrich and the whole Telekom team.
And i thought the where the team to beat on this timetrial.
But they got even beaten by RaboBank (men was i happy when i heard that )
So the loss of Micheal Boogerd isn't as big as i feared.
He is now 24th with only 2.47 behind O'Grady.

So the differences aren't that big, but i think O'Grady will keep the Yellow Sweater, until The mountains that is.
Then the favorites will come and take over the leaders position.

[ 07-13-2001: Message edited by: TheDude ]

I also think the team time trial is good, it adds to the excitement.

Credit Agricole did well to win, also I think Kelme and Radobank did very well. Congratulations on Radobank beating Telekom, their result was very disappointing. And now Ullrich has lost seconds to both Armstrong and other competitors.

I also think O'Grady will keep the sweater for a few days still, which is nice, but when the riders hit the mountains, I don't think we'll see much of Credit Agricole.

Tour Update:
Friday was boring notthing special happend it became a mass sprint and estonian Jaan Kirsipu won.
The classement didn't change.

BUT saterday a lot happend.
The first Etappe with a mountain (4th catagorie) and it changed the whole classement.

Jalabert won teh etappe followed by german Voight on 0.17 sec
The peleton came in on 4.28(!)
in which where al the favorites including Ulrich,Armstrong and the yellow sweater O'Grady.

Voight now has the yellow sweater:
top 3 of the general classement:
1 Voight (german) 29.51.29
2 Jalabert (french) 2.34
3 O'Grady (australian) 4.03
15 Armstrong 5.56
19 Ulrich 6.23
best hollander:24 Boogerd 6.50

so now the tour can really start
The Mountains Are Coming.

And if Ulrich and armstrong want to make something of this Tour they really should get to work now.

Yesterdays stage was good

Congratulations to another Radobank victory today

yes thnx

WoW today was great!!!!!
Erik Dekker won he and his fellow leading group in this ettappe ride the whole peleton to an 35 min arrears
O'grady came in in on about 4 min after Erik Dekker.
He has the yellow sweater again, he has 4 min advantage of number 2 in the classement Simon (french).
and an advantage of 21. min on number 3 Bram de Groot (dutch).

tomorrow i give u all the exact numbers but now i'm just to exited about the victory!

*Sigh* I think excitement is gone from this years Tour. Armstrong looked like a one man show today, I think no one will be able to challange him. What a great athlete he is! I'm sorry for Ullrich though, he's my favorite rider. I wish he wouldn't get so fat every winter!

[ 07-17-2001: Message edited by: C Elegans ]