For the eighth year in a row, an American rider led the pack into Paris to claim victory in the Tour de France. The only difference is that the rider was not Lance Armstrong, who retired after his 2005 victory.
The new champion is Floyd Landis, whose triumph Sunday capped one of the most astonishing comebacks in the Tour’s 103-year history.
“I want to say thank you to everybody who kept believing, most of all my team,” Landis said from the top step of the victory stand. “When things weren’t going so well, they kept fighting and never stopped believing.”
Crowds six-deep lined the Champs Elysees as the peloton streamed into town. Landis, normally poker-faced while racing, allowed himself a faint smile as the cheers rose.
The victory followed a mostly ceremonial 95-mile ride from the village of Sceaux-Antony to the heart of Paris with Landis protectively flanked by six members of his Phonak team. The 30-year-old American virtually had clinched his victory in Saturday’s time trial, when he took the lead back from Spaniard Oscar Pereiro and built a 59-second cushion.
The final margin was 57 seconds. Pereiro, who rides for the Caisse d’Epargne team, held on for second, and German Andreas Kloeden took third.
“I’m proud and happy for Floyd,” said Armstrong, who won the race seven times and watched this year’s finish on TV from his hotel room near the Champs Elysees. “He proved he was the strongest.”
As Americans continue to dominate a sport that is a mystery to most of their countrymen, Armstrong said he was “very proud that an American has won again.”
Landis becomes the third American to win cycling’s most prestigious event, after Armstrong and three-time winner Greg LeMond.
“The streak is mostly thanks to Lance,” Landis said. “He won seven in a row, so whether I’m part of a streak or some characteristic I don’t know. But overall I don’t think there’s some characteristic of the American guys in the race more than anyone else.”
A shadow was cast on this year’s race before it even began when the riders who finished second, third, fourth and fifth behind Armstrong last year withdrew amid suspicions of blood doping.
Landis and Pereiro had traded the yellow jersey over the last week and a half. When Landis had a terrible day Wednesday, tumbling 8 minutes 8 seconds off the pace, he said, “It’s not easy to get back eight minutes, but I’ll keep fighting.”
No one doubted he would try; no one believed he could succeed. The experts, including fellow riders, gave him no chance.
But right from the start Thursday, Landis attacked the last stage through the Alps with a vengeance. Most expected he would weaken quickly. He didn’t. In a ride that is destined to go down as one of the greatest in cycling history, Landis won the stage by more than five minutes and, more importantly, recouped almost all the time he had lost the previous day.
With seven riders taking turns with the yellow jersey, the 2006 Tour was one of the most wide-open races in recent years. It was in sharp contrast to the Armstrong era, when the Texan habitually took command early and the outcome was rarely in doubt.
Landis, raised in Lancaster County, Pa., is the first former mountain biker to win the Tour de France. He took up cycling in part to escape the lifestyle of his Mennonite parents, who shunned television, computers and much of the modern world.
But last week, he reflected on his upbringing.
“It taught me that hard work and patience are the important things that get you what you want,” Landis said. “It took me a long time to get patience, but that, and persistence, were the lessons I brought to this race.”
After winning the U.S. national mountain bike championship in 1993, he moved to California and took up road racing.
He joined Armstrong’s U.S. Postal team in 2002 and spent three seasons as a support rider for Armstrong. The pair had a falling out, and when Landis joined Phonak, they spent much of the 2005 season feuding. Both now say their differences have been resolved.
“I learned a lot from him, even if our relationship was complicated,” Landis said. “There came a time when I wanted to lead my career as I wanted. I was responsible for certain tensions between us. I admit it. I am not always very reasonable.”
In addition to being strong-willed, Armstrong and Landis have had to overcome serious health problems. Armstrong’s battle against cancer is well known. Landis has suffered for years from a painful degenerative hip condition that he kept secret even from his teammates until this year.
The condition was caused by a training accident in 2002. Two years later he underwent an operation to alleviate the pain, which he characterized as “bone rubbing on bone.” After the surgery, his right leg was an inch shorter than his left, causing him to walk with a limp.
Landis said he would have hip-replacement surgery this year but has predicted he will be back stronger than ever.
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thundley@tribune.com
