A lacklustre Tour de France

After my rant about South American soccer yesterday, let me express my disappointment today about the lineup at this year's Tour de France. After Lance Armstrong's retirement two years ago, there was expected to be much more intense competition amongst the riders who constantly challenged Lance but came up short. Sadly, doping scandals have taken away all those riders who had been contenders for the title. Jan Ullrich, Ivan Basso, Floyd Landis, Tyler Hamilton ... all perfectly capable of winning the Tour, but unfortunately succumbed to the temptation of drugs (Talking about drugs, the fallaway of the rivalry between Justin Gatlin and Asafa Powell, due to Gatlin's suspension, was also extremely saddening :-().

Anyway, shorn of all these star riders, my interest in the Tour de France has taken a severe beating. To make the event at least slightly interesting for me, let me stick my neck out and make a prediction. Given the lack of competition from any other serious climbers, I say this year's Tour should be a cakewalk for Andreas Kloden (the second runner up behind Armstrong and Basso a couple of years ago). I'll revisit me prediction in a couple of week's time when the Tour comes to a close :)

Update: So much for my prediction! With the onus of my support on his shoulders, Kloden took a tumble in yesterday's stage and suffered a fracture in his tailbone. His continued participation in the Tour is now in doubt. Looks like I jinxed him :)

BTW, I realized that I got some of my facts wrong. Kloden actually finished second behind Armstrong in 2004, and finished third last year.