Next year’s Tour de France is going to be an interesting one. Bypassing the Normandy and Brittany regions completely, the Tour will mostly be held in central, southern, and eastern France, departing from Monaco, and featuring sojourns into Spain, Andorra, Italy, and Switzerland.

The most interesting feature that I’ve been able to glean thus far? The Stage 20 finish atop the Mont Ventoux … while the Giro d’Italia and Vuelta a España have both had summit finishes on the penultimate stage, the Tour de France never has.

This will truly make for an interesting final week, but one almost has to give the edge to Astana’s Alberto Contador for the overall win, simply due to this final twist.

Returning to the Tour in 2009 is the team time trial, which should favor the Christian Vandevelde and Dave Zabriskie’s Slipstream-Chipotle squad in the early days of the race.

Look at me, we’re in the midst of cyclocross season, ski season is about to start, and I’m already giddy for July.

VeloNews | Contador wins the Vuelta

With his third grand tour victory in barely a year, Alberto Contador has quickly grown from cycling’s boy wonder to the peloton’s new alpha male.

The 25-year-old Spanish climber lived up to expectations to win the 63rd Vuelta a España to complete cycling’s “triple crown” and becomes just the fifth rider to win all three grand tours.

“Now I am the winner of the Vuelta. Before I crossed the finish line I didn’t dare say it before, because today there was a crash with 3km to go and was just able to get around it,” Contador said at the finish line in Madrid. “I still don’t realize what I’ve achieved. It’s been a long three weeks and the race was difficult to win. I haven’t had a chance to reflect, but I am sure in the coming weeks I will have a chance to enjoy it more.”

Unless my mind is slipping, I believe this is also Contador’s third consecutive Grand Tour win in his last three starts, beginning with the 2007 Tour de France, the 2008 Giro d’Italia, and now the 2008 Vuelta a España. If I recall correctly, Contador did not start the 2007 Vuelta.

Has anyone else won the three different Tours in three consecutive starts (albeit in different years)?

Armstrong to return for ‘09 Tour - More Sports - SI.com.

Lance Armstrong will end his retirement and hopes to compete in the 2009 Tour de France, according to a cycling journal report.

The 36-year-old seven-time Tour de France champion will compete in five road races with the Astana team in 2009, the cycling journal VeloNews reported on its Web site Monday, citing anonymous sources.

Armstrong’s manager Mark Higgins did not immediately respond to a voice mail left by The Associated Press.

The move would reunite Armstrong with Johan Bruyneel, now the team director for Astana.

VeloNews reported Armstrong also will compete in the Amgen Tour of California, Paris-Nice, the Tour de Georgia and the Dauphine-Libere.

The Astana team, however, was not allowed to compete in this year’s Tour after Alexandre Vinokourov was kicked out of the 2007 Tour for testing positive and the team quit the race.

VeloNews, which said Vanity Fair will publish an extensive article detailing Armstrong’s comeback, said the cyclist will race for no salary or bonuses and post his internally tested blood work online.

Okay … what the fuck does Armstrong think he’s doing? I’m guessing that he’s stepped up from EPO to crack. Does he really think that he’ll be helping cycling by attempting a comeback?

Even if he does come back and does well at the Tour de France (or any other race he enters), does he think it’s really going to put to rest the question of whether or not he doped throughout his career.

Does he think that Levi Leipheimer and Alberto Contador will willingly step aside so that he can lead the team again? Does he expect us to believe that he’ll be the super-domestique that Bernard Hinault promised that he’d be to Greg LeMond in 1986?

This is bad news for cycling. It might be good news for those of us who want to watch it on Versus, but bigger picture, this is NOT a good thing.

I can only hope that this is a wicked rumor.

VeloNews | Contador weathers Mortirolo storm

Alberto Contador (Astana) is 28.5km from winning a Giro d’Italia he never expected to start.

The Spanish climber deflected a flurry of last-gasp attacks from arch-rival Riccardo Riccò (Saunier Duval-Scott) over the Gavia and Mortirolo in Saturday’s 232km mountain shootout to retain the maglia rosa and roll into Sunday’s final-day time trial with the narrowest of margins.

But four seconds might as well be four hours for Contador, who is favored to cement his lead in Sunday’s mostly flat race against the clock into Milano.

“I could never have imagined that I would be in the maglia rosa poised to win the Giro a month ago when my team called me,” a relieved Contador said. “To be in the maglia rosa in the last day of the Giro, playing in the time trial to win it all, it’s something unimaginable a month ago.”

Last day time-trials are always exciting, because you truly never know what might happen … just think about Greg LeMond’s performance in the 1989 Tour de France, when he was 50 seconds behind Laurent Fignon on the final day, with just 24.5 km to go until the finish. And yet, he managed to dig in and find 58 seconds, to win the overall by a mere 8 seconds. The closest, and the most exciting finish to the Tour de France ever, as far as I’m concerned.

While I don’t believe (at least at this point) that Alberto Contador or Riccardo Riccò are quite the same calibre of rider as LeMond and Fignon, despite VeloNews’ assertions that 4 seconds are as good as 4 hours, this Giro d’Italia is not yet over.

Contador could have an off-day … Riccò could put in the ride of his life to claw back those 4 seconds and all of a sudden, the accidental maglia rosa changes hands.

And maybe, just maybe, ASO will reconsider their ban of Astana from the Tour de France, which starts in just 5 weeks.

Dave Zabriskie’s bad luck at the Grand Tours continues as he crashes out of the Giro d’Italia during stage 2.

Early reports indicate that the Team Slipstream-Chipotle rider, Alberto Contador (Astana), and a couple of other riders crashed on some railroad tracks. Apparently DZ took the brunt of the fall, as the other riders were able to rejoin the race. Zabriskie was taken to hospital in an ambulance, but was conscious and sitting up at the side of the road holding his back before being placed on the gurney and taken way by paramedics.

Here’s hoping that it’s nothing terribly serious, and that he’ll be back on two wheels soon.

Update: 17:35 GMT

VeloNews | Zabriskie crashes out of Giro

David Zabriskie’s 2008 Giro d’Italia ended Sunday when he was caught at a pileup with about 55km to go in the 207km second stage from Cerfalù to Agrigento.

Zabriskie, 29, went down with several other riders as the peloton approached a railroad crossing.

Zabriskie, who started the day second overall, was knocked off his bike and was unable to rejoin the pack. Doctors immediately attended to the reigning U.S. time trial champion and transported him to a local hospital.

Team officials confirmed to VeloNewsthat Zabriskie suffered a fractured L1 vertabrae, in what was described as a painful, but not a serious injury.

Zabriskie, who wore the yellow jersey in the 2005 Tour de France, played a key role in Slipstream-Chipotle’s victory in Saturday’s team time trial event that delivered the maglia rosa to teammate Christian Vande Velde.

Astana invited into Giro lineup - Cycling - Yahoo! Sports

GENEVA (AP)—Giro d’Italia organizers have invited the Astana team to compete in the race, reversing an earlier decision to ban it because of doping scandals.

Astana officials confirmed Saturday they are hurrying to get elite American rider Levi Leipheimer from California to Palermo, Sicily, for the start of the three-week race next Saturday.

“It is a good moment for us. When we were told in February that we were not invited it was a disaster,” Astana spokesman Philippe Maertens told The Associated Press.

Alberto Contador, winner of the 2007 Tour de France, will also be at the starting line for Astana. The had been shunned by cycling’s biggest events this year, including the Tour, for involvement in doping scandals. It was asked to leave the 2007 Tour after team leader Alexander Vinokourov tested positive for a blood transfusion.

The Kazakhstan-backed team brought in Johan Bruyneel, the Belgian who guided Lance Armstrong to seven Tour victories, as director to overhaul its image and operations. It also signed Contador.

Astana’s rebuilding work was rewarded late Friday, when Giro organizer RCS Sport called Bruyneel to offer his team a place.

“We are hurrying now to arrange everything. We must have a truck and a bus down to Sicily—it is not the perfect preparation,” Maertens said. “Levi was still in California and Alberto was on holiday in Spain because he had a dental operation two weeks ago. Everybody is happy.”