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.

I don’t know what it is, but part of me really wants to see just about anyone besides Cadel Evans take the yellow jersey in Paris this year.

I’ve never been able to figure out what it is, but something about Evans rubs me the wrong way; and I just don’t want him to win.

Looking at the other riders currently in the top-10, however, I’m not sure who quite has the legs to take it away from him. Frank Schleck (currently just 1 second behind Evans) would be a great candidate, as would Christian Vandevelde.

Alejandro Valverde, who was my pre-race favourite, lost a good junk of time yesterday, but with more mountain stages, he might be able to pull back some time, especially if Evans has a bad day somewhere along the line.

Today is the rest day … time to get caught up on all the articles being written on all the various websites covering the Tour; and then the transitional stages (including a couple of pancake flat stages) until the Tour is back in the mountains in full force next Sunday.

I hope Jens Voigt can get into one of his patented long breaks.

Photo: Graham Watson/VeloNews

By virtue of being the first rider across the line in the opening team time trial, Christian Vandevelde of Team Slipstream-Chipotle becomes the first American to wear the maglia rosa (pink jersey) of the Giro d’Italia since Andy Hampsten in 1988.

David Zabriskie is in second place in the GC with the same time as his compatriot.

An excellent start for the American team!