Landis on course
The American, riding for the Phonak team, took a 10-second advantage over previous leader Oscar Pereiro, who is second overall.
The stage was won by Frank Schleck, who became the first rider from Luxembourg to win the famous stage by leaving Damiano Cunego behind with a late attack to take victory by 10 seconds.
Landis was not involved in the early breakaway, with Belgian Axel Merckx tasked with ensuring Phonak had a representative at the head of the field. The race favourite made his move late in the piece, attacking along with fellow contenders Carlos Sastre, of Team CSC, and Davitamon’s Cadel Evans to chase down the lead group.
And, when he pushed for home on his own 10km out, only T-Mobile’s Andreas Kloden was able to respond.
“My job was to follow Kloden, and I got the jersey back, so there you go,” Landis said.
After Pereiro, the chasing pack of Cyril Dessel, Denis Menchov, Sastre, Kloden and Evans trail Landis by over two minutes, but he refused to write off any of his challengers.
“You never know what’s going to go on in the final week,” he said. “I wouldn’t write any of them off.”
The result provides a huge psychological boost for Landis’ hopes of winning the Tour, with L’Alpe d’Huez historically a significant marker. On 20 of the 25 previous occasions, the stage has featured in the event, the holder of the yellow jersey at the summit has gone on to claim overall victory.
Recently, that man has twice been Landis’ compatriot Lance Armstrong.
Landis was able to leave Sastre, Evans and Davitamon Rabobank’s Denis Menchov — another of the leading contenders — trailing in his wake in the closing stages.
Delighted stage victor Schleck said: “It’s huge to win here in L’Alpe d’Huez, it’s a massive thing. My teammates David Zabriskie and Jens Voigt did a great job for me.
“It wasn’t the plan to attack at such an early stage of the race, but sometimes that just happens.”
David de la Fuente took 28 climbing points on the earlier ascents at Col d’Izoard and Col du Lautaret to take a commanding lead in the King of the Mountains standings, Schleck moving second on 74 points, 34 behind the Spaniard.
Another significant development was the withdrawal on the Col du Lautaret of Quickstep’s Tom Boonen, who was lying second in the sprint category.
Davitamon’s Robbie McEwen now leads the race for the green jersey by 45 points from Oscar Freire of Rabobank.
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