Maybe Disco had a bad day, but maybe it was just supposed to look that way. Anybody else remember when Lance faked feeling bad to convince Telekom to attack all day prior to the Alpe d´Huez? Which team did all the work that day and who ended up winning the stage and taking time out of whom?
JB and Lance have already stated that the stage from Grenoble to Courcheval will be key. As team manager your job is to make certain that your team is less tired than your main rivals when that day arrives. Sending Hincapie with Voigt early on today was perfect, since George can keep up with and outsprint Jens any day of the week and having both of them off the front forces everybody on T-Mobile to do all of the work to keep them close.
When it comes to the last part of the race all Lance has to do is to make sure that: A) neither Vino or Jan make any time on him, and to stay of out of the wind as much as possible to conserve energy. Having team members there would be preferable, but having them all sitting in, looking worn but conserving energy for the really big day to come will entice the three T-Mobile guys to work really hard to try to shake Lance, not just today but also in the days to come.
Letting Kloden gain time is not such a bad deal, in fact, it brings up the possibility of even more confusion and friction amongst the strategists and riders on T-Mobile. Who works for whom and to what end? If Lance continues to show that he is willing to let Kloden make up time, why should Vino keep working his butt off and why should Ullrich be allowed to just follow along? Don't tell me that Vino won't be resenting it soon, he looks and acts hungrier and faster than Jan, he has every reason to want some support. Kloden was tweaked at not getting any help from his break-mate today in making time, and then getting nabbed at the line for the stage. That can't feel good. Jan knows that there are real mountains coming up and his position as the leader of the team is not as obvious as it should be at this point - not to Vino, not to Kloden and probably not to Jan either.
Or they might just have been tired and slow. The point is, Bjarne Riis and the T-Mobile guys don't know which version is the truth, and keeping them doubting and second-guessing is something that JB and Lance are very good at. The climbs to Courcheval will reveal the truth about how the Disco team is feeling as well as showing who really should be supporting whom on T-Mobile and CSC. It would not surprise me one bit if Bobby Julich ends up doing well enough on the climbs to shake things up a bit at CSC.
