Gourds Tonight

Tonight's Alive After 5, here in lovely downtown Boise, is one of the events of the year. Our favorite Austin band The Gourds is making the annual trek northwesterly, and they'll grace the plaza on Grove for a big free rock show this evening.

Yeehaw.

Back to Normal

Well, a trip to Montana and the fallout that must accompany any break from the work-day routine kept me from keeping on with the Tour version of the blog, and now it's back to the normal format.

It was quite an exciting race, though, with a few dopers only grabbing headlines for a day or two at a time.

The wide-open nature of this year's race kept us all guessing, and the final few days proved as exciting as we could have hoped for. In the end, Spain's Carlos Sastre prevailed, after following a smart and consistent performance with huge days on Alpe de Huez and in the final time trial. Sastre's worked hard for a long time and he deserves this as much as anyone, so congrats to him. And it must burn the asses of those running Le Tour to have Spaniards win the thing for the last three years, so that's another positive.

Hope y'all are enjoying your summer.

Vande Velde

As David Millar has abandoned his GC hopes and declared his intentions to chase stage wins, Christian Vande Velde, Chicago boy and all around class act, has taken the reins of his Garmin-Chipotle team and moved up to race with the big fellas.

Yesterday's stage over Tourmalet and up Hautacam saw Vande Velde hanging with a select group that included all of the race's main favorites--excepting those like Valverde and yellow jersey wearer Kim Kirchin who couldn't keep the pace. He went stroke for stroke with Evans, Menchov, and Ricco, and finished the day in 3rd place on GC. That's pretty damned impressive for the 31-year-old who didn't show up on much pre-race radar.

If you're looking for someone to cheer for in this free-for-all, Vande Velde's your man.

Story at VeloNews.

Happy Friday

Sanchez Takes First Climbing Stage

Luis Sanchez (Caiss de Epargne) attacked a small breakaway group over and over again on the run-in to the finish today until finally one stuck. He motored away from the group to open a good gap by the finish.

Today's stage hit the Massif Central, not the biggest hills but nothing to sneeze at, especially the nasty little bugger at the end of the day's race. With the main group bearing down on him, Sanchez managed to stay away for the win.

Kirchen held the yellow. Story at VeloNews.

A Break In the Day

Got away from the computer long enough to take the dogs for a hike up 5 Mile Gulch today. Summer's heating up around here, that's for sure.

Good times.

Yellow Moves to Gerolsteiner

Today's individual time trial produced a few surprises and tilted the balance of the GC battle. Gerolsteiner's Stefan Schumacher won the day, beating out favorites Fabian Cancellara (CSC) and others, to take control of the yellow jersey. It'll be tough for him to keep it over the next week, but he vows to try and do so.

Cadel Evans (Lotto) finished best of the big threats, beating out Alejandro Valverde (Caisse de Epargne) by well over a minute and taking time out of anyone else who considers themselves a threat for the GC. That's an interesting result, and one that will definitely help Evans as the race heads toward the big mountains. Evans can stay close and limit losses, but he's shown a deficit as far as big attacks or taking time out of climbers, so any lead will help immensely.

In this wide open Tour, every day can bring big changes.

Frischkorn Gets Close

American Tour-rookie Will Frischkorn, racing with the impressive and argyled upstarts Garmin-Chipotle, instigated a break today at the outset of the stage and held it together all day long to the finish.

At the end, Frischkorn was outkicked by Agritubel's Romain Feillu for the win. But 2nd's not so bad for the first week of the first TdF ever. Both Frischkorn and team director Jonathan Vaughters and the whole squad should be pretty damn proud.

(photo from VeloNews.com)

Valverde Takes First Yellow

On a winding uphill finish, Alejandro Valverde, newly crowned Spanish national champion, jumped into the lead in the last half a kilo and rolled through the finish with a nice gap to take the Tour's opening stage.

No prologue time trial this year, so the first winner is the first in yellow.

I've said this before, but I truly think this could be Valverde's year.

Story at VeloNews.

Oh to be in NYC for July 4th

As expected, The Feelies are reuniting and playing not only with Sonic Youth on Friday, but also a couple of sold-out shows at Maxwell's in Hoboken.

Great article about them in today's NY Times.