Tour de France
Downhills can be downfall for some

By Mark Akins
Seattle Times staff

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The Tour de France is usually won on mountain climbs. Occasionally, it's lost going downhill.

Today, in the last big Alpine mountain stage, riders who are fearless — or desperate — get a final chance to make up ground on more cautious descenders.

On a 60-mph descent, with only inch-wide racing tires holding them to the pavement, the margin for error is slim. But a few make it look easy.

Italy's Paolo Savoldelli, who is not riding in this year's Tour, is nicknamed Il Falco ("The Falcon") for his nosedive descents. Not many riders can drop others on a descent. Savoldelli can.

Belgium's Eddy Merckx was such a dare-devil descender that in 1974, his pursuing team car drove into a ditch trying to keep up. In the 1975 Tour, he ditched another car.

Lance Armstrong is a skilled descender, but told Bicycling Magazine that the best he's seen was Britain's Sean Yates, his teammate on the Motorola team of the 1990s.

"He wouldn't even touch his brakes," Armstrong said.

A love of motorcycle riding helped turn Yates into a slalom genius.

Others can't seem to turn the corners.

When a 23-year-old Jan Ullrich won the Tour in 1997, he was so inept at picking a good line through the curves that teammate Bjarne Riis had to do it for him. Ullrich simply followed.
 
For some, going downhill is harder than going up.

Mark Akins: 206-464-8994 or makins@seattletimes.com