56th Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré - 2.HC

France, June 6-13, 2004

Floyd Landis' diary

Lance Armstrong's first lieutenant was second behind the boss in 2002. This year he is again a vital part of the US Postal-Berry Floor effort to prepare Lance Armstrong for his attempt to win a record-breaking sixth Tour de France.

• Index to all entries

Two weeks till Tour time

Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré Stages 4-7, France, June 10-13

Hey you guys on Cyclingnews,

I'm back in Gerona and getting ready for the Tour. I'm really hoping I'll be selected again this year. Plus it's great that we have a new sponsor with Discovery Communications - I guess we'll be getting new jerseys for the Tour. But more on that later, first back to the Dauphiné Libéré.

The first time I raced up Mont Ventoux was in Paris-Nice when I was with Mercury...we went up close to the top and then made the turn. We didn't finish at the Observatory. Then we did it two years ago in the Dauphiné. It's one of the longest climbs with a constant grade like that in France. With the pine trees and rocks, it looks kind of like Southern California, where I live. I really like Provence; it's my favourite part of France. It smells like springtime now, with the rolling hills and the big mountain and the small, quaint villages.

Le Mont Ventoux is about the same length as Mount Palomar in Southern California, where I train sometimes, but Palomar isn't as steep. Ventoux starts closer to sea level so it gains more elevation. Palomar starts at like 500m altitude and goes to 1800m. I sometimes use Mount Palomar as a test. It's never as steep as Ventoux - Palomar is about a 6% average gradient, while Ventoux is a lot steeper, especially in the middle 9 km or so.

I had the fastest time on Ventoux for a little while and I felt good. I had a little bit of a break before and my form is improving as the Tour gets closer. The team gave me some chances for myself in the spring, but now the focus is the Tour de France.

We're in Tour mode now; I was free to make my own moves in the Dauphiné but the difference between this race and Paris-Nice is that there, I had my heart set on doing something and at the Dauphiné, I'm not going to spend a whole lot of energy trying to make things work out.

Lance was not obsessed this year winning the race. Even though Lance lost some time to Mayo on Ventoux, I don't think it's a big deal. He was at the race to train more than anything. He never likes to get beat, but there's nothing to worry about. Last year at the Dauphiné, Lance was too skinny. He looked tired last year, but I think this year, Lance is back to his 2002 form.

On the next to last stage at the Dauphiné, it was a hard one from Gap to Grenoble. And no, there's no Gap store there! It's a little town at the south end of the Alps, with a tough climb, Col Bayard, straight out of town. It was a crazy, windy day and Michael Rasmussen decided he wanted to ride alone most of the day. He and Ivan Basso took off after a few kilometres and frankly, I didn't think it was going to work. But it was good for us, as we didn't have to chase all day.

I remember Rasmussen from when he was a mountain biker. He was always a good climber then and he still is. Rasmussen is a nice guy and has had lots of good road results last year. We'll have to watch him in the Tour, I guess. Before the hard climb of the day, Col du Luitel, we went pretty hard up and then down the Col de la Homme Mort. The mountain of the dead man. I'm not sure I like that name...

On the descent, Stuart O'Grady and some Ag2r guy attacked and strung everything out. I don't know why; there was no reason for that and they got dropped right away on the Luitel. Tyler crashed right in front of me and he was lucky. A little further along and he might have hit a retaining wall. Johan was saying on the radio 'don't take any risks' and he was right. But Tyler just made a mistake; anyone can in that situation.

So then we got to the Luitel and man, that was a really hard climb! It was long and steep and straight. I couldn't wait for it to end. Johan kept saying "ok, keep going, not much longer" but eventually with 1km to go on the 9.5km climb, I dropped off a little. I think I was better off because I was with some team cars that blocked the really strong headwind. We all made it into Grenoble like 8 minutes behind Rasmussen.

On the last day of the Dauphiné, we were in Grenoble, a pretty city surrounded by big mountain climbs. We did an out and back loop. We were all expecting Phonak to attack Mayo and Euskaltel, but they didn't and we all just rode together. The last climb was pretty hard and then there was a straight shot to the finish. O'Grady worked hard for another stage win.

I'm happy to get the Dauphiné out of the way, and have a last few weeks of training before the Tour. We'll probably just hang out here until the 30th of June, when we'll head north to Liege. But even though I had a good Dauphiné Libéré, I'm not on the Tour team yet.

Great news on the new sponsor. Now we can really focus 100% on the Tour without worrying about this...ok now to bed and another hard day in the saddle tomorrow.

Thanks for reading
Floyd

Stage 4 Results
Stage 5 Results
Stage 6 Results
Stage 7 Results