The 2005 Tour de France was the 92nd edition of Tour de France, one of cycling's Grand Tours. The Tour began in Fromentine with an individual time trial on 2 July and Stage 11 occurred on 13 July with a mountainous stage to Briançon. The race finished on the Champs-Élysées in Paris, on 24 July.
Stage 1 2 July 2005 — Fromentine to Noirmoutier-en-l'Île, (ITT)
The winning time of David Zabriskie was set early in the day – so early, in fact, that virtually none of the TV stations covering the Tour actually showed it. Zabriskie, who has also won a stage in the Vuelta a España and a time trial in the Giro d'Italia, put a powerful time in that few could approach. The best attempt was a run by Alexander Vinokourov, a teammate of Jan Ullrich, who came in 53 seconds back, putting him, for a time, in second place. Most of the other big names rode respectably, as with Landis, though Iban Mayo wound up four minutes behind the other GC contenders – a disappointment to be sure. Also disappointing was Joseba Beloki, who demonstrated that he has not returned to the form he had before his crash in the 2003 Tour.
The favorites of this Tour were expected to be Ivan Basso, Jan Ullrich, and Lance Armstrong — the final three starters. Basso finished 18, 1:53 back from Zabriskie. Ullrich finished in 12th place, 1:12 back, despite having a gruesome crash with his team car the day before, in which he shattered the rear window as he flew through it. Lance Armstrong, whose time trialing skills this year had been in doubt after a poor showing in the Tour de Georgia, rode an impressive time trial after a small mishap where his foot fell out of the pedal at the start, bridging the one-minute gap to Jan Ullrich with 3 km remaining; he finished two seconds behind Zabriskie.
As for the other jerseys, Zabriskie won the first green sprinter's jersey, while the winner of the previous year's prologue, Swiss Fabian Cancellara, got the white young rider's jersey.
Stage 1 result and general classification after stage 1 Rank Rider Team Time 1 2 + 2" 3 + 53" 4 + 57" 5 + 59" 6 + 1' 02" 7 s.t. 8 + 1' 04" 9Illes Balears + 1' 05" 10Liberty Seguros–Würth + 1' 06"
Stage 2 3 July 2005 — Challans to Les Essarts,
A textbook Tour day – an early break of László Bodrogi (Crédit Agricole), David Cañada (Saunier Duval–Prodir), Thomas Voeckler (Bouygues Télécom), and Sylvain Calzati (Ag2r-Prevoyance) got away and was caught at the end. This led to a bunch sprint, with a strangely lackluster McEwen holding on for third as a rock-solid Tom Boonen blasted to his 15th win of the year, and to the green jersey, which he claimed from Zabriskie, although today, in a rare occurrence, Lance Armstrong was wearing it, since Zabriskie also had the yellow jersey, which meant the green went "on loan" to Armstrong, who was second. Bodrogi racked up enough time bonuses on the intermediate sprints to pass Vinokourov in the standings for third place, 47 seconds behind Zabriskie, who held his yellow jersey. All but three of the riders finished in the peloton, making time bonuses the only things that shuffled the standings at all. In the last kilometres, the main group broke, and most of the General Classification contenders (except Jan Ullrich) came in nine seconds after Boonen. The break-up, however, was caused by a fall, and the judges applied the same time to them as the first group.
Thomas Voeckler attacked on the category 4 climb to win the points available in the mountain competition. As these were the only mountain points awarded that day, Voeckler moved into the lead of the mountain classification. He has now worn three of the four leader jerseys in the Tour de France during his career.
Stage 2 result Rank Rider Team Time 1Quick-Step 2 s.t. 3 s.t. 4 s.t. 5 s.t. 6 s.t. 7 s.t. 8 s.t. 9 s.t. 10Liberty Seguros–Würth s.t.General classification after stage 2 Rank Rider Team Time 1 2 + 2" 3 + 47" 4 + 53" 5 + 57" 6 + 59" 7 + 1' 02" 8 s.t. 9 + 1' 04" 10Illes Balears + 1' 05"
Stage 3 4 July 2005 — La Châtaigneraie to Tours,
A normal day with some minor drama at the finish, the early break this time consisted of Erik Dekker (Rabobank), Rubens Bertogliati (Saunier Duval), and Nicolas Portal (AG2R), who were caught 1 km from the end. Dekker had already managed a great feat at Tours the previous season by holding off the peloton after being in a breakaway for 200 kilometres, and winning the Paris–Tours. This time, however, the French city did not bring luck to the Dutchman. After the breakaways were reeled in, the Swiss time trial champion Fabian Cancellara attempted an escape in the last kilometer, but was brought back, leading to a bunch sprint. Commentators expected that the long, straight drive to the finish would favour Robbie McEwen, but instead it was Tom Boonen who took a convincing win.
At the finish line Robbie McEwen was reprimanded for trying to push Stuart O'Grady away with his head, a move possibly spurred on by O'Grady preventing him from attacking Boonen by blocking his path. Although McEwen crossed the line third, the judges knocked him to the back of the main pack, giving him a place of 186th, and dealing quite a blow to his hopes of a fourth green jersey, placing him 44 points behind Tom Boonen, who has 70.
The general classification remained unchanged, and Cancellara held his young rider's jersey, although if Tom Boonen gets another stage win time bonus, it would go to him. Meanwhile, the early break crossed two of the three category four climbs first, giving Dekker six mountain points. Voeckler could only manage to cross an early climb in second, giving him two more and bringing him up to five, putting Erik Dekker in polka dots. Dekker also won the prize of most combative rider.
Stage 3 result Rank Rider Team Time 1Quick-Step 2 s.t. 3 s.t. 4 s.t. 5Liberty Seguros–Würth s.t. 6 s.t. 7 s.t. 8 s.t. 9 s.t. 10 s.t.General classification after stage 3 Rank Rider Team Time 1 2 + 2" 3 + 47" 4 + 53" 5 + 57" 6 + 1' 02" 7 s.t. 8 + 1' 04" 9Illes Balears + 1' 05" 10Liberty Seguros–Würth + 1' 06"
Stage 4 5 July 2005 — Tours to Blois, (TTT)
This was a nail-biter of a team time trial in which the teams of the three favorites – Armstrong, Ullrich, and Basso – all did well. Discovery trailed CSC in the team standings, and so launched second to last, but showed their usual team time trial form with a pencil-straight line, each member taking pulls like clockwork. As the time trial wore on, Armstrong began taking longer pulls at the front, bringing the pace of the pack up dramatically. Even still, CSC, launching behind them, kept a grueling pace of their own, actually leading Discovery through all of the checkpoints. The race wasn't decided until the last kilometer and a half, when yellow jersey David Zabriskie crashed as his knee hit the handlebar, probably because of his cycle chain malfunctioning. He got back on and crossed the line in a blood-stained yellow jersey 1'28" behind the Discovery riders. On the other hand, Ullrich, whose T-Mobile Team crossed the line at 35", lost only 30" due to the adjusted gap for the team trial stage. After this stage, Ullrich was in 14th place, 1'36" off Armstrong.
Had Zabriskie held on another half a kilometer he would have gotten the same time as the rest of CSC, but instead he dropped to ninth in the overall standings, and CSC's surprise at the yellow jersey hitting the pavement in front of them cost them two seconds on Discovery – coincidentally, the exact margin by which Zabriskie had led Armstrong going into the stage. The result was to put Armstrong in his 67th yellow jersey, and to put teammate Yaroslav Popovych in the white jersey. With no sprints or mountains, the green and polka dot jerseys remained on the shoulders of Tom Boonen and Erik Dekker, respectively.
Stage 4 result Rank Team Time 1 2 + 2" 3 + 35" + 30" 4Liberty Seguros–Würth + 53" + 40" 5 + 1' 31" + 50" 6 + 1' 41" + 1' 00" 7Illes Balears + 2' 05" + 1' 10" 8 s.t. + 1' 20" 9 + 2' 19" + 1' 30" 10 + 2' 26" + 1' 40"General classification after stage 4 Rank Rider Team Time 1 2 + 55" 3 + 1' 04" 4 + 1' 07" 5 + 1' 14" 6 + 1' 16" 7 + 1' 21" 8 + 1' 26" 9 s.t. 10 s.t.
Notes * This means that even though the team finished with a longer time, the provision set forth in the Tour de France Guideline states that the gaps for the team trial stage is capped according to the relative finishing position of the teams. Thus, even though Gerolsteiner and Illes Balears-Caisse D'Epargne finished at the same time, for the riders in those two teams, IBC riders have a 10" advantage over the GST riders for the individual classifications.
Stage 5 6 July 2005 — Chambord to Montargis,
Juan Antonio Flecha made an early break, and was joined 90 km later by László Bodrogi (Crédit Agricole), Salvatore Commesso (Lampre), and Kjell Carlström (Liquigas), but not by George Hincapie, whose team had earlier said they wanted to put him into a break to give him a turn in yellow. The break was finally reeled in 10 km from the finish by a Discovery-led peloton, setting up the sprint. It was a tough, uphill sprint, and McEwen took it by a wheel over Tom Boonen, taking his first win of the Tour, but still only putting him in fourth for the green jersey due to his being relegated to 186th in the third stage.
David Zabriskie recovered enough from his crash to start today, and finished with the peloton in 176th place. Out of respect for the role his crash played in the overall standings, Lance Armstrong initially refused to wear the yellow jersey today, and it was not until the race was stopped as it was rolling out of the neutral zone so that the organizers would ask him to wear it that he agreed to.
Today also saw the first withdrawal of the Tour as Constantino Zaballa of Saunier Duval–Prodir failed to finish the stage. The Yellow, Green, Polka and White jerseys remain on their respective riders.
Stage 5 result Rank Rider Team Time 1 2Quick-Step s.t. 3 s.t. 4 s.t. 5 s.t. 6Liberty Seguros–Würth s.t. 7 s.t. 8 s.t. 9 s.t. 10 s.t. General classification after stage 5 Rank Rider Team Time 1 2 + 55" 3 + 1' 04" 4 + 1' 07" 5 + 1' 14" 6 + 1' 16" 7 + 1' 21" 8 + 1' 26" 9 s.t. 10 s.t.
Stage 6 7 July 2005 — Troyes to Nancy,
An early escape initiated by Christophe Mengin (Française des Jeux) after 24 km was accompanied by Karsten Kroon (Rabobank), Jaan Kirsipuu (Crédit Agricole), Mauro Gerosa (Liquigas-Bianchi) and Stéphane Augé (Cofidis). Karsten Kroon and Stéphane Augé took 7 mountain points each, with Kroon winning the last mountain, which results in the Dutch rider wearing the polka dot jersey, keeping it in team Rabobank. Around 10 km from the finish, the breakaway was broken in pieces after an attack of Estonian champion Kirsipuu, but Mengin, a rider local to Nancy, managed to hold on and left Kirsipuu behind. One and a half kilometers from the end, Alexander Vinokourov and Lorenzo Bernucci came off the peloton to join him, and then, 700 meters from the end, Mengin risked too much, slid out and crashed, followed independently by much of the front of the peloton. The result was to give Bernucci the stage, due mostly to his superior navigation of the crash, and Vinokourov a 19-second boost in the general classification. Boonen kept the green jersey, but Hushovd's fifth-place finish gave him a substantial boost, putting him just 7 points back in that competition. Claudio Corioni of abandoned the race.
Stage 6 result Rank Rider Team Time 1 2 + 3" 3 + 7" 4 s.t. 5 s.t. 6 s.t. 7 s.t. 8 s.t. 9 s.t. 10 s.t. General classification after stage 6 Rank Rider Team Time 1 2 + 55" 3 + 1' 02" 4 + 1' 04" 5 + 1' 07" 6 + 1' 14" 7 + 1' 16" 8 + 1' 26" 9 s.t. 10 + 1' 32"
Stage 7 8 July 2005 — Lunéville to Karlsruhe,