| | By George Hincapie
Special to ABC Sports Online
Greenville, S.C.'s George Hincapie rides for the United States Postal Service team, and played an integral part in Lance Armstrong's victory in the Tour de France in 1999. He is a two-time winner of the World Road Cycling Championship, and was ranked 50th in the world last year. Throughout the Tour de France, Hincapie is sharing his experience through the eyes of a key member of the defending championship team.
COURCHEVEL, France -- Sunday's stage was another hard mountain day. We went pretty easy in the first part of the climb, but there were a bunch of attacks in the last five miles. A couple of riders got away, and we had to really push on the descent just to get back up in the front. We then pulled through the valley with a major headwind in our faces, which made it very difficult.
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Jan Ullrich (right) and the rest of the field is fighting for second place behind Lance Armstrong (left). |
When we got to the second climb, the entire group was going really fast. A separate group formed consisting of about 40 riders up in front that had three or four of my teammates in it. Lance Armstrong was pretty much just hanging with (Marco) Pantani at that point. Pantani ended up taking Stage 15, with Lance coming in fourth, however, he put two and a half minutes more on Ullrich for the overall lead, so it was a pretty successful day for us.
A break came off the front and we were riding tempo, but no one threatened, so we weren't concerned about it. Ullrich, (Joseba) Beloki and (Christophe) Moreau, who are second, third and fourth respectively, were concerned because there's a group of guys that are only a few minutes behind them. They had to start chasing through the valley because they were worried about losing their second and third spots. We don't care about who takes those spots, just first.
With only one really hard day left, I think that -- barring any serious disasters -- the real race is now for second and third place. While the race is far from over, Lance has such a big lead and is looking so strong. It's kind of inconceivable that he won't win at this point.
We went for a short hour-and-a-half ride on Monday's rest day. We are all pretty exhausted. We had lunch together, a big nap and a massage. I hung out with an old coach of mine who's over here too. It's been a very relaxing, much needed day for us. The last day wasn't like a full rest day because we had to travel, plus we went on a pretty long practice run, so Monday was especially nice.
Everyone on the team is feeling pretty good considering all the pain and suffering we've endured over the last few stages. All in all, the race has really gone by quickly. It seems like just yesterday that we started this whole thing.
Tuesday's stage is another hard one -- five mountains, 200 kilometers. It should take us around six and a half, seven hours. The good thing at this point is that a lot of the teams are trying to secure the overall spots they're in right now.
Some of the teams might start helping their riders to secure their spots in the top five. It helps us in the long run, because we'll probably have to do less work as a result.
Find out about George Hincapie's "Tour de Café," a line of specialty-roasted coffees with proceeds benefiting the Lance Armstrong Foundation on his web site at www.hincapie.com/2000tdf.html.
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AUDIO/VIDEO
 Stage 16 course map
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