July 14/04 9:14 am - Tour de France: Stage 10 (brief)

Posted by Editoress on 07/14/04
 

Tour de France

On Bastille Day, Frenchman Richard Virenque (Quick Step-Davitmon) took the seventh Tour stage win of his career, also assuming the Mountain Jersey from team mate Paolo Bettini in the process. Virenque was away for over 200 kilometres on this, the longest stage of this year's Tour, a stage that included one Cat. 1 climb, two Cat. 2's and five Cat. 3's. After a series of early abortive attempts (always including Virenque), the French rider broke clear with Axel Merckx just after the first sprint of the day. The gap maxed out a nearly 11 minutes, but Merckx was suffering on the climbs, and was dropped with approximately 70 kilometres to go. He was reeled in by the reduced peloton, but Virenque easily stayed clear to win by over five minutes. Andreas Kloden took the sprint for second, followed by Erik Zabel, with yellow jersey Thomas Voeckler in fifth and Lance Armstrong sixth.

Stage 10 - Limoges to St Flour 237 km

1 Richard Virenque (Fra) Quick Step-Davitamon 6:00:24
2 Andreas Kloden (Ger) T-Mobile Team at 5:18
3 Erik Zabel (Ger) T-Mobile Team
4 Francisco Mancebo Perez (Esp) Illes Balears - Banesto
5 Thomas Voeckler (Fra) Brioches La Boulangere
6 Lance Armstrong (USA) US Postal p/b Berry Floor all s.t.