This is a whole different Tour de France after Stage 7's first Alpine climbs of the bike race sent up five new cyclists to the head of the overall standings.
The stage winner and overall leader, T-Mobile's Linus Gerdemann, is new in more ways than one. The 24-year-old German is riding in his first Tour de France, having turned pro with Team CSC in 2005.
Gerdemann attacked with about 6 miles to go on the Col de la Colombière, holding off all challengers on the descent into Le Grand-Bornand to win by 40 seconds. He moved up from 20th at the end of Stage 6.
The pre-race favorites hung on to finish about 3-1/2 minutes back. Among them, injured Andreas Kloden of the Astana team is in the best position, sitting (on a fractured coccyx) in 6th place at 3:39 behind the leader.
Kloden's injured teammate, Alexander Vinokourov, also survived to race another day — namely Stage 8 of the Tour de France on Sunday. The 102-mile route starts with three Category 2 or 3 climbs, and finishes with three Category 1 ascents of Cormet de Roselend, Montée d'Hauteville and Montée de Tignes. It promises to further shake out the peloton.
Team CSC's Fabian Cancellara, who had worn the yellow jersey every day since the prologue, knew this wasn't going to be his stage. He spent the day assigned to domestique duties, running water bottles up to the team favorites. He finished 148th on the day, and dropped to 108th overall, more than 22 minutes behind the leader.
The 123-mile stage from Bourg-en-Bresse to Le Grand-Bornand crossed four mountain passes, two Category 3s, one Category 4 and the Category 1, the Col de la Colombière.
Gerdmann's effort not only won the day and awarded him the yellow jersey, he also won the Best Young Rider designation from Discovery's Vladimir Gusev. In other competitions, Tom Boonen retained the green jersey and Sylvain Chavanel (France) held the polka dot mountain jersey.
The Top 10 are:
1. Linus Gerdemann (Ger) T-Mobile Team
2. Inigo Landaluze (Spa) Euskaltel — 1:24
3. David De La Fuente (Spa) Saunier Duval — 2:45
4. Laurent Lefevre (Fra) Bouygues — 2:55
5. Mauricio Soler (Col) Barloworld — 3:05
6. Andreas Klöden (Ger) Astana — 3:39
7. Vladimir Gusev (Rus) Discovery — 3:51
8. Vladimir Karpets (Rus) Caisse d'Epargne — 3:52< BR> 9. Mikel Astarloza Chaurreau (Spa) Euskaltel — 3:55
10. Thomas Dekker (Ned) Rabobank — 3:57
Where are the pre-race favorites?
6. Andreas Klöden (Ger) Astana — 3:39 behind
13. Cadel Evans (Aus) Predictor – Lotto — 4:02
15. Oscar Pereiro (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne 4:03
16. Levi Leipheimer (USA) Discovery — 4:06
17. Denis Menchov (Rus) Rabobank — 4:06
18. Alejandro Valverde (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne — 4:09
21. Christophe Moreau (Fra) AG2r Prévoyance — 4:15
27. Carlos Sastre Candil (Spa) Team CSC — 4:22
28. Frank Schleck (Lux) Team CSC — 4:23
44. Alexandre Vinokourov (Kaz) Astana — 5:16
And the US riders?
16. Levi Leipheimer, Discovery — 4:06
23. Chris Horner, Predictor – Lotto — 4:19
54. George Hincapie, Discovery — 7:15
102. Christian Vande Velde, Team CSC — 21:41
152. Fred Rodriguez, Predictor – Lotto — 32:13
177. David Zabriskie, Team CSC — 39:55
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