About brotherhood and cycling races:

Another TdF mountain stage has come and gone and we supporters find ourselves even more confused than before. Voeckler kept the yellow jersey and, in the finale, he was the only one who tried to follow Andy Schleck (don't get too excited, girls: he attacked with less than one km to go and gained just 2" on his main adversaries). Now I consider him a serious, serious, serious threat to the GC. Thomas is experienced, he has the strongest team of the race (I'm not kidding: Rolland is the helper that every GC contender would love to have amongst their teammates) and his TT skills aren't that bad. Moreover, he's terribly determined, especially because the last Frenchman to win the Tour was Bernard Hinault in 1985. Considering how Thomas is doing, I think he can keep the jersey without problems until next Thursday. And who knows what will happen if he manages to keep the maillot jaune on that day?

Seriously, people need to watch out for the Europcar rider.

Today's stage actually started in a good way. I was eager to see some changes in the GC and LT was determined to make the race hard. 24 riders went on a breakaway (amongst them there were Voigt, Gerdemann, Riblon, Casar, LL Sanchez, Chavanel and Izagirre), whereas O'Grady pulled on the second climb du jour. Then Cancellara pulled hard between the penultimate and the last climbs of the day, so that the breakaways soon lost every chance of succeeding. Finally, we were ready to witness a good show.

With 11 kms to go, the first attack: Andy Schleck, after that his teammates pulled for him, attacked twice. Basso and Cunego, who can't stand the sudden changes of tempo while climbing, got temporarily dropped. Nicolas Roche had already got dropped on Col d'Agnes, whereas Martin had already said 'Adieu!' to the group of the yellow jersey. However, the two Italians didn't panick as they lost contact and they kept climbing at their own pace. In that way, they soon managed to join the group of the best climbers again. Then it was Frank Schleck's turn to attack and his action was followed by the one of Andy. The Italian couple got dropped again, but then Basso joined the brothers and all the other GC contenders for the second time. And, this time, Ivan set the pace at the front of the little group, thus making sure that no one could attack.

With about 5 kms to go, the one who attacked was Jelle Vanendert, who soon got a gap of 40" on his chasers. Samu Sanchez tried to follow him and escaped from the group too.

As Jelle was riding towards his most prestigious victory, the chasers seemed to slow down a while. Then an attack by Evans caused Cunego (who had 'yo-yoed' successfully until that moment) to get dropped. Together with Damiano, the other rider who had some problems because of Evans' move was Frank Schleck. And so, in one moment, everyone understood everything: Andy had stopped his strong attacks because Frank wasn't feeling fine. A noble gesture, that's for sure, but not the gesture that one needs to do for winning the Tour de France.

As Frank slowly managed to get back on the group of Voeckler and Cunego got definitely dropped, Vanendert took the victory atop Plateau de Beille, whereas Sanchez took the second place. Jelle and Samuel, the magic couple of the Pyrenées.

The GC riders kept on looking at each other until they reached the final km, where Andy Schleck decided to launch a very strong attack. Too bad that attacking with just 1 km to go is never very very useful and, in fact, OGL got just 2" of advantage on his main advesaries. The only ones who actually suffered today's stage were Roche and Cunego, whereas the other ones (if we don't consider Frankie) apparently didn't have any problem.

So, what can we say about today's stage? Well, I'll tell you how my mood changed in the last 3 hours. Before the stage I was happy, excited, eager to know who would have won on such a great climb like Plateau de Beille. After the stage, all I got was a thousandth of critics from my familiars. 'And you like the Schleck brothers?', my uncle asked me as soon as the stage ended. 'How can you like them? I mean, they're so in love with each other that they never attack when one of them doesn't feel fine. And if one of them attacks and manages to get a little gap on the others, the other one can't attack because his brother is at the front. What game are they playing at?' If this wasn't enough, also my dad started to criticise the behaviour of the Schleck brothers. 'They can't win the Tour if they keep on riding this way! They must understand that, if they can't reach the two top spots of the podium, they should understand who the strongest of them is and try to get the victory anyway!!', he told me. Actually, writing 'he told me' doesn't convey the way in which he, my uncle and my grandfather spoke to me this afternoon. In fact, as soon as the stage was over (and before I could hide myself in the bathroom, pretending I was showering), my 3 loved relatives were all in the living room, shouting at me as if I were the owner of Leopard Trek or the ds of the Schleck brothers. 'You should tell them that they can't race in that way!' Oh, yes, of course I should tell them, wait a moment and I call them on the phone... Really, arguing with the 3 cycling lovers of the family after such a disappointing stage wasn't fun. Especially because I had to admit that, in spite of everything, their critics aren't totally senseless.

Let's start from the beginning. First of all, I must admit that today's stage was much better than the one to Luz Ardiden. Both los Schlecks attacked (although they never looked very convinced of what they were doing) and LT tried to work at the front. Unfortunately, the truth is that LT isn't the strongest team in this Tour and, once again (also thanks to the crashes of Jens Voigt), los Schlecks found themselves all alone at the beginning of the last climb. This is the first GT for LT, but I think the team ds need some new riders for next year. Because, this afternoon, the efforts of the team didn't actually have any serious consequence as far as the GC fight is concerned.

As far as the brothers are concerned, instead, I have a serious and complex point to make. Basing myself on what I saw about a hour ago, I think that we can say that Andy this afternoon didn't give it all because Frank wasn't at his best. And this reminds me of what the late Laurent Fignon once said about the brothers. 'Frank is a brake to Andy'. A sentence that, from the human point of view, sounds very harsh but that, from the sportive points of view (*takes a big breathe before being hanged, drawned and quartered by her readers*) may be true. Especially after today, I'm really, really afraid it is true.

Andy is in a great shape. He showed that with his attacks and he's probably the best climber of this Tour. Frank is in a very good shape too, but this afternoon it seemed that he was on a bad day. That's why Andy waited for him, that's why Andy didn't attack. And that's why, this afternoon, the brothers were a brake to each other rather than an advantage. Considering that none of them is good at time trialing and that the hard stages in the next week aren't many (tomorrow, although it is Sunday, the Tour organisers have decided to offer us a ridicolous flat stage), the brothers shouldn't waste opportunities like this. Does this mean that they have to race against one another? Does this mean that one of them has to become a helper? The answer is in the legs (and in the hearts) of the boys. Frank is older than Andy and, probably, less regular. Andy is stronger but he'd like to help his brother winning the Tour. Unfortunately, the adversaries often take advantage of this fact, as it happened also in Tour 2009.

Imo, a possible solution would be making the brothers take part in two different GTs. Or, better: Frank could peak in May and race the Giro as a captain; then, he could go to the Tour as a magnificient helper for his little bro. Andy, instead, could race the Giro as a helper for Frank and the Tour as a captain. Perhaps, it would be worth trying.