Landis loses lead, all hopes of victory

LA TOUSSUIRE, France -- In a single torturous Alpine stage, Floyd Landis' lead and chance for a Tour de France victory slipped away almost pitifully Wednesday as rider after rider passed him on the punishing final climb.

Abandoned by his teammates, Landis fell apart, dropped to 11th place and lost the leader's yellow jersey a day after regaining it in a spectacular ride up the famed L'Alpe d'Huez.

Landis, now 8 minutes, 8 seconds, behind new race leader Oscar Pereiro, was unable to attack, let alone intimidate his rivals -- which was Lance Armstrong's calling card en route to a record seven Tour wins.

"I suffered from the beginning, and I tried to hide it," Landis said. "I don't expect to win the Tour at this point. It's not easy to get back 8 minutes."

With about eight miles to go up La Toussuire, Spain's Carlos Sastre burst out of a small group of would-be favorites that included Landis, and Pereiro and several other contenders gave chase.

The American simply couldn't keep up, losing the 10-second lead he started the day with.

"Sometimes you don't feel well, and sometimes it's on the wrong day. What can I say?" asked Landis, who is riding with an injured hip.

And with that, Landis went in search of something cold and soothing.

"Drink some beer ... that's all I'm thinking about now," he said, adding: "I would be lying if I said I was not disappointed."

When Pereiro regained the lead Wednesday, Phonak's original plan appeared to have backfired, and the team looked as if it badly underestimated one of its riders.

"It was difficult to imagine that things would turn out like this," Pereiro said. "Floyd Landis seemed untouchable, but like everybody, he wasn't immune to collapse.

"Something in me said that today could be my day," he added.

Denmark's Mickael Rasmussen won the 113-mile stage through the Col du Galibier and the Col de la Croix-de-Fer -- two climbs so hard that they defy classification in the cycling's ranking system -- before the uphill finish.

Kloeden, who finished fifth, was escorted by two T-Mobile teammates up that climb. Landis finished alongside Phonak teammate Axel Merckx, but only because the American had dropped so far behind.

All along, Landis hasn't been in tip-top shape.

He surprised many Tour fans last week by announcing that he was riding with increasing pain in a right hip that had been damaged in a 2003 crash, and planned to have surgery on it this fall. It raised the prospect that Landis -- like cancer survivor Armstrong -- could overcome adversity and win cycling's premier race.

Landis insisted the hip wasn't a factor Wednesday.

Pereiro, meantime, has been one of the biggest surprises at the Tour. Even though he was a Top 10 finisher the last two years, he had come in primarily as a support rider for Illes Balears teammate Alejandro Valverde, who crashed out in Stage 3 with a broken right collarbone.

Overall, Pereiro holds a 1:50 lead over Sastre in second, and 2:29 ahead of Kloeden in third.

The race ends Sunday on the Champs-ElysŽes in Paris.