Oh No, Jens!

That was horrible. Gut-wrenchingly awful. But the good news is that they say he's okay. By that, I think they mean he is alive. The way he went down, he very well might not be. Could this be his final exit from the Tour? Bonnie Ford seems to think it will be. I hope she is wrong. That would be a sad way to end it.


As for the rest of the race, it somehow seems less important after watching Jens hit the deck today. Besides, other than whiny little Cadel Evans riding himself out of contention, nothing really changed anyway. Mikel Astarloza won the stage. I'm sure he's happy. Check out Pez for more.

Brad the Impaler won the stage in the FGBC Tour de France Pool. That is fitting, really, since Brad does a spot-on impression of our man Jens. He racked up 270 points for the win, getting points from Casar, Contador, and Roche. Melissa's strong showing coninues. She took second place on stage 16 with 230 points. Charlene rounded out the podium with a 220 point day.

In the overall race, Greg is still holding onto his lead. But just barely. Melissa is a mere 3 points back of retaking the lead. Considering they both have over 2700 points, that is very, very close. With Contador and Nibali on her squad, it's starting to look like Melissa may well have the team to beat. It doubt Greg's American duo of Armstrong and Vandevelde will be able to match the GC placing of Melissa's top two guys. So someone will have to have a sizeable lead to prevent Melissa from jumping ahead on the strength of the points awarded for the final GC and special jersey competitions. That doesn't look like it's about to happen. King Andy wasn't able to keep pace today. He's still in third place, but now finds himself 138 points back of the top spot on the GC. And he better watch out, because Brad is breathing down the King's neck. The Impaler is 70 points away from pulling a Hinault and throwing Andy from the podium.

Results and standings here.