CASTELSARRASIN, France (AP) _ Daniele Bennati of Italy won the
17th stage of the Tour de France and Alberto Contador of Spain
became the new overall leader Thursday, a day after Michael
Rasmussen was sent home for lying to his team in another devastating
jolt to cycling's premier event.
Bennati won a sprint at the end of the 188.5-kilometre trek from
Pau to Castelsarrasin, as the doping-marred Tour staggered north
toward its finish Sunday in Paris.
Bennati, riding for the Lampre Fondital team, won a Tour stage
for the first time. He led a small breakaway group and finished in
four hours 14 minutes four seconds. Markus Fothen of Germany was
second and Martin Elmiger of Switzerland was third.
Contador earned the leader's yellow jersey. He had been second
overall to Rasmussen after Wednesday's last ride in the Pyrenees,
when the Dane's Rabobank team took him out of the race.
``I would have liked to take it on Wednesday,'' said Contador,
who finished second to Rasmussen in that stage, up the Col
d'Aubisque. ``But these are particular circumstances, and that's
just the way it is.''
The last time there was no yellow jersey was when leader Rolf
Sorensen crashed and was too injured to continue in 1991, according
to the Tour's website.
Contador, a 24-year-old Discovery Channel rider, leads by one
minute 53 seconds over Cadel Evans of Australia in second. His
Discovery teammate, Levi Leipheimer of the United States, is third,
2:49 back.
Rasmussen was ousted by his team for lying about his whereabouts
during pre-race training, the third blow this week to the venerable
104-year-old Tour. In recent days, two riders _ including star
Alexandre Vinokourov _ were thrown out because of positive drug
tests.
Some French newspapers declared the Tour dead on Thursday and
said it should be stopped after the bombshell announcement late on
Wednesday night that Rasmussen's team was sending the Dane home.
Team spokesman Jacob Bergsma said Rasmussen's withdrawal was
ordered by sponsor Rabobank. It was linked to ``incorrect''
information that Rasmussen gave to the team's sports director over
his whereabouts last month. Rasmussen missed random drug tests on
May 8 and June 28, saying he was in Mexico. But a former rider,
Davide Cassani, said he had seen Rasmussen in Italy in mid-June.
Tour director Christian Prudhomme on Thursday described the
withdrawal of Rasmussen as ``the best news of the week.''
Rasmussen had been the leader since July 15.
``My career is ruined,'' Rasmussen told Dutch newspaper Algemeen
Dagblad. ``I have no idea what I should do or where I will go. This
is an enormous blow for me, and also for all the guys from the Rabo
team. They're devastated.''
Contador said he had not missed any doping tests.
``I am clean. If I weren't, I wouldn't be here,'' he said
Thursday.
