Poor Cadel Evans

I tend to agree. Valverde is tainted, and although innocent until proven guilty should be the order of the day, CONI has seen fit to impose a ban, so for me it is guilty. Not only that but it seems that Valverde requires assistance to get around Evans whenever thay race. First Contador in the Dauphine, and now De La Fuente allowing Valverde to pass to collect the remaining time bonification.

I am also frustrated for Cadel watching Valverde pass his compatriot just before the line to claim time bonification after Cadel was boxed in by Gesink. BTW, I thought Gesink's move was more blatent than Hushovd's against Cavendish in the Tour, yet it went unpunished.

Don't want to be in the lead this early anyways, it just eats up your team to have to try and keep the jersey for 2 weeks.  Hang in there and stay close and drop them in the last few days for the win.

Agree with the post prior to mine: Cadel doesn't want the jersey yet. His team is quite young and would have a hard time killing themselves trying to chase down the breaks. It's actually probably going to be good news for Cadel.

I really hope he can win and get the 2nd place monkey off his back (and I really do not want Valverde to win either!).

Good race so far and it should only get better!

Wow just wow, can he catch a break? get a flat under 20k to go. Further, his team mate waited nearly 7k before he decided to drop back and help cadel. I know evans was upset with Silence Lotto before but this will probably put the nail in the coffin.