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July 24

    Today will be the deciding factor for the final podium in Paris, except for the green jersey, which won't be decided until the last spring on the Champs Elysees. We have a bigger group of friends meeting us at Bugsy's today. Doug & Joanne Larimore, who have been with us on the Champs for several previous years, the Fowkes family, Renee Nicholas (two year breast cancer survivor) & Allison Wright who have both been on staff at LiveStrong for many years, Claire (Angie's friend who's been in culinary school in Paris the past year) and a few others that may join us.

    Slept past breakfast, again, and made the walk to Bugsy's. In previous years we've followed the Tour every day. It's a very tiring vacation, if you call it that, because of the banners and signs we display promoting Livestrong, so this year we decided to skip being on the last couple of stages and just watching, then have our usual setup in Paris. If we had been at the time trial today, we probably wouldn't have gotten to Paris until midnight or later, then we'd have to get up at 4:00am to get to the Champs to have our pick of exactly where we want ed to be.

    Strolled to the bar about 1:00 and had lunch and a beer with our crowd as they arrived. The race today was fairly uneventful until the last few riders. We figured Fabian Cancellara would win the stage and he had already set the fastest time, which nobody else was getting close too. We'd cheer for Lance as he rode, but knew with the effort he'd put out through the crashes and the long breakaway he'd been in that he was tired and wouldn't be a threat for the stage. The real questions would be can the Spaniard Samuel Sanchez keep his third place on the podium and can Andy Schleck ride the TT of his life and beat Contador.

Jimmy watching Lance ride

Molly just being her cute self

The beers have kicked in

    Great day with our friends! Interesting that Andy rode a great TT for him and that the time difference ended up exactly what Contador gained when he attacked Schleck when he dropped his chain a few days ago on the climb. Should make for a good rivalry in Tours to come. The nice thing is that Radio Shack locked up winning the Team Classification, so Lance will be on the podium for his last Tour.

    As we were about ready to leave, our bartender, Babs decided we need to toast LiveStrong with a shot and proceeded to setup glasses and start filling before anyone had a chance to refuse. So Salute! Sonte! LiveStrong and we toasted to 28 million people around the world affected by cancer! Somehow Babs poured too many and I had to take a double for the team. Sometimes we must sacrifice.

    Gotta get to bed early tonight because we'll be one of the first on the street in the morning, not counting the drunks just going home at 5:00am.