On Saturday, I spent all day in Antella during the class B triathlon held in the town. I didn't run myself, but helped my teammates giving them food, water and of course, support. The triathlon is quite good because the swim is held in one of the biggest rivers around the Valencian territory, Xúquer, in a place where the water is a bit more calm and the current isn't so strong. The distances are double than in a normal Olympic triathlon: 2.500m swimming, 80km cycling and 20km running. This year, it started at 15:30 instead of 8:00, as last year the running segment turned out to be hell itself, at 13:00 or so, in the middle of the heat wave. This year the only people who really suffered the heat were assistants, so that's probably ok. :)

While the triathletes concentrated for the race two hours before, the rest of us had a nice bath in the river, and killed the time jumping down from a 10 metre fall and then climbing up again.

During the triathlon, we were quite busy taking pics and helping our team mates, and after 5 hours of competition and a few more of wait for the award ceremony (we were second in the team rank), we went back to València at 23:30 or so. We should to Antella more often, having baths in l'assut is a lot more fun than the beach.

There were no surprises in the Alps or the time trial, and Armstrong managed to win his 6th consecutive Tour de France. That I initially wanted Ullrich to win doesn't mean I acknoweledge there was no rival for him this year, and he's, without doubt, the best rider the History of Le Tour has know. US Postal is also with difference the best team around right now. Congrats!

Related to Lance, jfleck has been blogging about the Lance Armstrong Foundation and his LiveStrong initiative to help survivors of cancer. It's very nice to see people like Lance spending some of his time in helping others while they go through what he managed to defeat years ago. It's interesting, too, as he's a fierce competitor while riding (this year he has won in time-trials, sprinting, in mountain stages, just conceeding a victory to Basso one day), but is obviously another kind of person outside the cycling world.

During some of the mountain stages, and specially in Alpe d'Huez, you could see people booing at him as he flied past them. That wasn't good either. You might not like his fierceness or the fact that he is now the best rider, but if you don't like it just don't hail or clap. One Spanish diary translated his comments about the Basque spectators in La Mongie as if "they wanted to kill him". This probably wasn't what Armstrong said, but made many people here think he was quite idiot.

Congrats to jfleck, greg and others, too!