With the three leading riders within eight seconds of each other, the Tour de France is even tighter than expected less than a week before the finish in Paris. Australia's Cadel Evans, who held the yellow-jersey by just a second entering the Alps on Sunday, stumbled in the first test after suffering attacks from all sides, most notably from the CSC team of new Tour leader Frank Schleck. But the Australian, the Tour number one after the Astana team of last year's winner Spain's Alberto Contador were not allowed to start, remained confident after the 15th stage. “You can see what a beautiful race this is. It's closer than ever and nothing's over,” Evans said after falling eight seconds behind Luxembourg's Schleck and one adrift of Austrian climber Bernhard Kohl. The Silence-Lotto team leader remains a firm contender with experts predicting he will beat most of his rivals by at least two minutes in Saturday's penultimate stage, 53-km individual time trial between Cerilly and St. Amand-Montrond. Despite their show of strength in the Italian stage of the Tour, Schleck's team still have a lot to do to widen the gap sufficiently but warned Evans that the worst was still to come.
