Basso - tour Italy and tour de france?

I believe that Basso will win the Giro and is the odds on favorite to win the Tour. With no clear cut favorite, it will come down to who gets the most support from their team.

With Liberty Seguros dropping sponsorship of their team as of today, there are a few wildcards out there that could change the mix. Vinokourov is the top name that is now without a contract.

Petacchi is also in the mix, although he is not in top form at this time.

Should be fun to watch as it's wide open!

Basso has won the Tour of Italy by riding smart. He won it in the beginning allowing him basically to train the rest of the way. Some may argue that he is peaking too soon. But he is young, and he should be able to sustain it going into the Tour de France. But there are a lot of contenders for this year TdF. Jan Ullrich is riding into form. He is still tough ITT. And his team did well in the TTT in the Giro d'Italia. There is Floyd Landis who has won the Tour of Cali and Georgia. He dropped out of the International Crit. But he will be a force in the TdF. It is a strong field this year. And the Discovery team might be protecting George Hincapie who has had a good Spring season. My money is on Landis.

I think the Tour de France is wide open this year - would love to see some unknown kid shock everyone. A lot of the "favorites" are getting old.

It's so difficult these days to see how stong the top riders really are - most only peak for "the" tour.

If I were betting, I'd take Basso. I have a feeling he's going to destroy Ulrich in the mountains.

the tour of italy and the tour of switzerland are good indicators of how well a rider is doing as far as aiming for the TDF. they used to use those tours as training races in preparation for the TDF, now they are major races in themselves. I think Basso will be a contender barring not being involved in any crashes!