Stage Eleven: Lannemezan > Foix

After a well-deserved rest, the cyclists are back on the road today! The Tour is far from decided and far from over. What twists and turns will fate throw the riders in the next 10 stages?! Certainly today's route will take the riders through the twisting roads of the foothills of the Pyrenees, a route never before included in the Tour itinerary. The three towers of Castle Foix seen against the backdrop of the Pyrenees mountains will provide plenty of beautiful scenery for Paul and Phil to embellish their commentary!

Team CSC's Kurt-Asle Arvesen was part of the 12-man breakaway 20km into the stage and went on to win it - narrowly beating Lampre's Alessandra Ballan and AG2R's Martin Elmiger. Because no one in the breakaway group was a threat in the GC standings, the peloton (and mainly Team Silence-Lotto) let them go ahead without any response and as a result we have no change in the yellow jersey standings.

The standings after Stage 11:
Yellow: Cadel Evans (Silence-Lotto)
Green: Oscar Freire (Rabobank)
Polka Dot: Riccardo Ricco (Saunier Duval-Scott)
White: Riccardo Ricco (Saunier Duval-Scott)
Team: Team CSC

Have you voted yet? If not, pop on over to the Rest Day and cast your vote for your favourite entry from our shortlisted Intermediate Sprint #1.

Once you've voted, it's time to start work on Intermediate Sprint #2! And here 'tis:

The Regional Challenge:
Every region and town in France seems to have its very own specialty wine, cheese, or produce that it is particularly well known for. One of the joys of the Tour de France is to discover the flavours which characterise each region. This week's intermediate sprint is all about regions:

• France Option: Present us with a regional French specialty - have a wine or cheese tasting, cook a regional dish (here's some inspiration), or research a regional product such as perfume or fashion and tell us all about your findings!
• Cycling Option: Get on your bike and show us something special about your own region where you live and cycle!
• Knitting Option: Is your project inspired by or traditional to a particular region (whether French or not?) Investigate the origins of a technique or pattern you're using and tell us all about it! Note: entries need not let pesky facts get in the way of a good story!

Entries may be posted on your blog or (if you do not have a blog) on a photo sharing service such as Flickr or Picasa (you can use the caption and comments/notes facilities to explain your entry).

In order to enter, please leave a comment on this post containing a link to your entry. Entries will close at midnight, Paris time, on July 21st (at the end of the next Rest Day following Stage 15).

The Tour co-hostesses will select a shortlist of entries, which will then be opened up to a vote by all TDF participants to decide the final winner! Bonne chance!!

And now - the news from the knitters following their rest day - but from the looks of things, many people have been very busy indeed!

A very brief update from the Leaky-Gas team.

Look what Betseydoodle has been up to :-) Isn't it lovely.

And I have a heel - with wraps and short rows :-)

This briefest of updates sadly brings my stint on the TdF KAL and blog to a close. It's been such fun getting to know you all :-)

Jusqu'à ce que nous rencontrions le gain

[The lovely Kate will now be giving us our Leaky-Gas updates - Ed.]

Team AG2R-Mondiale
Katie's up to the calf shaping in her Neither Garments and has already done stripes in the special tour colours. She also attended her first knit night where she did most of the knitting.
After knitting more 10 rows, Gemma started the wings on her dragon shawl. She may be on the look out for a pilgrim for a good photo opportunity.

And with the winner of today's stage....Team CSC:
A big Woo Hoo for our team with the stage win!
Lori truly enjoyed her rest day with no knitting on the Pi Shawl. Instead she drank wine and knit on another project. Maybe tomorrow she'll get back to the shawl.
We hope Sarah got all her frogging done on her lace sweater, and is back on the road to Paris.

Team Rabobank:

The rest day came just in time for poor Kate, who got walloped by her daughters' tummy bug. But like a true pro, Kate is indefatigable (she posted recipes for FOOD from her sickbed, which is an incomprehensible show of fortitude in my eyes) and was quickly back on her feet with needles in hand:

Ondulation is three-quarters done! (Kate asks that you pardon her iSight's resolution limitations.)

Erika offers her update in rhyme:

Ode to my progress on the BYOB bag

I decided to ditch
the pattern’s seed stitch
because it was being a…it was being difficult.

I frogged a few rows
and sighed, “I just knows
that one day I’ll reach those yo’s.”

(the ones in the middle of the bag, that is)

Anyway, I’m re-doing the stripes because 1) I think they’ll look crisper in stockinette, and 2) I felt like doing stockinette instead. Things should go faster now!

And as I predicted, Beth has a finished Baudelaire sock to flaunt:

Sandy is plugging away at her entrelac bag and has nearly reached the point where the diamonds get smaller, but meanwhile she's also finished a most intriguing secret project - I have to share the photo because it's so tantalizing and beautiful and she won't tell what it is:

But it looks an awful lot like a beautiful yoke sweater with stranded colorwork, and I can't resist those!

Sarah is about to pack up and take her yellow cardigan on the road, as she's attending Meg Swansen's Knitting Camp in Wisconsin. She's crossing her fingers that the Holiday Inn gets the Versus channel... otherwise she may be wandering the streets of Marshfield in search of a sports bar or a friendly native with cable! As of tomorrow, Kate will be taking the reins to guide the team up to the dizzy heights of Prato Nevoso and l'Alpe-d'Huez... Sarah will chime in as much as she can!

Team Lampre update: Things are veeeery quiet here. I guess team members did take advantage of the day of rest. Greeley ran into a little trouble with Manon: "The mountains did me in... Had to rip back to get gauge anew. Looking forward to the rest day. I think I can recover!"
And Jordan reports "I’ve been doing a lot of tour watching and only a little bit of knitting – yes, it’s like a tour rider saying “I’ve been on my bike but I’ve only been peddling every now and then”. But I did manage to frog several rows of my Juliet ‘Binoche’ sweater and redo them and now I actually have the correct number of stitches."

Team Quick Step Update.
Alli is storming ahead with her crop cardigan,

and possibly working too hard! Stop moving the furniture and stick to knitting!
Jennifer has begun her new project, the Parisenne Beret in a colour she's trying to convince us is French!

Oh and this beautiful...thing...sshhh, it's a secret.

Lauren is knitting Thermal,(from Knitty Winter 2006) which seems to be notorious for being unfinished. She says she started the sweater towards the end of May and flew through the body and the first sleeve in just over a week, but hadn’t started the second sleeve yet.

Well now she has and is racing through it.

Madalyn has returned from her rest day(s), do you think she did any knitting? Go see for yourself!

Marge is doing so well on her project, finishing the Fairisle Cardigan, that she's even tempting fate with the knitting gods to say so! Careful now!
She's off on a trip with her bike this weekend, Have fun Marge.

I can't put what Shelley had to say in my own words, so here it is...
"The blanket is going swimmingly. QuiltingMick suggested a simple crochet-picoted edge when I finish it off. (The more I think about it - the more I love it. Now, I've just got to learn how to do it...). I think I can get it all done by the end of next week. Very excited. It's been such a lovely project so far, and watching the lace just blossom with each row has been an utter delight. Yes. I have the bug. It's all over now."
Well done you Shelley.

And Whitney, our Immediate Sprint finalist has been planning for her Gansey Sleeves.



don't forget to vote.