Despite a few anxious laps during the climactic Stage 7, wire-to-wire overall race leader Levi Leipheimer (Discovery Channel) found just enough energy to fend off a cheeky breakaway from Danny Pate (Slipstream) and win the 2007 Amgen Tour of California (TOC) . A seven-man group including Pate broke out from the main peloton very early in the race and worked a beautiful pace line to stretch the lead out to 2'50". Pate came into......

Levi Leipheimer successfully defended his gold leader's jersey yesterday in Stage 6 of the 2007 Amgen Tour of California (TOC), but it was Team CSC that commanded everybody's attention. Refusing to concede a single pedal stroke to Leipheimer or his Discovery Channel team, CSC kept the stage hopping with steady pressure on the front from veteran scrappers like Bobby Julich and Stuey O'Grady. For their efforts, CSC locked up the overall team classification and propelled their TOC sprint man Juan Jose "JJ" Haedo to his second stage victory of the tour.

Running 169.6 kilometers (km) from Santa Barbara to Santa Clarita across challenging terrain that included four King of the Mountain (KOM) category climbs, two points sprints, and three 5.6-km circuits to finish, Saturday's Stage 6 featured nonstop, granular action motivated by visions of personal glory and dedication to team and teammates.

It's one thing to sit in a team's slipstream or ride the momentum of the peloton, but the truest measure of a cyclist is how he (or she) performs in an individual time trial (TT). On Friday, in Stage 5 of the 2007 Amgen Tour of California (TOC), 127 bicycle riders looked into the face of destiny to see who would crack and would emerge triumphant. When the dust settled, it had become clear to all that Levi Leipheimer (Discovery Channel) is the best bicycle rider in the TOC.

In an individual TT, it's just the bicycle rider against the clock. No drafting, no group tactics, no jockeying for a sprint finish, no using other riders for motivation. Finishing position is irrelevant, it's all about the time. It is cycling distilled down to its most primal essence: how fast can you go?.

It was poetry in motion out there in Stage 3 of the Amgen Tour of California, like a ragged stream of consciousness.

Hills, . . . hills-hills mark the stage most crucial to date, elevation profile like an EKG.

Under the merciless stare of giant windmills stoic 17 riders breaking away BEWARE! the false summit of Patterson Pass, Van de Walle caught out as Peterson's debt to William Frischkorn grows. Over the top jersey stuffing newspapers, protection against the windy descent.

Let's face it, in the peloton of American spectator sports, cycling got cracked off the back on the first climb out of town and is just now working its way back into the rear of the pack. Even with eight straight years of Americans winning the Tour de France, the biggest event in the cycling world, cycling has only the most tenuous of holds on the American consciousness. O'er the pond, the Europeans have more than a century of rich road racing history and cultural lore out front making a passionate pace.

One of the problems is that American race promoters and fans haven't quite figured out how to wrest maximum entertainment value out of a professional cycling race. Organizers of the 2007 Amgen Tour of California (TOC) understood this issue and came up with a great solution: circuit laps to finish the stages. Brilliant.

Stage 1 of the Amgen Tour of California (TOC) started out in the brilliant sunshine of Sausalito but ended 156.2 kilometers (km) later under a cloud of controversy in downtown Santa Rosa. In between, riders faced heavy winds, multiple crashes, and an entertaining collection of breakaways and points sprints. When it was all said and done though, Levi Leipheimer was still the hometown golden boy.

This was a stage for cycling geeks to Tivo and watch over and over. From a rolling start, the peloton quickly pulled a Category 4 climb up and over the shoulder of Mt. Tam and down the Panoramic Highway to Stinson Beach, following Highway 1 through beautiful West Marin. Local roadies finally got a chance to see how the international cycling elite handle our regular rides. On the Versus network television coverage, legend Phil Liggett praised the beauty of the Panoramic Highway, but commented that it was a little narrow to ride when open to vehicle traffic. Ha!

Photographer Matt Cohen went to yesterday's Amigen Tour and took these photos of the race. You can't really pick a better place to hold a bike race than North Beach. At the end of the leg, Ben Jacques-Maynes, Jason Donald (Best Sprinter), Levi Leipheimer (Stage Winner) and Taylor Tolleson (Best Young Rider)......

For most of the day it looked like a total Cinderella story for unknown Jason Donald, but when the very last rider of the 2007 Tour of California (TOC) prologue crossed the finish line Sunday, it was Levi Leipheimer who had tears in his eyes.

A Credit Agricole rider suffers his way up the last 300 meters to the finish line atop Telegraph Hill. Photo from SF_Chris.

Following a ribbon-cutting ceremony and the national anthem, Jean-Marc Marino of team Credit Agricole rolled down the starting chute at 1:00 p.m. sharp and the prologue was on. In a time trial like Sunday's prologue, riders race alone and against the clock rather than against each other en masse. Following Marino, 144 more riders attacked the course at one-minute intervals for the next two hours.

Clip in sports fans, between the weather and the Amgen Tour of California (TOC), it's going to be a great weekend for cycling in the Bay Area.

Whether you're tackling Mt.Tam on your Saturday morning club ride or comparing yourselves to the pros with a summit of Stage 3's infamous Sierra Hill climb, pack the sunscreen today and leave the rain shell behind.

On Sunday at 1:00 p.m., the TOC starts with the prologue, a 3.0 kilometer time trial from the Ferry building to Coit Tower.

That's right Cutters, the Italians are coming, along with the French, the Spaniards, the Americans, the Germans, the Dutch-- yeah, even the Dutch. They're all going to be in the City this weekend to compete in this year's Amgen Tour of California.

We're talking the real deal. This isn't some club-level Saturday morning crit for free tubes at the local bike shop (no offense), this it the best road cyclists in the world, competing for top-tier elite international cycling teams like Discovery Channel, CSC, T-Mobile, Rabobank, and more, in serious competition.

For 127 of the best road cyclists in the world, it was five minutes of pain. For Americans Levi Leipheimer, Bobby Julich, George Hincapie, and Floyd Landis, it was a little less. For the American cycling peloton, veteran cycling announcer Paul Sherwen called it the Holy Grail they've been seeking. For the spectators, it was an instant classic....