Tour de France 2010: Stage eight - as it happened

Good afternoon and welcome to theguardian.com's coverage of stage eight of the Tour De France. The big news today is that Lance Armstrong crashed seven kilometres into the 189 stage to Morzine-Avoriaz, along with 10 other riders including Cadel Evans, who is second overall behind Sylvain Chavanel. It was not immediately clear whether Armstrong sustained any injuries, but he made it back to the peloton with the help of three RadioShack team mates. 2.45pm: Armstrong has just crashed again, a little over 50km from the finish. His jersey is torn and he is now trying to get back to the peleton ... again. But he is nearly 50 seconds behind them ... 2.52pm: On Eurosport, Sean Kelly believes Lance Armstrong will be able to ease back towards the peleton before the climbers hit the 1,619m Ramaz. At the moment the peleton is 4m23 seconds behind a group of seven, which includes Mario Aerts (Omega Pharma-Lotto) Koos Moerenhout (Rabobank), Benoit Vaugrenard (Francaise des Jeux), Imanol Erviti (Caisse d'Epargne), Amael Moinard and Sebastian Minard (both Cofidis) and Christophe Riblon (AG2R-La Mondiale). 3pm: Armstong, his jersey torn and his Radio Shack grunts silently helping him on, continues to inch back to the peleton. The gap is down to 3m35s to the leaders. 3.05pm: This from Gary Naylor: "Crashing is a part of cycling, but the best, in form, seem always to avoid them. If nervous, tired or with one's mind distracted, the falls will come. Not the least remarkable feature of the Tour Greats' careers is how seldom Merckx, Hinault, Lemond, Indurain and Armstrong fell off." True, Gary true. But I wouldn't say always: remember Armstrong crashing in 2003 when he caught his handlebar on the strap of a spectator's bag? Jan Ulrich sped ahead, then slowed for Armstrong to recover, and then watched in horror as Armstrong surged past him to win the stage by 40 seconds. 3.08pm: Lots of people are going backwards on the climb up the Ramaz, including Geraint Thomas and Jens Voight and, more surprisingly, Astana's David de la Fuente. 3.12pm: The gap from the three breakaway leaders - Aerts, Minard, Moerenhout - to the peleton is now down to 3m25. 3.17pm: Five kilometres from the summit of Ramaz, Chavanel looks to have cracked. Wiggins is sitting comfortably behind his Team Sky team-mates. 3.20pm: Chavanel is now over four minutes behind the leaders and a minute behind the peleton. 3.22pm: Armstrong is losing ground too! He's trying to get back using the wheel of Chris Horner but he's blowing up! 3.25pm: Meanwhile Gary Naylor is back. "The 2003 LA crash was great television (I literally jumped out of my chair) but LA had clearly intended to attack and so, once confident that the bike was okay, the anger he felt at his own carelessness (for the fault was his) drove his furious ascent. It's the popped collarbones that finish a Tour early, though Tyler Hamilton even beat that one - possibly with some illegal assistance." Possibly, Gary? Possibly? 3.27pm: The Astana riders are pushing things on, eager to capitalise on Armstrong's woes. And the pace is such that Vinokourov and Kloden have dropped off too. No one expected this ... Wiggins is still alongside Contador in the peleton, but Armstrong is 40 seconds down. 3.28pm: Top riders still in the peleton: Evans, Wiggins, Contador, Schleck, Leipheimer ... 3.32pm: To the sound of ringing bells, the three breakaway leaders - Aerts, Minard, Moerenhout - go over the Ramaz, 1m55 ahead of the peleton. There's 34.2km left of this stage. 3.35pm: Lance Armstrong is now a minute behind the peleton. 3.37pm: The peleton hit the descent. As Sean Kelly on Eurosport points out, it will be interesting to see if Astana push on ahead of the final climb, or whether they ease off slightly which may allow Armstong to claw back some time. 3.41pm: More from my co-commentator, Gary Naylor: "Before the advent of EPO in the peloton, even great champions had to face at least one crisis in a Grand Tour. The trick was to avoid losing the race on a bad day, which could be achieved through the support of the team or the strange ability to make other teams fail to attack. LA is in a crisis now, but he has neither the team, nor passive opponents, to help him. Expect Contador to go very hard from half way up the last climb and Evans to suck his wheel for all but the last 500 metres. LA? Three minutes back and finished." I'm not sure Armstrong is quite finished ... he's barking orders to his team-mate on the descent. 3.46pm: As things stand, Cadel Evans will be in yellow tonight with Chavanel still going backwards. 3.51pm: The Radio Shack team have deliberately slowed up. They've clearly given up the chase for the day ... Armstrong is surely out of contention for this year's Tour De France - the big question now is whether he'll continue deep into this race. 3.54pm: Armstrong is involved in his third crash of the day! A rider in front of him wobbles over during a feed station and although he doesn't crash, he tips his bike over and loses more time. 4pm: We're coming up to the final climb of the day. Astana are leading the way, and there's 13km to the summit. 4.03pm: Incidentally, Aerts, Moinard, Moerenhout are still leading - with the peleton 1m36 behind and Armstrong's group 4m02 back. 4.05pm: Chavanel, meanwhile, is 5m05 down on the leading group ... 4.08pm: The main riders are now in the early stages of the climb to Morzin-Avoriaz. Wiggins, who has no Team Sky members to help him out, is beginning to slip out the back. Alberto Contador, meanwhile, is surrounded by three Astana riders and looks the picture of controlled calm. 4.11pm: The peleton is closing the gap on the leaders; it's down to 54 seconds down. Meanwhile Armstrong continues to grunt, to growl, to bite into his gums but all to no avail: he's over five minutes behind now. 4.14pm: More from Gary Naylor: "Evans has to attack here. He really lacks any instinct for Grand Tour cycling." Really Gary? Really? Has Evans ever taken time out of Contador in a climb during a Grand Tour? And, remember, Contador has three team-mates with him. Surely he'd be better off trying to stick with Contador in the mountains - he has a 1m01 second lead, remember - and squeeze a little bit of time during the next time trial? 4.17pm: The peleton is just 31 seconds behind the lead group, with 6.8km to go. 4.20pm: Aerts and Moinard are about to be swallowed up with 6km to go ... Meanwhile the remainder of the Astana team - Contador and Navarro - are still at the front of a group of about 20 riders. 4.21pm: Lance Armstrong is now 6m20 back. And looking every one of his 38 years ... 4.23pm: Schleck, Evans, Contador, Rogers, Castre are all still in the main group. I backed Rogers to win the Tour three years ago at a huge price and was quite excited when he charged off in a mountain stage ... and then he crashed. 4.25pm: Rogers is dropping off the back of the group, but Wiggins continues to sit midtable ... 4.26pm: I wrote too soon; Rogers recovers to stick with the peleton ... but Wiggins has blown up completely with 3km to go. 4.28pm: Meanwhile Gary Naylor is back. "But that's exactly the kind of thinking that has led Evans to fail time after time. And not just fail - which is forgiveable - but not to give himself a chance - which is not. If Evans went, Schleck would go too and Contador would be under pressure - and then we'd see what he's made of." Sort of see where you're coming from but I don't think Evans is good enough to attack Contador in the mountains. Right now, he also has a 1m01 lead over him. So why go for broke one week into a three-week tour? 4.30pm: Just 2.5km to go now. Armstrong is 7m37 behind the leaders. 4.31pm: Kreuziger attacks! Basso, Rogers, Rodriguez are all forced to dig in as Schleck, Contador and Hessink play cat-and-mouse at the front. 4.32pm: Schleck attacks! And Contador is unable to respond ... 4.34pm: Sanchez leads with Schleck second ... the Contador group is probably about 10 seconds back. 4.35pm: Schleck punches his fists in the air after pipping Sanchez on the line to win in four hours 45 minutes and 11 seconds. Contador finishes 10 seconds down, along with Cadel Evans, who will take the yellow jersey tonight. 4.37pm: Bradley Wiggins finishes 1m45 behind ... that's a lot of time to lose in 3km. 4.38pm: Armstrong continues to rhythmically trudge towards the finish line; face as emotive as the Terminator T-100. 4.41pm: Here are the overall standings after Stage 8. 1. EVANS C (BMC) 37h 57' 09" 2. SCHLECK A. (SAX) 00' 20" 3. CONTADOR A. (AST) 01' 01" 4. VAN DEN BROECK J. (OLO) 01' 03" 5. MENCHOV D. (RAB) 01' 10" 6. HESJEDAL R. (GRM) 01' 11" 7. KREUZIGER R. (LIQ) 01' 45" 8. LEIPHEIMER L. (RSH) 02' 14" 9. SANCHEZ S. (EUS) 02' 15" 10. ROGERS M. (THR) 02' 31" 4.45pm: Armstrong enters the last kilometre, knee cut, shorts torn, elbow patched and jersey zipped wide open showing off the silver medalion dangling around his neck. Meanwhile Schleck is already on the podium, giving his thoughts on the race. 4.48pm: According to Schleck: "The tactic wasn't really to attack today, but this puts me in a great position. I am very confident. I have made a lot of sacrifices this year but I feel right for this race. My legs are fine, I'm in a quiet place mentally, and I hope I have another great day. I've just got to thank my team for everything they've done today. It was job to do, but they trusted me." 4.51pm: Meanwhile here's the standings for stage 8. 1. Andy Schleck (Lux/Saxo Bank) 4h 54m 11s 2. Samuel Sanchez (Esp/Euskatel) same time 3. Robert Gesink (Net/Rabobank) +10" 4. roman kreiziger (Cze/Liquigas) same time 5. Alberto Contador (Esp/Astana) same time 6. Cadel Evans (Aus/BMC Racing) same time 7. Jurgen van den Broeck (Bel/Omega Pharma-Lotto) same time 8. Levi Leipheimer (USA/Radioshack) same time 9. Ivan Basso (Ita/Liquigas) same time 10. Denis Menchov (Rus/Rabobank) same time