Tour de France 2008 – Stage VII

Tonight is Stage 7 (Brioude to Aurillac) 159 km

Climbs:
Cat 3 – at:11.0km – Côte de Fraisse – h:912m
Cat 2 – at:52.0km – Côte de Villedieu – h:958m
Cat 2 – at:101.5km – Col d’Entremont – h:12101m
Cat 4 – at:117.0km – Pas de Peyrol (Puy Mary) – h:1588m
Cat 3 – at:150.0km – Côte de Saint-Jean-de-Donne – h:822m

via UBI Labs tracker

Stage Details:

• stage 7 – Brioude > Aurillac 159 km [www.letour.fr]
• Stage 7 – Brioude > Aurillac [SBS]
• Brioude – Aurillac, 159km [CyclingNews]
• Stage 7 • BRIOUDE > AURILLAC • 159 km [EuroSport]
• Stage 7 preview: Brioude → Aurillac, 158k (hilly) [SteepHill]
• Route Tour de France 08, Étape 07: Brioude – Aurillac [bikemap.net]

Live:
Live Race Data [Polar]
Live Telemetry [SRM]
Current local time in Paris (World Clock)

Live Audio|AudioPlayer [EuroSport]
Tour de France – Live Tracker [UBI Labs]
stage 7 – Brioude > Aurillac 159 km live [www.letour.fr]
Brioude – Aurillac, 159km Complete live report [CyclingNews]
Brioude – Aurillac “live match” [Eurosport Yahoo!]
TdFblog (Frank Steele’s) [Twitter]
Boulder Report Live Blog [bicycling.com]
SBS: Tour de France 2008 Forum [SBS]

Results:

17:11 – Sanchez Claims His Victory!
Luis Sanchez has pointed to the heavens as he crossed the line. He has given Caisse d’Epargne its second stage victory for the 2008 Tour.
17:10 – Sanchez Leads By 10″
There has been an attack by Schumacher in the chase but Sanchez is about to start celebrating his first victory in the Tour de France in much the same manner as his win in Nice in Paris-Nice earlier this year.
– [www.letour.fr]

Le parcours 2008 : découvrez l’étape 7
(Tour de France YouTube Channel)

Stage 7 results:
01 Luis Leon Sanchez Gil (Caisse d’Epargne)
02 Stefan Schumacher (Gerolsteiner)
03 Filippo Pozzato (Liquigas)
04 Kim Kirchen (Team Columbia)
05 Alejandro Valverde (Caisse d’Epargne)
06 Oscar Pereiro Sio (Caisse d’Epargne)
07 Samuel Sanchez Gonzalez (Euskaltel – Euskadi)
08 Josep Jufre Pou (Saunier Duval – Scott)
09 Christian Vande Velde (Team Garmin-Chipotle)
10 Andy Schleck (Team CSC – Saxo Bank)

15:37 CEST 96km/63km to go
Christophe Moreau has abandoned the race!
15:38 CEST
That is the second abandon of the day. Mauro Facci (Quick Step) was the first one to go.
– [CyclingNews]

Spaniard Luis León Sánchez dominated the final descent into Aurillac after an undulating stage through the Massif Central to win ahead of an elite group of riders containing yellow jersey Kim Kirchen and former leader Stefan Schumacher. Notably absent from this group was Italian Damiano Cunego, who suffered a crash earlier in the stage and further damage to his overall challenge.
– Gregor Brown [Cycling News]

But in OH $H!7 news Tricky Beltrán has tested positive for EPO;

Spain’s Manuel Beltran tests positive for the banned blood booster EPO at the Tour de France.
– BBC

French police have taken Spaniard Manuel Beltran away for questioning in the wake of the first doping scandal to emerge at this year’s Tour de France.
– VeloNews

Tour de Web:
(What others have to say about this stage)
[1] Stage 7 – Brioude – Aurillac, 159km [Cycling News]
[2] Results: Brioude – Aurillac, 159km [Cycling News]
[3] SBS Tour de France 2008: Stage & Map [SBS]
[4] Stage 7 Photos [Graham Watson]
[5] — [TDF Blog]
[6] Stage 7 results: Luis León Sánchez (Caisse d’Epargne) solos the descent and run into Aurillac on a difficult, hilly, crosswinds day that riders rate the hardest of the Tour [Steephill.tv]
[7] STAGE 7: SANCHEZ WINS STAGE; CUNEGO CRASHES [The Tour de France for the Rest of Us]
[8] Stage Seven as it happened [BBC]
[9] Sanchez seals Tour stage victory [BBC]
[10] Stage 7: Caisse d’Epargne’s Sanchez solos to victory [Spare Cycles]
[11] Tour de France ‘08 Stage 7 Link Roundup [Spare Cycles]
[12] Stage Seven: Brioude to Aurillac [Tour de France Lanterne Rouge]
[13] Luis Leon Sanchez wins at Aurillac [VeloNews]
[14] Stage 7 • BRIOUDE > AURILLAC • 159 km [EuroSport]
[15] Daily Video – Stage 7 [Versus]

[Error number: 0x80072F76]

A laptop that I manage had been running along ok with MS Office XP, but to allow for the use of “ink” enabled packages for use with an interactive whiteboard it was time to upgrade to MS Office 2003. (NOTE: We don’t run Office 2007). I un-installed Office XP, restarted and installed Office 2003 Pro. I had copies of SP1 and SP2 for Office 2003 with me but no SP3 so I jumped onto Microsoft Update to patch the system … this is where things didn’t look too good

[Error number: 0x80072F76]

WTF? Straight onto Google and I see that MS KB836941 deals with this;

CAUSE
These errors indicate that the Windows Update client did not receive a response from the Windows Update or Microsoft Update Web site. This may be caused by programs that are running on the client computer or by general network-related failures.

Not up there with the most useful KB’s ever published. The information available regarding this issue is quite poor but there are some gems that can be sifted from the chaff. After checking network connectivity and proxy-on/proxy-off configurations it was time to dig a little deeper. There appear to be two distinct options at play with this error;

1. Third party software (AntiVirus/Firewall/anti-Spyware/etc.) blocks the Update
2. The Microsoft update cache files, ActiveX controls, or other component has become corrupted.

As I did didn’t have anything unusual happening with the security software a quick replacement of the Windows Update software was in order.

THE FIX:

1. Control Panel > Automatic Updates > Turn Off Automatic Updates
2. Administrative Tools > Services > Automatic Updates : Stop Service
3. Rename %SystemRoot%\SoftwareDistribution to be %SystemRoot%\SoftwareDistributionOLD
4. Administrative Tools > Services > Automatic Updates : Start Service
5. Re-run Windows Update and let it rebuild all of the ActiveX controls and settings
6. Control Panel > Automatic Updates > Turn On Automatic Updates

A short time later things were off and running again.