Battling cancer ... and staying upbeat about it

I'm at work, and probably shouldn't be trying to sneak in this post, but ... given the subject matter, and the the fact that it's fresh on the brain (no jokes solicited), I thought I'd do it anyway.

A work colleague, Carl Sygiel (pictured), has been undergoing treatment for prostate cancer for about a year now. He did the prostate removal surgery, went through a battery of chemotherapy and now is in the final stretch of a seven-week radiation treatment. Even though tests and image screens indicated his cancer had barely entered nodes and spread marginally outside the prostate, his doctors recommended the maximum treatment to avoid taking any chances.

Carl has held up remarkably well; he lost what little hair he had (he's mostly bald) during chemo, but that little bit is coming back now, and the only real "change" is that he's gained weight. Odd thing about that, too, is that his doctors don't want his weight to fluctuate during the radiation treatment. So Carl, who was pretty active in the years before he began tackling the prostate cancer (he's participated in several bike tours in recent years, including at least three or four annual 72-mile America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride in Lake Tahoe, Nev., to benefit the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society). I'm sure Carl is not too thrilled about the weight gain thing, but he realizes it's a small price to pay to ensure he bounces back from this.

The reason I'm posting this is that Carl, who turned 60 last December, has taken an unusual step through all this: keeping friends and family informed with periodic -- and upbeat -- notes about his treatment and progress. His latest arrived today, and it was such a fun read, I thought I'd share it with any of you who might be interested. The accompanying picture is a bit dated; it's probably eight years old.

Here's Carl's update today:

Greetings all:

We are nearly two months into 2010, we've buried the Colts, the snow has buried us, the Olympics are in full swing, Tiger Woods has confessed his sins, and I hope by now everyone has decided how they are pronouncing the new year. Do you say two-thousand ten, or do you say twenty-ten? I don't know that it qualifies as the burning question of the day, but I guess some people do get worked up over things like that. But once again, I digress.

Whatever year this is, it has ushered in the final phase of my three-pronged prostate cancer treatment. I began radiation treatments in mid-January and am cruising down the home stretch. The schedule called for 37 treatments, and I've done 27 so far. It's every day, Monday through Friday, with weekends off for good behavior. The first few weeks, the treatment times were all over the map, but now I've settled in at 8 a.m. It means getting up early, but at least it doesn't interrupt my workday.

I had no idea how all this worked, but I've since learned, and actually, it's pretty fascinating stuff. Radiation beams are like powerful x-rays and they kill cancer cells. Unfortunately, they can also damage good stuff that gets in the way. Things like kidneys and colons and bladders and other, uh.... kinda important organs in the area. Radiation used to be doled out in sort of a one-size-fits all approach. The latest technology is called IMRT or intensity-modulated radiation therapy. The rays are delivered in varying doses and shapes from different directions by this enormous piece of equipment called a linear accelerator or more formally, something that looks like a giant water faucet.

In my case, the faucet head turns around counterclockwise and zaps me from seven different positions. There are 71 zappings each day. Trust me, I've counted them: 13-14-3-7-14-12-8. I've even gone so far as to play those numbers in the lottery. Hey, winning that would be one of those side effects everyone could like.

The rays come through tiny different shaped openings formed by small, lead Venetian-blind-like shades. Imagine putting a stencil on a paper and then scribbling over the top with a pencil. You lift the stencil and the shape is left on the paper below. It could be a circle, or a box or maybe even the state of Oklahoma. The rays race through like Danica Patrick and then crash into the area being treated --- come to think of it, also like Danica Patrick. Most of the radiation is absorbed, some is diffused, which is why all the techs scurry out behind a door that's about 8 feet thick.

The New York Times recently ran a frightening story on what can happen if radiation treatments go awry. Once the oncologist maps out a plan, the machine is programmed and pretty much runs on its own. The therapist is supposed to keep an eye on everything on their own computer screen and as long they aren't asleep at the wheel or sexting somebody, it all runs like clockwork. I brought the article in, however, just to keep everybody on their toes.

Remember the tattoos I wrote about? I've got 'em now. Three specks, one on each hip and a third in the groin. Laser beams come from the ceiling and the walls, hit the tattoos and line you up precisely on the table. I've been told not to lose weight or gain weight during the seven week process because it will throw off the dimensions. Like they don't want you eating a whole pizza before your treatment because your stomach will be bigger and closer to the machine, and they will have to adjust the table. Seriously.

They say radiation is supposed to make you tired and make your skin red. I've experienced a little of both, but for the most part, it's been pretty tolerable. The whole daily process takes about 25 minutes. I've done the math and at the end of the 37 days, I will have been zapped 2,627 times. If I've been glowing with excitement lately, you know why. I meet with the doctor every Wednesday, and when you go to the same place 37 times, you get to know the techs, the nurses, even the women in the office. I brought 'em all doughnuts for Valentine's Day, figuring they didn't have to worry if their stomachs got bigger.

Meanwhile, I'm still making monthly trips to Methodist Hospital for a Lupron shot and a Zometa infusion. That will eventually space out to every three months with a target date to finish of 11/11/11, about a year and a half from now. And of course, there are the daily pills (Casodex, Avodart, calcum, etc). I take about seven a day. It really is a long process, but they run blood tests every month and so far each time, the numbers are good: negligible PSA, good white and red blood cell counts, and whatever else they stick you for.

It's amazing how fast time flies. It's been just about a year since I first went to the doctor and got the news that started this ball rolling. I've been asked hundreds of times by friends, "So how are you feeling?" The answer is "Great," and to be honest, it's a question I never get tired of answering.

carl

A whistle out to Mozart ... and those like him

S o it’s a Saturday morning, and I’m sitting here typing this ... while whistling Mozart.

The great composer is my current obsession, and it isn’t the first time. I’d written a draft of a post for this blog in October that I never finished and, consequently, never posted, that was about the motion picture Amadeus. Which is about, of course, Mozart.

And a little over year before that, I went a solid nine months without listening to any music except Mozart  — not on my car CD player or at home on my computer media player or living room stereo. And to think that when I was a child, taking piano lessons that I absolutely detested, I had to play ... and practice ... so much Mozart. Such began my hate-love relationship with this fascinating composer.

Before I go further, in case you’d like to get in sync with me musically, the music I’m listening to while whistling is “Mozart: The Piano Quartets,” featuring instrumentalists Emmanuel Ax (on piano), Jaime Laredo (on viola), Isaac Stern (on violin) and Yo-Yo Ma (on cello). 

An acquaintance from a classical music discussion group at the business networking site LinkedIn pointed me to this recording about a month ago, and it’s been difficult for me to listen to anything else since. I absolutely adore it, which I’m sure explains why I’m whistling along right now.

Which gets me back to the point: love-hate relationships, or hate-love relationships. 

Most people, when they use or grasp that phrase, think of things that are simultaneous. You know, there’s someone you really love ... for reasons that developed over time in your interaction with him/her/them, but these also are people who tend to hurt you in ways they (and possibly even you) don’t fully understand or appreciate, so ... you keep distance between you and them, whether that distance is physical or emotional.

With me, and in the context of this post, the phrase refers to a “former/current” thing, and hence why I call it hate-love instead of love-hate:

** I used to hate Mozart, but now ... I adore him.

** I used to hate the Electric Light Orchestra’s song “Evil Woman” (and yes, there’s a bit of a story there, too); now I really like it ... and a lot of what ELO has done.

** I detested hip-hop music when it first hit the scene; now, I can abide some of it ... most of it, even. Recently, I even spent an hour plus watching a cable channel documentary on Tupac Shakur and another on one of the HBO channels, the 2009 motion picture “Notorious,” a biopic about the late Notorious B.I.G. (aka Biggie Smalls, real name Christopher Wallace). B.I.G. and Shakur were the coastal focal-point stars of the much-written-about East Coast/West Coast hip-hop feud/war.

** I used to think gardening was something for people who had nothing better to do; for the past five years, however, I indulge the activity quite earnestly in warm weather months.

** I used to detest spicy foods, but now I put black pepper on lots of things, I season my frozen pizzas with hot pepper flakes, love cajun spicing and put hot mustard (if I have it) on my Chinese meals. I will note that despite this turn-around, I still cannot stomach foods prepared with or containing very strong or high concentrations of garlic (e.g., garlic bread) or raw onions. At all.

** I used to think reading fiction was a waste of time. You know — it’s fake, so why bother? So whenever I’d look to find reading material, the books I’d line up would be only non-fiction — history, biographies and such. Alas, for the past 15 years, it’s been largely the other way around, and it opened my door to John Grisham, Patricia Cornwell, Clive Cussler, Lawrence Sanders, Daniel Brown and their ilk. In that 15-year period, I've probably read fiction to non-fiction in a 15:1 ratio ... a ratio that might have to slip a bit because of my reading material of late. The last two books I finished — and the one I'm reading right now (“Open,” retired professional tennis player Andre Agassi's autobiography) — are non-fiction.

You get the idea. I’m sure there are others. Again, characteristic of each item on the list above is that they are all hate-love situations — things I once disliked but I now like a lot. Are there any love-hates I can site, you might ask? Sure.

Foremost are professional sports, with baseball, football and basketball right up there at the top ... primarily because of how the business and commercialization sides of them have transformed the importance and relevance of each into something astronomically beyond what they deserve and, as a result, have warped the reality of so much of our populace.

The sad part is that the vast majority of people can’t and don’t see it. Collectively, these sports-as-a-business have sucked valuable community resources from areas where such resources are far more deserving and needy — education, welfare, education, infrastructure, education, public safety, education, and the arts, to name a few. Oh, wait. Did I mention education? If not, I apologize. Please add that to the list, and send it to the top with a bullet.

Which kind of gets me again back to point (yeah!). Mozart struggled financially in his short life (35 years and 11 months) on this earth. And yet, he amassed a voluminous, and quite stunning, body of work in operas, symphonies, concertos, minuets, quartets, sonatas and liturgical works. Unfortunately, he never enjoyed the wealth that should have come with such profoundly meaningful art; tragically, he was buried in a pauper’s grave. But I bet he would be pleased to know that there are people like me — some 200+ years later — sitting at a fancy, high-tech piece of equipment like a computer and listening to his works on a media player.

Obsessing, enjoying his music ... and whistling while they work.

Note: All of the images in this post are in the public domain and can be found at Wikipedia’s entry for Mozart.

A job Teddy just missed seeing accomplished

There have been so many topics I've wanted to delve into here since I last posted. I just never found the time to actually ... well, delve.

So, before we bid farewell to 2009, I thought I'd make an appearance to at least touch base on one of them.

I just finished reading "True Compass," the memoir of Ted Kennedy, who by the timeframe mentioned in the book, must have wrapped up his work not long before he died. He alludes to the brain tumor in the final chapter, along with his appearance at the 2008 Democratic National Convention and Barack Obama's inauguration early this year, and there is a picture of Kennedy with Obama (and a couple other congressmen) from April of this year at the White House.

The above is actually beside the point of my post today. The book did allow me to look at Teddy in a slightly different way. I found his candor on a lot of the book topics, whether it be related to the Congress and legislative issues or his personal life, refreshing. I'm sure staunch Republicans or Kennedy haters will find the extent of candor insufficient, or aver that Kennedy's version of Chappaquiddick was hardly thorough (or even complete). But that, too, is not the point of this post.

I actually found myself most interested, throughout the read, in the extent of Kennedy's involvement of some his pet legislative projects, the foremost of which -- one that goes back decades and, alas, one he will not see to fruition -- was health care.

The book laid the foundation for why all the Kennedys embraced issues and legislation directed at the downtrodden as so important to them. Yes, the Kennedy family was very well off, but Ted Kennedy and his siblings were raised by two very resolved parents to never brandish their wealth. In fact, the Kennedy siblings were strongly and repeatedly encouraged to seek out those who were far less fortunate, to strive to understand those people's plights and to invest whatever clout their societal or political stature allowed them toward helping the disadvantaged secure and enjoy every right that was enjoyed by the privileged.

Ted Kennedy embraced health care for the masses as an issue early in his Senate career. It was incredible -- and very sad -- to read how presidential administration after administration either shot it down or simply refused to consider it, thanks in large part to the extraordinarily powerful insurance and medical lobbies.

So it was with this fresh read in mind that I've been trying to follow Obama's attempts to make happen what Kennedy tried to bring to so many millions of Americans -- affordable health insurance. The strange perks we're seeing key legislators wresting in return for their votes for the legislation should tell you plenty about how difficult it had been through the years to extract elected representatives in both chambers from their comfortable and cozy beds with the insurance and medical lobby.

Equally telling is the degree of dilution of some key points of both measures in the two houses, the foremost of which being the one-payer option that would have totally removed control of funds to pay for health costs from the coffers of stingy, profit-hoarding private-sector insurers.

In the interim, I marvel how, as Obama gets farther than any president has ever gotten to reaching out and helping the giantly, under-insured lower class (and probably a good amount of middle-classers, too) people in our nation, he also is taking a political hit for doing so. Granted, the timing of funding the health care measure -- so soon after someone had to do something to bail out the tanking auto industry -- is not ideal. But if the uptick of Wall Street in the past six months is any indication, the president's move to revive the country's financial health should give us hope that there will be something of merit to come from the health care legislation.

My only regret, and probably a regret shared by those who knew how passionate Ted Kennedy regarded health-care coverage for the masses, is that he will not be here to see it finally arrive.

Call if you must ... but please, not while driving!

Thirty-two countries in the world -- including Germany, Ireland, Denmark, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Japan, China, Egypt and the United Kingdom -- either ban all use of a phone or just a hand-held phone (read: cellphone) by anyone operating a motor vehicle. Four Canadian provinces, including the largest, Quebec, do likewise.

In the United States, no state imposes a blanket use of telephones while driving, although six states -- California, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Oregon and Washington plus the District of Columbia and the Virgin Islands -- do ban the use of a hand-held phone by a vehicle operator (which means the use of phone earpieces while driving in those states would be OK). Only six states. Six other states have laws prohibiting local jurisdictions from enacting any restrictions on phone usage while driving.

Are legislators and the people in this country really that naive to trust the majority of people to drive undistracted while talking on the phone at the same time? I realize that I'm only one voice, but I find such trust incredulous. Blind, even. I don't even think it's a close call. I don't think half of the vehicle operators in this nation can drive and talk on the phone simultaneously without significantly diminishing their focus and attention to where it belongs -- the road.

To me, that's scary because it also means the likelihood of serious consequences on the road are significantly greater. As if we need another good reason -- aside from drunk drivers, who we already have a challenge trying to police and eradicate -- to be fearful about being "caught" driving while sober and phoneless.

Why is it our nation cannot put the hammer down -- much harder than it does already on drunk drivers, and simply "at all" on people who have to operate cellphones while behind the wheel? This is a rhetorical question, of course, because I don't know the answer -- other than to say Americans so value their right to get liquored up and to jabber away with their fancy hand-held electronic devices, the latter because it makes them look important. Hey, that's all that I can come up with. Important -- and deadly.

Perhaps you think I exaggerate, or am beating the drum to a pointless issue. I don't think so. I can't tell you how many times I -- just me, myself and I -- have come across a cellphone-using driver making a bonehead maneuver with the vehicle that I'm pretty certain was made because his or her attention was totally fixed somewhere other than the road or traffic.

I consider myself an accomplished multi-tasker. And yet, while I'm driving, and especially while driving in heavy traffic (e.g., rush hour or locales I'm not familiar with), I have trouble holding a simple conversation with a passenger in my vehicle -- someone sitting right next to me -- because I feel that to do so significantly affects my ability to remain adequately attentive to driving. As a result, I'm sure many passengers have thought me to be an antisocial while driving ... and certainly one who has trouble composing intelligible responses or comments if I do try to communicate.

So if someone who otherwise is a darn-good multi-tasker cannot, in good conscience, feel comfortable simultaneously driving and talking WITHOUT jabbering into a hand-held device, how many people are out there to you suppose are fooling themselves into thinking they can? Or simply ignoring the fact ... and risking so much -- like, oh, human lives -- doing so?

The latter two questions are what scare me the most. I suppose I could dismiss this fear by chalking up myself as a human anomaly, but I really don't think so. My years of observing human nature tell me too many people who feel the need to use phones at all times and places also fool themselves into thinking they jabber and drive without sacrificing the needed attention required of the latter.

I have no quip-laden ending for this. Except, please, don't ever try to call me if you're driving a vehicle. I'm likely to launch into the rant above. Do you really want that?

A somewhat long hiatus

Yeah, I know. It's been over two months since I stopped to post an entry here. But I know "bloggers" who've been away from their writing or posting far longer, so I guess I don't quite feel so bad.

I'll try to summarize the busy-ness that's kept from being "regular" here in those weeks since I wrote about the Tour de France.

*** On Aug. 7, my second granddaughter, Addison Elyse, was born at St. Francis Hospital - South in Indianapolis. Two days later, Addison came home, and two days after that Addy's mother, Kelly Anne, noticed Addy had a fever and was twitching unnaturally. After a brief visit to the St. Francis emergency room, staff there had Addy transported to Riley Hospital for Children in downtown Indianapolis, where Addy remained -- invariably in the pediatric intensive care unit and the newborn floor -- until this past Monday, Sept. 28.

It'd be difficult to summarize the roller-coaster medical issues Addy weathered during her stay -- and she's still not totally over the hill yet. But it entailed seizures, infant apnea, three blood clots, a blood infection (MRSA) and a lower-extremities hematoma. She had ultra sounds, X rays, MRIs, blood tests, a spinal tap, antibiotics (intravenous and needle-administered), tubes coming from every place visible and temporary loss of vocal cords.

Family members made regular visits to Riley during the period, and I will cherish my several post-work, late-day few hours alone cuddling with her for a long, long time -- the almost perfect ones (where she slept in my arms start to finish) to even the ones where nothing could seem to comfort her. I was still with Addy, and I knew she was in far more discomfort than I.

*** Work has dealt me yet another formidable challenge. My staff merged with another in our features department, and I've been left to figure out how to make it work. People's work shifts and days off have changed, we're finding Tuesday nights and all day Wednesdays incredibly overwhelming because of the onerous workload. But this weekend, our two desks are now physically merging (from mid-July until now, we'd still been operating in separate locations in the newsroom), so I'm hoping the proximity and ability to have access to all staffers to throw on the sundry triages that surface on those Tuesdays and Wednesdays will give us a little better means to deal with it all.

*** I had my first public display of my photography in an art gallery show for a one-night, monthly First Friday art tour along the Massachusetts Avenue cultural district of downtown Indianapolis. Actually, I was among five members of a photo club who contributed images for the display. That occurred Sept. 4. At my photo blog, Photo Potpourri, I have a picture of one of three walls from our photo club's exhibit (which was at the Art Bank gallery).

*** A staffer at the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library called me last month to seek permission to use six images from my Irvington neighborhood gallery (at my Fototime.com online site) in a display the downtown main library plans to put up in January to represent the Eastside of Indianapolis. The display will be available on the sixth floor of the library's new wing throughout the month of January.

*** I spent last Saturday at Faught Stadium on the grounds of Franklin (Ind.) College, shooting photos of an exciting football game between the host Grizzlies and Trine University (Angola, Ind.). The Grizzlies came from 13 points down late in the third quarter to win it 30-29 on a 13-yard pass from Nick Purichia (a graduate of Cardinal Ritter High School in Indianapolis) to Adam Mellencamp with only 2 minutes and 25 seconds left in the game.

Pictures from my shoot there can be found also at my online gallery at SmugMug; a few of the images and a text summary also can be found at Photo Potpourri. I include this shoot in this summary because I took more than 1,000 images at the game, and the process of editing them all ... and selecting the 150 I decided to post on the online gallery was time-consuming. But it was worth it; it was a beautiful day for a college football game, I enjoyed the small-college atmosphere there (reminiscent of my years at UW-Eau Claire in northwestern Wisconson), and, perhaps most importantly, I was extraordinarly pleased with with quality of images.

Armstrong and Contador keep their positions

Teammates and race favorites Alberto Contador and Lance Armstrong kept their positions -- first and third -- after the climb up fabled Mont Ventoux (pictured above) at the end of today's Stage 20 of the Tour de France, despite expected and repeated attacks from Schleck brothers Andy and Frank.

The four were among a select few of the race's leaders who managed to separate themselves from the peloton (the rest of the pack) and conquer Ventoux without losing much ground. Andy Schleck (in white, left, crossing finish line) attacked repeatedly, hoping to both distance himself from Contador (in yellow jersey, left) to possibly pick up huge chunks of time and pass the race leader -- but also to wear down Astana teammates Contador and Armstrong (behind Contador, left) in hopes Andy's brother could push ahead and possibly vault over Armstrong for third place.

But Contador and Armstrong answered every attack. They did manage to add some time between fourth-place rider Bradley Wiggins of Great Britain, but not enough to enable Frank Schleck to leap over Wiggins and grab fourth place in the overall standings.

None of the major race leaders won the stage -- that distinction went to Juan Manuel Garate
of Spain (right), who finished three seconds ahead of Tony Martin of Germany. Garate and Martin, neither of whom's overall time was anywhere close to threatening the leaders, were the lone survivors of a much larger breakaway group that had led the stage most of the way. Except for the two survivors, the breakaway riders, one by one, withered and fell back on the 6,273-foot Ventoux.

After the race, Contador still led Andy Schleck by 4 minutes, 11 seconds in the overall competition. Armstrong remained in third place, 5:41 behind his teammate. Barring any unforeseen disasters, those three should stand together on the victor's podium in Paris tomorrow. Wiggins is in fourth place, Frank Schleck in fifth -- but only four seconds behind Wiggins -- and Andreas Kloden of Germany, another Astana team member, was sixth. Astana has a commanding lead in the team competition.

The 2009 Tour de France concludes Sunday with a largely ceremonial stage that will end with the fabled multi-loop ride in Paris that will include the Champs Elysees. The only drama will be a sprint to the finish line for some rider to wrest a coveted stage win.

A rousing climax to Le Tour

(Above) The 2009 Tour de France's top competitors (from left) Andy Schleck of Luxembourg, Bradley Wiggins of Great Britain, Lance Armstrong of the United States and, wearing the leader's yellow jersey, Alberto Contador of Spain.

For the past eight years or so, this time of the year has been my favorite when it comes to spectator sports. For three weeks each July, the top professional cyclists in the world combat the most difficult courses, terrains, mountains and each other in pursuit of the most prestigious honor in the sport -- the championship of the Tour de France.

Tomorrow's penultimate stage of the 2009 Tour promises to be an exciting show, indeed. Oh, the Tour winner -- 2007 champion Alberto Contador of Spain -- has this year's victory pretty much locked up. But there is a tight race for second through sixth positions. Whoever finishes second and third will earn a place with Contador on the winner's podium when the race ends Sunday on the Champs Elysees in Paris.

Le Tour is one of three grand tours (the Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a Espana are the others) in pro cycling, and each of those is tantamount to a major tournament in professional golf or tennis. But like the Masters in golf and Wimbledon in tennis, the Tour de France is the most coveted in cycling.

This year's Tour has been particularly exciting with the return of Lance Armstrong, who retired from the sport in 2005 after winning the last of his unprecedented seven consecutive tours. Armstrong (right) has been in fine form this Tour, and going into tomorrow's stage that ends with a formidable climb of the legendary Mont Ventoux, he's in third place -- a little over a minute behind second-place Andy Schleck of Luxembourg and less than a minute ahead of Britain's Bradley Wiggins, Armstrong's teammate Andreas Kloden of Germany and Schleck's older brother Frank.

But Armstrong has been in an awkward situation on his return to the sport: He's riding on a team, Astana, that also features race leader Contador, who now is widely regarded as the best in the sport, and two other onetime prime contenders for a grand tour championship: Kloden and American Levi Leipheimer. Contador already has won the sport's "triple crown" -- each of the three grand tours, an accomplishment so rare in cycling that only four other riders have done it -- Jacques Anquetil, Felice Gimondi, Bernard Hinault and Eddie Merckx. Although Armstrong won the Tour de France seven times, he has never won the Giro or Vuelta.

Mont Ventoux could have been the chief motivation for Armstrong to return to the sport, and specifically, to ride in the Tour again. As he said in an interview on the Versus channel during the broadcast of today's stage, Armstrong has unfinished business on this mountain.

The moonscape-looking Ventoux is regarded as one the most brutal and unforgiving in French races, not only because of its steep climb, but also because the top portion's bare, deforested, unprotected slopes (no trees anywhere in sight) leave riders extremely vulnerable to any of the weather and climate conditions that torment cyclists -- stiff winds; stifling heat; and freezing cold in the high altitudes.

Armstong twice has narrowly missed winning Tour stages on the mount. The most bitter of those came in 2000, when Armstrong and the late Marco Pantani of Italy waged a thrilling battle ascending the hill. Pantani, the 1998 Tour winner whose nickname was "the Pirate," had the lead at first, but Armstrong found a burst in reserve and bolted upward, eventually catching Il Pirata. Several times the two jockeyed to separate from each other, but it appeared Armstrong had the upper hand in snagging the stage victory. Even though the veteran Pantani stayed close, Armstrong seemed to poised to claim victory until, just near the finish line, he inexplicably eased up and Pantani crossed first. It was believed Armstrong yielded purposely in a show of sportsmanship and respect, a gesture he would later regret. Pantani didn't regard the deliberate pullback kindly; the suggestion that Armstrong had to "give" him the win angered Pantani.

In the 2002 Tour, when Ventoux reappeared on the Tour map after only a year's absence, Armstrong allowed Frenchman Richard Virenque a seven-minute lead in the Ventoux stage and could never catch up.

Riders in the Tour don't get many chances to conquer Ventoux; it's been included in a Tour stage only 15 times since 1951. Armstrong also has tried, and failed, to win stages on the mount several times in the annual Dauphine-Libere race, which is held each June and is widely used by cyclists as a tune-up for Le Tour. Unlike the Tour, Dauphine-Libere almost always includes Mont Ventoux in a stage.

All of which is good reason for anyone who enjoys pro cycling and its drama -- and the Tour de France in particular -- to look in on tomorrow's stage. It could be Lance's last change to grab the one unconquered cycling challenge he craves most. I have to believe that tonight his team, with Contador's overall victory comfortably in hand, is trying to devise a strategy that can help deliver that victory for him.

The broadcast of Saturday's stage on Versus begins at 7 a.m. Eastern time.