Lance Armstrong (Discovery Channel) Photo ©: AFP

On the road before the Tour Photo ©: AFP

Behind the Blue Curtain

Inside the Discovery Channel bus with Chris Brewer

Chris will be bringing us daily updates from within Discovery Channel HQ, getting the lowdown from team management.

Discovery Channel is the team on everybody's lips at this year's Tour de France. Why?

One name - Lance Armstrong.

This network of riders and staff previously existed as the US Postal Service Pro Cycling Team, helping Lance win his six Tour de France crowns, and in 2005 they're gunning for a seventh title. Follow the progress of the team here on Cyclingnews.com from 'Behind the Blue Curtain'

Index to all entries

July 5, 2005

Stage 4 - Mystery Oakleys?

Nice shades...
Photo ©: Roberto Bettini

One of the cool aspects of the Tour de France is the appearance of new and sometimes secret gear, and as we all know, shwag is always good... Here at Discovery Channel that's readily apparent, with more notable items like Trek's TTx Time Trial bike, Lance and Nike's 10//2 line of clothing as well as the "Iconography" symbols on his TT rear wheel (more on that in another article). But one of the items that has really raised quite a bit of buzz was Lance in the Green Jersey sporting a new set of Oakley eyewear in Stage 2. They looked like M-frames, but not anything anyone could recall seeing...

We went right to the source, and a quite storied source he is. Kiko Garcia rode for 7 years as a domestique for the Spanish ONCE team and is now one of the European marketing managers for Oakley. "The glasses Lance has on are prototypes - he is the only person who currently has these," he told me as he sipped a coffee in Le Village before Stage 4. "But I keep getting emails every day from people all over who want to know where they can get a pair of these - so hopefully they will go into production soon."

Now for the real behind-the-scenes info. We were in Lance's hotel room the day before Stage 1 as he checked out the fit of his new Giro TT helmet. In addition to the helmet, eyewear selection in the opening stage is also huge as millions of people will get an up-close look at LA's face as he readies in the start line. So Oakley sends Lance quite a few sets of new eyewear for him to choose from. When he got ahold of the white frames he immediately put them on, stared in the mirror and declared them "Bad ass!" but couldn't wear them for the TT because the M-frame top bar is right in his vision line when he's down in the aero position.

But it wasn't long after that the new Oakleys were brought out for all to see, and as Kiko said, hopefully they'll be available soon for the masses.

Thanks for checking in.

Cheers,
Chris

2005 entries - the Tour de France

• July 28 - Lance's Tour curtain call
• July 23 - Time Trial support
• July 19 - How to become a pro
• July 18 - All's well on rest day
• July 16 - The Disco team car
• July 15 - Iconography
• July 14 - The team behind the team
• July 13 - A little bit of Discovery tech
• July 11 - Staying on guard
• July 9-10 - Life at the start & Entering the Holy of Holies
• July 7 - Coloured Lids
• July 6 - Recovering after the TTT
• July 5 - Stage 4 - Mystery Oakleys?
• July 4 - Stage 3 and looking ahead to the TTT
• July 3 - Discovery Channel Satisfied with Stage 1 Result

Previous Cyclingnews articles on the Discovery Channel team

Interviews

• Lance Armstrong: Ready for Number 7
• Lance Armstrong: Suddenly seven
• Lance Armstrong interview: On top of his game, having fun
• Johan Bruyneel: It's not a formality, really
• Lance Armstrong: Three weeks to go before the Tour de France

Tech

• Tour de France tech - Lance's TTX