Why hasn't anybody been freaking out about how well this guy rode to day. I believe his performance today was more amazing than Rasmussen's on Sunday by the way he just flew up the Galibier attacking at will and then held his lead on the down hill. The way he accelerated when he wanted to was amazing....almost superhuman.

And he said that he never pre-rode it....even more amazing.

He does deserve some serious accolades. He looked great and if you go back to the Gerdemann stage, he came in a very quiet 4th just 2:14 down on the stage winner (and 1:20 up on the main GC riders).

More amazing than Rasmussen? Hard to say. I'm not a climber by any stretch of the imagination, plus I've never raced, and I've also never seen those roads in person. The Linus Gerdemann ride of a couple days has to rank up there in terms of "didn't see that coming!"

I hate to make the comparison, but remember the south American rider from the Giro a couple years ago? Jose Rujano. He was a revelation there, and then completely imploded and disappeared after getting onto a ProTour team.

Still, hope this fellow pans out.

"I attacked like a crazy man," said Soler. "I didn't know the Galibier, but I looked at the road book and I knew it was hard."

You have to love a guy who attacked the field and won the stage, alone for the last 40K, on climbs he had never ridden before. That takes a certain amount of balls!

He does deserve some serious accolades. He looked great and if you go back to the Gerdemann stage, he came in a very quiet 4th just 2:14 down on the stage winner (and 1:20 up on the main GC riders).

More amazing than Rasmussen? Hard to say. I'm not a climber by any stretch of the imagination, plus I've never raced, and I've also never seen those roads in person. The Linus Gerdemann ride of a couple days has to rank up there in terms of "didn't see that coming!"

I hate to make the comparison, but remember the south American rider from the Giro a couple years ago? Jose Rujano. He was a revelation there, and then completely imploded and disappeared after getting onto a ProTour team.

Still, hope this fellow pans out.

Same could be said about a whole bunch of Colombian riders, they`re natural climbers but tends to dissapear.. how about Walter Perez?

most amazing of all was that he didn't get caught on the final stretch. That last little climb to the finish looked like a leg breaker.

The Linus Gerdemann ride of a couple days has to rank up there in terms of "didn't see that coming!"

I hate to make the comparison, but remember the south American rider from the Giro a couple years ago? Jose Rujano. He was a revelation there, and then completely imploded and disappeared after getting onto a ProTour team.

Still, hope this fellow pans out.

While I was watching Linus win that stage I knew that he would be a one day wonder(he's got to mature some more) because he got slower and slower, and knew he couldn't maintain that over the course of the rest of the tour...but....Soler's manner on the bike portrayed a very competent and mature rider. His movement is compact and efficient and watch the slow motion of his finish and you can see the guy is strong and very competent. Also his position is amazingly aero for a climber type. I just don't think he is going to fall apart like Rujano did.

When Chicken loses yellow (he will), it will be cool to see these Soler and Chicken fighting for the polka-dot jersey -- they're reasonably close on king-of-mountains points. Another sub-plot in the making for a hitherto excellent TdF.

You have to love a guy who attacked the field and won the stage, alone for the last 40K, on climbs he had never ridden before. That takes a certain amount of balls!

Oh yeah! And I really liked how he attacked when he caught the lead group. He sized them up from behind and then BLEW by them. That's what I like to see, when you make your move you MAKE it dammit! No kittiefooting around.

For an unknown being on a first-year TdF team, I thought it was a pretty heads-up move for him to zip his jersey as he crossed the line, making sure the Barloworld logo was fully visible for the press. Or maybe he was just cold :D

But the attack and his ability to stay in front - especially on what must have seemed like an interminable climb to the finish - was awesome stuff and he is on the map. Hope he can stay on it.

It probably didn't come through in my first post, but I was rooting for the guy to get the win. It would have been a terrible injustice if he would have been caught in that final kilometer.

He did look quite composed, so hopefully he can be one of the next big things.

and in his post race when he said "well I looked at the course sheet and it looked hard"

it's the freakin Galibier in the TdF, the guy had never ridden it and went off the day sheet

my fave moment

Gotta love this race! And of course "he probably had to be on drugs to do a race like that!" people will say. But when a guy has that natural ability, that's what should be applauded. So kudos to the young columbian.

incredible ride - not only did he attack the lead group of 4, it only took him 10K to move up to them from the peloton - a nearly 3:30 minute gap! as i saw him join up and roll to the right, it was awesome - i was on my feet cheering him on to attack and he did - and then blew apart the 4 on the front. when the Contador and Popo joined up, i thought for sure they would get him and maybe have a battle in the last kilometer.

i love this year's race - so much going on - much better than the 7 times in a row years...

!Vamos Colombia! El que tiene las pelotas, ataca.

It's great to see riders from the third world have success. By the way, there's a great book about the history of Colombian cycling called "Kings of the Mountains" that explains why Colombia is an anomoly.