Sports

DENVER (CBS) ― The Tour de France begins Saturday and officials of the race say it will be the most rigorously-tested sports event in history.

There will be 520 doping tests given to the 180 riders and officials are already keeping a very close eye on Lance Armstrong, who's back at the Tour after retiring after the 2005 race.

John Wilcockson, the author of a new book on the legendary cyclist, explained why the seven-time Tour winner is so unpopular in France, CBS station KCNC-TV reported.

"He's American. He's winning at their sport. The French haven't won the race for more than 20 years. There's just a lot of factors, but I think they perceive him as being an arrogant Texan," Wilcockson said.

Wilcockson, a long-time journalist, follows the sport of cycling and lives in Boulder. His book is called "Lance: The Making of the World's Greatest Champion."

"It started it two-and-a-half years ago, the first interview I did and I've been interviewing more than 50 people. I actually started writing it about a year ago," Wilcockson said.

Wilcockson received a phone call from Armstrong late last summer saying that he'd be participating in the 2009 Tour de France.

"He told me, 'I have an idea.' I said, 'What's your idea?' He said, 'Well, I'm thinking about riding the Tour de France again.' So it did change quite a bit -- the latter part of the book."

After many years of covering the sport, Wilcockson says he thinks Armstrong is the greatest athlete -- ever.

"I think he's the greatest champion. He's won the Tour de France seven times in a row, which nobody else has done and nobody else will probably do. But I think he's the greatest champion of any sport."

Armstrong always seems to be on the cutting edge of training. He recently bought a house in Aspen and was seen this week training on the hills of Colorado.

"He came to Aspen mainly to get away from the heat of Austin. He has three kids; he wants them to come up and visit with him in the summer. When he decided to make his comeback he said, 'Well, this is a great place to train.'"

Everybody is wondering if Armstrong will be at the forefront of Team Astana, or if it will be Levi Leipheimer of the U.S., or even Alberto Contador of Spain.

"Contador won the Tour 2 years ago and Levi helped him win that Tour and he also helped him in the Tour of Spain last year and the Tour of Italy. At this point, although Contador -- in theory, on paper -- is the team leader, I think when we get to the race we'll see something a little different because Lance, he really wants to win the Tour and I think he has good chance of doing that."

Wilcockson says establishing a team leader depends many things, including time trials, but that Armstrong definitely has a legitimate shot at winning the yellow jersey.

"The guy has won it seven times. You can't argue with that. Although he's had a three-and-a-half year break from the sport, he's comeback and he's down to his racing weight now and is up to his power output that he was at when he was winning the Tour; and he's got a lot of ambition."

In his book, Wilcockson says Armstrong wants to prove, especially to his children, the doping allegations that have chased him are just false.

"It's always going to be there -- the doubts and accusations -- but he's proving to himself, this time, this comeback, that he's totally clean. He's been tested more than 30 times out of competition since he's announced his comeback. Most people don't get tested that many times in their whole career."

There's been some early talk that Armstrong might be contemplating organizing a race in Colorado. The last big cycling road race held in Colorado was the Coors Classic, which was staged from 1979–1988.

"He's spoken to Gov. (Bill) Ritter about it and if Lance gets behind it, I think it will really happen because there are very few people in the sports world that could make something like that happen here."

Wilcockson will travel to France to once again cover the Tour de France this year. His book is on sale at bookstores everywhere.

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