Cycling Tour De France: When Lance Armstrong returned from a near-fatal bout of testicular cancer in 1998, few knew what to expect.
The Texan's early career had been a successful one, stage wins in the Tour de France and a world championship win at just 21 years of age showing the extent of his talent. But no endurance athlete had attempted a comeback of this significance, returning from such severity of illness to so tough a sport.
Armstrong ultimately performed better than all expectations in his post-cancer career. In the fallout of the Festina affair, this success raised questions in some quarters about the source of his strength.
For his part, he maintains there are less-than-sinister reasons for his achievements; he is lighter, mentally tougher, driven to make the most of his second shot at life. Ever since his comeback, Lance Mark II has obsessed about the Tour, his weight, his training and his chance to inspire other cancer sufferers. Now, years later, he's on the brink of true cycling immortality.
Only four men - Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain - have won five Tours de France. This afternoon, Armstrong embarks on a campaign to join these in the history books.
Standing in Armstrong's way are several rivals who would love to deny him. Beating Armstrong, the Merckx of his generation (every July, at least) would be a massive achievement.
Chief of the pretenders to the throne is Jan Ullrich. The German won the race in 1997 but has finished second on three occasions since, Marco Pantani (1998) and Armstrong (2000, 2001) keeping him from returning to the top of the podium. A ban for recreational drug use ruled him out of competition for many months, but he is returning to form. If he comes to the Tour with all guns blazing, the Team Bianchi rider is the most likely to deny Armstrong.
Joseba Beloki (ONCE-Eroski) finished second last year but never really troubled his American rival. He'll need to step up a level. A rider who is more capable of attacking is the Euskaltel's Iban Mayo, who put Armstrong under considerable pressure in the recent Dauphine Libere race.
Tyler Hamilton used to ride for Armstrong's US Postal team but has since moved to the CSC squad. This season he out-manoeuvred his former leader to land victory in the Liege-Bastogne-Liege classic and also won the Tour of Romandy. On paper, at least, he is a big challenger.
So, too, the climbing specialist, Gilberto Simoni, of the Saeco team, a rider who has been talking up a fight ever since he won the Tour of Italy last month.
Alexandre Vinokourov (Telekom) wants to commemorate the memory of his fallen compatriot Andrei Kivilev by riding strongly. David Millar (Cofidis), Levi Leipheimer (Rabobank), Aitor Gonzalez (Fassa Bortolo) and Telecom's world time-trial champion Santiago Botero also hope to shine.
In truth, though, it's all down to the defending champion. People used to say the only person who could beat Indurain was Indurain himself.
The same applies to Armstrong. But is he at his best? Those hoping for a change at the top point to Armstrong's performance in the Dauphine Libere. He defended his title but was below par in the mountains, being distanced several times by Mayo.
Armstrong maintains his form has yet to peak and he is on course. He'll be keen to show his strength in the key stages; today's prologue, Wednesday's team-time trial, the two individual time-trials and the seven big mountain stages. If he's on a par with his level of previous years, that should be more than enough to land him his fifth Tour.
