Cycling: Halgand's stage victory provides lift for French

Presumably, the noise of a cockerel crowing on local television broadcasts of the Tour after Stage 10 yesterday was electronically and not organically produced, but there could be no questioning the authenticity of Patrice Halgand's delight at becoming the first rider to take a win for the host nation in this year's Tour.

Halgand's lone success at Pau also represented a welcome upturn in French cycling fortunes. On Tuesday the news of the retirement at the end of this season of their most internationally successful professional, Laurent Jalabert, followed hard on the heels of a collective defeat of the French at the time trial at Lorient, with their best-placed rider 30th on the stage. Furthermore, their overall contender, Christophe Moreau, has seen his chances wrecked by a series of crashes and injuries.

Small wonder, then, with such disappointing local results so far that Halgand looked back no less than three times to be sure that the trio of fellow breakaways he had succeeded in shaking off with seven kilometres to go were not sneaking up on him at the last moment. Even as he was raising his hands in victory, the Jean Delatour rider turned his head again for one last check, but in fact the next rider, Jerome Pineau, was a good 27 seconds behind.

The contrast between the two reactions to reaching the finish could hardly have been greater. As Pineau free-wheeled over the line he provided the public with a crash course in Gallic gestures of regret at losing out in a bike race – hammering the handlebars, clasping his head, covering his face with his fingers and throwing his hands up in despair. Finally (presumably for latecomers) he thumped away one last time at the handlebars.

Neither Halgand, Pineau or the remainder of the day's breakaway formed any serious threat overall, and the main favourites remained ensconced in the peloton, which finished four minutes behind the stage leaders. Britain's David Millar. was among them, having spent the day nursing a twisted rib muscle, one of the longer-term consequences of his first-week crash. Millar is wearing protective bandages under the white jersey that distinguishes him as the leader of the best young rider competition, and team doctors estimate that it will take a week or so for the swelling and pain to ease.

Today, in the mountains, there may be more reasons for the French to be cheerful, if Richard Virenque has anything to do with it.

"We're reaching a new stage in the race when climbers have a chance to express themselves, like me," the five-times King of the Mountains said. "We will quickly see who is strong."

Asked what his tactics would be, he said: "Attack and attack again."

The Pyrenees were probably not uppermost in the mind of the race leader, Igor Gonzalez de Galdeano, though, given that a French article claimed that the Basque had "registered positive for salbutamol", a bronchial dilator – a drug which helps breathing.

The ambiguity of the word "registered" was understandable, even cunning, perhaps, as the Once-Eroski rider had previously received medical permission to use salbutamol because of asthma, and could not, therefore, be declared positive for its use.

As Leon Schattenberg, the president of the doping commission of the UCI, cycling's international governing body, pointed out in the same article, "once [the use of salbutamol has been] justified for therapeutic ends, you cannot talk of a permitted level."

Gonzalez de Galdeano had been discovered to be using a substance, therefore, which the UCI regulations had given him permission to use. The case is not yet closed, though, given that France's government-backed CPLD (Anti-Doping Council) has begun its own inquiry into Gonzalez de Galdeano.

"It's time that the criteria concerning doping is unified," the Basque's directeur sportif, Manolo Saiz, observed. "As far as we are concerned, there is no case to be answered." Gonzalez added. "My legs are not going to be affected by this. It's not been a good day, though."

The Tour organisation had its own reasons to be in a far grimmer mood, after a seven-year-old boy was run over by a race publicity vehicle during the stage, dying instantly. This is the second time in three years a child has been killed by a publicity vehicle, in this case apparently when he was crossing the road to rejoin his grandparents.

The race director, Jean Marie Leblanc, held an press conference to express his condolences. He also urged spectators to be extra vigilant with children. A minute's silence will be held before today's start.

Alasdair Fotheringham writes for Cycling Weekly