Stage 13 finish- WTF?

[trg]

Weird finish today. Ardilla thought the line was 100 meters before it
actually was. Pereiro too. Also the Eurosport announcers as did I. The
reason is that there was a banner (not a 100 meter to go banner) stretched
across the road at around the 100 meter mark. But the funny thing is that
the Euskatel guy who greets the riders with towels and drinks as they cross
the finish, was stationed just after the banner at around 100 meters to go.
I can understand how the EuroSport commentators (and I) could get it wrong,
since all we had was the long range camera shot that we saw for the first
time as the riders were battling it out. We couldn't see the ground in the
shot, but could see the banner stretched acroiss the road. And similar fot
the riders who are approaching at full speed and who may be keying in on the
banner rather than a line on the road. But how the hell did the Euskatel guy
get it wrong?

Sanchez certainly had a cat-ate-the-canary grin as he passed the line. Was
it an intentional fakeout? If so, it was a brilliant (albeit slimey) move.

 

[Mike Bruno]

trg wrote:
> Weird finish today. Ardilla thought the line was 100 meters before it
> actually was. Pereiro too. Also the Eurosport announcers as did I. The
> reason is that there was a banner (not a 100 meter to go banner) stretched
> across the road at around the 100 meter mark. But the funny thing is that
> the Euskatel guy who greets the riders with towels and drinks as they cross
> the finish, was stationed just after the banner at around 100 meters to go.
> I can understand how the EuroSport commentators (and I) could get it wrong,
> since all we had was the long range camera shot that we saw for the first
> time as the riders were battling it out. We couldn't see the ground in the
> shot, but could see the banner stretched acroiss the road.

Vellosnooze reported that it was the KOM banner.