Basso, who has already won the race's white jersey for the best-placed rider aged 25 years or under, was the only rider to really threaten Armstrong in the Pyrenees mountains last year.

The 28-year-old Italian won a stage at La Mongie ahead of Armstrong, who relegated the classy CSC rider to second place a day later.

Basso's efforts left him with a respectable third place finish on the Champs Elysees last year, although he could have finished runner-up instead of Germany's Andreas Kloden who performed better in the penultimate stage time trial.

This year, however, Basso has tightened up the few loose ends in his armoury, namely his time trialling, and showed at the recent Giro d'Italia, where his bid for overall victory came unstuck because of a stomach bug, he still has what it takes to do well at altitude.

As a result, his team boss at CSC, former Tour de France winner Bjarne Riis, expects his Italian protege to be one of the protagonists of the race.

"Ivan is ready for the Tour as well as he was ready for the Tour of Italy," said Riis, who won the Tour in 1996 ahead of his then teammate Jan Ullrich.

"But it won't be easy. Three weeks (of racing) will decide who is strongest. For the last six years it has been one man (Armstrong), and he will be the favourite again."

For Riis, the sight of seeing his former Telekom teammate Ullrich struggling at the recent Tour of Switzerland was perhaps an omen.

Ullrich finished third overall in the race but was pushed to his limits on the final stage as a number of attacks on the decisive climb ultimately left Spaniard Aitor Gonzalez with the stage and overall victory.

Riis even believes U