Belgian Steels Win in Stage 3

N A N T E S, France, July 3 —, 2000 -- Belgian fast-man Tom Steels won Stage 3 of the Tour de France today, his second in as many days, just edging Germans Marcel Wust and Erik Zabel. David Millar retained the leader’s yellow jersey, despite a crash near the finish that delayed him momentarily and cost him 8 seconds of his leading margin.

Steels’ finishing time was 3 hours, 37 minutes, 51 seconds.

“The team is working very well together,” said Steels, who races for Mapei. “We’ve won two now—why not a third?”

American Lance Armstrong remains in second place standing overall, still four seconds behind Millar, but lost time to several key rivals. The shakeup came as the pack split near the finish, with a small, faster first group crossing the line eight seconds before the rest.

Millar Still in Yellow

Millar would have lost his yellow jersey to defending championArmstrong if he had not managed to get back into the race. Heremained in first place, four seconds ahead of Armstrong, whofinished 63rd Tuesday as part of the second pack.

Among these early finishers were French ace Laurent Jalabert and German Jan Ullrich, who is Armstrong’s main rival this year. Armstrong finished in the second group, along with Millar, and several other contenders, including Swiss Alex Zulle and Spaniard Abraham Olano.

As a result, Jalabert is now just two seconds behind Armstrong, in third place, while Ullrich is just three seconds behind, in fourth place. These slim margins could disappear entirely during tomorrow’s team time trial, a brutal test that favors both Armstrong’s team, the U.S. Postal Service and Ullrich’s team, German Telekom.

U.S. Postal Team Among Favorites

Armstrong’s U.S. Postal team will be among the favorites to winthe time trial, but he thinks that the race would be wideopen.

“We have a good team, but it’s still too early to tell,”Armstrong said before setting off today. “We are just one name ona very long list. ”

Meanwhile, the third major contender for this year’s Tour de France, Italian Marco Pantani, remains well down in the overall standings. The renowned climber finished today’s stage in 99th position, and is now in 2:18 minutes behind the leaders, in 139th place overall. Pantini will likely lose more time still in tomorrow’s time trial, but could easily erase that margin and put both Armstrong and Ullrich in trouble during the first mountain stage next week.

The riders began in the old town of Loudun and covered 100miles, passing by Muscadet vineyards and rolling fields ofsunflowers.

Monday’s mild weather made conditions for sprinting almostideal. The course ended with a fast half-mile straight.

ABCNEWS.com correspondent Paul Roberts, and The Associated Press contributed to this report.