Welcome to the month of July. The days are cold, dark and dreary in most of Australia. Sounds like the perfect time for a few late nights watching the world's best cyclists putting their body and minds to the toughest test - a 21-stage, 3,430.5km grand tour of the highest mountains in Europe.

All the colour and atmosphere of the 2011 Tour de France, and the smooth voice of Phil Liggett and Mike Tomalaris will once again be on show, as the peloton rolls out this Saturday night for the 98th edition of the world's toughest bicycle race.

And by all early indications, this year is shaping up to be one of the most-anticipated tours in the post-Armstrong era.

Defending champion Alberto Contador will naturally start a short-priced favourite, but circumstances have changed dramatically since he cruised to victory in 2007, 2008 and 2010 with Astana.

Contador already enters the Tour under a dark cloud of controversy, with an appeals board at the Court of Arbitration for Sport set to hear his final case in August over a positive drug reading for clenbuterol in last year's Tour. How he handles the media throng and intense scrutiny will be an entertaining side-act to the drama on the roads.

Contador is now with the Saxo Bank team and, despite easily winning the Giro d'Italia in May, he should face tougher opposition in France. Contador was left to fight many of his battles in the Italian mountains alone, and will need more support of his lieutenants, including Australian Richie Porte, if he is to conquer the French peaks.

Cycling may seem like an individual sport, but it is the protection and mateship the other eight riders provide, which gets Contador and the other team leaders over the finish line.

This year is particularly tough Tour, and has been described as one for the ‘climbers'. It will be interesting to see how much affect winning the Giro will have on Contador during the tough third week.

Never before have we seen the depth of riders who can challenge for the overall yellow jersey. Added to the motivation is that many of the riders come from the nation where their teams are based.

Andy Schleck has finished runner-up to Contador for the past two Tours, being pipped by just 39 seconds last year. He has a new team in 2011, and being based in his home nation of Luxembourg, Leopard-Trek was formed essentially to drive Schleck and brother Frank to the top of the podium in this year's Tour de France. With them, the Schleck brothers have brought the might of the former Saxo Bank team, in world time-trial champion Fabian Cancellara, Australian workhorse Stuart O'Grady, as well as Jens Voigt, Linus Gerdemann and Maxime Monfort to form a formidable team.

The American-based Team RadioShack, led by an American Levi Leipheimer, have already declared they are chasing a general classification victory, by leaving behind their Australian sprinter Robbie McEwen, who has three green jerseys and twelve stage victories. Together, Janez Brajkovic, Chris Horner, Andreas Kloden, Dmitriy Muravyev, Sergio Paulinho, Yaroslav Popovych and Haimar Zubeldia formed the 2009 Astana team, which piloted Contador to victory. This team knows what it takes to win the Tour de France and could do it again in 2011.

Dutchman Robert Gesink of Rabobank, Belgian Jurgen van den Broeck of Omega Pharma-Lotto, Spaniard Samuel Sanchez of Euskaltel-Euskadi, Ivan Basso of Italy's Liquigas, Bradley Wiggins of Britain's Team Sky and Kazakhstan's Alexandre Vinokourov of Astana, will all be podium contenders representing their home nation and team.

For these general classification contenders, two stretches of consecutive stages will be vitally important, and will ultimately decide the Tour winner. Stages 12-14 are when the real action starts and the climbers are introduced to the Pyrenees. The final places will then be decided on the mountain stages 18 and 19, before the one and only individual time-trial on stage 20. Expect hundreds of thousand screaming Europeans to line the entire route of these six key stages; particularly the mountaintop finishes of the famous Luz-Ardiden (stage 12), Galibier (stage 18) and Alpe-d'Huez (stage 19).

It seems the only team led by a foreigner is the American-based BMC, led by our very own Cadel Evans. Victories at Tirren-Adriatico and Tour de Romandie, a runner-up at Criterium du Dauphine shows he is in good form, and passing on the Giro d'Italia means Evans will enter the Tour de France fresh. At 34, this could be Evans' last realistic shot at winning the title.

Six riders will represent Australia in 2011, led by Evans, and all of them should feature quite regularly. Porte and O'Grady will be vital for their team's chances of winning the overall honours, Simon Gerrans of Team Sky won a stage in 2008, and Matthew Goss and in particular Mark Renshaw of HTC-Highroad will be responsible for launching the Manx Missile, Mark Cavendish, to many stage victories.

The fastest man on two wheels, Cavendish, has 15 stage victories in the Tour de France, and will look to add to his tally during the first week, as it is all uphill from stage eight onwards.

Cavendish will once again battle with Alessandro Petacchi (Lampre), Tom Boonen (Quick Step), Tyler Farrar (Garmin-Cervelo) and world champion Thor Hushovd (also Garmin-Cervelo) for the green jersey.

A new rule has been introduced for the sprinters in 2011, with more points on offer, but only one intermediate sprint during the stage, meaning victories are vital and the riders will have to contest every sprint section.

The racing gets underway on Saturday, and the first yellow jersey won't be decided by the traditional prologue against the clock, but a 191.5km opening stage ending with a tricky climb to the finish line, reminiscent of the tough finish to the 2010 World Championships in Geelong. Expect the victor on that day, Hushovd, to once again be among the favourites, as well as the surprise early attack from especially strong riders Cancellara, Gilbert and Vinokourov.

The second stage sees the return of the team-time-trial for the first time since 2009. The winning team are expected to hold the leader's jersey for the entire first week, and the Norwegian sprinter Edvald Boasson Hagen, of the favourites Team Sky, could be a smoky to be wearing yellow.

What all this means is even more late nights after Wimbledon fortnight, and even blearier eyes. But plenty of entertainment awaits for those who have the stamina for three consecutive gruelling weeks.