Well, one of the primary sponsors(since 1987), Credit Lyonnais, uses the lion as its mascot, and they present the lion to the stage winner at the end of every stage.

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Lance must have a fair old lion collection by now. Anyone know what he does with them?

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Put the bunny back in the box.

I think he has 17 lions at this point, and around 60 yellow jerseys(since they give him a new one every day) after this tour.

Some cool Tour info at http://www.angelfire.com/...s/tour/eddy/xtra.htm

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i've read they actually give the leader two yellow jerseys per day in the lead. and i thought they gave the lions to the leader, not the stage winner. i'm not sure about the second one, and i don't have the benefit of OLN to watch the presentations every day. later,

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mckenzie

They do get 2 jerserys every day, the presentation jersey (that zips up the back) and a fitted one to ride in the next day. Nike supplied special jersers this year, you could see special ventalation under the arms and along the sides.

My mistake. I misspoke. They give two yellow jerseys and a lion to Lance at the end of every stage. The actual stage winner gets a peck on the cheek, some flowers, and a boot in the ass to make room for Lance.

I think that answer is both technically correct and will make everyone happy.

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I believe that the team that is in the lead also gets a lion each day they are the top team. So each USPS member would have picked up a few in early days of the tour.

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Reach for what you cannot.

-Percy Cerruty

I don't know what Lance does with his, but I believe it was Tyler who said in an interview (some days after CSC had been in the lead) that he had just gotten "another small Lion" (as opposed to the bigger yellow jersey variety, I assume) to give to his dog with which to play. At first, I was a bit shocked by that, but then I tried to figure out what else he could do with them and couldn't really come up with a better idea, since he doesn't have any kids (another rider mentioned that he wanted one for his daughter) and I can't really see him selling them off unless it's a charity auction or something. And it's his momento, so he can do with it what he pleases, eh?

As I recall, Tyler said his dog picked up one of his small lions and he didn't have the heart to take it away from his surrogate son, Tugboat. I also remember him saying he's had one of Tugboat's tennis balls in his bag as a good luck charm.

http://www.tylerhamilton.com/familyphotos45.html