Oscar Pereiro has been waiting for this moment for a long time now.

On Monday, Pereiro was given the yellow jersey for the 2006 Tour de France. Pereiro finished second in the race to Floyd Landis and as a result of the Landis trial, Pereiro was moved from second to first.

“I have the feeling of arriving at the end of a thriller, after having spent 14 months thinking about it and not being able to concentrate as I should have on my job,” Pereiro said. “It is essentially a kind of release.”