The Tour de France needs it fans. They are the source of its popularity. But there are some fans out there that the race can really do without. Always has. Just ask Lance Armstrong. He has already said what he thinks of those who jeered him all the way to the top of Mont Ventoux on stage 14.

Go back in time and ask Eddy Merckx. In 1975, while leading the Tour on stage 14 to the Puy de Dôme, he found himself at the receiving end of a mighty wack in the kidneys from a roadside fan. Well, maybe not a fan. Merckx still believes the attack cost him the overall victory, which that year went to Frenchman Bernard Thévenet after he won the next stage to Pra-Loup.

It is no secret. On the roads of the Tour, riders face the risk of some extreme verbal and physical abuse every day they race a stage.

It is a unique trait of the Tour that spectators who pay not a cent to watch can come and be so close to it.

In reality, they are major players themselves in the spectacle that is the Tour. Still, as the peloton continually rides through a daily sea of seemingly maddened humanity, it is surprising more incidents don't occur.

Here's a tip. You don't need to be rider to get a feel of what I am talking about. Following the Tour in a media car is not an easy matter.

In the VeloNews press car, each year we keep arriving in Paris after three weeks on the road to the finish saying there's gotta be a safer way. Each year, there we are again, ambling along at 40 kph, listening to the crackling airwaves of Radio Tour while outside all we see is mayhem.

And then when we hit the mountains, there we are - parting the crowd. Not a safe thing when you consider that the fans have been sitting for the most part under blazing sun for an entire day. Not a safe thing when you consider many of them are up to their eyeballs in the good ol’ grog from nearby vineyards.

Already this year we have had water sprayed through our windows (luckily not onto our laptops), as well as rubbish, confetti (really!) and the odd chicken bone and aluminum beer can.

Already we have had one assault. As reported yesterday, VeloNews European correspondent was hit on the arm by a drunken spectator as he began the 21km ascent up Mont Ventoux on stage 14.

We have also had our Tour accreditation sticker ripped off, not to mention the famed red, yellow and black VeloNews decal on the hood.

On that, we have a suspect. As well as a plan to catch him. So if it is you, watch out. We are more ready than you can ever believe.

To be fair, just as there are the bad fans there are the good ones, too. Thankfully. However, before we mention the good, we want it on record that there is one particular pest we would love to name and identify. But we won't for the simple reason that the recognition he would get would only feed his crazed ego.

As for the good fans who deserve the kudos he will never receive, we can’t go without mentioning the Devil and the Angel. Absolute opposites they may be, in belief and location on the course every day. Absolute they are when it comes to loving the Tour.

Although, I have to admit it, we are all waiting for the day that the Devil will gets his tail caught in a yellow jersey wearer's rear derailleur. And with it, won't the cries come that he should have been kicked off the race years ago. Maybe that's why the Angel stands atop a big van when he spreads his wings at the Tour.

When it comes to collective passion, you can't beat the barking Basques. Mad as cut snakes they may appear, as they scream and run alongside riders with arms waving like a short-circuiting robot warning Will Robinson of danger in an episode of “Lost in Space.”

With red, white and green Basque flags draped over their shoulders - or anything fluorescent orange to match the color of the Basque Euskaltel team - they are an act of their own. Maybe not a class act, but an act.

So are the beer drinking Belgians who chant songs with bare bellies sticking proudly out. The word's we can't figure out. Never have or will, we reckon.

Neither have we figured out the Dutch, even though they seem to have a lesser presence this year. The theory is they have been upstaged by the Basques who had made off with the Dutch national color of orange, which the Basques now call their own.

One special mention has to go to the daring fan who dared to drop his dacks and run with one Tour ride in week two. We've seen backsides bared before, but never on the run, with his, what we assume was his tackle, threatening to trip him over. And to think there are still five days to go!