World time trial champ Fabian Cancellara of Team CSC scorched the 2.1 mile time trial in Palo Alto on Sunday, winning the stage in a remarkable 3 minutes 51 seconds 21 seconds.

Bradley Wiggins of High Road Sports was second in 3:55.98, with Slipstream-Chipotle’s Tyler Farrar third in 3:56.46.

Astana’s Levi Leipheimer, the defending ToC champ, just missed the podium in 3:57.52.

Twas a big day for the two American teams — High Road and Slipstream, which combined to take seven of the top 10 spots, with Slipstream taking four of them. In addition to Farrar, David Zabriskie (7th), David Miller (9th) and Steven Cozza (10th) were in the top 10 for Slipstream. For High Road, Wiggins was 2nd, Edvald Boasson Hagen was 5th and Mark Cavendish placed 8th. 10 Speed fave George Hincapie of High Road finished out of the top 10 in 13th.

1 Fabian Cancellara (CSC)              3.51.21
2 Bradley Wiggins (High Road)          3.55.98
3 Tyler Farrar (Slipstream)            3.56.46
4 Levi Leipheimer (Astana)             3.57.52
5 Edvald Boasson Hagen (High Road)     3.58.89
6 Gustav Larsson (CSC)                 3.59.19
7 David Zabriskie (Slipstream)         3.59.58
8 Mark Cavendish (High Road)           3.59.65
9 David Millar (Slipstream)            3.59.78
10 Steven Cozza (Slipstream)           4.00.12

Though it took a while to get into the site, 10 Speed enjoyed the cycling.tv feed … until it blipped out halfway through Leipheimer’s ride. Bummer.

The prologue played out as Kathleen Nelson predicted, with Cancellara taking the yellow jersey. He could be a threat to win the race if he can build a big enough lead in the time trials and flat stages, though Leipheimer is super motivated to repeat as champ and repudiate the A.S.O.’s un-vitation of him and Astana to the Tour de France.

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