With five stages left in the Tour de France, Lance Armstrong admitted Tuesday that an eighth tour title may be out of reach -- until next year. Armstrong, the seven-time tour winner, said he was 100 percent sure that he would return to ride the 2010 tour, though he would do so on a team with a new, American-based sponsor. That new sponsor would be announced at the tour on Thursday, and would work with the team for 2010 and beyond, Armstrong said, while speaking to reporters in his room at a ski lodge high above this city. He said he would neither finance nor run the team -- only ride on it. 'Even though I'll be a year older, I think I'll be better,' Armstrong said of next year's venture. He added, though, that he still held out a sliver of hope that he would win the tour this year, but he would have to beat teammate Alberto Contador to do it. Contador, the Spaniard who won the 2007 tour, is the overall leader, 1 minute 37 seconds ahead of Armstrong. Bradley Wiggins, of the Garmin-Slipstream team, is in third, 1:46 back. The three-week race ends Sunday in Paris. 'I think this year, it might be out of the question because Alberto is just too super,' Armstrong said of his chances to win. 'If he just avoids, which I think he will, a mistake, I don't see how anybody beats him,' Armstrong said, of Contador. 'Next year? Different story.' Armstrong, 37, emerged from retirement in the fall after three and a half years away from cycling, and appears to be headed to a team, with the longtime manager Johan Bruyneel in charge. Bruyneel said Tuesday that he was leaving Astana at the end of the season. Later, Armstrong said he would never race for a team without Bruyneel at the helm of it. 'You'll have to wait until Thursday to find out the details,' Bruyneel said as he headed to dinner. Next year's plans aside, Armstrong must first make it to the end of this tour, and several of the race's toughest stages are still to come. But he has been impressive. In his first season back after the retirement, Armstrong has shown that he is still one of the best cyclists in the world, even as one of the oldest riders in the race. He admitted, though, that Contador had been so dominant, that even a younger Armstrong could not have beaten him. He said Contador had pedaled up the climb during Sunday's stage in Verbier faster than Armstrong had ever gone. That quickness was matched or surpassed only by the Italian cyclist Marco Pantani at the Giro d'Italia in 1999, Armstrong said. Still, Armstrong showed some spark in his old legs on Stage 16, a 98.8-mile (159-kilometer) ride that started in the Swiss town of Martingy, traveled through Italy and ended up back in France. He fell back from the pack that contained the race leaders, losing 35 seconds before finding more energy. He then zoomed back to that pack, as if he had not stumbled at all. 'It's easy to explain; he's a very great rider,' Contador said. 'He was one in the past, and he showed it once again. 'Lance did some great work today, but I didn't really need his help,' he added. 'I'm really satisfied with his performance.' In Stage 16, the ranking of the overall leaders did not change. Contador finished 10th, 59 seconds behind the stage winner, Mikel Astarloza of the Euskaltel-Euskadi team. Astarloza finished six seconds ahead of Sandy Casar, the Frenchman on the Francaise des Jeux team. Armstrong was 12th, also given the time of 59 seconds back from Astarloza. After the race, Armstrong sent best wishes to the Saxo Bank rider Jens Voigt -- who is one day older than Armstrong. Voigt was forced to pull out of the race after crashing during the final descent. Voigt, the 37-year-old rider from Germany, toppled onto the pavement, face first, and slid for about 20 feet before coming to a stop, unconscious. Saxo Bank team spokesman Brian Nygaard said that Voigt had a concussion and 'very, very bruised face,' and that he regained consciousness in the ambulance that arrived on the scene. Voigt was then transported by helicopter to a local hospital, where test results showed that Voigt had a broken bone under his right eye. From sliding on the pavement, he also had numerous wounds that needed stitches. 'There was no malfunction of the bike,' Nygaard said. 'It could be a freak accident.' Earlier in the season, Armstrong crashed during a race in March, breaking his right collarbone. The injury required surgery, and a metal plate was affixed to the bone to stabilize it. Though he has said he sat on the roadside after that crash, wondering if his return to racing was a smart move, Armstrong said Tuesday that he could not be more pleased with his performance this season. He did admit, though, that he missed the feeling of winning at this tour, a ritual he became used to when he won every tour from 1999 to 2005. 'While it'd be great to win at nearly 38 years old, it's virtually unheard of in this game,' he said. 'So you've got to understand and respect that, too.' 