VIELHA, Spain – This could be the last Tour de France for Floyd Landis, but at least the U.S. cyclist is determined to go out in style.

Landis, competing in cycling’s most grueling race with what he says is a potentially career-ending arthritic hip condition, took the overall lead Thursday in the hardest stage of the high Pyrenees.

Landis didn’t win the stage – that honor went instead to Russian Denis Menchov. But it didn’t matter. The Pennsylvania native’s goal was to distance key rivals, establishing himself as the favorite to become the heir to Lance Armstrong, his former teammate.

The 30-year-old, who rebelled against his pious Mennonite upbringing to start racing as a teen, grinned broadly as he became the fifth U.S. cyclist in the Tour’s long history to don the leader’s prized yellow jersey.

“A dream come true,” he said.

His performance offered a little clarity to the Tour too. The race had been leaderless since a doping scandal knocked out several of the favorites before the start on July 1. Thanks to the Pyrenees, there’s the beginnings of a hierarchy for the first time. Stage 11’s five arduous climbs over 128 miles, under the hot sun, mercilessly whittled down the field.

By the finish, at the Pla-de-Beret ski station, just two riders had managed to cling to Landis: Menchov and fellow American Levi Leipheimer.

Landis took the race lead from Cyril Dessel, who held the yellow jersey for one day. The unheralded Frenchman, who had been 4:45 ahead of Landis at the start of the stage, is now 8 seconds back overall and can be expected to drop back further in the Alps.

“Everything will be decided in the last week in the Alps,” Menchov said.

A question is whether Landis’ arthritic hip – the legacy of a training crash in 2003 _ can carry him to victory in Paris on July 23.

“Ordinarily with this condition, it’s a slow process and it isn’t a catastrophic failure in one day, so it’s unlikely at this point that it will be so much of a problem that it will affect the race,” Landis said. “But afterward I have to make a decision what to do and, at this point, I’m leaning toward a hip replacement because I am getting tried of dealing with it.”

No one has ridden the Tour with a hip made of titanium, steel or ceramic. In case it doesn’t allow him to continue professionally, he’s been savoring this year – winning the Tours of Georgia and California and the Paris-Nice stage race.

“I decided that I gotta force it no matter what, and I have to get a good season out of the one that I got,” he said.