Gay of the Week & Battle of the Network Gays July 1, 2009

Bear with us, we're making a slight timing change with our weekly Battle of the Network Gays poll. In the past we've posted our nominees on Friday and announced the victor in a Gay of the Week post on Monday. Moving forward we'll be announcing the Battle of the Network Gays contestants on Wednesday and hand out the hotly coveted crown at the end of the Best Gay Week Ever column on Fridays.

To get us onto this exciting and new (i.e. easier for us to manage) schedule, this special interregnum post both announces last week's winner and unveils the nominees for this week's poll.

And this week's winner is....

Lt. Col Victor Fehrenbach

How he won: Fehrenbach earned 44% of the votes this week, giving a resounding thumping to challengers Dustin Lance Black (23%), True Blood's Lafayette (17%) and Y&R's Rafe (15%). Semper Fi!

Past wins: This is Fehrenbach's first time on the throne, but given his heavy rotation on the cable news channels, his cleft chin, uber-hot chrome dome, and courteous eloquence we expect to see more of him!

The Lieutenant Colonel's benevolent rule will last until Friday. If he hopes to keep the crown longer he must fend off these three challengers:

Rafe (Yani Gellman) from Young and the Restless (Why?)

Derek Chavez from The Real Word: Cancun (Why?)

Dr. Morales the coroner on The Closer (Why?)

Check them out, and vote for your favorite!

Vote for your favorite by 8 PM EDT on Thursday, July 2. Be sure and check Friday's Best Gay Week Ever column to see which gay our readers have carried to glory!