It looked like Fabian had a “patron” moment Sunday when he pulled up to the leading Sky riders in the valley before Andorra, presumably to “call time” for some reason. But Phil & Paul ignored it and I didn’t see any recaps mention why that happened. I don’t believe there was a major rider who had a mechanical at that stage of the race.
Hopefully we’ll see Fabian pull something magic in the next two weeks.
Not like Phil to miss a subtle development in the race…
We’ve finally gotten rid of those two jokers as commentators on the main TV carrier here in the UK. One of the replacements is David Millar and it’s night and day - superbly insightful guy as you would expect.
Phil Liggett has done a huge amount for cycling in his life but needed to put the mic down 10 years ago.
Paul and Phil are the Statler and Waldorf of cycling. It’s hard to dislike them.
I love when they break to Jens Voigt for commentary. He sounds like he’s smoking pot all the time but instead of making him mellow it makes him really chatty.
Watching the rest day recap, I feel like Quintana has more in him. I think that the severe weather affected some riders more than others. I hope Quintana has a bit more in him and is just waiting for the right time. I noticed there is a Mountain Time Trial this year. Have Froome and Quintana ever dualed in one in the past? By the way, do the Tour organizers ever mention why they don’t end the Tour with a Champs-Elysses time trial? The last one I remember was the Fignon-Lemond dual, which was the most exciting finish of all time. I wonder why they don’t do it every 4-5 years.
Suppose the GC leader had an advantage of a couple minutes. A time trial on the final stage would be terribly boring; watching the riders come in to the city one-by-one. I think they got lucky to have such a close race between Fignon and Lemond. As it is, they get all the spectacle of having the peloton making multiple laps in front of the fans in Paris, and they’re guaranteed an exciting finish with riders fighting for the stage win.
Yeah, it’s a tradition. The last stage TT was only a really great idea because it ended so dramatically.
Before I left this morning NBCSN were showing a segment on how the riders are massaged to aid recovery. They could have just talked about it for 30 seconds. But no. They actually went into a private room where a rider was lying bare ass naked on the massage table while a (not unattractive) female masseuse was rubbing down his ass and legs.
And now I know. So glad I watched.
Next: How soigneurs make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, with or without crusts.
No spoilers, as I assume some of our American friends will need to wait until later today to see today’s action. I also assume that there will be some stuff to say, to be frank.
However, to point out that tomorrow’s Ventoux climb has been cut to 14km, instead of the full 23km. They’re expecting gale force winds at the top tomorrow and it’s too dangerous to ride a bike up it, so they’re going to stop at Chalet Reynard. A bit disappointing, but totally understandable given conditions. The priority clearly has to be rider safety.
I love watching racing in the wind. The riders suffer, I know, but the echelons are interesting and opportunities for team-coordinated attacks abound in what would otherwise be a boring stage.
Brilliant tactics from Sagan and Froome, and their teams!
Yeah, it’s a pity about the Ventoux finish. But understandable.
Oh, yeah: Quintana is a whiner. Has he never ridden a bike in the wind? For example, in SPAIN? :smack: That’s what you have a team form, numbnuts.
I have such a crush on Peter Sagan.
Quintana, otoh - there were just a few too many shots of him dithering along, waiting for someone to come and give him a push. Sometimes you have to make your own luck, Nairo. And spare me any pissing and moaning about how today was so impossible -
Just finished watching, and oh man but I loved that. What a cheeky attack, and you couldn’t draw up a 4-man group more likely to work perfectly together. Anyone who complains about a stage like that just doesn’t like bicycle racing.
Quintana will attack in week 4.
This is the second time in two years (though not as thoroughly as last year) that Quintana has been caught out in cross winds. When the four went off and Team Pursuited it up the road, it didn’t look like he had a lot of his team around (at least to me) but that doesn’t excuse him sitting on his saddle and not reacting himself to get onto that group. Maybe he couldn’t but it looks like he got caught out (also not the first time this Tour, never mind the replication of the cross winds issue from last year).
The gap is by no means insurmountable but he’s not covering himself in glory at the minute by any means. It’s pretty disappointing, to be honest.
Sagan, meanwhile, is a bloody hero. Froome and Thomas reacted well but that guy, as always, is into everything. He always makes the race more interesting.
WTF happened there? Incredible scenes.
Surely the commissaires have to adjust the result there.
Quintana did attack today, then managed to get dropped by just about everyone
Luckily for him that was overshadowed by what happened next!
Chaos at the finish!
Good call by the race jury to give Froome the same time as Mollema and Porte. Imagine the frustration of crashing inside 500m, and seeing your bike get crushed and broken by an official car!
I think there’s rule that says that if there’s a significant crash within 1km of the finish (possibly one of the reasons they make it quite clear to the riders where the “1km to go line” is), the crashed riders are given whatever time those around them at the time of the crash got.
What an absolute clusterfuck. Antoine Demoitie died earlier this year after a crash and then getting run over by a motorbike. It’s not the same sort of incident - and in this case, I don’t think it’s the motorbike’s fault. The organisation of this with the fans all over the road was a disaster. I don’t think the rules actually allow for what they did but I suspect that they decided that common sense was the best rule of thumb to use in the end. I guess it depends on your pov as to whether this is fair and/or common sense though. For me, it might not be in the rules but you can’t let something like this, that was preventable by race organisation, play into the competition so heavily.
I don’t know that the 3km rule is in effect on mountain top finishes. Isn’t it just for massed finishes since crashes are more likely?