Tour de France 2016 **SPOILERS**

[Toshiba Boy]

Really enjoying watching them cycle round my favourite ski resorts

I have told friends going off on their winter holidays that they're "privileged" to be skiing in and around all those iconic cycling climbs.

 

[HF2300]

Still waiting for the interview of Bardet. Luckily, I got it on France2 channel. I think ITV4 is a bit biased towards English speaking riders only. ( Don't know if Bardet speaks English though).

I think ITV are biased towards interviews with whoever they can get hold of in the time available; and I suspect a French rider, riding for a French team, who'd just won a stage and jumped to 2nd on GC might have been a little in demand by the French media...

 

[psmiffy]

Really enjoying watching them cycle round my favourite ski resorts

Really enjoy watching them ride a lot of roads that I have ridden - apart from a couple of stages there has been at least 10k of each stage that I have ridden

 

[HF2300]

For all the drama of the last climb, still can't help feeling that was a bit of a damp squib overall. All Astana's work on the front didn't really seem to lead to anything, no-one really attacked Froome when they had the opportunity*, the tactics were again highly conventional 'wait till the last climb' stuff (which was unlikely to realistically threaten Froome), and much of the GC shake up was due to riders crashing (Mollema) or running out of legs (Yates) - though I appreciate that where riders cracked or weren't able to seriously attack it was probably because of the pace set by Astana, Sky and to an extent BMC.

Just wondering to what extent the other GC contenders have simply run out of legs or didn't have it in the first place, and to what extent they've mentally settled for fighting for podium rather than yellow, or even just defending the places they're in.

Be interesting to see what happens today, but really they're just scrapping for the minor placings. Hope Yates has a good day though, it'd be good to see him in the top 3 and Quintana's 19 seconds looks quite vulnerable.

*(except possibly Bardet, but I can't recall the timing - I thought Bardet and his team-mate had set it up and possibly attacked before Froome's crash)

 

[coffeejo]

*(except possibly Bardet, but I can't recall the timing - I thought Bardet and his team-mate had set it up and possibly attacked before Froome's crash)

Yup. Other than silly cycling, Bardet is the reason that Froome and Nibali crashed. He attacked and they gave chase, which literally led to their downfall.

 

[Tin Pot]

Really enjoy watching them ride a lot of roads that I have ridden - apart from a couple of stages there has been at least 10k of each stage that I have ridden

Mmm, I'll have to do a summer trip to the Alps some time. Looks great.

 

[Louch]

Enough for Froome to choose to use them, train on them, and race on them.....horses for courses and all that.....if he's trained all season on ovals and has to use round there is going to be a world of difference for him. His power stroke has to be delivered differently. It's like running across a field in studs and then using spikes. Don't forget that teamSKY's mantra has always been "Incremental gains"...or in the words of Tesco, "Every little helps"

It wasn't like he has never ridden on a normal bike set up, and it wasn't like he was handed a tesco generic bike with forks wrong way around. He had to ride about 6 miles on a bike that was slightly different to his usual one. Every little may help, but he was hardly on a Clown bike. If he had then Millers praise would have been worthy. His over praise of sky this year after years of belittling their techniques when he was at Garmin is really disingenuous too

 

[smutchin]

My brother is just heading out to bag a spot on the Joux Plane and paint "YATES" on the road. He says it's about 24°C and "sunny in places" at the moment.

I'm not at all envious of him. The sod.

 

[smutchin]

Of course it made a bloody difference.

In practical terms, no, it didn't.

Truth is we'll never know.

It cant be quantified,

What we do know, what can be quantified, is the time showing on the clock when he crossed the line. And really, that's all that matters.

 

[brommers]

Have just seen the Froome crash again. He could have chosen the bike of any of his teammates as they were all behind him. So G's bike must be set-up closest to his.

 

[smutchin]

Have just seen the Froome crash again. He could have chosen the bike of any of his teammates as they were all behind him. So G's bike must be set-up closest to his.

Partly that, partly down to which riders were going to be more useful to him on the final climb. Poels could possibly be an even closer match, given that he's the same height and build as Froome, but he was never going to leave Poels without a bike!

 

[brommers]

but he was never going to leave Poels without a bike!

Agreed

 

[coffeejo]

Another minute's silence. Puts the race into context.

And yet, vive le Tour!

 

[Pro Tour Punditry]

Another minute's silence.

What for?

 

[HF2300]

What for?

The Munich shootings?