Blimey. I'm glad I went to the pub to watch that. Not entirely surprised to get home to find 15 pages of comments to catch up on...
If the result stands Yates is in yellow
Shame - would have been the first time three different Brits have worn yellow in the same Tour. Arguably, Yates could well have taken the yellow sooner if not for the flamme rouge incident.
I'll likely get shot down for this but what a great spectacle. There's much to be said for Mario Kart Pro Cycling.
I am full of admiration for Chris Froome. He is of the same mould as Merkcx, Anquetil, Hinault, as great champions. He is clever, intelligent and an opportunist. He can read the race and act accordingly. I think he has already won this tour and will win more. Quintana on the other hand lacks some of those qualities. He is too conservative and not as strong as we might think. He will never win the Tour.
Quintana has already shown himself to be tactically suspect again this year. And on top of that, we've had a real glimpse of his true form today. It was always a red flag that he chose to do the Route du Sud rather than the Dauphiné, and while I've been keen to give him a chance to prove himself, he needed to show some form today and wasn't able to. Clearly he isn't where he needs to be.
If they don't make any adjustment can you imagine how fired up Froome is going to be for the TT tomorrow...
Absolutely. Even if the result had stood, Froome would only have been 53 seconds down on Yates, and I wouldn't have been surprised to see him recoup all of that in the TT tomorrow. By the end of stage 17 he will have totally buried this race.
If the result stands Yates should tell them to stuff the jersey were the sun doesn't shine, to accept yellow in those circs imo would be a blight on his career.
Pffft. Unless Yates himself had deliberately caused the crash, the incident and its outcomes should have no bearing on his reputation.
It's racing, it was an incident. Stuff happens, the result should stand.
Yeah, I'm inclined to believe it should have stood, and that Froome would have gone on to win the race anyway. I get why they have changed the result, and it's probably the right decision on balance, but I don't think it's a truly satisfactory outcome for anyone, including Froome. Most of all, it's a shame the racing is overshadowed by this kind of controversy.
Good point just made on the BBC live text commentary... whilst Froome and Porte have been given the time of Mollema, had the crash not happened then the three of them would have put more time into the others
Yeah, Quintana can count himself lucky. Same as the Yates flamme rouge incident, which is why he is doubly unlucky not to have been awarded the yellow jersey today.
And in all the excitement, no one has yet mentioned that Dan Martin also found his limits today, which I'm both surprised and disappointed by.
Let's not forget waht we saw today though. We know Quintana is not on form yet and Mollema and Porte are.
Good call by
@400bhp to pick Mollema. There's been nothing in his performances so far this year to suggest he would do anything in this Tour - but at the same time, he's been quietly going about his job in a more effective and intelligent way than some much more fancied riders.
I guess the sun's always been well over the yard arm long enough somewhere...
And when I texted my wife with what was happening she replied "is that allowed?"
