Don’t ever let anyone tell you that I don’t know how to lose a race

your crapness was never in doubt
As others have said well done for these tour threads a proper STW tradition and some nice intros

Busy today at wrok so briefly o sprint finish Cav wins

[mystic meg]I feel a crash will take out a big player today as in out of the race and the number 7 will feature [/mystic meg]

Greipel to take the points again? Interesting to hear Cav hasn’t given up on green yet, wonder if we’re going to see him in a break at some point..

Taking forever to catch..

Just leaving them dangling at the moment to nullify any further attacks.

There we go, 5km to go and the sprint trains can start to get organised.

crazy

That nudge stopped him going for it, guess he thought it might be a hollow win?

Wonder if Cav will get penalised for that?

Oops.

looked like cav’s mistake from where I was sitting but who knows

What happend?

I’m guessing a relegation for Mr Cavendish for that one…
Mind you the other guy did sit up.

well that was a silly finishing ‘straight’

I’d guess Cav DQ also, lucky that didnt bring a whole load down!

No doubt Cav will get relegated for that, to be fair though if you sit up in the middle of the pack when they’re going for a sprint finish you can expect some kind of carnage 😯

Damn that looked painful. Very lucky not to cause a massive pile up.

Looks to me like the other guy swerved into Cav and he gave him a nudge back, tit for tat, but the other guy ended up going down.

Wasn’t he part of kittels lead out train- guys sit up and slow down in every sprint. I like cav but he should be DQ’ed for that. Fat chance though.

well that was a silly finishing ‘straight’

I’m all for variety, and if every finish was on a motorway it would be a bit boring – it’s good to have some technical finishes. However, in a race like the tour, there’s just too many riders, and it’s all too fast. I’ve been quite disappointed with the sprint finishes so far, they seem to have been marred with more crashes then usual, and I think it might have something to do with the layout of the run ins.

Definitely does look like the Argos guy didn’t hold his line and wasn’t really Cav’s fault. Wonder how the French will see it though..

Also quick-step sucking as usual.. Cav to change team? Garmin? 😉

Definitely does look like the Argos guy didn’t hold his line and wasn’t really Cav’s fault. Wonder how the French will see it though..

Yeah, watching it back on the Eurosport coverage, it looks more like “one of those things”. The other guy drifted right (cos his team mate was on the left), Cav was going left to get onto Griepel’s wheel.

Maybe no real blame either side.

Cav shouldn’t be DQ’d or relegated as the other guy was all over the place in front of him.

Cav does however need to ditch his lead out train and start jumping on other folks.

Mol, watched slo mo doesn’t look like that to me, cav is leaning towards him for about 2 crank turns, other guy is bolt upright. Head on totally shows intent on cav, facial expression and position all look bad. The other guy does wonder off line, but basically goes left then right, back onto the line he was already on (right on white line). Cavs move was a sprinter vs sprinter strong-arm, except against a slowing non sprinter.

Before the hit by cav, a cynic might suggest the Argos rider sitting up had a look at cav and drifted right to clear him out as kittel went up the left. Cav’s response ott, though.

cav is leaning towards him for about 2 crank turns, other guy is bolt upright. Head on totally shows intent on cav, facial expression and position all look bad.

Yeah but he could see the impact coming and brace for it. Bear in mind this is all happening at 70kph, there’s really nothing you can do other than brace for impact – he absorbed the shock of the other guy drifting into him, not much else you can do.

Didn’t see it so is it worth watching the highlights later? There has to be less ads surely!

TomB I agree, Shimano rider looked back, saw him, and deliberately drifted back to stop Cav getting across onto wheels.

Crazy, Cav is “bracing” for an impact he is going to deliberately make, he could see it coming as he he instigated it. At the point they collide the other guy is bolt upright riding in a straight line right along the painted centre white line. Cav is leaning his upper body off his bike towards him as he comes up behind him-looks to me like Cav was p1ssed off he was impeded and decided to deliberately hit him, but wasn’t expecting the result.

Press conference outside bus really did him no favours – mentioned everything but the crash, then snatches dictaphone out of journos hand 🙄

I DO agree that his team appear to suck at leading him out.

someone please tell sagan to shave that stupid thing off his chin

Six of one and half a dozen of the other. I don’t care cause I got Kittel and Cav in my deam today.

cav took that rider out like some mad spanish bull

moving on from crashgate, great to see Kittel getting the opportunity to beat all the sprint favourites, rather than have people be able to suggest “Well, X wasnt there…”.

And yes I should have put him in my team….

Re: Ryder’s sunglasses: already done!

The lovely and obsecenely quick xc-steve of this parish, and of Silverfish/Mondraker race team has been wearing that look for at least three seasons now. Plastic Aviators Blog.

They are not funky eyewear .They look like a Conference footballers missus glases

LOL @ Cav’s latest tweet:

Can all sprint experts on twitter go & try flicking their bike right at 65kph without leaning your body left to balance & come back to me.

I wonder if Cav spoke some extra comments into the tape recorder before it got returned to the reporter 🙂

Where do I find this broom wagon program they do after? I can only find the first one to watch again.

The argos rider started to move left then drifted back right at the same time Cav made a dive for Griepels wheel. I’d say 60:40 to Cav. He should not have done the interviews though.

Cav’s team more than a little short of the mark at the mo – how many times has he had to go looking for a wheel from another team??

Cav was right it was not his fault though he explained it poorly. He needs to be allowed to calm down before he does interviews as he comes over as a dick at times

Thank christ Stannard was there. WTF happend to the rest of sky?