At 125 km, the shortest stage comes just after the longest. To be honest, it will be a hectic 125 kilometres, since it is all up and down from kilometre 50 all the way until the summit finish on Plat d’Adet. Even the leaders will find this a tricky stage. And the riders in the autobus… For them, it will be a stage of trials and tribulations, with a tight elimination time which will force sprinters to spend the entire stage à bloc. Several green jersey contenders could end up having to pack their suitcases after this stage! The final podium will start to take shape. Without a doubt, the highlight of the race.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/rogers-delivers-tour-de-france-stage-win

Great win for a great rider, done with style. Brilliant move by Pinot as well, fantastic racing.

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHsIEBoVt0I[/video]

That’s awesome.

My heart is being stolen by a very very classy French man..

Photos from stage 16.

Today is tricky, I feel like the win will come from the break, and so perhaps Majka maybe? Otherwise I’d be expecting Pinot, Nibali, maybe Valverde to be up there.

A few useful links

Live Cycling News Text Updates
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Official Tour Live Feed App
Classifications
Withdrawals
Fantasy League Standings
Loser League Standings

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/gerrans-pulls-out-of-tour-de-france – nice guy, shame to see him go

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/contador-to-miss-vuelta-a-espana – not surprised

http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/pro-bike-alessandro-petacchis-s-works-tarmac – this is how road bikes should look

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nAsd8RCOJ8[/video]

A good and deserved win yesterday. Looks a bit like the fizz has gone from the GC race though.

Looks a bit like the fizz has gone from the GC race though.

Yep it looks like Nibbali just has to stay on his bike to Paris and it’s his. However, I thought I detected a bit of weariness on him (and team) yesterday.

Rest of the podium is all to play for. Pinot looked good yesterday. I don’t think that the rest of the places will be sorted out until the TT though.

Just read on twitter that Reto hollenstein crashed at 1km into yesterday’s 227(or however long) rode in alone and finished. With a collapsed lung. A collapsed lung. Mind: boggled!

GC is all but done and dusted though I’d expect a fair bit of attacking today,at a push Mibali might loose a bit of time. Possibly another breakaway with some top 5 duelling coming in at the back of it. I’ll go for Pinot being the first placed GC guy and Nieve or J-Rod FTW.

Thought yesterday was brilliant, Pinot really put it down and was going all out to the line, was great to see Bardot really giving his all to make up the time on the descent to limit losses as well.
Was some great racing, Rogers was great and as soon as he was off the front he was not going to lose.
Looking forward to today, be interesting to see if Bardot can do anything to make back time and the other podium places are still pretty contentious with today and tomorrows mountains and a ITT to come it should be great racing.

Nibbles looks like (barring an unforeseen disaster) he’s got the GC pretty sewn up.

The rest of the podium however… Would love to see Bardet, Peraud and Pinot give Valverde a good kicking and drop him off the podium.

All to play for in a KOM as well.

Been a good tour, the downside has been the number of early crashes that have denied us a proper Cav vs Kittel sprint battle and I’d also would have loved to see some proper Froome vs Contador action in the high mountains.

Am I a bad person in wishing that Nibali has a bad day and has his lead cut right down, just to blow the GC competition wide open again?

always like Pinot since he showed his flaws last year (poor descender, possibly a manifestation of the pressure he felt to be the Great French Hope) so have been rooting for him all Tour. It looked like Nibali was working hard to try stay with him just before the summit when he realised he’d dropped Bardet, and it was nice to see his team mates burying themselves for him (to the extent of pointing out potholes on the hectic final run through the city centre to the finish). Podium and white jersey please (though I love the FDJ blue kit!).

Interesting situation with AG2R with twin prongs (Bardet, Peraud) who do seem to be riding independently.

The rest of the podium however… Would love to see Bardet, Peraud and Pinot give Valverde a good kicking and drop him off the podium

this x eleventy million.

oooh i do hope theres some attacks on nibbles today (theres a joke in there somewhere) to spice it up. I think its time Valverde stopped playing second fiddle and got moving, always the bridesmaid.

Would love to see Bardet, Peraud and Pinot give Valverde a good kicking and drop him off the podium.

We all would

Nibbles has it in the bag barring accident

He seems peerless at the minute in a very much reduce GQ race.

That last climb is pretty much the way the Grand Raid des Pyrenees Ultramarathon descends, it starts and finishes at Vielle-Aure.

Outside bet: Majka to gun up it for another stage win.

my prediction-
Nibali to lose a surprising amount of time today/tomorrow.

why? he just looked a bit sheepish in the interviews last night. nothing more scientific than that.

😛

Is Pinot not off to SKY next year? Could completely foil uncle Dave’s plan of giving France their first GC winner in ages if Pinot could overtake Valverde (conceivable) and Nibali were to abandon… If Pinot is off to SKY then he would fit in well with the other talented GC climbers who also have an aversion to descending 😆

^ He’s been a long time in yellow and his team are beginning to falter. Movistar looked strong yesterday. Pinot has taken this years man crush trophy, to turn his descending from tears to smoking has really impressed me. Was Nibali faltering or just super calm yesterday? We’ll find out today!

Pinot looking a class act. His descending looks on the mend too.

Mind you, he doesn’t have the skills of an ex-mountain biker at speeds of up to 100km per hour in this, the month of July*

*copyright Phil Liggett

why? he just looked a bit sheepish in the interviews last night. nothing more scientific than that.

Sheepish Nibbles earlier:

I would like to see more from Valverde – there will be a lot of Spanish fans out today, although he is from Murcia not the north, he will be getting a lot of encouragement !

I don’t see how Nibali can lose a lot of time, he looks strong enough individually just to hang with any GC contenders and follow a break containing any – am I wrong ?

It does seem to me he has it won barring a crash, I like the way he’s put time into people on that epic cobbled stage and in the mountains, seems quite a complete performance.

jens is in a break

I can’t see the winner coming from those in the break unless the peleton completely gives it up again though.

I’d be happy to see Valverde drop off the podium; one less unrepentant cheat we have to look at. Two French riders on the podium in Paris would be fantastic

Having someone decent targeting the KOM is really spicing up the race.

Or maybe Rodriquez’s inability to make the break is spicing up the race. If he’d made it today the competition would be as irelevant as always.

Kiryienka giving it some beans again today, what a machine. Be good for Sky to have something to show for this tour.

…and has something happened to Kwiatkowski or is he just struggling?

As much as I want Nibali to win i’d like him to have a least one bad day. Pinot and Bardet have spiced things up now and Valverde has been boring as hell and is still in second. Like others have said i’d happily see him off the podium.

This is a pretty crumby story if it turns out to be true:

Europcar boss accuses Michael Albasini of racism
Orica-GreenEdge’s Swiss rider reportedly called Europcar’s Kévin Réza a “dirty negro”

http://road.cc/content/news/124595-europcar-boss-accuses-michael-albasini-racism

Would imagine alarm bells starting to go off at FDJ and AG2R with Mollema in the break. He’s handy at a TT.

Quite puzzled by the Eurosport commentary. How was the FdJ team (or lottery) created because of WW1? Are they just saying random things on the off-chance that nobody notices?

How was the FdJ team (or lottery) created because of WW1?

At a guess, French government needed revenue?

It was reintroduced in 1933 I think, so a good few years after WW1. Were the French not one of the first countries in the world to have a lottery way back in the 1500’s?

cracking battle between Pinot and Bardet, should make the final climb interesting to see if one or other can put some time in!

Valverde going backwards, AG2R working Nibali as hard as they can…

Now nibali working AG2R as hard as he can…

Great work from Majka to pull back Visconti

And off he goes, 2km to go!

Jesus Christ I might be right for once…

Dammit, how did Valverde get ahead of the Pinot group?!

I feel like the win will come from the break, and so perhaps Majka maybe?

Ahem.

He’s like a low fat version of Sagan. Brilliant riding.

Funny that, RealMan.

Something feels dodgy about that stage win.

What did happen to Kwiatkowski? Can’t see him in the top 30. Can’t have lost more than an hour surely. Did he abandon?