TdF Stage 6 – One For The Brave [Spoilers]

I have already talked of teams built around sprinters… Well then, I would not be surprised to see a breakaway stick on the day after the cobblestones stage, as we continue to commemorate the centenary on the roads of the Battle of the Somme and the Chemin des Dames. Yes, this is a stage for the brave, with lots of twists and turns towards the end, so the wind could also play a role… If attackers happen to come up short, a power sprinter may prevail on the long, leg-breaking false flat on the final straight. Last year’s Kittel and Greipel would have had lots of fun here.

Yesterday – where to begin? Everyone crashes, Froome pulls out, Nibali rides like a demon over cobbles, Fulsang is the best team member of all time (he pulled Nibali so hard Fabian AND Sagan went pop – how do you do that? how??), Boom drops the hammer and wins, somehow Lemoine (the Cofidis rider in the polka dots) does an insane ride and comes 10th, and it never rains, it only pours. Also Frank Schleck managed to finish, and only 8 minutes down. At the time of writing the only withdrawal listed for stage 5 is Froome. I’m wondering how many riders will be DNS for stage 6. That was insane. I’d also like to make a point that Boom averaged 46kmh (nearly 29mph) over the stage.

What would happen if you put these two on the same team?

Sorry, I couldn’t choose between those 3, more photos from stage 5[/url] here.

Today? Well maybe a break could stay away – but I don’t think so. As long as Kittel is ok after yesterday I think Giant-Shimano will pull it back and Kittel will take it. Hopefully everyone will just cruise the first 150k or so and have a nice breather, think they all need a break after yesterday.

A few useful links

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http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/van-garderen-feels-tour-de-france-should-not-include-cobbled-stages – is he being a wuss, or does he have a point?

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/riders-have-to-be-able-to-ride-every-kind-of-road-says-prudhomme – the response (man up)

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/merckx-i-would-have-loved-to-race-in-this-tour-de-france – Merckx approves

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/mechanical-hinders-contador-at-tour-de-france – Contador… urgh…

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/froome-abandons-the-tour-de-france – ok, maybe he’s not fine (he’s still not a footballer though)

OGE continues to be the coolest team in the peloton.

One final thing – for god’s sake, give this some kudos.

I liked that Geraint Thomas described the stage yesterday as ‘awesome’ with a big grin on his face while being interviewed on the steps of the Team Sky bus.

Got to have a photo of Nibali too, amazing ride…

This from INRNG sums up the Froome situation…

If you’re a fan then it’s a sad moment and if you can’t stand the sight of him then you should be sad too because you won’t see your preferred rider challenge and perhaps beat him either. For neutrals it means the Alberto Contador duel’s over and we lose a GC contender.

Jamie rises again 😆

I read that the last man home yesterday still rode the 100 miles of the stage in less than 4 hours.

*is impressed*

Daniel Lloyd tipping cross winds today.

With the way Astana are riding, if they get it right they could inflict a whole more pain today. Unless they’re blown from yesterday.

Hope to see the Sky train rolling, get Eisel on the front to drive it along.

You owe me a new keyboard Jamie. We need some sort of coffee/keyboard warning for your gifs.

a couple of questions today:

1- why is kittel not going for intermediate sprints? does he want the green jersey or just kudos of stage wins?
all the points he gets on Sagan at the final seem to have already been covered by Sagan getting those intermediates…
will kittel decide to go for a few key intermediates on later stages?

2- Was that ride by Nibali and the rest of Astana TOO good?? i mean 3 guys blowing away sagan and spartacus on the latter’s specialist turf?
(3 guys in a team managed by good old Vino)??? can you Really do that?

Time will tell, sorry to sully the thread and raise such thoughts!

I really hope its all genuine as Nibali looked sensational and if he keeps yellow all the way its going off in the final stages big time. 😛

Kittel knows Sagan will get the points in the lumpy stages and easily keep the Green jersey.

Thoroughly enjoyable spectacle. Only hesitancy is that Nibali rides for a dirty team.

1- why is kittel not going for intermediate sprints? does he want the green jersey or just kudos of stage wins?
all the points he gets on Sagan at the final seem to have already been covered by Sagan getting those intermediates…
will kittel decide to go for a few key intermediates on later stages?

Kittel really can’t climb, so he’s just interested in stage wins. Even if he was contesting the intermediates, he’d lose points (and most likely the jersey) to Sagan on the intermediates on hillier stages, hence he’s decided it’s not worth pursuing, I guess.

2- Was that ride by Nibali and the rest of Astana TOO good?? i mean 3 guys blowing away sagan and spartacus on the latter’s specialist turf?
(3 guys in a team managed by good old Vino)??? can you Really do that?

🙄

I swear some people would go to a kids race and have in their mind somewhere, “that kid seems a lot quicker than the others… maybe too quick…”

1- why is kittel not going for intermediate sprints? does he want the green jersey or just kudos of stage wins?

Stage wins. I think there’s an understanding amongst the pure sprinters that someone like Sagan (or Sagan specifically) can pull points off them over the 3 weeks making it really hard to win the jersey. It might be interesting to do the maths and see whether, on the flat stages, they could get enough points from the intermediates to add to the stage wins to get the jersey.

“Because of the mud I didn’t drop into the small sprockets and I couldn’t keep up with the front,” Contador said after he rolled across the line.

The article says he had a mechanical but was it just that he was too worried to go quickly? If it was the former, surely his team car could have squirted bottles into the mech and the cassette and cleared some mud.

Was that ride by Nibali and the rest of Astana TOO good??

what about Boom? was he in on it too?

Are we saying Nibali is on some drug that improves bike handling skills?! He had 2 team mates ride themselves into the ground for him. And they still got dropped by Boom, so obviously he’s dirty too 🙄

The article says he had a mechanical but was it just that he was too worried to go quickly? If it was the former, surely his team car could have squirted bottles into the mech and the cassette and cleared some mud.

or got on his spare bike while the other was cleaned?

team managed by good old Vino

Regardless of what his team may or may not be doing, he really should not be allowed to manage a team. Same goes for Riis.

Are we saying Nibali is on some drug that improves bike handling skills?

I don’t know if he is or isn’t, but that is a comical argument. It’s a bit like Tennis claiming that there is no benefit in performance enhancing drugs because it’s a game of skill 🙂

29mph average, that is so fast – I can barely fathom how fit you need to be to do that.

Are we saying Nibali is on some drug that improves bike handling skills?

whilst I’m not suggesting he is on them at all, drugs that make you fitter, faster, stronger, for longer will directly impact your ability to control the bike through reducing fatigue.

29mph average, that is so fast – I can barely fathom how fit you need to be to do that.

They have fasterer bikes than us!

I’m a bit gutted about yesterday, I normally take a day off work for one of the big mountain stages and discount the flat ones. The highlights did not give me enough.

29mph would give you a very respectable time at the sharp end of a club level 10 mile time trial. To average that over 150k in those conditions with 15k of pave is bloody impressive.

I watched through till 35Km to go when I had to go to bed, everything was just about smashed by then.

Interesting to see how Sky go now, putting Porte up as team leader rather than just declaring stage wins. If it goes too well then they could be back to having too many team leaders in the team. Wonder who Brad will be riding for next year.

Wondering if today will be a little tame as the road rash starts to settle in.

Fixed

Are we saying Nibali is on some drug that improves bike handling skills?! He had 2 team mates ride themselves into the ground for him. And they still got dropped by Boom, so obviously he’s dirty too

Cyclocross world champ innit.

either way nibali is of course a top top bike handler for sure, the skill he has on descents obviously came into play yesterday

Is Froome sneezing in that gif?

Anyway, back to the stage…

If the crosswind tip above is correct could there be a repeat of stage 13 last year when OPQS took advantage of the crosswind and blew the field apart. Obviously they’ve lost Cav but could be tempted to go for a stage win?

Fulsang is the best team member of all time

Westra was on the front of that group for a looooong time

Not all that interesting. Not when Sagan would be contesting the intermediates anyway and only losing a few points on each one, and as mentioned picking up lots of points from the intermediates and at the finish on days when the pure sprinters aren’t up there. I think it’s quite clear that a pure sprinter who gets no points on the harder days doesn’t have a hope against Sagan in the points jersey. Cav who is better at making it over climbs than Kittel struggled to take on Hushovd who isn’t as good as Sagan (when the intermediate sprints were also worth less).

He just needed a Crudclaw!

I don’t know if he is or isn’t, but that is a comical argument. It’s a bit like Tennis claiming that there is no benefit in performance enhancing drugs because it’s a game of skill

No, it isnt. Did you watch the same stage as me? The one where Nibali wasnt the fastest rider and didnt cross the line first? But obviously Astana are doping, but no ones suggesting Belkin are? Boom solo’ed away from 2 Astana riders who could do nothing to match his pace. There were so many variables yesterday to pin a performance on doping is what’s comical. Gee and Porte probably held a higher road speed in the final kms to catch the leading groups after Porte was baulked by crashes, was that down to doping or to Gee relishing the conditions and attacking it?

Astana have a bad rep (Vino, LA, Contador all worn the tainted jersey) but if youre so convinced every good performance is down to drugs why even watch the racing?

crashtestmonkey, I can’t really be bothered and don’t want to turn this into yet another tedious doping thread… what brakes said earlier ^^^

I agree with Brakes and (to go back to your straw man) strongly suspect there are doped tennis players, but you can’t be bothered to actually answer my point and explain why you think Astana doped but Belkin didnt? Fair enough, dont let your prejudices be challenged 🙄

29mph average, that is so fast

effectively tailwind for the whole stage.

Boom solo’ed away from 2 Astana riders who could do nothing to match his pace.

just to keep the fires stoked (sorry),

As anyone who’s raced cyclocross knows, riding in those sort of conditions is all about keeping momentum through the corners and slippery bits, rather than over-braking and having to power up again each time.
someone who’s been cyclocross world champ would have been able to do just that relatively easily, saving valuable energy for the last miles…!
that could be a sound reason why a cyclocross specialist won it.

explain why you think Astana doped but Belkin didnt? Fair enough, dont let your prejudices be challenged

Don’t think that, and didn’t say I thought that 🙂

that could be a sound reason why a cyclocross specialist won it.

As much as Nibali went for it, someone like Boom with no GC aspirations was always going to be prepared to take more risks on the run in (win it or bin it!)

It will be fascinating to see who doesn’t start or finish today. Standing by.

answer my point and explain why you think Astana doped but Belkin didnt?

Surely the thought process is obvious. Two Astana climbers dropped 2 of the best classics specialists and only lost 20s to Boom who is also a one day rouler type rider who you would expect to be better.

But obviously both arguements are spurious. Performance is not an indicator of doping and never can be. There are too many variables.

Which climbers did that?

Fuglsang (Astana) has a XC racing background, in 2007 he was U23 XC world champ and second overall in the Cape Epic.
In 2008 he won the Cape Epic.
It showed yesterday in the way he excelled on the cobbles.

G looks like he if feaking lovin it in that picture.
Absolute hero/hardman/nutter

/hat

Which climbers did that?

On the face of it Fuglsang and Niballi are climbers. So on the face of it you could draw a crappy conclusion that they must be doping to beat Cancellara and Sagan.

But I don’t think this. It’s ridiculous. Its so much more complicated than that.

Take into account all we know is the result what we don’t know is how much a huge number of factors influenced the result. Just as sample of things that will have impacted Niballi’s ability to win include
– Niballi worshiping Paris Roubaix as a kid and therefore having the motivation to do well
– Fuglsang being an ex mountain biker
– Niballi being one of the best bike handlers in the peleton
– Niballi being in yellow and needing time on the other climbers due to a percived weakness
– Kwiatkiowski puncturing which caused Cancellara and Sagan to loose contact
– Cancellara and Sagan not wanting to pull the other one to the finish for the win
– Niballi being a great TTer so knowing how to pace a ride on the flat.

There will be more but this just highlights how ridiculous it is to think that just because Niballi won he must be doping.

But this is the corner that cycling boxed its self into. The only way out is through testing and transparency but this isn’t happening. Also the grey area’s between clean and cheating are growing thanks to the MPCC (of which Astana are a member) and other bodies setting their own standards rather than everyone just playing by the WADA code.

What is interesting is the Froome got asked on every stage last year about doping. I haven’t seen any press about Niballi getting the same questions.