Wiggins nearly gapped Evans yesterday! 🙂 He’s on rather good form this year, isn’t he?

yeah, that was impressive – wierdly Martin looked like he was doing twice the speed of Wiggins, despite supposedly using huge gears

Coffee can’t have hit yet, as I was expecting potatoes.

Dauphinoise, Jamie! Mange tout, mange tout! 🙂

Coffee can’t have hit yet, as I was expecting potatoes.

Snap!

Did look impressive yesterday. Has been working hard though:

Daily Telegraph

did anyone else think wiggo looked to be sitting off-centre on his saddle ?

Some interesting comments from Jens Voight on twitter yesterday which he hastily back pedaled from after cathy wiggins replies

Today’s stage will be interesting

Wiggins is certainly flying… for some reason i stll don’t have the confidence when it comes to the big mountains for him. I just can’t see him grinding it out with Evans etc at the TDF day after day…

I do hope to be proven wrong though.

Bit of a repeat of last year, let’s hope he can stay out of trouble in the Tour, so we can see what he’s really got!

I think it’s shaping up to be an interesting TdF actually. Schleck is a mess right now but he was a mess this time last year too (that said the course doesn’t really suit him). Cuddles is looking pretty strong. Wiggins is looking good and as we’ve seen there are a lot of Grand Tour contenders ready to step up from other places too.

I’ll be gunning for Brad, but i’ll sticking a sneaky tenner on Amador if hes in this years Tour…hes looking like a bit of a dark horse, hes a great climber and can time trial pretty well also.

there’s no stopping the Sky train. it’s either going to make it to Paris in record time or it will derail leaving a mess of bloodied limbs and twisted metal.

It’s looking good and Sky are getting lots of practice controlling the peleton. It’ll be fun once Cav is added to the mix

Many bookies have Wiggo as fave for the tour now.

it is his best chance for sure and he will podium
one thing is certain evans will need to attack in the mountains as he wont win on the TT like last year so ther eis some pressure on him.
I dont think he can drop Wiggins personally and I doubt wigins can drop him. Will be close

We could have world road champion, TdF winner and Olympic gold road this year.

Imagine this 20 years ago…brilliant is all I can say even if it all ends in glorious failure we are out of the dark years

It’s looking good and Sky are getting lots of practice controlling the peleton

One race doesn’t mean they’ve won the TdF unfortunately. In the Giro they weren’t controlling the peloton (although arguably that might be about sprinting not the GC) particularly. There’s too many split teams, people on different programmes to say much yet. Half of people’s TdF squads were in Luxembourg last week (Sky weren’t that impressive, but the Radioshack lot were quite impressive when it got hilly) and are in Switzerland this week.

I’ll wait for the tour to judge the tour. Luckily in the first week I can go and see the depart and 2-3 other starts and finishes without missing too much work.

Interesting to see how the mountains work out though. Other than the Giro riders, we’ve not seen much of the GC contenders and the money in Luxembourg is on Andy Schleck doing a big stage tomorrow to show he’s got some legs. Not so sure myself though.

Rumour is that Cav won’t go to Le Tour and will focus on the Olympics instead. Remember he did a full Giro, very few other sprinters did that.

he will podium

Podium is not a verb! AAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH! 😉

Well Cav rarely finishes the giro if we’re being honest. My guess is they’ll have him for some wins at the start then he’ll go home and they’ll focus on the GC.

I do wonder whether sprinters who fail to complete the race should get the green/red jersey though. Or at least perhaps they should have some sprint stages after the mountains to keep them honest.

mind you is Wiggins peaking to early, Holding form for 6-7 weeks is a big ask.

One race doesn’t mean they’ve won the TdF unfortunately

Agreed, this is really much shorter race and there isn’t quite the same level of stuff to chase down. It’s still good to see though.

My guess is they’ll have him for some wins at the start then he’ll go home and they’ll focus on the GC.

Yep. Can’t see him missing the Tour somehow even if only the start.

..runs off and books train for Liege for the Saturday…

do wonder whether sprinters who fail to complete the race should get the green/red jersey though

You need to finish to win any of the jerseys

Podium is not a verb!

Oh ffs I spelled it right, the boy done good. 😉

Wiggo said when he was in yellow – first interview? that if he bombed here the press would say he was no good and if he won he had peaked to soon. He has said it was a prelude to the TdF so this is not his peak.

Yes I know spelled is wrong in case it is not clear

I doubt Cav will miss the TDF as he will want to defend his jersey and get Olympic gold to cap his year off. Team Sky were awesome in the TT yesterday, Wiggins just capped it off. I reckon he will drop Cadel and suprize us all on the mountains, hes won some good races so far this year against top GC contenders.

he will podium
Podium is not a verb! AAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!

It can be, if the user wants it to be. Ask David Crystal, the world’s foremost authority of English usage….It’s called denominalisation….

I can’t see Cav not riding the Tour, he cares about that more than anything. Fourth win in a row on Champs-Élysées?

Read an interesting article – he’s been doing huge amounts of training apparently with aim of peaking for the tour and the dauphine is just being used as a run out.

He looks strong, but guess it’s all down to the hills.

Be interested to know his watts/kilo

Sky/Wiggins seem to have taken a lot from last years Tour, unlike before they’ve pretty much been keeping toward the front of the bunch and out of trouble ever since.

He stands a decent chance this year, more so if some of the others mark themselves out.

RD – What was Jens tweeting then, not suggesting other influences was he?

Harmon was claiming that Brad overtook Cadel and the fight-back was missed by the TV. I doubt it though.

Jens Voigt ?@thejensie
@andykloedi. No need to get afraid of Bradley after his TT. As far as i exeperienced it_ the Dauphine Winner never ever won the Tour …

Jens Voigt ?@thejensie
At least in last 10 years. If you peak for Dauphine than you are too early for the second half of ” Le Tour” Believe me, seen it many times!

Catherine wiggins ?@Cathwiggins1981
@thejensie Bradley hasn’t peaked yet.

Jens Voigt ?@thejensie
Ok Ok, after lots of angry and protesting answers i guess i should explain a little more…

*

Jens Voigt ?@thejensie
I was simply trying to keep moral and motivation high by saying this statistics.

Jens Voigt ?@thejensie
And like one of guys absolutly correctly mentioned- How scary is the tought of Brad beeing that strong now- and not even peaking yet??!!

*Although my favourite tweet of the exchange was:

Kirk Groves ?@LSVLKirk
@thejensie Being Jens fricking Voigt means never having to say sorry or explain yourself.

Haze, no, jens saying wiggins peaking too early and that schleck had it right not quite peaking yet, then cath pointed out Brad hadn’t peaked yet either, followed by much back pedalling by Jens

Edit: see above

Cav wont miss the Tour he has a chance over the next few years to become the winner of most stages overtaking Merckx.He is on 20 now and I think the record is 34 .

Ah cool, thought that would have been a bit low of Jens tbh.

Jens can only pedal forwards!

mind you is Wiggins peaking to early, Holding form for 6-7 weeks is a big ask.

Much as I hate the near perpetual hype surrounding Wiggins and the “this is his year for the Tour!” I’ve got to feel sorry for him. If he just rolled through the Dauphine doing not a lot, everyone would say he was shit, hasn’t done enough training, is never going to win the Tour…

But with him winning stages and leading it, he’s peaked too soon, he’s done too much training, he’s not going to win the Tour. Can’t win. 🙄

I suspect that Wiggins and Team Sky know more about his training and what works than a bunch of keyboard warriors and credit to Sky, they’ve wound down their hype a little bit since their all-singing-all-dancing launch which preceded a pretty average first year.

It really grates for me, this constant media need to big someone up and up and then when that sports person or celebrity fails to acheive the lofty heights, kick them hard.
Henman can win Wimbledon!! Oh no, he’s out in the quarters, he’s shit
Humperdinck can win Eurovision!! Oh no, nearly last, he’s shit
England can win [insert name of wendyball tournament]. Actually, does anyone ever claim that anymore? 😉

I’d love Wiggins to win it, but I have a niggly feeling that he just isn’t good enough in the high mountains. he seems to only have one pace, and is always reluctant to chase down attacks. Hopefully thats something he’s been working on, and if he has then I can’t see anyone else winning. If he hasn’t, and is still one paced in the mountains I think the Cuddles and Frandy will put enough time into him in the mountains to cover the TTs.

I also have a sneaky suspicion Tony Martin might feature. The strongest TTer and not at all bad in the mountains, it’s gonna be a cracker!!!

Not so sure about Martin, don’t recall him doing very much in the mountains?

he has done in the past, 2009 went up Ventoux out in front with a radobank climber and stayed out for the whole climb, was only beaten in the sprint, so he can do it.

Your memory’s clearly better than mine!