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Cheers lunge, good work over the last 3 weeks and greatly appreciated.
Some good posts on today's thread.
All I can throw into the pot is
# With regard to La Vuelta I'm sure Brailsford and crew will have been preparing a team since December (in the same way as they have been preparing Thomas for the Tour).
# With regard to gc in the Tour being a bit mleh, with just 3 days to go the podium was still realistically in reach of 5 riders. There will always be casualties amongst top gc riders throughout the 3 weeks including in past years Froome & Thomas, the race still goes on.
# I'm not sure that Dan Martin's style of riding would suit a support team, he'd destroy them! Would love to see him podium in a GT before he retires though.
Just random thoughts! Good stuff Lunge.
He didn’t ride the Giro, and I’monly aware of Giro
Did he not? I was sure he did, a quick google suggest I am wrong, apologies.
I really enjoyed it this year, felt quite competitive even if it wasn't the usual suspects.
On the subject of sprinters, there has to be steep climbs, a cut off, some atritition and tired legs by Paris. Otherwise you'd get riders bulking up and looking like Hoy on the start line. Which whilst great for the sprinting if they made it to the end, wouldn't really improve things much. All the sprinters know the game, get as big and powerful as you think you can be and still make it over the mountains. They gambled and lost this year and some lighter guys made it to Paris.
That said, they could always split it up better, start in the mountains with fresh legs, then some sprinters stages, more mountains and then some more flat stages on the run to Paris. That way at least they've got a reason to hang around after the first mountains as they've got some fun to have, then only a few more hilly days before Paris.
In this era of cleaner competition this sort of racing will be the norm I`m afraid. All the more reason to split the tour in two. One tour for the clean athletes, and one tour were you are allowed to take as many drugs/transfusions as you like, I know which edition would be more exciting to watch.
Problem is, they'd mostly just kill themselves.
So rather than bemoaning the difficult course for sprinters causing attrition, forums would just be moaning about how 3 of the GC contenders had withdrawn due to heart attacks and one missed the start due to liver failure.
And while it might produce some spectacular attacks, you'd just end up with another lance armstrong, the guy with the best Dr winning year after year.
How far outside the time were the sprinters on the day a large group got eliminated? I always thought rules were relaxed in those circumstances but maybe it was a conscious decision to try and make things a bit less predictable for the remaining flat stages.
I never made reference to Katusha in my summary neiverz..
I’m not sure what to think about the squad these days, Tony Martin was (yeah still is) a fabulous talent. Yet he has been on the wrong end of injuries lately, s’pose that’s the reason he was out this year.. and sadly lacking because of it.
Him and Zakarin would have made a good team, I like Zakarin I have a lot of time for him. He’s a fighter, has been brilliant in previous GTs and I’m hoping soon he will be able to win something significant, along with Turbo-Tony. But, they must break the mould of sticking behind Sky on every stage..
In fact that’s a point ought to be made on its own...
We’ve mooted the Sky Train many times over the years, I am simply not a fan of the rolling roadblock tactics.
Argue all you like about “fittest, sits on the front at 45clicks,drags everyone in the wake, prevents attacks becuse the pace is so relentless” I hate it.
Kwiat is definitely the new Kyri, never thought I’d see another Kyri because when he was born Michalangelo had just gone off to sharpen his chisels and left the marble alone for 10mins and Kyri broke free and nicked the butchers bike and rode off into the hills... grinding out a marble paste that littered the white roads of Tuscany...
Yes you use the talent pool to maximise gains, Kwait is a thinking mans rider, yet to poke him out front for 100k must be demoralising to say the least.. Hope he gets his wings in a GT pretty sharpish.
Back to the Sky train, some bloke once said “if you can’t beat em’, join em’” but flock in numbers in the wake is just pointless, there are no tactics not until Poels goes for a piss and everyone shouts “gap!” and Dan Martin squeezes through for 80mtrs...
It is no wonder the racing has become dull, the French have started to turn away... The French fans, like I, enjoy the baroudeur.. the fighter, the punter, the rouleur the entertainer yet all we see is rolling roadblocks without blue flashing lights.. Dull.
We need a couple of strong men, big Vocklers to start breaking the stranglehold up and the soonernthe better.
Wonder what Geraint is doing now??
Hated seeing Cav of the pace, but so much respect for him finishing the stage when he could have easily stepped off.
Geraint on the One show (earlier)
Nearly fell off the sofa when he walked on. It's made my night.
Another thank you for these threads, Lunge. Always appreciated.
All the best,
Rich
Thanks lunge+1 more. I thoroughly enjoyed it this year. My son really got into it, as much as the fitba! When he spotted G on the 1 show he was delighted.He loves Bardet just a little less this year.
I’ll miss “Ask Sagan” on Eurosport & do hope G can ride the tour of Britain.
There will always be one team that is a little bit stronger than the others and riders line up behind them, it was the same for Highroad, USPS , banesto, Renault, Molteni, and le dopage isn't the reason either. It's how GTs work.
FWIW I thought that the Lance years were as boring as the indurain once the pattern was set and it was as much a result of the same old courses playing right into their hands so Gouvenu and Prudhomme take a bow
Lows - Bardet. Well, not actually Bardet but the bloody awful gushing praised laddled on by Miller and Ned in the commentary box, which normally went "There goes Bardet on the attack with 100km to go. What a genius, he's such a brilliant rider, blah blah blah". Normally followed about ten minutes later with a "And there's Bardet off the back of the group". They genuienely seemed to think he was going to do a massive solo effort and take the lead by 15 minutes every time.
I'm also going to say the Roubaix sections aren't a TdF thing. They just felt like they were there to maim a GC rider which isn't the point of the tour. You takes your chances on a classic one-dayer but not the three week event.
Oh, and while I'm on a random rant, downhill finishes on mountain stages. Whats the point?
But I agree with others, the flat stages/first week was a bit dull. I sadly think it's due to radios, all the data people have at their disposal these days, powermeters etc. which I suppose is 'progress'. Gone are the days of someone belting off and then the mad chase that may or may not work. Now it's the team car saying ''I've calculated on the laptop you need to ride at this speed/wattage and you'll catch them with 1.8km to go'.
Highs - obviously the result.
And short stages. If you're going to stop the Sky dominance I think shorter,rather than longer stages might be the way. Maybe not the mad F1 grid startline but shorter sharper mountain stages where people could get away and stay away. It's either that or every other team are going to have to agree to work together to blast Sky away and that ain't gonna happen. hrist, Movistar can't even get their own team to work properly...
And watching Dan Martin just having fun after losing that time early one.
My broadband was playing silly bu@@ers, so im still catching up!
a) the coverage could do with the speeds and distances in miles. I didn't support brexit, but short of nuclear war, were committed to 'old imperial'.
b) Chris boardman could present his stage features/ monologues on an e-bike. Lycra and skinny tyres don't endear the unfit 95 percent of the population to enjoyable cycling.
Chris boardman could present his stage features/ monologues on an e-bike
He won't be presenting any of it next year. A great loss in my view.
A great loss in my view.
Agreed.
Lows: Sill grid start. Very few of the sprinters making the time cut off. Moscon losing it. Booing, spitting and pushing by idiots who aren't racing fans, but people who just want to be on the telly.
Highs: Ned and David commentating. Letour (I think) riding through his home town being cheered by his locals. Alaphillipe making sure Yates was ok after his crash. Sagan being Sagan. Chris Froome being a top sport (you still have chance for another tour win). Dan Martin going for it (he needs a better team). And of course my favourite rider winning. A lot of riders didn't have the luck this year, but this has been G in the past, this was his time, his luck, his skill and fitness.
Kwiat is definitely the new Kyri, never thought I’d see another Kyri because when he was born Michalangelo had just gone off to sharpen his chisels... etc
I'd have said Kwiato is quite a different rider from Kiri. The latter is a huge, but largely one-paced engine, Kwiato is a far more versatile rider. Better high mountain climber. Better sprinter. Has legitimate GT leader ambitions. Arguably Castroviejo is closer to Kiri if you want to compare riders.
I do occasionally wonder what would happen if Team Sky were to take on say, Bardet or Pinot. Could a year of Tim Kerrison training and Team Sky support turn them into GT winners. And what would the French media and public make of it? Or maybe in a few times Pavel Sivakov - half-French / half-Russian, raised in France - will be leading Sky at the Tour, who knows.
"Downhill" finishes on mountain stages. There's not a lot of places that can cope with a mountain top finish, many of the cols are pretty tight for space, some have a hotel or ski lift and associated car park but many don't. Alp d'Huez is a ski resort, the finish is on the edge of town, when you look down the finishing straight there's a ruddy great field on the left that gets filled with the Tour's paraphernalia on the day. A downhill finish also gives the opportunity for someone to breakaway rather than the whole stage just being a pre-amble to the GC contenders slugging it out on the final climb.
Shorter stages. I think most of the big GTs are going this way. The UCI have a maximum length for a stage, 240km or 250km from memory, but they tend to be pretty boring IMO. ASO try to cover as much of France as possible without having every stage being a 200km slog fest so shorter stages mean less of the country can be visited without having lots of transfers (there may be a limit on those as well). Then again there are quite a few stages that are almost loops.
Glad to see G win it. He's always seemed like a "nearly man", a Welsh/British Raymond Poulidor if you will. Surprised to see him on The One Show, I thought he'd be resting up in Paris.
Not sure if you could build a GC team around Dan Martin. His style is very much a lone wolf approach. Exciting to watch as he's very seat of the pants in the way he rides, any plan gets ripped from the stem before the Depart Real.
Get a better team around the Yates brothers and they'll win a GT.
A pity to see so many sprinters not make it through the mountains. Cav might not have been a surprise - he didn't look race ready. The time cut-offs are there to stop riders just taking it easy and turning up two hours after everyone else.
The coverage is just fine in metric. This is the 21st century not the 17th!
I thoroughly enjoyed it this year, I know this shows my age, but the first Tour de France I watched was won by Jan Ulrich, and few have matched the drama of 2018.
Highs: Thomas' grace and dignity in everything he did. The Roubaix stage - I know there were casualties but it was exciting to watch.
Lows: the TV motorbikes becoming a part of the race. Last year was bad enough when one hit a crowd and lead to the ridiculous Froome running up the hill incident, but they have contributed to crashes too often, and there was the supposed drafting by Primoz Roglic alleged by Tom Dumoulin.
Also, call me a fusspot but I will not watch ITV coverage any more unless David Millar can learn to speak proper, and stop prononcing the t in often. And it is "Tours de France" David, not "Tour de Frances". They don't ride around a different France each year you numpty.
Offen and often are both correct pronunciations.
Nope. Off-tin is 100% wrong.
You mean that you don't like it. OED has both for GB English but only with the 't' for US English.
I'm the opposite, i much prefer the ITV4 coverage to the Eurosport, where everyday Carlton has to mention Sagan and mountain biking and the only thing he seems to know about TT'ing is the phrase "negative split".
David Millar often gives a real insight and knowledge of what is happening and i will miss Chris Boardman too.
a) the coverage could do with the speeds and distances in miles. I didn’t support brexit, but short of nuclear war, were committed to ‘old imperial’.
b) Chris boardman could present his stage features/ monologues on an e-bike. Lycra and skinny tyres don’t endear the unfit 95 percent of the population to enjoyable cycling.
I ****ing despair, if there was a point, you missed it!!!
“Tour de Frances”.
Yes he surprised me with this one. Certainly as a French speaker I would have expected him to get that right. Anyway apart from that I often put a t in often.
"The French coming round here with their bidons, casquettes and peletons" if it was up to me it would the Tour of her majestys Great Britain, sponsored by John Smiths and Johnny Foreigner would have to show his passport and work visa at signing on for each stage"
All about Eurosport for me, Carlton and Kelly are the voice of cycling and much better than Ned and Millar in my humble opinion. How can you watch cycling and not have "the calculation" being talking about, or the rivet being sat on?
... but in English Tour de France is said differently to in French, with France being pronounced France and not Fronce. So if you pluralize the English Tour de France you get Tour de Frances. N'est-ce pas?
My thoughts:
Richie Porte - everyone commenting on how "unlucky" he is but missing that imho to a large extent in this, as with many sports, you make your own luck. That has been said many times in the past of G, but Richie seems to get a pass for some reason.
The "team" prize, as a few others have said, is silly. Don't know why they have it. Given that no one wins Le Tour as a soloist, to my mind the team prize, should there be one, goes to the team that have their guy in yellow in Paris.
Peter Sagan has markedly improved his racecraft over the last year or two - much better at picking the right wheel on the way in and then timing his final sprints than he used to be. He always had the legs but used to miss out on too many stages simply by going off too early / late. I wonder what he could do with a team riding for him rather than "freelancing" - not sure because maybe that's the style that works for him, but it would be interesting to see.
Team Sky couldn't have played it better - G gets a little bitty lead and no one really notices or cares cos they're all watching Froome and everyone knows he'll have a bad day or crash and won't be able to keep it up for three weeks and, oh shit, too late, while we were all marking Froome, G's run away it. Brilliant. I still think it was the plan from Day 1, Froome knew he didn't have the form and was running as a distraction.
Carlton and Kelly are the voice of cycling
Carlton Kirby is horrific, a babbling, know-nothing, cacophony of meaningless cliches and fake hysteria. He properly does my head in with his imagined conversations between riders and the team cars, his repeated crap about riders 'having their fun' and the awful contrived links... you know, 'It's raining here today, and Chris Froome is the reigning champion... etc. And the bit where at the finish he disintegrates into an absurd crescendos of screeching, hysterical white noise as if that somehow makes it exciting. Horrific.
I do like Sean Kelly, but his accent sometimes makes it hard to understand what he's saying along with the odd thing where he puts clauses and sub-clauses together in an eccentric random order. He's very good at correcting Kirby when he spouts some new snippet of idiocy without being nasty though, for which he deserves some sort of medal.
The joy of Millar is that he actually tells you stuff that you wouldn't otherwise realise about why riders are positioned where they are for example. Or about the personality of individuals who he's ridden with. He's still of this time as opposed to the likes of Kelly or Philippa York who've not raced for years.
That's my take anyway. I just find Carlton Kirby almost impossible to listen to, but it's great that we have a choice.
I'm glad it's not just me that hates Carlton Kirby and his terrible cliches
Peter Sagan has markedly improved his racecraft over the last year or two – much better at picking the right wheel on the way in and then timing his final sprints than he used to be. He always had the legs but used to miss out on too many stages simply by going off too early / late. I wonder what he could do with a team riding for him rather than “freelancing” – not sure because maybe that’s the style that works for him, but it would be interesting to see.
I think his racecraft has always been top notch but as a non specialist sprinter didn't have the pure speed against specialists and there lead outs. He has always IMHO chosen the right wheels and always seems to get in the right breaks, that's what has made him a multiple world champion.
I’m glad it’s not just me that hates Carlton Kirby and his terrible cliches
It's not just on cycling, he's put a big dent into my enjoyment of Le Mans for years too.
Millar and Boulting are much more interesting and insightful.
A medium-good Tour IMO. Which still makes it a great bike race because it’s the tour.
agree with the Carlton haters above. The final straw for me was when he was commentating on Strade Bianche and kept calling the Piazza Del Campo ‘the Palio’, which is like calling the champs Elysee ‘the tour de france’
Richie Porte – everyone commenting on how “unlucky” he is but missing that imho to a large extent in this, as with many sports, you make your own luck. That has been said many times in the past of G, but Richie seems to get a pass for some reason.
Very much so. After so many years of what if, and his history of major crashes, I wonder if there's something that a sports psychologist could help him with.
Lows – Bardet.
Totally agree. He just isn't that, and I wish ITV4 would stop making out that he is.
And Ned Boulting is a nice guy, excellent at the co-presenting piece, but he isn't a commentator. The number of times he had to correct himself "oh that's Sagan, oh no wait, that's his teammate", and so on. Maybe he'll get better with practice.
Finally, interesting to see stories in the papers today suggesting a team salary cap. It would basically only affect Sky, but it would be fascinating to see how a Tour with a more level playing field in terms of money played out.
So if you pluralize the English Tour de France you get Tour de Frances. N’est-ce pas?
Wouldn't it be Tour of Frances?
I am not sure how a team salary cap would work? Katusha and BMC are not far off, it isn't just money buying results.
Where do you stop, Sagan is one of the highest paid, but to the detriment of the rest of the team and the fact that they don't have a lot left to pay the remaining Bora-Hansgrove riders, so do you cap team as a whole or cap individual riders salaries too?
Then don't you endanger teams like Lotto NL Jumbo who turned up with 8 riders for this years Tour but really tried to have both a sprinter and a GC contender and actually did pretty well with both?
I think these figures were last years?
Tour de France team budgets (estimated)
Team Sky – €35m
Katusha – €32m
BMC – €28m
Tinkoff – €25m
Astana – €20m
Etixx-Quick Step – €18m
Movistar – €15m
Lotto-Soudal – €14m
LottoNL-Jumbo – €14m
Dimension Data – €13.5m
Orica-BikeExchange – €13m
Giant-Alpecin – €12.5m
Trek-Segafredo – €12m
Ag2r La Mondiale – €12m
Cofidis – €11m
IAM Cycling – €10.5m
FDJ – €10m
Cannondale – €10m
Lampre-Merida – €7m
Direct Energie – €6m
Bora-Argon 18 – €4.5m
Fortuneo-Vital Concept – €3.5m
Wanty - £1,000
+1 thanks to lunge from all the silent majority of lurkers on this thread.
I always prefer to watch Eurosport. While Millar, Boardman and Co are more informative, Kirkby and Yates are comedy gold. Carlton with his mispronounced French and oft-repeated ignorance - based opinions on a wide variety of irrelevant subjects. I also love to play Kirkby - bingo, where he will on cue repeat some nonsense every time a rider or situation comes up. Sean is much better on tactics etc but makes up words ('performant') if he can muster enough words to form a sentence. For me the highlight of the Tour this year was hearing Sean say, when Alaphillipe attacked "if on a big mountain like this you attack too early and get the big legs and lactate, then you are in trouble". The image of Alaphillipe jumping out of a group only to find milk spurting from his nipples will (hopefully ) stay with me forever.
lactate, then you are in trouble”. The image of Alaphillipe jumping out of a group only to find milk spurting from his nipples will (hopefully ) stay with me forever.
Have you confused lactate and lactose??? Or do you not know what lactate means in this context?
The confusion is between lactate and lactation.
The confusion is between lactate and lactation.
Oh right, of course. Kelly is still correct though and the poster just doesnt understand.
Very much so. After so many years of what if, and his history of major crashes, I wonder if there’s something that a sports psychologist could help him with.
The only one who seems to have seen what happened this year in the thread has fans the wrong side of a barrier getting in the way causing a big pile up, he landed on his shoulder not sure what a psychologist could do there.
I hope he gets a good run in Spain, should be in contention there. Office discussion was he could have pushed Sky properly.
Predictions, Froome will ride himself into form in week 4......
Highlights TD and Roglich pushing all the way
Good to see GvA hold yellow there
Negatives still the fans who don't know how to behave, they should have the flares shoved where the sun doesn't shine
Downhill finishes? Not really a fan
Sprinters getting the chop, either a bigger margin for the cut off or something different if you want them to race for 3 weeks
The police having no clue at times
and having sat through ITV I'll be finding a way for the SBS Australia coverage next year
Hels, what do you think of Boardman's nothingks?
Makes me cringe but I still think I'll miss him!
Carlton Kirby is horrific, a babbling, know-nothing, cacophony of meaningless cliches and fake hysteria.
Erm, disagree to some extent. Carlton has over the years become more involved in cycling, and he is a commercial commentator who covers other sports not just cycling.
When Carlton took over from the immortal David Harmon i’ll admit I hated Carlton at first. The Harmon/Kelly narrative and interaction was joyous, comedy gold. At points during races they’d be in fits of laughter and that translated well into the action on the road. I really miss Harmon, but illness and a personal issue made him leave... he still runs a PR Company but does less work these days.
Both Harmon and Carlton are commercial commentators, both commentating on LeMans and motorsport in general and have quite in depth knowledge in aspects of the sports. But they aren’t there for the knowledge, that’s what Kelly and Millar are there for.... to provide the support SME knowledge. That’s why Kelly often pops out during the stages to go seek out someone or fetch coffee.
But I have warmed to Carlton, took a couple of years I’ll admit and he has calmed down on the hysteria angle and his continual “EddieBoss” references. Carlton has matured nicely into the role, and I do enjoy his mellow tone when he’s not all uppity and excitable.
But Harmon and Kelly were comedy gold, and I miss that team.