Tour de France stage 19 – Albertville / Saint-Gervais Mont Blanc

Injured hand/wrist – suggested broken wrist

Ha ha ha! Forget that.
Shame, he’s ace is Big Tom.

Commentary is saying he’s injured.

Incredibly harsh luck for Dumoulin

Severe wrist trauma no less, it seems :0(

Dumolin 🙁

Weather closing in a bit, rain coats on. I think the break is going to be caught, could be an epic finish 🙂

I know froome always looks a bit off on the bike but he looked more gaunt and a little ill to me.

Nasty crash on greasy road for Rolland – take care guys 🙁

Its definitely not over

Rolland down…

ooof !

braking in the corner or just unlucky ?

Wouldn’t have happened if he was using flats

I know froome always looks a bit off on the bike but he looked more gaunt and a little ill to me.

I thought that the other day, about 30 seconds before he smashed the shit out the lot of ’em

Hmm, that’s going to hurt! Several repeats of Pierre Rolland’s crash before shots of him getting back on the bike with several areas of clothing ripped or worn away 😮

I thought that the other day, about 30 seconds before he smashed the shit out the lot of ’em

Me too

Rolland – these guys are bloody hard. I’d be sat in the dirt feeling very sorry for myself.

Road fully soaked now up ahead – possibly less slippy than first light rain on oily/muddy road

braking in the corner or just unlucky ?

Definitely a strong hint of tucking whilst dragging the brake wasn’t there?

Snapped my femur when I crashed like Rolland…probably as I was going much slower and didn’t skid!

More riders down – 2 FDJ, focus on Porte on his own ?

I know froome always looks a bit off on the bike but he looked more gaunt and a little ill to me.

I thought that the other day, about 30 seconds before he smashed the shit out the lot of ’em[/quote]

Yep, I thought the same, it looked like he was struggling to hold on to the wheel…then he attacked. Maybe his tactic is to look like he’s struggling right before he goes hard.

Edit, crashes, lots of them, at least 1 of which may well have been Porte. Looks nasty out there.

Has Porte attacked on a descent

Porte has been dropped from yellow jersey group

looks like it is/been hammering down now

Has Porte attacked on a descent ?

I can’t work out if he’s attacked or he’s behind the group. He’s in the cars so that suggests the latter.

^^ see my edit, he’s been dropped

maybe “hyperventilates” before an attack? He definitley had his head down and was puffing although I sure he’d be breathing pretty hard anyway

Porte is 200 metres behind the Maillot Jaune group, no firm indication of why the gap has appeared.

i’m only following on text feed so not sure when descent ends, but at least the rest is uphill and presumably less dangerous than a flatter or downhill finish.

French TV doesn’t know why he dropped back.

‘kin ‘ell! Had gone for Porte today. It’s a bloody good job I’m not a gambling man

Mechanical – phew!

Plenty of downhill to Megeve before the last climb – we drove that road from La Saisse to Megeve (overnight at Flume right on the route) this spring and it is quite steep and sketchy down 🙁

Definitely a strong hint of tucking whilst dragging the brake wasn’t there?

Fod knows how you can tell these things from tv. Could have been anything.

More bad luck for Porte

IMO Peleton / Sky are going to reel in the leader. Froome could win the stage 🙂

More on Richie Porte: With the worst of the descent behind him, Richie Porte is putting in some hard yards to get back in touch with the yellow jersey group. It seems he suffered the double-whammy of a mechanical and the aforementioned stop to avoid a rider who had hit the deck. His team-mates Damiano Caruso, Marcus Burghardt and Michael Schar wait to help pace him back to the yellow jersey group.

Cycling News feed

Fod knows how you can tell these things from tv. Could have been anything.

Hence “hint”. Also, I’m somewhat of an authority on dragging brakes….

First rain on road after a dry hot spell always makes it super greasy. Rolland just unlucky I think

56″ now – this is going to be an epic climb 🙂

20km left, they’re on the climb, Astana and, oddly Bling Matthews (I think) on the front.

Edit, no, they’re not on the climb yet. ignore me.

Absolutely, braking or not he was unlucky to find the grip levels had dropped that much

Sounds like it could be interesting…would like to see Froome take some more time as it’s the last mountain finish

Lunge, not yet – some steep descending then uppppp !

As above we drove Peisey/la Saisse/Megeve/Chamonix/Verbier in mid March quite a bit of it on rhe TdF route (map geek when planning the drive 😳 )

Leader looking a bit wobby on some of these corners, its steep and tight I remember

More fallers – legs out – in the trees !

Now reporting Bauke Mollema has had a spill.

The camera following Rui Costa at around the 12Km mark shows some very slippery bends. Another crash involving Navarro – looks like a collarbone 🙁 other riders off the road. Froome is off as well!