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

Apparently Yates got a 10 second penalty and a fine for a handsling. He should have held on to the neutral motorbike and would have got away without penalty. 🙄

I was staying at a campsite in Talloires/lake Annecy last night. Totally forgot the tdf was coming through the next day. Had to rush and get up quick smart so as not to get stuck there(had to take the GF to Lyon airport)
Saw a lot of the pre-race mentalness.
What happened?
🙂

@dave thanks, pity.

@kayak, great hilly stags, peleton closing down break when it started raining, downhill carnage on bends. Riders down and back up again. Mechanicals. Tight finish behind winner who was a little way up the road.

Best stage for excitement this year for sure. Am worried for Adam Yates now, sounds like thunder storms tomorrow so might be another chaotic day and I just have this nagging feeling that not only is it going to be difficult to get back to a podium place but that it wouldn’t take much to loose the white jersey.

This could turn out to be Froome’s greatest achievement, if he does end in yellow: He’s showed real skill, guts and determination; moreso than any other year, I think.

Fantastic stage. Very pleased for Bardet. Fun also to see Jensy as expert reviewer on the ITV highlights.

He’s showed real skill, guts and determination; moreso than any other year, I think.

I dunno, he had to dig real deep on the alp last year, he did look like he was going to crack at one stage as Quintana piled on the pressure.

Froome: downhill win, dominant TT, faceplant broken bike and running up Ventoux, down backslide swaps bikes. Still one more Alp stage to go, more drama tomorrow ? First win is always special but this could go down as his best and most courageous ?

Fun also to see Jensy as expert reviewer on the ITV highlights.

He’s hilarious. They should have him on the programme full time.
He was right though, it was an amateur error to try and straight-line that corner in those conditions.

Hope Yates can get back onto the podium.

He was right though, it was an amateur error to try and straight-line that corner in those conditions.

When you see the footage from above its pretty obvious 😐

Froome: downhill win, dominant TT, faceplant broken bike and running up Ventoux, down backslide swaps bikes. Still one more Alp stage to go, more drama tomorrow ? First win is always special but this could go down as his best and most courageous ?

I duunno, he’s hardly been under pressure, none of the favourites have spent any time up the road really, more a case of each of the other favourites has taken it in turn to have a bad day.

Not saying he’s not earnt it, or he’s had it easy, just that there’s never been the pressure for him to show if he does have the fitness to defend it.

Like others, starting to warm to Froome a bit more this year as a rider if not a ‘personality’. Skin missing, wrong bike, chasing back on. Tough as nails.

Head says he sits back and defends tomorrow, but I’ve a sneaky suspicion (depending on how sore he is and the weather conditions) he might attack on the last climb and show us another mental descent to take the stage. He seems to have developed (or is at least finally letting us see) a real racer’s mentality.

^^ I’m hoping for this too. I imagine there’ll be another fairly decent sized break as its the last chance for a stage win for the climbers, Saturday TV so maybe its beyond Froome and Sky

Its going to be another great stage

I get the feeling the other GC riders haven’t’gone up the road’ as they know it would be waste of time.

He would hunt them down

Well too much to take in overnight on that one and a rewatch of the highlights as it snows outside…
What a stage, such a shame the weather got in the way for the end. Good to see people actually attacking up there at the end even if it did come to not much. Great effort by Adam Yates to hang on in there, just off the podium at the moment and a lot to play for tomorrow. Hopefully 2-5 can have a decent go at each other with 66s the difference. It will be interesting to see what it’s taken out of Bardet, Quintana has played the longest waiting game going and might need to defend hard tomorrow. Froome just needs to keep out of trouble with more rain forecast.

Great effort by Adam Yates to hang on in there, just off the podium at the moment and a lot to play for tomorrow.

That was bloody agonising at the end, he was off, he clawed back on, off, clawed back on… As he said himself it was the effort of the bike change that cost him in the last two km.

Kind of looked like one of the sky riders was dropping of the back to help him in thAt last little bit, though could just as well have been struggling themselves

Saw him get get a helping push off a Sky rider at one one point. Interesting that they are happy to help him when he at the time was still 2nd in GC.

I guess it will have been one of the other Brits, and I suppose they know he’s got enough on his plate trying to get on the podium let alone making up the four minutes or whatever it is to Froome. Also, I imagine, the closer 2 to 6/7 are together timewise, the better for Froome as they be to busy attacking/defending each other to make severe inroads into Froomes time. Going to be an exciting stage – just got to do my chores and go out on the bike before a lazy afternoon watching it all unfold 🙂

I hope it is another great stage but I suspect that it’ll be Sky keeping a watch on things until the finale and then if others want to attack then they can. Unless there’s a crash or major mechanical the only way they’ll make 4 minutes on Froome is for him to crack badly, and he doesn’t need to risk cracking by following attacks any more, he can set the TT head on and let them take a minute or two if they can.

Of course, if he’s badly knocked by the crash that might change things, but I’d suspect Nurofen, adrenaline and MTFU will all be available by the bucketload.

And I’d love for him to feel good, gap them all in the finale and then swap to a ladies shopper which he rides to a no handed stoppie over the line. Maybe while wearing a Peter Sagan wig.

He was right though, it was an amateur error to try and straight-line that corner in those conditions.

Nibali behind him took exactly the same line though with the same result. Could argue he was just following the wheel but similar error all the same. And you didn’t get to see the line of the rider in front of Froome either.

Froome hit the white line, which was what took him down. It could have happened to anyone.

I’m just watching the highlights again on Eurosport: THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is why the Tour de France is the greatest sporting event in the World.

What a stage, such a shame the weather got in the way for the end.

I think the weather is all part of the racing and is part of what made it such an exciting stage: it’s not just about the legs, it’s also a question of whether the riders can adapt to the changing road conditions.

it’s not just about the legs, it’s also a question of whether the riders can adapt to the changing road conditions.

True but crashes that were happening at random meant that the attacks were getting spent on the final climb, Porte was interviewed saying they were losing traction up the hill too. They are already pushing to limits and to see guys not finish and or miss the Olympics trying to nail a dangerous descent isn’t slwhat it’s about for me.

highlights as it snows outside

😯

Agreed, you’d hate to see someone miss Rio due to a crash on a greasy road here.