Tour de France 2016

21seconds!

Dumoulin actually called in his post-TT interview, saying then he thought Froome would beat it. I had visions of him crashing on the run as he went into the aero tuck on his TT bike, swiftly abandoned thankfully.

Interesting seeing Mollema's descending speed clipping 82kmh in that tiny tuck down on the top tube, compared to Froome's which was a good 3-4kmh slower in the conventional TT position.

I absolutely understand why people might not like Froome, but you've got to respect him. He seems to have made his weaknesses into strengths - he's going downhill incredibly fast.

Froome just destroyed the field. He really didn't need to do that. Surely that was a marker for the Olympic TT?

Is the Olympic TT a mountain time trial?

He's still only holding a relatively short margin over the rest of the top 10. A minor crash or a mechanical could see 3-4 minutes disappear like sand through a collander if it happens at the wrong time and place. He'd not unassailable yet.

It's meant to be very, very hard.

Riders are meant to wait for the race leader if they have a mechanical (unless you name is nibali)

They've already had to wait for him to fake pee and go for a jog, surely it's game on if a mechanic forgets to charge up his Di2 battery.

Nibali wasn't in GC contention when he won that stage.

There's waiting and there's actually waiting.

If there's an attack over the summit of a climb and Froome has a mechanical, waiting may mean just taking it easy on the descent and pootling on the next one until he gets back on. At that point, domestiques have regrouped and while he's burnt from getting back to them, they're fresh to launch a relentless series of attacks. That sort of thing.

It's unlikely but if it happens, they're going to hit him as hard as they can. 1 second is all they need by the close of play on Saturday.

Aha I knew nibs-trolling would work.

For what it's worth, I've never understood the waiting malarkey and quite like nibali as an old school kind of rider

I've never understood the waiting malarkey

Because it's bad for the sport to allow grand tours to be decided by slipped chains

It doesn't happen in other sports tho. If you crash your racing car or the engine in your motorbike goes bang or the sail on your boat gets tangled up you lose.

I think it actually makes sport more exciting. Imagine if Froome was currently trying to make up 3 minutes rather than just defending his lead...

I can see why with regards punctures, as you don't want to encourage fuckwits to chuck tacks around. These days, mechanical reliability should not be a factor, so if someone like Andy Schleck wanted to use non-standard derailleur jockeys for some perceived advantage, then I have no issue with Contador trying to take advantage when it goes wrong.

Lols at Erdogan Goatlover graffiti. U there Boris?

Porte's tour has pretty much been decided by a puncture.

I feel for him, also had he had full backing of BMC at the start rather than joint leadership with Tejay, the puncture might not have been an issue (paced back, teammate's bike), and he might be even stronger this week.

Froome/porte to work together to get Richie on to the podium; Richie to get a stage as a result.

How many watts are the proper TT helmets worth over today's course? I know it was hot, so cooling would have been important, but I was surprised to see so many standard road helmets.

Uphill=less aeros=weight weinerism masiado importante

I hate to say it but check out the GCN video

If BMC had a recruitment policy that made any kind of sense maybe they'd have a domestique or two who could actually stay with their leaders on the climbs.

Had there ever been a team so poorly equipped to support a GC challenge? As each mountain stage passes, the more my respect for Cadel Evans grows.

Makes you wonder why porte left sky. Sure he was never going to get a crack at the tour being on the same team as froome but equally he must have realised that to beat froome you need a strong team to support you. Maybe BMC promised they would sign riders to support him?

Without team support Porte's best hope is in the giro or vuelta. Which he could have ridden as the supported rider at sky.

http://www.letour.com/le-tour/2016/us/stage-19.html

The last few KMs is in that ^