Pro-cycling thread

I'm reading a lot that the Moto was still moving as he peloton came past, so stopping suddenly and on the wrong side? I'm not sure that defensible, they fucked up bad and it shouldn't have happened. But with 15k to go talk of neutralisation was daft and mnowt wrong with Movistar drilling it. Halfway through the stage maybe not but they were already racing at that point.

Racing incident and fuck me, Quintana would have burnt Thomas anyway, maybe not Yates of Landa but...probably. Wow, great climb.

I can't see the moto still moving, but it's still a racing incident, shame we didn't see what Yates was capable of on this climb

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@TurtleRecall yes, Greg Van Avermaet got knocked off in San Sebastian, Adam Yates went on to win

Kelderman didn't see it until the very last moment, you can see he tries to move the bike round but his body instinctively tries to counter it and that strikes the motorbike.

So fucking stupid though, the general feeling is the amount of photographers and VIP's is too much in these races, and you can see it when they're caught out as groups come together and they're basically in the peloton. How the riders don't go beserk at them more often I do not know, especially when they're all for a push and a shove to one another...

Landa and Thomas not blaming anyone, good show

it's still a racing incident

Hmmm. Maybe in the bonkers world of Pro Cycling and fixie crits, it's common for vehicles that are supposed to be supporting the race taking out the very riders they are supposed to support.

Strikes me as ridiculous.

Brailsford seems measured.

Can't help but feel that if they packed up and all went home today it would send a message that it's completely unacceptable for motos to be continually fucking races up and this might be the start of the end of it.

Hard to believe that Liggett and Sherwen still get the commentating job for the Tour of California stream.

https://hammerseries.com/news/hammer-series-analysis-limburg-courses/

Thoughts on this?

Seems like the cycling equivalent of T20 in that it will never replace the purer, more intriguing form of the sport (Test cricket = grand tours and longer on day races) but can be a nice sideshow and help to influence other parts of the sport for the better.

Velon's race isn't it ? The teams attempt to get some of the organisers and TV rights money from a race.

Yeah, the idea is they make something that's more exciting to watch so they can get decent cash for the TV rights and share amongst the teams like football does.

A mass start team time trial!! Whut?

It seems timely to post this again, always worth a read on cycling's finances;

http://inrng.com/2014/01/problem-revenue-sharing/

The fundamental problem that Velon, Tinkoff, Vaughters and all the other people with an idea to generate more income for the teams fail to address, is that the current levels of revenue are too low to have any meaningful increase in budget for the 18 World Tour teams, even if ASO and RCS could be persuaded to share.

I think it looks pretty fun.
Sportives and youth races seems like a nice way to allow the fans to involve.

Brailsford and Thomas were quite sanguine, Matt White from Orica was hopping mad, mainly at Movistar for continuing to pull. I doubt it was malicious on their part, they had been drilling it for 15k already, I mean I suppose they could have soft-pedalled for a couple of minutes to let the pack reform but I think getting the entire peloton to knock it off as they are attacking the final climb is just impossible, someone would have attacked because they really wouldn't have known the situation behind them.

And I forget the year but I do remember Sky attacking as Valverde went down in the Vuelta.

But yes 100% we need to make sure motos and other race vehicles, as well as road furniture aren't affecting races, or injuring riders. I think the Giro organisers will be gutted: the UK is a huge audience for them and that crash just took out the two British hopes, people will be turning off as a consequence. The moto was a policeman so the organisers aren't directly to blame, but it was a huge balls up by the driver: just after a turn, stopping on the left not right, and not stopping far enough over.

I'm no motorcycle expert but would it have been possible for the policeman to pull up off the road? Those motorbikes look really heavy but maybe it could have been possible?

The accepted protocol in professional cycling is that any vehicle that needs to stop on the race course, does so on the right hand side of the road. So he was on the wrong side to start with. I'm sure he had good reason to stop, as the race was splitting up at that point and each group on the road tends to have it's own police outrider ahead of it to ensure a safe passage, but it was a major error in judgement to stop where he did, especially if you look at the footage and notice a metre wide strip on the right hand side that's off the carriageway.

The fundamental issue for me is that this is not an isolated incident, there are far too many incidents where rider safety is compromised and that is unacceptable. In this Giro alone I can think of three or four incidents, e.g. the marshall stood in the road on Friday who had the peloton swarm either side of him, the finishing circuit on the same stage which was unacceptably dangerous, the poor marshalling on the Etna stage that was partially to blame for a crash at the front of the peloton, that turn with 3.2 kms to go on the opening stage which narrowed suddenly and caused a crash, where rider safety was compromised by poor organisation. It needs to improve, and quickly.

Would you prefer 5th or lanterne rouge at the Tour?

I'm trying to think of another sport where the organisation failings ruin the contest at "World Level" on such a frequent basis?

Anyone got any info on how badly Landa was injured? Will he start tomorrow?

Not known yet. He's having scans in Italy today, but apparently has a lot of pain in his left leg.

So is it just stage hunting for Sky and Ulrika now? Hard to see anything other than a procession for Quintana from here.

While it sucks to not have Yates, Landa, and Thomas in contention, the claims that this has 'ruined' the race, or that somehow Quintada has now nailed it are a bit over the top. I don't think anyone expected Yates to really pose a challenge. Landa and Thomas weren't really the favourites either. In all three cases it was more of them being given a shot. Looking forward to seeing how the next two weeks play out.

Given the severity of the remaining stages, I think a top ten GC place is attainable for both Thomas and Yates. Both are going to have a bit of leeway too, so going for a stage win is a possibility too.

Adam Yates was 4th at the Tour last year - I think he was as credible as any gc contender other than Quintana

To be fair, the top-10 of the Tour last year didn't have the quality of contenders that this Giro has.

But you're as welcome to your opinion as I am. I hope to see Yates nail it at some point.