Tour de France 2014

Eerie. It's just like listening to Phil Ligget.

It fucking is a bit.

Surely it's all just the UCI's new hard stance on doping, though with the ingenious slant that it doesn't besmirch cycling's good (ish) name?

Have a fancy blood test result - admit it and eliminate yourself from the race subtly, or we'll 'out' you and you'll be banned for x years.

http://www.trekfactoryracing.com/news/cancellara-withdraws-tour-de-france

Cancellara: “I won't fucking ride for Frank any more. The season has been long for me, starting back in Dubai and to be fair, we weren't ever going to win much considering the betwetter to ability ratio of the team. I have done 59 days of competition this season so far without really doing much of any note, and I have another big goal at the end of this season: to get the fuck away from the Schlecks and maybe spend a quality weekend at Center Parcs to see if wives really to let you put it in their bum if you holiday there. It’s not a secret that I’d like to be in my best shape there, so it’s important that I take some rest.”

Cancellara came to the Tour to be competitive, whilst preferably not inconveniencing his online bridge playing scores or being relied on to deflect some of the air of mute tragedy surrounding the fiasco that is Trek racing and the Schleck brothers. He came close to the victory and his 29th yellow jersey with a late attack in stage 1, finished fifth in stage 5 in Arenberg, defended his fifth place in the overall until an untimely puncture in the final of stage 7 and sprinted to second place in stage 9 to Mulhouse, but when all the good riders started hurting themselves to get home early he decided he didn't want to be that awkward guy that's still at the party when it's really starting to thin out and the people that live there are visibly bored, so now he's fucking off home to try and find some reasonably priced garden furniture to compliment his new decking.

Cancellara: “It was not only about the cobblestones stage for me. The course for this year’s Tour is very attractive for a rider of my profile, I liked it. But then I realised I couldn't be fucking bothered, and that nobody else could either. There were many opportunities and with a little more luck, I could have gone home earlier with a result in the pocket to make it look like I'd tried. It’s been good to be back in the Tour, especially because we lost Andy (Schleck) and Danny (Van Poppel) early on, making it understandable not to try very hard for much longer, but the team is strong and will keep on looking for opportunities to leave as early as we can, hopefully without actually injuring ourselves. I know that Rast's been thinking up a blinder of an excuse to get out of here, although Haimar Zubeldia was really upset that I'd gotten in before him as he too was going to use the old 'World Championships' excuse. Last I saw him he was drinking a catering sized bucket of mayonnaise he'd left on the roof of the team bus all day to try and get a bad case of the shits, but Frank came along and started dipping chips in it and then it was confiscated. He'll probably just have to do what Andy did and fall off.”

General Manager Luca Guercilena: “We brought Fabian to the Tour to be a factor where his skills allowed it and it's just too bad that these primarily proved to be in the domain of pissing the bed at any and every opportunity, although he didn’t disappoint by the way in which he's excused himself from the table like a moody teenager and snuck off to play playstation. He’s a rider that always comes to a race to give everything he can to get home first - if you just look at how he was working for Fränk (Schleck) yesterday at 20 km from the finish in a mountain stage, it was clear he just couldn't wait to get back on the bus. Now he gets a short break and then we will build up his condition again to be at his best in Ponferrada, which is Center Parc's new 'Mexican buffet wigwam' that has something called 'Chicken Poppers' which is actually chicken nuggets laced with poppers so your wife can get a porn-star level gaper on the go after her all day spa session that of course, includes a coffee enema-it sounds fantastic so of course, we bear him no ill will in going home and just wish him every success in getting some bum action.'

Trek, what a team to be on.

...admit it and eliminate yourself from the race subtly...

... or hidden in plain site by throwing your bike under the Belkin car and swapping bikes like so:

But his still doesn't explain the skull found on the moon, 9/11 or Andy Schleck.

Must spread...

Must spread...

...cheeks?

But his still doesn't explain the skull found on the moon, 9/11 or Andy Schleck.

I'm not sure about the rest of it but 9/11 is easily explained if you look at the facts:

So it's pretty clear.

http://www.trekfactoryracing.com/news/cancellara-withdraws-tour-de-france

I seem to remember Canc saying last year he doesn't like riding the Tour de France, too much of a circus, too much press attention, too much pressure from the team and far too many dopage controllee, and cast doubt he would ride it again.

Or was it Boonen?

(I made up the bit about the dopage controllee)

Meanwhile:

Bike handling classes>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Bothwell repped for clearing up a few things.

WillMelling has pointed out, because he's a big sourpuss, that I can't claim credit for this because tynan predicted it happening five years ago.

Or perhaps, instead of "predicting" it, tynan actually has inside knowledge, if you will, and we should be looking more closely at the stamps on his passeport in order to get to the bottom of the matter. I don't think this should be considered coincidence.

I should have known.

We're all just his puppets.

Nibali. Got to be. Flouncing off claiming it's too easy without any proper competition and so he can't be arsed.

There's two whole weeks for him to crash out yet. Porte Jens will win for being the last man standing.

All the jerseys!

Today is boring. Having to resort to going out on my own bike and trying to drop some friends on a very short and gentle Kent incline.

If anybody's missing the action, we'll be heading up Layhams at about 7pm. We're quite fat and there's no caravan.

Will you at least throw your bidon in my direction?

Not a chance. I only own two.

Meanwhile:

another example of why carbon should not be used ..

At least he's happy. They must have given him a suppository of something nice.

All materials have fail points. I can't believe I'm engaging here.

^Fail.

Re: Cancellara, wasn't that sort of a plan all along.
Isn't he considering the hr record?

Excellent

@davidWalshST

Went to Richie Porte press confer in Besancon. When it ended Dave Brailsford asked, on a point of information, 'why no doping questions?'

All materials have fail points. I can't believe I'm engaging here.

It's a trap

Back and to the left x 3

Excellent

@davidWalshST

^Burned