Tour de France 2021

I just read Joe Lindsey’s article for Bicycling published following the TT stage on La Planche des Belles Filles 2020 – a balanced piece about Pog and the doubt that is clouding his performances. It’s got lots of context on the backroom staff, probably a repost but worth another look.

https://www.bicycling.com/tour-de-france/a34252569/tadej-pogacar-tour-de-france-win-unfair-doubt/

There’s some terrible spelling of rider names in this thread. Have a word with yourselves.

Tim Merlier hitting his top numbers but had to climb off too, though he has never raced 10 days straight.

“It just went too fast. I'm in good shape, I think. Proof of this is that I set a personal record today, among other things. But after an hour and a half the legs started to empty. I could no longer follow the grupetto . I didn't want to give up and still try to make it to the finish, but the bus drove so far away that another mental blow followed. It made no sense anymore.”

“I broke my 20 minute record today, in terms of wattages. I also set my second best hour record and my third best hour and a half record. That obviously indicates that there has been serious racing. The group with guys like Cavendish, Demare, that's where I was initially. But I couldn't hold it."

The spirit of Henri Desgrange in the age of the power meter.

ASO should think about introducing a fixed stage next year.

If you didn't have power reading and you got dropped you could at least say "ah, just a bad day"; must be a sickener if you do the best you've ever done and that's not enough.

Cavendish has better-than-most skills; surfing wheels, late-braking and generally hustling/moving-up to stay intouch. Amazing he’s stayed in. Spitfires! 🇬🇧

There’s some terrible spelling of rider names in this thread. Have a word with yourselves.

No, your a cundt.

Even better, make it a surprise. Announce it at the end of the prior day’s stage. Riders get 2 hours to choose their gearing.

Dlamini rode to the finish even though he was hugely OTL. Completely forget he had his arm broken by SA park ranger a few years ago.

There are maybe 5 more sprint finishes, and 3 more before the Pyrennes. Cav to equal and break the record?

Dlamini rode to the finish

superb effort

its an unbelivable opportunity. 5 sprints against essentially tier two opposition.

Think the stages will be hard to control, with teams not particularly interested in towing Cav to a bunch sprint. So i bet not all will be a bunch sprint and of those Cav will be left to surf wheels mostly.

I`m excited

It'd be next level poetic if he broke the record in Paris.

good read, hadn't come across it before. Ta for posting it.

https://twitter.com/cyclocosm/status/1412057042005770246?s=12

Worth a read.

Being in a purgatory of doubt is a great way of explaining my attitude to doping in pro cycling. Thanks for the repost.

I expect this is the reason that Cavendish has said in the past that he normally doesn’t do much sprint training, he spends most of his time climbing to get better at it (or be not as bad at it)

As a non climber, getting through a mountain stage within the time cut sounds bloody difficult.

Is GVA heavier than he used to be when he won Rio?

Cav has got to get over Ventoux twice on Wednesday with Bahrain team likely to be determined to shell him out of the back given his near miss on Sunday

Tomorrow's stage has a 5 km unclassified climb 40 kms from the finish. It wouldn't surprise me at all if someone like Bora-Hansgrohe tried a repeat of their successful tactics at stage 10 of the Giro to get rid of the pure sprinters and set up Sagan for a chance at the win.

You listened to the German commentary on yesterday’s stage?

Indeed, most of the other sprinters going home might seem to be to his advantage but it also means hardly any teams will need to chase the break if they have a rider in it. And from the other point of view, lots of teams will really, really want to be in the break because they know there's a better than normal chance of it working. Cavendish already came within 200m of missing out on stage 4.

Nein.

“I go deep with everything, whether that’s a bike race – or going out on the piss,” Thomas said. “That’s just the way I am. I am not one to give up easily, which is the reason I started the stage on Sunday. To be honest, I thought, ‘this is just going to be the same as Saturday,’ but you fight and give it everything, and then suddenly you can turn it around and come out better.”

But as UAE Team Emirates leader Pogacar ran riot, to the point where his Spanish rival, Enric Mas of Movistar, described being overtaken by the 22-year-old as if he “didn’t exist”, Thomas instead spent Saturday and Sunday pondering whether to stay in the Tour or go home.

Tour de France: Geraint Thomas to ride on through pain with Olympics in mind

Presented without comment.

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