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Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 21 Jul 2017, 11:55pm
by reohn2
Eddy Boss deserved the win today after two seconds and a third,I was glad for him :) .

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 22 Jul 2017, 5:54pm
by mjr
NATURAL ANKLING wrote:Hi,
mig wrote:can you cross the finishing line on a spectator's bike if needs be? :shock:

Can you proceed to run either like froomey last year?
Without bike..............

Spectator's bike is OK since bike changes are allowed. I think Jens Voigt did that most recently that I remember. Edit: nope, I'm wrong Jens took a bike from the caravan so maybe it is Le Mond who did it last as suggested earlier.

Without bike isn't - if they hadn't neutralised that stage from the point of the motorcycle crash, Froome should have been disqualified!

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 22 Jul 2017, 10:16pm
by NATURAL ANKLING
Hi,
Could Landa take a second off Bardet tommorow and escape assassination in front of the hosts :?

Could he by the rules :?:

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 22 Jul 2017, 10:29pm
by reohn2
NATURAL ANKLING wrote:Hi,
Could Landa take a second off Bardet tommorow and escape assassination in front of the hosts :?

Could he by the rules :?:

I've every confidence in him :D

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 23 Jul 2017, 10:14pm
by Postboxer
Well done Chris Froome and Team Sky, job done.

Well done Simon Yates for the white jersey, unfortunately the Yates brothers will be too old to win it next year, despite still being 25, they'll turn 26 before the end of 2018. At least there's a chance we'll finally get proof that there are indeed two Yates brothers as they might both be in La Vuelta, I assume Simon will be supporting Adam, or they'll just see how it plays out. Could be a good Vuelta, depending who's in it from the early withdrawals/suspensions from Le Tour.

Well Landa attacked, but only for a joke. Interesting last stage, even a marriage proposal in there.

I'm wondering whether Geraint Thomas gets a team classification medal, he didn't finish but if it goes from the three best times in a team, per stage, then some of his effort counted.

I'm hoping the organisers decide to mix it up a bit, have more time trials and more short steep climbs, then the lead might see-saw some more. I think it needed more summit finishes. Do they ever do a time trial with a summit finish? I was pondering whether the difficulty would be getting the camera bikes back to the start.

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 24 Jul 2017, 12:18pm
by thirdcrank
Postboxer wrote: ... I'm hoping the organisers decide to mix it up a bit, have more time trials and more short steep climbs, then the lead might see-saw some more. I think it needed more summit finishes. Do they ever do a time trial with a summit finish? I was pondering whether the difficulty would be getting the camera bikes back to the start.


AFAIK, the trend has been away from time trials since they give a big advantage to some riders and so encourage them to defend in other stages and bank on the TT's to establish a time gap. Also, in the past, there's generally been a tendency for a steady stage before a TT, although recently, especially with increasing telly coverage, there are riders prepared to ride hard every day. The days of the real promenade stage are over. Getting a bit historic now, but when GB TdeF pioneer Brian Robinson won a stage in 1959 by 20 minutes, it was the day before a TT and illness had knocked him out of the top ten so he was allowed to ride away. Once upon a time, a mountain TT eg up the Ventoux or similar was a regular feature. Again going back into an earlier era, when Tom Simpson Took the Yellow Jersey in 1962, he lost it the following day in a mountain time trial. FWIW, I thought the back to the future trend this year was away from summit finishes.

A bit more history. Once upon a time TdeF stages and big races more generally finished in in an outdoor vélodrome. AFAIK, Paris-Roubaix is the only famous finish of this type to survive, but the recent start and finish was in a stadium still called a vélodrome, even though the track was ripped up some 50 years ago. The reason for this type of finsih was that the crowd was entertained (pre TV) with a full track meeting and the announcer would give out updates as the race approached. Inevitably, this meant that some cities with a large-capacity track such as Bordeaux hosted a lot of finishes. Obviously, there are no vélodromes on top of mountain passes, so there were some regular stages such as Pau-Luchon in the Pyrenees, or Luchon-Pau when the race went the other way. Mountain-top finishes were seen as a good wheeze to publicize ski resorts and give them a bit of trade out-of-season.

It's a commercial event, depending on sponsorship and publicity.

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 24 Jul 2017, 1:00pm
by Spinners
Quite a good tour and I found the balance spot on. I used to like the team time-trial but it can damage the GC chances of those team leaders with weaker teams or teams just not so good at it (think Boardman's GAN team in 1994).

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 24 Jul 2017, 1:39pm
by Si
i may be imagining it, but in tours gone by the GC was mostly decided in the TTs and big mountain stages, whereas lately it feels like the events of what should be more mundane stages are also contributing to the GC more often...which is good as it means its all less predictable.

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 25 Jul 2017, 10:54am
by mig
re. crossing the line on a random bike. don't tour bikes have timing chips fitted?

i do like the idea of a GC contender crossing the line on a butcher's bike though :)

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 25 Jul 2017, 2:45pm
by mjr
mig wrote:re. crossing the line on a random bike. don't tour bikes have timing chips fitted?

i do like the idea of a GC contender crossing the line on a butcher's bike though :)

Yes, but the finish line also has cameras so it is possible to identify who finished where. As I understand it, it used to cause more confusion when a team leader takes a domestique's bike because the initial readout had to be corrected - I expect they can just tell the timing software about bike changes now, though.

Re: 2017 TdeF (spoilers post-highlights please)

Posted: 26 Jul 2017, 9:08am
by mig
got to see this in a long TT one day :D