2019 Tour de France: Spoilers!

[Cyril Haearn]

Anyone can see what the thread is about,no need to read if one is afraid to learn who won

Education First gets my vote, promoting learning seems a good thing
But I guess EF is a bu$in€$$ like all the other sponsors

[Brucey]

the rumour mill is speculating that Aldag might quit the team. Certainly an obvious rift of this kind is an unusual thing in this day and age...

If you are a conspiracy theorist you might give some credence to the idea that the prospect of Cav exceeding Merkcx's record number of stage wins is not one that is greeted with enthusiasm in all quarters....

Anyway there has been an unlikely stage winner today; you'd have got long odds on him!

cheers

[Brucey]

this is what the bookies thought the GC odds should be, ahead of stage 1

Bernal 2/1
Thomas 9/4
Fuglsang 5/1
A Yates 11/1
Quintana 14/1
Porte 16/1
Pinot 18/1
Kruijswijk 20/1
Bardet 25/1
Nibali 25/1


but what do they know....?

cheers

[Cyril Haearn]

A N Other is my favourite rider at 100/1

[Brucey]

I think that Nibali is 'good value' at 25/1.


cheers

[Brucey]

Re Fuglsang's crash; they showed some new footage of it today; there is one of Nibali's team mates on the ground, and he appears to deliberately hook his bike with his feet and swing it across the road to his left, presumably because he thinks the rest of the peloton is going to come to grief on it otherwise. Unbeknownst to him this throws his bike in the way of some other riders; the first being one of his team mates, who sees it coming and neatly avoids it by bunny-hopping onto the pavement, and the second is Fuglsang, who doesn't.

Today's TTT was pretty impressive; Jumbo Visma were always going to be 'up for it' and had the firepower to match their aspirations. I am sure that Michael Teunissen never imagined that he would outsprint Sagan uphill for the yellow jersey one day (there are not many people who can lay claim to having done that) and keep it the next; he must be on cloud nine.

For years they have avoided the TTT in the TdeF, reckoning that it skews the whole race. This year's course (with the early TTT) will force those who want to win the race to attack to make up losses and furthermore for the strongest team to defend. Even the very strongest team may struggle to defend for the whole race, so it is glorious to have the yellow jersey but it is also something of a poison chalice; I'm sure that INEOS will be gutted to have not taken the stage win today (all that sitting around when they should have been warming down.... gah!) but they were well beaten and they won't have to defend the jersey, so it is not all bad by any means.

cheers

[tony_mm]

...the first being one of his team mates, who sees it coming and neatly avoids it by bunny-hopping onto the pavement...

It was Nibali.

[mattheus]

this is what the bookies thought the GC odds should be, ahead of stage 1

Bernal 2/1
Thomas 9/4
Fuglsang 5/1
A Yates 11/1
Quintana 14/1
Porte 16/1
Pinot 18/1
Kruijswijk 20/1
Bardet 25/1
Nibali 25/1


but what do they know....?

cheers

I presume that all they know is how much the punters have bet on each of these riders. I'd be interested to see the country breakdown - are the English mainly backing G over Bernal??

Anyway, it looks like a fair ranking (unless Yates S has a secret unannounced plan ...)

And Nibali does indeed look the best of the "outsiders".

[pjclinch]

I don't expect it, but thinking how much I didn't expect Kruiswijk's 2016 so-nearly at the Giro... if he's at that form, where he couldn't leave anyone behind but nobody could shake him and he was up there every day, then he's got a 20+ second head start, and a team that seems to be firing on all cylinders.

Pete.

[Bonefishblues]

this is what the bookies thought the GC odds should be, ahead of stage 1

Bernal 2/1
Thomas 9/4
Fuglsang 5/1
A Yates 11/1
Quintana 14/1
Porte 16/1
Pinot 18/1
Kruijswijk 20/1
Bardet 25/1
Nibali 25/1


but what do they know....?

cheers

I presume that all they know is how much the punters have bet on each of these riders. I'd be interested to see the country breakdown - are the English mainly backing G over Bernal??

Anyway, it looks like a fair ranking (unless Yates S has a secret unannounced plan ...)

And Nibali does indeed look the best of the "outsiders".

Remember that these do not except in a loose way represent the Bookies' view of the likelihood of their winning, they are the odds on their 'Book', which are designed to ensure that they profit from the event, irrespective of the particular outcome.

[Brucey]

...the first being one of his team mates, who sees it coming and neatly avoids it by bunny-hopping onto the pavement...

It was Nibali.

he's a classy bike rider.

re the betting odds; this is the first time for a long time that a Colombian rider has been in with a good chance of winning the TdeF, so anyone in Colombia who fancies a flutter has probably 'invested'. Normally the odds fairly well reflect how the punters have placed their money.

cheers

[NATURAL ANKLING]

Hi,
Yet another policeman stands Outside the barriers, shoving the barrier back, straight into the path of poor old G

[Audax67]

For years they have avoided the TTT in the TdeF, reckoning that it skews the whole race. This year's course (with the early TTT) will force those who want to win the race to attack to make up losses and furthermore for the strongest team to defend. Even the very strongest team may struggle to defend for the whole race, so it is glorious to have the yellow jersey but it is also something of a poison chalice; I'm sure that INEOS will be gutted to have not taken the stage win today (all that sitting around when they should have been warming down.... gah!) but they were well beaten and they won't have to defend the jersey, so it is not all bad by any means.

cheers

IIRC the TTT was [re]introduced as a bonbon for Lance back when he was still Mr. NeverPositive, and fell out of favour again when he sloped off, stage left.

I've always enjoyed watching them, and regret I've never ridden one and never will. I was looking forward to yesterday's but the enjoyment was spoilt by Francetvinfo's web feed dropping out every minute or so, and only consenting to restart after showing 84 sec of adverts. It was especially galling that while the wee wait-a-bit dots were running in a circle mid-screen, perfectly clear little advert tabs kept appearing, inciting me to buy a Skoda.

So that's something else I will never do.

[Brucey]

can you pick up ITV4 coverage eg via 'ITV player' ?

cheers

[Brucey]

re brake types in use;

https://www.bikeradar.com/features/pro-bike/tour-de-france-bikes/

shows what equipment is being used in this year's TdeF. Some teams will allow a choice to be made (by individual riders) but those team bikes protrayed as having disc brakes include

Bora Hansgrohe (specialized)

Deceuninck Quick-Step (specialized)

Dimension Data (BMC)

EF pro cycling (cannondale) [possibly both types of brake in use]

Katusha-Alpecin (canyon)

Mitchelton-Scott (Scott)

Sunweb (cervelo) [both types of brake in use]

Trek Segafredo (Trek)

Total Direct Energie (PC) (Wilier)

Wanty-Groupe Gobert (PC) (Cube) [both types of brake in use]

(PC) = Pro Continental team.

The other teams appear to be using rim brake only.

If correct, this means that between 8 and 11 teams (from 22 in the race) can be riding disc brakes on any given stage. However where the team has a bike manufacturer as a named sponsor, you can assume that they might have a say in the bike choice. Even without that some teams will be, uh, 'financially incentivised' to use particular equipment. A surprising number of teams have to buy their equipment and they just buy what they think will work best for them.

This means that of those teams only using discs you would have to guess that about three or four of them have no choice in the matter; its part of the sponsorship deal and they have no option. For example if you are paid to ride specialized bikes, you have to ride discs this year; they are so sure it is the future that they no longer offer their supposedly 'top end' frames with rim brakes.

Anyway, it seems that rash predictions about the death of rim brakes in the pro peloton 'as soon as discs are allowed' seem somewhat exaggerated. Two years into it and still it seems most riders at this level are using rim brakes.

cheers