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Starts this Saturday.
Loads of British interest this time.
Cavendish looks odds on to win stages again - his greatest rival - a bloke called Kittel - is off form this year and not been picked to tide (funny how some riders are great one moment and can't win a bean the next - I'm saying no more!).
On form this season there is no one better than Cavendish in a sprint, he's got a great team to get him to the front on the flat stages - and I can't really see anyone beating him on equal terms.
We've even got a chance of being in yellow after the first day's time trial (where riders ride individually against the clock) with Alex Dowsett - the man who held the hour record that Wiggins recently beat.
The time trial is a bit on the short side - distance wise - so Dowsett is not the favourite - but he certainly is in with a good chance.
As for GC (General Classification) - or who is going to be first in Paris, again you can't really look much beyond Froome and Contador - that is as long as they don't fall off their bikes like they did last year!
Contador (former drug cheat) had one of those days in the Tour de Italy (The Giro) about three weeks ago, where he blew everyone away on a hill climb.
It was an amazing ride that immediately normal people would wonder if he was riding clean - but I guess he must have been, or at least within the scope of what we know about how to catch those cheating these days.
Interesting - or at least for me - Panarama did an experiment of doping someone and seeing if the cycling system would catch them.
It didn't!
(On iplayer still - called Catch me if you can - if anyone is interested)
Another viewpoint - re past doping - is that it can alter the body in such a way that your body as benefitted from being made stronger, so much so that even when you stop taking drugs, you have become stronger and better than you were before - and now riding clean.
This is one of the views as to why disgraced two times drug cheat Justin Gatlin is running the extraordinary times that he currently is, at an age when normal form significantly diminishes.
Or then again maybe Contador is just sprcial!
Either way it all adds to the theatre of the race for me.
We also have eight other brits in the field and several of them are capable of winning an odd stage or two if their team gives them the green light - look out especially for Yates twins, both of whom are very good riders.
I was a bit disapointed in last years race with Cavendish, Froome and Contador being out so soon after the start, so this years should be very much better.
Should be fun!
Loads of British interest this time.
Cavendish looks odds on to win stages again - his greatest rival - a bloke called Kittel - is off form this year and not been picked to tide (funny how some riders are great one moment and can't win a bean the next - I'm saying no more!).
On form this season there is no one better than Cavendish in a sprint, he's got a great team to get him to the front on the flat stages - and I can't really see anyone beating him on equal terms.
We've even got a chance of being in yellow after the first day's time trial (where riders ride individually against the clock) with Alex Dowsett - the man who held the hour record that Wiggins recently beat.
The time trial is a bit on the short side - distance wise - so Dowsett is not the favourite - but he certainly is in with a good chance.
As for GC (General Classification) - or who is going to be first in Paris, again you can't really look much beyond Froome and Contador - that is as long as they don't fall off their bikes like they did last year!
Contador (former drug cheat) had one of those days in the Tour de Italy (The Giro) about three weeks ago, where he blew everyone away on a hill climb.
It was an amazing ride that immediately normal people would wonder if he was riding clean - but I guess he must have been, or at least within the scope of what we know about how to catch those cheating these days.
Interesting - or at least for me - Panarama did an experiment of doping someone and seeing if the cycling system would catch them.
It didn't!
(On iplayer still - called Catch me if you can - if anyone is interested)
Another viewpoint - re past doping - is that it can alter the body in such a way that your body as benefitted from being made stronger, so much so that even when you stop taking drugs, you have become stronger and better than you were before - and now riding clean.
This is one of the views as to why disgraced two times drug cheat Justin Gatlin is running the extraordinary times that he currently is, at an age when normal form significantly diminishes.
Or then again maybe Contador is just sprcial!
Either way it all adds to the theatre of the race for me.
We also have eight other brits in the field and several of them are capable of winning an odd stage or two if their team gives them the green light - look out especially for Yates twins, both of whom are very good riders.
I was a bit disapointed in last years race with Cavendish, Froome and Contador being out so soon after the start, so this years should be very much better.
Should be fun!
Last edited by Sluffy on Wed Jul 01 2015, 23:13; edited 1 time in total
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