Tour de France 2020

So many factors i realised again through watching that they must know the coourse in advance becuase they have mentioned that they "Recce" the leg makes sense. Also picked up on the various jersey's and pecking order.

The TT is it always the same distance ? If so what distance ? i remember watching Bradley a few years back when he smashed it. 

Great again today the two at he front made it the perfect finish for them. I love watching Carapaz and Hirshe he came a cropper today his kit saved him from serious damage.

The Bahrain team have had  good couple of days, and the two leaders are like shadows i think Roglic will have enough now baring accidents BUT you never know . Interesting few days ahead. New king of the mountains so guessing Pogacar goes back in white.

Took a look at Sagans sprint record in the tour awesome.

No TT's like every other stage is variable from race to race, year to year.  Sometimes they are circuits, sometime point to point, sometimes up mountains, sometimes a few kms, sometimes 30/40/50kms, etc, etc.

They even have Team Time Trials, which if you are a GC contender on a team that isn't good at TTT's ruins your chances before you really even start!

It really is a mixed bag - this year they've not ridden on the 'cobbled' roads (like Beaumont Road used to be like) - which is a big thing on the continent and causes no end of crashes particularly if the weather is wet.  They've included a bit of 'gravel' stretches in recent Tours, which had some riders very concerned.

The only real constant for the TdF is a Paris finish on the Champs Elysees and that only became a mainstay about 30 years or so ago.

I'm pleased for the Sky/Ineos boys - the winner is Polish and has been a very exceptional rider in his own right and a mainstay in the team but I think he's finally over the peak in that he showed nothing last year and not much until today.

Carapaz is the new boy to the team and has already won the Giro last year - so is one to watch - clearly through no fault of his own he came to the Tour under prepared and it's only the last few days he's up to peak performance.  The Yates brother (Adam) who is a twin (Simon) and is in this Tour will be joining Ineos next year as well.  

Landa is the top dog at Bahrain and has the talent but he always comes up against someone better.  Poels has been one of my favourite riders and helped Froome enormously to win many of his Tours but again age has caught up with him - it does with us all in the end.

Sagan has been the best (all-round) cyclist for most of the last decade but again he's probably on the downslope and Wout van Art will take his place as the best rider, sooner rather than later.

It's a good time to get interested in cycling right now because there is a changing of the guard going on, the likes of Froome, Sagan, Cavendish, etc are on the wain and the next generation - Roglic, Pogacar, van Art, Matthews are starting to push them aside - so you're in at the beginning of a new era of riders so to speak.

You've even spotted one yourself to follow with Hirshe.

As for the Paris stage it is regarded as the sprinters blue ribbon event of the season - Bennett and Ewan are the obvious two favourities but I just wonder with Sagan about to lose his green jersey if he will pull something out of the bag to win on the Champs Elysees?

Just another bit of trivia Carapaz is currently leading the King of the Mountains by 2 points over Pogacar and 7 over Roglic with just 12 points left to go - ten of them at the Time Trial!

Yes i can see that a lot of change is a foot, so i do intend to try and watch the next event, thanks to you i feel i have a much better understanding, i actually knew everyone you summarised above lol, two weeks ago i hadn't heard of any. and some of the teams are begining to stick in my mind now so alls good.  Right so the tour other than Paris can go anywhere (even the UK) on a yearly basis, makes it interesting i have realised though that they return to certain climbs from time to time. And that some are very famous within the races history.
They had a gravel section today, Cobbles cruel sods as if it's not dangerous enough.

The king of the mountains is poised to make great theatre. All about the sprints tomorrow?

What usually happens with the TdF (not always) but more often than not, is that every alternate year they will start the Tour in another country (we had it in Yorkshire not so long back, and London a few years earlier as well) and the second year start it somewhere in France.

The idea of starting it in other country's (apart from the money) is to widen it's appeal to a larger TV audience.

Perhaps I should mention that part of how the Tour is financed (and where it 'comes' and 'goes' to) is that towns and city's pay to host the stage 'start' or host the stage 'finish'.

The Tour coming to town brings lots of visitors, which means lots of business!!!

The TdF also usually alternates from year to year with the route broadly going clockwise around France one year and anti-clockwise the next. The two big mountain ranges being the Alps and Pyrenees and depending which way round the Tour is that year the one is raced before the other - and in the following year visa versa.

On a practical level in the Alps and Pyrenees there are that many towns and villages big enough to host the Tour and the spectators so you will often see places such as Lourdes, Gap and Pau for instance appearing more often than most everywhere else (bar Paris).

There are several iconic mountains on the Tour but they don't use them every year, quite rightly too as the enjoyment is in the wait until they appear in the Tour the next time.

The big two I would say being Alpe D'huez and Mont Ventoux (which you pronounce something like mon-von-two - easy when you know how)

Here's two famous British wins - one at each!







You might be right with a sprinter win tomorrow but it wouldn't surprise me if someone wins from a breakaway - Alaphilippe maybe?

My thinking being that GC won't go for it and its the TT the next day and Paris/sprinters blue ribbon Sunday, so it really is the last stage for most riders to win. Depends of course what people have left in their legs but there's not much team duty required from anyone other than the sprinters teams on Sunday and some good riders might have an eye on this one - Wout van Art for instance.

It's going to be fun to find out as really the TT and Paris are in all honestly a bit dull to watch, so tomorrows race is going to be the last exciting one - unless something unexpected happens!

Very interesting how they keep the course fresh, didn't realise any of that thanks, now watched all the video clips some awesome stuff, after watching Froome and Thomas i still find it hard to grasp how a team can leave out such talent, i understand that only one rider within a team can be top dog, but it's seems a bit like leaving Messi out of the Argentina team lol.

Going to struggle today to watch all the race mu my mother in law just come out of hospital and we need to do her shopping so may record and watch later. 

Sluffy todays questions lol

How does the team race count is it like in athletics whereby the first 3 or 4 out of the 8 count? or do all the team have to get over the line , and if so if a team loses a rider are they out of the team comp?

By my limited thinking if each team nomininates a team leader and the others are employed to get him over the line then the winner of the tour should come from one of the team leaders? is this always the case or could the yellow jersey go to anyone a number two in the squad if say the star is just not delivering assuming the team director would make a call.  or does it just never happen.

Finally: noted that Froome is joining the new Isreal Team? do they move about annually or does it dependant on contracts like in football.

Let's take Froome first.

Froome and Thomas are now in the twilights of their careers and although they still have the ability to turn it on at times, their best days are now behind them.

There comes a time when they have to move on, think Kevin Davies for instance, great player for us but simply kept in the team in the end more through sentiment than current performance and when the manager at the time eventually did what was right for the team at the expense of the player, it was him seen as the villain and not him doing the inevitable.

Froome and Thomas simply didn't deserve their places on the team when it was named and a gamble was made in bringing in Carapaz that didn't work out as they hoped it might.  Froome and Thomas both have very good chances in their respective Tours to come and hopefully Froome will end on a high with Sky/Ineos before he takes his final big pay day contract with the Israel team and hopefully gets them established as a pro team for years to come.

Thomas is still under contract and is a very good team player so he would have no problems being part of Sky again but it isn't unheard of for teams to release cyclists still under contract to enable them to join other teams.

I don't know what will happen, I guess it will all boil down to money as usual - would Sky want to get his huge wage of the payroll in the Covid era and if so what other team would pay him what he wants as they are in the Covid era too!

There is a transfer window in cycling but it is more to do with riders moving to other teams at the end of their contracts rather than big money transfers as in football.

To be honest I've never been bothered much with the team race and how it is worked out.  

I would have thought the same as you in that the first (say) four riders in each teams their points/time are added up and at the end of the race whoever's points/time is the lowest of all the teams win.

It doesn't necessarily follow that the GC winners team also wins the Team race, depends I guess on how many sacrifice themselves and finish way down on time in order to help their leader do well in GC.

I've found this that list the team results for last years TdF where Sky finish first and second with Bernal and Thomas but only came second as a team!

To be Fair though the team that came top is the team of Alaphilippe who led the race for most of it, Bora, the team that finished fourth had both Sagan and the rider who finished fourth overall in the Tour and the team that finished fifth had the third place rider.

The team that finished third though is a bit harder to work out why though?  They had Nibali who was up there near the top before he crashed out but other than that most have had a solid team throughout I guess?

Sorry, I can't be too helpful on this one!

https://www.procyclingstats.com/race/tour-de-france/2019/startlist/teams-ranked
https://www.cyclingnews.com/races/tour-de-france-2019/

Hope your mum in law is ok and of course should be your first priority.

Maybe you can start to get her hooked on cycling now!!!

Sorry, forgot to answer another point you raised.

Sometimes the team plan changes to who is the best positioned rider on the Tour at the time. What I mean is that last year it could be argued that Thomas, who was team leader, should have won the Tour but events took a turn when one of the later stages was stopped before the end giving his team mate who was ahead on the road at that particular time the deciding advantage to win the Tour instead.

It's not uncommon to go into a race with two or even more team leaders and let the 'road' decide which of them to eventually all get behind.

This of course can and does lead to many internal team upsets and squabbles - and probably best to be avoided if you can.

Froome was the best rider when Wiggins won but played it straight as per his contract as being there to help Wiggins to win. The deal was the next year Wiggins was to stand aside and let Froome win but Wiggins went back on the arrangement and cause no end of problems for all concerned.

Thomas and Froome are examples of good team players with talent, Wiggins and Quintana bad team players with talent.

Up to the management to do the right thing because trying to please everyone doesn't always work.

Sky/ineos plan this Tour was to have Bernal as the leader and Carapaz as plan B but Carapaz wasn't ready in time for the race and lost too much time early on to be a viable alternative and meant Bernal was his top man down on helping him retain the title.

From what's happened since Carapaz seems to be a good team player with talent but I'm not fully convinced Bernal is - time will tell if I'm right or wrong about that.

Hope that gives you a better perspective on this issue - hope so anyway.

Thought I would just throw this in is as part of the randomness and theatre that goes on in Tours!

Tour de France 2020: Lukas Postlberger abandons after being stung in the mouth by a bee

Lukas Pöstlberger has been forced to pull out of the Tour de France 2020 three days from Paris, after he was stung in the mouth by a bee.
The Bora-Hansgrohe rider was stung in the early kilometres of stage 19 of the Tour, as riders tried to forced a breakaway on the road from Bourg-en-Bresse to Champagnole.
Pöstlberger was then seen visiting the race medical car without around 160km left of the stage and looked to be in a lot of discomfort.
Shortly after, Bora-Hansgrohe announced on Twitter that he had been forced to abandon the race because of the sting.
The team said: “A bee stung Lukas in the mouth. Hope he will be fine.

https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/racing/tour-de-france/tour-de-france-2020-lukazs-postleberger-abandons-after-being-stung-in-the-mouth-by-a-bee-469053

Poor bloke, rode all that way around France just to get stung!

Really appreciate the time you have given to help me understand, i feel i have picked up a lot but still struggle on a lot of the intricasis that pan out whilst the stages unfold. The commentators seem so on top of it yet i miss so much, but the main thing is i have really enjoyed this tour.

Only saw the highlights today but a great break by the Sunweb guy Andersen.

Two things from today when the group of around 12 got away, the commentator said when one guy tried to get across that he had no chance up against such a group. I was fine with that it made sense, however fast forward and Andersen goes off and the same group are chasing, he says the group wont make in roads on the leader ? They were correct but you would have thought that with such a large talented group they could have really gone for it.

Another interesting thing i was surprised on, tomorrows time trial obviously Roglic will be full on, and could also take the king of the mountains, BUT Carapaz can idle until he reaches the climb and only compare times on the climb. Makes sense but never thought that would be the case.

Bee sting how unlucky was that, however it happened to my mate whilst cycling when we where kids.

Also saw a clip in 2016 when a finisher had the arch balloon marker ? defalte in front of him bringing the rider crashing. 

Mother in law is fine thank you

Team classification in the Tour de France; awarded since 1930, and the calculation has changed throughout the years. As of 2011, it is calculated by adding the times of the three best riders of each team per stage; time bonuses and penalties are ignored.


I remember the Wiggins win and at that time just couldn't understand why Froome put up with that situation. Not realising the protocals

wessy wrote:Really appreciate the time you have given to help me understand, i feel i have picked up a lot but still struggle on a lot of the intricasis that pan out whilst the stages unfold. The commentators seem so on top of it yet i miss so much, but the main thing is i have really enjoyed this tour.

Only saw the highlights today but a great break by the Sunweb guy Andersen.

Two things from today when the group of around 12 got away, the commentator said when one guy tried to get across that he had no chance up against such a group. I was fine with that it made sense, however fast forward and Andersen goes off and the same group are chasing, he says the group wont make in roads on the leader ? They were correct but you would have thought that with such a large talented group they could have really gone for it.

Another interesting thing i was surprised on, tomorrows time trial obviously Roglic will be full on, and could also take the king of the mountains, BUT Carapaz can idle until he reaches the climb and only compare times on the climb. Makes sense but never thought that would be the case.

Bee sting how unlucky was that, however it happened to my mate whilst cycling when we where kids.

Also saw a clip in 2016 when a finisher had the arch balloon marker ? defalte in front of him bringing the rider crashing. 

Mother in law is fine thank you

The thing about the bit I've highlighted is what is happening in the stage at the time.

A group of riders will almost always chase down and catch a single one (or a much smaller group of riders) given enough time to do so - as the work of riding on the front is shared by more riders and thus they become less exhausted than the smaller group/lone rider.

HOWEVER if you are near to the end of the race and a rider/group goes, you will have to expend energy to catch them - but you don't want to knacker yourself catching them - you want others to do that - you want to be towed up to the breakaway rider/group and still be fresh enough to then attack yourself to win the stage.

So with just a few kms to go a rider breaking away like the lad today (another Sunweb win - very impressive for them this Tour) in effects turns the race into a time trial to the line because the group behind them stop working as a 'team' with a mutal interest to catch him but rather riding as a group of individuals more or less saying to each other - well you catch him, no you catch him, not me I'm tired, oh yeah sure pull the other one etc, etc - and all the time the rider off the front is gaining more and more seconds.

What the chasing group needed was someone in that group who had team mates who could sacrifice themselves to get him (and the rest of the group) to the lone rider and then himself be confident of winning from there.

The group just happened to have both Bennett and Sagan in it so what was the point of anyone else working hard to catch the rider in front knowing all they were in effect doing was towing the fastest sprinter in the race and more or less putting the win on a plate for him!

There's an article talking about what happened today that you might find explains it a bit better than I can.

Chase group air frustration as Søren Kragh Andersen solos to Tour de France victory again

https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/racing/tour-de-france/chase-group-air-frustration-as-soren-kragh-andersen-solos-to-tour-de-france-victory-again-469146


Good to hear your mum in law is in fine fettle!

You were asking about when the riders set off tomorrow - looks as though we can see the match and the race leaders!


16:50:00 CARAPAZ Richard IGD ECU
16:52:00 MARTIN Guillaume COF FRA
16:54:00 CARUSO Damiano TBM ITA

General classification top-10 start times

16:56:00 VALVERDE Alejandro MOV ESP
16:58:00 DUMOULIN Tom TJV NED
17:00:00 URAN Rigoberto EF1 COL
17:02:00 YATES Adam MTS GBR
17:04:00 MAS Enric MOV ESP
17:06:00 LANDA Mikel TBM ESP
17:08:00 PORTE Richie TFS AUS
17:10:00 LOPEZ Miguel Angel AST COL
17:12:00 POGACAR Tadej UAD SLO
17:14:00 ROGLIC Primož TJV SLO

In GC terms Porte is a better TT rider than Lopez so could he possibly snatch third place tomorrow - he's certainly earnt it over his career and I'll have my fingers crossed for him!

And I hope Carapaz can keep the King of the mountains too!

This is more like it. 

Thanks slufffy understand now the reason behind my question thanks, great those times you list are perfect, it's as though the organiser is a Wanderers fan lol. looking forward to that later today hopefully after a win.

Bonce that is sheer madness, my daughter asked for a unicycle from her partner a birthday present while she was at Uni, guessing it's my fault for passing on a weird gene lol

Wow is this going to be one of the great upsets????

Absolutely amazing, pure theatre and totally unexpected.

That's why I love it so much and simple can't understand why others don't!?

OMG only saw the last 4k stunning will watch the highlight show later, but gutted for one yet amazed by the other, and they are best mates you can't write a script that betters that finish.

observer wrote:

Reminds me of the time trial on the final Saturday when Fignon was beaten by LeMond,after leading by 50 seconds.  LeMond finished 8 seconds ahead of Fignon... with his aerodynamic helmet on his sprint cycle.  Lest we forget that Pedro Delgado, the favorite to win the race, showed up three minutes late for the prologue.

Yes indeed!

In fact I put a video and cut and paste about the very thing on post 29 of this thread if you want to recall old memories!

Wow!!!!

Well what can you say sport at it's very best pure theatre.

Watching the difference at the end in the two cyclists, and the kudos when Roglic congratulated the victor top class.

Obviously Pogacar's TT was breathtaking and way faster than any other rider and deserving of all the rewards (Three Jersey's at 21) But i assume Roglic's abiity at TT and past history contributes to seeing his performance as a collapse.

On analysis the guy was still the 5th fastest on the TT, numbers 2,3,4 beat him by a margin that would not have taken the jersey ie less than 57 seconds.

This leaves a situation were by the only way he can lose is by Pogacar being fast enough to do damage and Roglic not performing at his very best. and sport being what sport is BOOM.