The Official 99th Tour de France thread, 2012.

[1066familyman]

I can't see how it can [ get any better than this for the UK at the Tour? ], to be honest. Yellow Jersey for 2 weeks, 1st and 2nd place, wearing the Rainbow Jersey, 5 (possibly 7) stage wins from 4 different riders. There's only the points and mountains jersey missing.

What would be better?

Bloody right !, how do you top this Tour for British road cycling !?

What a win from Cav today ! I confess my recall ability isn't great but I think that's possibly his best Tour stage win. it was so sweet on so many levels. Particularly loved hearing him say how Brad was straight onto agreeing to the team helping him get the stage win today - after all the debate and people trying to find division in the Sky team, this feels like a "stick that in your pipe and smoke it" show today from Sky

Btw, I know Phil & Paul have to read NSC to help them out with their analysis, but I had no idea the thread was being relayed over Cav's ear piece too... check his football analogy in a post stage interview, along the lines of... " it's felt a bit like being Wayne Rooney and being played in defence at times"

 

[perseus]

Who knows the contenders for the Olympic Road race up the mighty Box Mountain? All nations?

 

[Stat Brother]

Btw, I know Phil & Paul have to read NSC to help them out with their analysis, but I had no idea the thread was being relayed over Cav's ear piece too... check his football analogy in a post stage interview, along the lines of... " it's felt a bit like being Wayne Rooney and being played in defence at times"

Did you (or someone else) have that?

 

[1066familyman]

Ooh, and almost forgot. That fantasy yellow jersey battle is shaping up to be a real classic.

Meanwhile, looks like I'll be settling for those UCI points and just happy to maintain my current place on GC now

 

[1066familyman]

Indeed, four transfers for me leaving a team of:

Wiggins, Froome, TJvG, Velits, Grivko, Voigt, Iziguirre, Urtasun and Simon

Pretty confident of a 1,2,3 and three other points scorers.

Bollox ! That's my star rider team too !, having brought in Peter Velits for today. Or at least that was it, I haven't done it yet as that's my next stop from here, but no point changing plans now as I won't get a better star rider team than that. I can't work in that much quality in DS's though I don't think. 3 transfers for me to play with.

 

[1066familyman]

Did you (or someone else) have that?

I'm confused now

Have another go.

I was referring to you lot comparing cycling to football in terms of our national development, pre stage on here. I haven't seen any mention of football before a stage on here before and then Cav comes out with that today.

Anyway, don't mind me it's been a long day.

 

[Indurain's Lungs]

Indeed, four transfers for me leaving a team of:

Wiggins, Froome, TJvG, Velits, Grivko, Voigt, Iziguirre, Urtasun and Simon

Pretty confident of a 1,2,3 and three other points scorers.

Same here really - wiggins, Froome, TJvG, Zubeldia, Simon, Impey, izaguirre, jeandesboz, pinot

On another note (plus a bit of shameless associating myself with the greatest moment in British cycling history)

http://m.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/...itment-win-tour-france?cat=sport&type=article

 

[1066familyman]

Same here really - wiggins, Froome, TJvG, Zubeldia, Simon, Impey, izaguirre, jeandesboz, pinot

On another note (plus a bit of shameless associating myself with the greatest moment in British cycling history)

http://m.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/...itment-win-tour-france?cat=sport&type=article

Mixed feelings having read that.

1) Proud of one of NSC's owns place in this bit of history ( I was even looking to see If I could recognize you in early photos of Wiggins they showed on the news earlier )

2) Slightly concerned that a doctor is able to have all those sports windows open on his computer whilst at work and has so much time on his hands to do so well at the fantasy cycling. What is the NHS coming to !

 

[Indurain's Lungs]

Mixed feelings having read that.

1) Proud of one of NSC's owns place in this bit of history ( I was even looking to see If I could recognize you in early photos of Wiggins they showed on the news earlier )

2) Slightly concerned that a doctor is able to have all those sports windows open on his computer whilst at work and has so much time on his hands to do so well at the fantasy cycling. What is the NHS coming to !

I would have been in one of the photos from last night - National junior track champs 1998.

I'm actually an academic clinician so I spend some of my time doing research and number crunching at a desk - hence the windows open on the computer!!!!

 

[CP 0 3 BHA]

How many Brits are going to head over to watch next year's Tour after this past couple of weeks? I must say I'm tempted.

And what are the odds that Sky nick the rights now they've built a team that dominates and has got the attention of the British public. That will be a shame as I've really enjoyed it being on free to air.

 

[Pantani]

How many Brits are going to head over to watch next year's Tour after this past couple of weeks? I must say I'm tempted.

And what are the odds that Sky nick the rights now they've built a team that dominates and has got the attention of the British public. That will be a shame as I've really enjoyed it being on free to air.

Sky won't be able to get TV rights for a while yet I believe. ITV have the rights until 2015, and Eurosport have europe wide broadcast deal for cycling, so it should be free or very cheap to watch the Tour for a good while yet.

 

[TotallyFreaked]

I think today was my favourite of all the stages so far. Cav has been immense this tour in his commitment to the Sky and Wiggins cause and totally deserved it. Even the rest of my family who usually begrudgingly sit down for the highlights marvelled at the sheer force that he blew the rest of the field away. Magnificant

 

[Stat Brother]

I'm confused now

Have another go.

I was referring to you lot comparing cycling to football in terms of our national development, pre stage on here. I haven't seen any mention of football before a stage on here before and then Cav comes out with that today.

Anyway, don't mind me it's been a long day.

That's a relief I thought someone had that exact (ish) Rooney quote, over the last 3 weeks.

 

[Stat Brother]

How many Brits are going to head over to watch next year's Tour after this past couple of weeks? I must say I'm tempted.

And what are the odds that Sky nick the rights now they've built a team that dominates and has got the attention of the British public. That will be a shame as I've really enjoyed it being on free to air.

Sky won't be able to get TV rights for a while yet I believe. ITV have the rights until 2015, and Eurosport have europe wide broadcast deal for cycling, so it should be free or very cheap to watch the Tour for a good while yet.

Yep, P's right.
I was a little surprised ITV4 kept the rights, but not totally.

Cycling isn't, hopefully wasn't, a multi million audience figure sport.
Therefore once you remove the percentage of non Sky owners, Sky would have been doing there own product and advertising down.

They certainly wouldn't be getting the million+ viewers this year, that ITV4 are getting.
Esp as the ITV format is so comfortable, even if you only have a passing interest in all sport, you still know the voices, and feel of the ITV presentation, which must be pretty important when there's only a small core market, but loads of national interest.

So I see it as a bit of a win win at the moment, and long may it continue.

 

[Bold Seagull]

Why is there this apparent belief that if Froome was unleashed he'd beat Wiggins? There have been a couple of climbs where he has looked stronger, but perhaps the highlights package is not showing some of the times when Wiggins has been the stronger, yesterday a case in point with the Yellow Jersey being the lead out for the sprint!

Overall I think Wiggins is the more complete rider, tactically & physically. Froomes time will come, & he is an undoubted talent but I don't agree he'd beat Wiggins on this tour if orders weren't in place.

 

[Stoichkov]

Why is there this apparent belief that if Froome was unleashed he'd beat Wiggins? There have been a couple of climbs where he has looked stronger, but perhaps the highlights package is not showing some of the times when Wiggins has been the stronger, yesterday a case in point with the Yellow Jersey being the lead out for the sprint!

Overall I think Wiggins is the more complete rider, tactically & physically. Froomes time will come, & he is an undoubted talent but I don't agree he'd beat Wiggins on this tour if orders weren't in place.

Froome only lost 35secs to Wiggins in the long ITT. Even if he'd lost 1min in that one and another, say, 1min today - that sort of time can be re-couped in the mountains very easily.

Races don't explode in Time Trials but they can in the mountains and gaps of 3,4,5mins can open up very easily.

If Froome had a free reign, I think he'd have won this Tour

 

[Wardy]

Froome only lost 35secs to Wiggins in the long ITT. Even if he'd lost 1min in that one and another, say, 1min today - that sort of time can be re-couped in the mountains very easily.

Races don't explode in Time Trials but they can in the mountains and gaps of 3,4,5mins can open up very easily.

If Froome had a free reign, I think he'd have won this Tour

We will never know. I personally think that the only reason he and to some degree Wiggo were able to pull away Thursday was because they had saved up energy during the rest of the tour. I think if needed both of them could have given more in some of the other stages but had no need to since they were secure. This is held up by the fact that yesterday Wiggins was able to lead out Cav.

 

[Stat Brother]

We will never know. I personally think that the only reason he and to some degree Wiggo were able to pull away Thursday was because they had saved up energy during the rest of the tour. I think if needed both of them could have given more in some of the other stages but had no need to since they were secure. This is held up by the fact that yesterday Wiggins was able to lead out Cav.

Wiggins lead out yesterday was because Cav asked, and he's worked so hard for Brad, it was the right and harmonious thing to do.
Plus it's the safest place to be on greasy roads, as it was just beginning to rain.
And finally it's what he does, the big turn at the front 2 or 3 kms from the end. It's one of the main reasons Cav is world Champ now. Brad held off the entire Aussie 8 man team, on his own, to put Cav in the right place to win.


The one thing not mentioned about Froome, is the 1.30 he lost to a puncture on Stage 1.
Without that it might have been trickier for Sky to manage the team.
But that gap was a nice easy way to keep everyone on topic, and focussed on Brad and the jobs they are handsomely paid to do.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Wiggins-Froome WAG Wars break out. No towing the company line for these ladies!

Tour de France: War of the Wags hots up as Bradley Wiggins closes in on victory - News - Gadgets Tech - The Independent

 

[Stat Brother]

Wiggins-Froome WAG Wars break out. No towing the company line for these ladies!

Tour de France: War of the Wags hots up as Bradley Wiggins closes in on victory - News - Gadgets Tech - The Independent

Nice one Indie, news from 10 days ago!

2 more stages.