Retarded decision to DQ Sagan. Simply retarded.

Sagan's elbow move pales in comparison to the actions of Cavandish in past Tours.

quote:

Originally posted by dgshooter:
Sagan's elbow move pales in comparison to the actions of Cavandish in past Tours.

Never seen any evidence the elbow ever contacted Cavendish. I think the disqualification was for not holding his line and the resulting crash.

Chris Froome took 3rd in today's stage 5 mountain finish. 20s behind winner Aru, but it was good enough to get him into his usual attire – the yellow jersey.

Aru: "I’m amazed. I attacked with three kilometres to go and gave it everything. I wanted to see who would move because Team Sky was setting a fast pace. I wanted to see what they had. The final 300 metres were terrible but then when I look back with 200 metres to go and I knew I’d got it.
…
Chris Froome congratulated me after the stage. That’s nice from a three-time winner. We’re going to fight each other for three weeks but it’s important to fight right to the end of the race."

Cav tries to get into a hole that doesn't exist, puts his head into Sagan's side to try and push him off line. Sagan pushes back. Cav most likely would have wrecked even without that if you look at the footage, he's pretty reckless. But that's bike racing, especially sprinting, but to DQ someone? Totally asinine.

I disagree with the DQ as well. It is in the DNA of sprinters to push, elbow, shove, bite and just about anything else to get a stage win in The Tour. Certainly Cavendish has done plenty of elbowing his way to a win in the past. Maybe after years of bad press from doping the organizers are getting a little overzealous..

Marcel Kittel, Arnaud Démare, and Andre Greipel took 1st, 2nd, and 3rd in the sprint finish of stage 6 today, but Démare retains the green jersey. All of the top GC contenders finished with the same official time as Kittel – no major drama today.

Marcel Kittel won the sprint finish of stage 7 today (by 6mm!), booting Arnaud Démare out of the green jersey. All of the top GC contenders finished with the same official time as Kittel. Again, no major drama today. One interesting thing – Edvald Boasson, Cav's lead out guy, took 2nd place.

With a category 1 climb near the finish, tomorrow's stage will be more telling for the GC contenders.

quote:

Originally posted by Pipe Smoker:
Marcel Kittel won the sprint finish of stage 7 today (by 6mm!),

I am surprised it was 6mm. was that the official, final determination ? In the photos shown on TV coverage it was indistinguishable! They must have used microscopes.

Sour grapes here, with the DQ of Sagan - have little interest in daily following the results. UCI is a bunch of idiots. Rant off.

Lilian Calmejane (French) won stage 8 today. It was a day for the climbers, with a cat 1 climb near the finish. Calmejane's good effort also won him the polka dot (King of the Mountains) jersey.

All of the top GC riders finished 50s back, so Froome retains the yellow jersey. Fabio Aru (Italian) is showing himself to be a GC threat.

Chris Froome comments in VeloNews about tomorrow's stage 9:

“I think after today’s tough stage, tomorrow (Sunday) will be very, very hard and very selective for the overall contenders,” added Froome.

“And definitely there will be riders who gain time and others who lose time.”

Sunday’s ninth stage is 181.5km long from Nantua with seven categorised climbs, including the three steepest of this year’s race, and a technical descent to the finish in Chambery.

Most of all, Froome is wary of the Mont du Chat climb which peaks 25km from the finish, and which he and other contenders sampled during last month’s Criterium du Dauphine.

“That climb’s savage, especially coming quite late in the race — it’s the fourth big climb of the day,” said Froome.

“It’s 10 kilometres at more than 10 percent gradient.

“It’s going to blow the race apart.”


http://www.velonews.com/stages...#ZurKS3FGDm0xazUg.99

Tomorrow's stage is going to be brutal. Those climbs are just plain nasty. Six miles at over 10%? Lord have mercy...

Besides the very unfortunate loss of two great riders in the beginning of the Tour, I've enjoyed this year's race so far. I don't doubt that tomorrow won't disappoint either.

quote:

Originally posted by Balzé Halzé:
Tomorrow's stage is going to be brutal. Those climbs are just plain nasty. Six miles at over 10%? Lord have mercy...

Besides the very unfortunate loss of two great riders in the beginning of the Tour, I've enjoyed this year's race so far. I don't doubt that tomorrow won't disappoint either.

Yep. We're starting to see who is a clown and who wants to be a cowboy when the road turns up.

I remember sitting by the side of the road in the Laguna Mountains east of San Diego one day, taking a break on a ~80 mile training ride, and realizing that no matter how much we trained, how hard it seemed, this was nothing. We weren't going to be worth a pimple on the butt of a Tour rider, no matter what.

Tomorrow’s stage 9 climbs look so tough that I’m thinking that some of the sprinters won’t survive the time cut.

quote:

Originally posted by JALLEN:

quote:

Originally posted by Balzé Halzé:
Tomorrow's stage is going to be brutal. Those climbs are just plain nasty. Six miles at over 10%? Lord have mercy...

Besides the very unfortunate loss of two great riders in the beginning of the Tour, I've enjoyed this year's race so far. I don't doubt that tomorrow won't disappoint either.

Yep. We're starting to see who is a clown and who wants to be a cowboy when the road turns up.

I remember sitting by the side of the road in the Laguna Mountains east of San Diego one day, taking a break on a ~80 mile training ride, and realizing that no matter how much we trained, how hard it seemed, this was nothing. We weren't going to be worth a pimple on the butt of a Tour rider, no matter what.

I once used to try and compare my ride numbers to those of professional cyclists. It didn't take me long to realize that professional riders, particularly those who are chosen to ride in Grand tours such as the Tour de France, are almost super human compared to everyone else. That's not even overstated. Super human. It's incredible the power they can put through those pedals for the sustained amount of time that they do.

Imagine averaging 11-12 mph at over 9-10% gradient for six plus miles. That's easily a sustained 400 + watts. Insane. The average person simply can't imagine how hard that is. You and I surely understand it. Words though can't do it justice.

^the Big Nasty-3000 feet in 7 miles...oh to be young again.

quote:

Imagine averaging 11-12 mph at over 9-10% gradient for six plus miles. That's easily a sustained 400 + watts. Insane. The average person simply can't imagine how hard that is. You and I surely understand it. Words though can't do it justice.

Little Cottonwood Canyon - up to the finish at Snowbird. After struggling to maintain 6 mph up that thing, I went back and watched the pros go up it at 2X or more my speed - pretty impressive. Dombrowski won it that year and he looked pretty good going by.

I am also impressed with their ability to maintain a 25-30 mph pace in the "flats"

"It doesn't get easier, you just get faster"

Geraint Thomas, Froome's ablest lieutenant, has crashed out of tour on stage 9. Dangerous descents! Bad break for Thomas (and Froome).

The stamina and pace of professional riders is ASTOUNDING!! I once finished a 100k ride in just a couple of minutes over 3 hours. About 5 minutes behind me was a group of about 30 or so pro/semi-pro riders doing the Century Ride. I just shook my head in bewilderment and drank my beer.