Tour De France 2021
-
@davesofthunder said in Tour De France 2021:
Worth noting most of the crashes in day 3 were rider error rather than the course though
I guess - in a way - they always are.
Course designers job is to reduce the chance of those errors. However, as Willie notes - that's not easy.
For whatever reason, there's been too many crashes at the start of this one though - it's quite severely affected the GC race - removed a number of plotlines.
Interesting to see the riders themselves having a protest at the start.
-
Stage 3 was pretty fucked though, the narrow winding sections leading in to the finish was always a risk
The riders and the teams need to take some responsibility. If you are going to send absolutely everyone to the front, not just the sprinters, then that's where the bunching happens, and as the pace and jostling increases their is only one outcome to be had.
-
@crucial said in Tour De France 2021:
@mariner4life said in Tour De France 2021:
@williethewaiter said in Tour De France 2021:
this good - interesting insight and different from most peoples opinion!
https://cyclingtips.com/2021/06/the-secret-pro-tour-de-france-sagan/pretty handy article to read after the first couple of days have panned out like he said
never head that about Sagan before. Didn't he cause the sprint crash today?
Ewan took him out. Comms were saying Ewan 'lost control' but it looked more like bad riding to me.
No need to punish him though as he came off worse with a broken collarbone.just an unlucky racing incident. Ewan started to move up on the right just as Merlier moved to his right to go around his lead out man and took out Ewans wheel. Lots of fingers being pointed at Ewan but he did nothing wrong.. I certain don't get the 'his wheel was overlapping' comments - last time i checked to pass someone your wheel has to go past theirs..
anyone saying 'there was no gap there' look at the gap Cav squeezed thru today to win!
fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck taht was good!
-
@mariner4life said in Tour De France 2021:
Stage 3 was pretty fucked though, the narrow winding sections leading in to the finish was always a risk
The riders and the teams need to take some responsibility. If you are going to send absolutely everyone to the front, not just the sprinters, then that's where the bunching happens, and as the pace and jostling increases their is only one outcome to be had.
Armstrong had a good solution today - just flat out reduce the no of teams in the race.. reduces the teams fighting for the front then go back to 9 riders from 8 so you get the sprinters trains back and life becomes more orderly again!
johan bruyneel suggested disc brakes responsible to that big crash that took G down on stage 3- guys braking much later into big corners
-
@williethewaiter i remember that debate from a couple of years back. Essentially guys were saying discs were a problem because of how good they are at stopping bikes.
-
@mariner4life said in Tour De France 2021:
@williethewaiter i remember that debate from a couple of years back. Essentially guys were saying discs were a problem because of how good they are at stopping bikes.
yeh i don't really buy it as the direct mount brakes and pads on rim now are so good it stopping basically comes down to the contact patch from your tyre.. easy enough to lock up a rim brake on a 25.. cept in the wet obviously discs much better
-
@williethewaiter said in Tour De France 2021:
@mariner4life said in Tour De France 2021:
@williethewaiter i remember that debate from a couple of years back. Essentially guys were saying discs were a problem because of how good they are at stopping bikes.
yeh i don't really buy it as the direct mount brakes and pads on rim now are so good it stopping basically comes down to the contact patch from your tyre.. easy enough to lock up a rim brake on a 25.. cept in the wet obviously discs much better
i don't know enough to have an opinion, only i remember it seemed weird at the time
-
Given that weight (or lack of) is a bigger consideration I would assume that the really good 4 pot disc brakes and larger rotors are not a viable option. They give you far more feathering control and are less likely to lock up. Think ABS braking on cars.
-
@crucial said in Tour De France 2021:
Given that weight (or lack of) is a bigger consideration I would assume that the really good 4 pot disc brakes and larger rotors are not a viable option. They give you far more feathering control and are less likely to lock up. Think ABS braking on cars.
I should state I'm firmly in the rim brake camp for road bikes.. when I start riding the shit I ride on my mtb on my roadie I'll defo put rim brakes on.. until then.. enjoying hte second hand market for rim brake wheels!
-
@williethewaiter totally agree. I upgraded my road bike wheelset earlier this year and was amazed at how few of the 2021 models even make a rim brake version though, feels like disc is taking over.
-
Pogacar wins the time trial by 19 seconds over Stefan Kung and has a pretty solid grip on things compared to his main rivals.
Van Aert was 30 second down in the TT and I'm not sure he yet counts as a main rival.
Roglic lost another 44 seconds, Alaphilippe 1 minute 11 seconds, Thomas 1:18, and Carapaz 1.44.
Van der Poel still has the yellow jersey - just - but Carapaz is 1.36 down on Pogacar, with Roglic a further 4 seconds back and Thomas 6 seconds behind Roglic.
-
@chris-b said in Tour De France 2021:
Pogacar wins the time trial by 19 seconds over Stefan Kung and has a pretty solid grip on things compared to his main rivals.
Van Aert was 30 second down in the TT and I'm not sure he yet counts as a main rival.
Roglic lost another 44 seconds, Alaphilippe 1 minute 11 seconds, Thomas 1:18, and Carapaz 1.44.
Van der Poel still has the yellow jersey - just - but Carapaz is 1.36 down on Pogacar, with Roglic a further 4 seconds back and Thomas 6 seconds behind Roglic.
Carapaz the big loser there. Just got himself up the board to look like the man Ineos would get behind but dropped right back. Roglic now has the option of attaching himself behind Ineos if he needs to give his team a rest.
-
Great to see Cavendish do it again.
With that lead out he really could win a few this year which would be ace
-
What’s the view on Pog (and Rog) riding clean? I’m not naive enough to think that doping has been completely eradicated from the peloton, but from other sites I’ve looked at, there’s a school of thought that Pog is definitely on the gear; the Slovenian doping controls are quite lax. Now this view is not backed up by any real evidence that I can find. Would be sad if it’s proven to be the case as I quite like the way they ride.
-
@scribe Hard to know.
It's certainly a golden age for Slovenian cycling.
One thing I've liked about cycling in the past few years is that (mainly) pretty much everyone has shown some substantial weakness somewhere in a Grand Tour. E.g. Bernal in the Giro. Roglic last night.
When you see guys showing no weaknesses, winning the time trials and burning off the best climbers it seems too good to be true and probably is.
Very interesting stage last night. Pogacar has given Van der Poel and Van Aert a substantial head start now. Thomas and Carapaz 5+ minutes back.
The brief article I read was attributing Roglic's failure to his crash a couple of days ago. Probably right, since there wasn't much on the day that should have cracked him otherwise (heat?). Anyway, he is cooked and you'd imagine TJV will be all in behind Van Aert now.
-
Leaderboard looks quite spread for week 1.
It’s not like the top five have hammered themselves to get some early promotion either.
I guess that week 2 will see teams show their hands a bit.
Ineos strategy seems to be to control the peloton (what a surprise) and pounce on any weaknesses shown by contenders like they did with Rog last night. Pick them off one by one. -
@sparky said in Tour De France 2021:
Le Tour reaches the Alps this weekend. 🔥
I like the idea of these downhill finishes after the climbs.
We’ll see how it works tonight.
Tomorrow’s finish is at Tignes. Not overly steep but the elevation/altitude is pretty hard if he are gasping.Wednesday twice up Ventoux. That could get fun.
