And that is why the Tour de France is the greatest sporting event in the world.........

Crashes, mass crashes, everywhere.

And at the end of it all, Petacchi.

I echo your sentiments Loyal, it's bloody brilliant.

Was with a few lads this evening and when I mentioned it there were moans of criticism and disgust at how "boring" Le Tour is. How very wrong they are.

Yeah throw in an ould dog here and there - makes for great excitement.

Loyal2TheRoyal wrote:Crashes, mass crashes, everywhere.

And at the end of it all, Petacchi.

And drugs great sport

Great stage today as well - the crashes on a very wet course caused disarray amongst the peloton and at one point I think the was 6 or 7 separate groups of riders at different points on the route, something I haven't seen before on a flat stage. It was also interesting to see a successful breakaway in such an early stage - and what a breakaway it was! 183km at the front of the race and finishing with 3 minutes plus over the pack. Will surely stay in the yellow jersey for a while.

I have never seen anything like the 'protest' finish carried out by the peloton at the end of the race. Quite annoying really as I was waiting for a sprint finish (as was the large crowd in Spa). It gave a strange insight into the unity these riders have - even if some of the sprinters were nudging as far forward as they dared!

The organisers claim to be making the opening stages more difficult and more interesting to allow challenges to be made on the top riders. With an even more intriguing and dangerous route set for tomorrow it seems they may have succeeded!

What was the protest about Sami?

I'm going to miss all stages this week because of work!

RMDrive wrote:What was the protest about Sami?

They claimed that the course of the race had been too dangerous. So in protest they refused to contest a sprint finish and crossed the line as a unit so all the riders would achieve the same time.

There was some nasty descents alright, and a few tight bends and roundabouts etc, but the wet weather played a part in the crashes that occurred. The riders also know these roads from the Leige Bastone Leige (spelling?) race and had seen the route months previously when the Tour route was released.

They had a point but it wasn't very convincing.

More drama in Stage 3 today, the cobbles on the route causing a great deal of problems and crashes. Sad to see Frank Schleck out of the tour with a broken collar bone. Also a bad day for Lance Armstrong who lost 50 seconds on his main rivals. A good day for Brits Bradley Wiggins, who has got himself back in it with an 8th place finish moving up to 14th overall, and Geraint Thomas who came 2nd in the stage and is now owner of the white jersey. Cavendish yet to make his mark, has failed to score a single sprint point so far and has lost even more ground to main rival Thor Hushovd who won the stage today.

Cancellara regains the yellow jersey. Chavenal, who was expected to retain it for some time, was hampered by mechanical problems and bike switches.

SamiPremier08 wrote:More drama in Stage 3 today, the cobbles on the route causing a great deal of problems and crashes. Sad to see Frank Schleck out of the tour with a broken collar bone. Also a bad day for Lance Armstrong who lost 50 seconds on his main rivals. A good day for Brits Bradley Wiggins, who has got himself back in it with an 8th place finish moving up to 14th overall, and Geraint Thomas who came 2nd in the stage and is now owner of the white jersey. Cavendish yet to make his mark, has failed to score a single sprint point so far and has lost even more ground to main rival Thor Hushovd who won the stage today.

Cancellara regains the yellow jersey. Chavenal, who was expected to retain it for some time, was hampered by mechanical problems and bike switches.

Better day for the Irish Roche is 11th

Roche gained time on a few of his rivals too. Tactically, there ain't much better than Roche in the peloton.

Bitter sweet feeling for Saxobank with Frank failing to complete and Andy gaining time. Apparantly, the crash of Frank allowed the attack to stick. All on Andy's shoulders now.

The Manx Express should roll into town tomorrow!

Good day for Wiggins and in particular Andy Schlek - Andy will miss Frank when they hit the Alps though.
another tough day for Armstrong although nothing to date suggests and problems with form. Only caught some highlights today - Didn't seem to have any team support to recover from the puncture ?
more of a worry for Contador whose loss of time today was more of a form issue.
Its been a very tough but interesting start all round.
Shortish stage tomorrow should see a bunch finish. First chance to see if Cavendishs team are able to manage the peloton.

Poor performance by HTC Columbia but Cavendish looked like he was barely moving when he tried to sprint. He obviously needs to be delivered to within 50 metres of the line.
Petacci must now be favourite to win the green jersey. Hursvod hasn't got the pace for a bunch sprint. His best chance of points is to get into a breakaway like he did yesterday.

Dr.Shephard wrote:Poor performance by HTC Columbia but Cavendish looked like he was barely moving when he tried to sprint. He obviously needs to be delivered to within 50 metres of the line.
Petacci must now be favourite to win the green jersey. Hursvod hasn't got the pace for a bunch sprint. His best chance of points is to get into a breakaway like he did yesterday.

Cavendish looks to have lost his form of last year quite disastrously. There was some very complicated and clever teamwork going on in the peloton today, but all this seemed to fall apart at the end. Great attack from Petacci to win it, Cav looked like he'd given up. Not so much of an exciting stage today unfortunately.

Was reading in some newspaper over the weekend and it was just saying how cycling has never recovered from all its drug past and while the sport may now be drug free there is still a perception out there that it is still full of cheats and I don't think it has gotten over that yet and maybe more of an effort should be made.

clash-of-da-ash wrote: maybe more of an effort should be made.

it certainly hasn't got over it clash. Sometimes it's hard not to think "bet he's on drugs" or "when will get found out" when an impressive achievement is made. In fact my dad's tongue-in-cheek response to Cavendish's failure today was "bet he's on the wrong drugs". It has tarred the sport a great deal, but I don't see what you mean by more of an effort? Surely there is nothing more they can do than have stringent testing and strict rules?

clash-of-da-ash wrote:while the sport may now be drug free there is still a perception out there that it is still full of cheats and I don't think it has gotten over that yet and maybe more of an effort should be made.

Maybe maskers are staying one step ahead of the authorities .... Don't see any dip in levels of performance, times etc ... makes you wonder why they took them in the first place ...

clash-of-da-ash wrote:Was reading in some newspaper over the weekend and it was just saying how cycling has never recovered from all its drug past and while the sport may now be drug free there is still a perception out there that it is still full of cheats and I don't think it has gotten over that yet and maybe more of an effort should be made.

i read an article quite recently about a cyclist (not sure of his name or if he is competing in Tour) but he was winning time trials and beating records etc with ease and the authorities had launched an investigation into allegations that he had tampered with the bike and had an engine of some sort fitted to the bike...............

bocerty wrote:i read an article quite recently about a cyclist (not sure of his name or if he is competing in Tour) but he was winning time trials and beating records etc with ease and the authorities had launched an investigation into allegations that he had tampered with the bike and had an engine of some sort fitted to the bike...............

I read that ......... he was from Tyrone ...

Jayo Cluxton wrote:

bocerty wrote:i read an article quite recently about a cyclist (not sure of his name or if he is competing in Tour) but he was winning time trials and beating records etc with ease and the authorities had launched an investigation into allegations that he had tampered with the bike and had an engine of some sort fitted to the bike...............

I read that ......... he was from Tyrone ...

wasnt a Dub anyway - he obviously had more than one gear

bocerty wrote:

clash-of-da-ash wrote:Was reading in some newspaper over the weekend and it was just saying how cycling has never recovered from all its drug past and while the sport may now be drug free there is still a perception out there that it is still full of cheats and I don't think it has gotten over that yet and maybe more of an effort should be made.

i read an article quite recently about a cyclist (not sure of his name or if he is competing in Tour) but he was winning time trials and beating records etc with ease and the authorities had launched an investigation into allegations that he had tampered with the bike and had an engine of some sort fitted to the bike...............

Fabian Cancellera, there was a thread on him here a few weeks ago.

Proud wearer of Maillot Jeune tonight!

Loyal2TheRoyal wrote:Proud wearer of Maillot Jeune tonight!

Thankfully he mustn't have ran out of petrol so ...........

So this is what the Tour de France comes down to.

Schleck vs Contador.

Ya can keep your Evans, your Basso, your Wiggins, your Armstrong, your Kruzeiger. The only cyclist in the world who could match Andy and Alberto in the hills is Frank Schleck and he's injured.

But can Andy hold onto yellow? He has to drop Contador once again before the penultimate day's time trial. And needs to put more than ten seconds into him. Makes for a fascinating week as the peloton makes its way to Col du Tourmalet next Thursday.

Thought earlier that Evans might have a chance seemed to have come on since winning teh rainbow- showed a small bit of weakness on Sunday and nearly dropped off the back of the contador group in the final km - clearly when they hit the real stuff today he got burned on the hors catejorie. Andy Schlek is looking in super form
but dropping Contador inside the kite like on Sunday isn't enough he needs to get away at least 5km from the summit-Just can't see it unless Contador has a fall.

Well nearly three weeks after it began, over 3000kms and 80 odd hours of cycling
after the cobblestones, the wet roads, the crashes, the ascent and descent of the alps - big stages in the Pyrennes, as it was always going to do it boils down to an eight second gap as they head to the highest point of the race - three mountains and 18km climb to the top of the Col de Tourmalet.

Schlek has to gain on Contador today or else it should be done and dusted. so he has to attack hard - can he get away and build enough of a gap for the time trial
I'd bet not.