Le Tour de France (1 Viewer)

[Jay H]

Ditto on that 1913 thing, I guess they didn't carry duct tape on the tour
OLN's Ride of the Day is simply whoever wins that day, at least it has been so far.. Surely one thinks that Heras should of won it on either Friday's or Thursday stage. Kind of I guess like most of the three major sports MVP award, not really going to the most valuable player, but the most popular player on the team that wins..
I hope OLN does Mt Ventoux tomorrow night so I can skip CBS's horrible excuse.
Jay

 

[Mario Bartel]

OLN's Ride of the Day is simply whoever wins that day

Ah, but today OLN awarded its Ride of the Day to Jalabert.

I sure hope Heras gets a stage win before the end of the Tour, as he sure deserves it.

Beloki also deserves great praise for his courage and determination to hang tough as long as he has. Mt. Ventoux tomorrow will be very exciting.

Jay, if you haven't yet seen it, the Tour plays a small, but pivotal, role in the great French movie, Amelie, for which there are now three pages of praise in the Software forum.

 

[Jay H]

Ahh, but that explains it as I haven't finished watching yesterday's stage yet. I'm about half way through OLN's coverage. I was just super tired last night.
Didn't know that about Amelie, although I have already heard good stuff about that, I didn't know it had anything to do with the TdF. I mean I did go out and buy Breaking Away on DVD because it was sitting in the cheap bin at a Walmart in Delaware
Jay

 

[Jay H]

Finished Saturday's stage before the Mont Ventoux stage was aired at 9pm Eastern.. Another great stage with something for everyone, an early breakaway, super climb at the end, drama between the Robbie and Erik who are tied for the green points competition and a cool finish.

Another stage where the ride of the day wasn't the stage winner, I wonder if it had anything to do Tricky Dick's past history with Festina??? I mean Virenque was out in the breakaway and was doing more work than Lance who got a ride on the Lampre team who was working for Rumsas. With Rumsas work, he might get a podium spot, kind of like the Oscar Sevilla of the '02 TdF.

I was waiting for an attack by Beloki and it was funny to see Lance punish him because of it. The only bad thing is that he attacked too late, late enough that Lance didn't have time to catch Virenque at the end.

Looks like Jonathan Vaughters wants to return to America and race for Saturn. Cyclingnews.com says he requested to be removed from his contract at CA so he can return to America and spend more time racing here. I can't believe the bad luck CA has had with this tour, Christophe Moreau was almost booted from the tour for punching Carlos Sastra of CSC, I thought that might be the final straw. The only guy on CA that seems to be doing OK is Stuart O'Grady who is third on the points I believe.

Jay

 

[Mario Bartel]

Christophe Moreau was almost booted from the tour for punching Carlos Sastra of CSC

Geez, when did that happen? It sounds like Nascar
Jay, has there been much buzz at all in your neck of the woods about the New York City Cycling Championships? Sounds like it could be a great event, with Lance the star attraction, only a week after the Champs d'Elysee.

 

[Jay H]

Re: the NYC cycling championship. Well, as much buzz as they'll ever be for a cycling event in America. On the cycling rags it is mentioned alot. Lance and Matty Nothstein are schedules. Mario Cippolini was and has now rumored to have backed out so who knows about him :frowning: I will be in Alaska not long after the TdF is over so I wont be around. I know Greg LeMond is schedules to be on NBC Today (I think it's NBC) this wednesday to promote his cycling one-day race in Colorado, which BTW is supposed to include 7 mountain passes and be like 140miles so it looks to be a killer one-day race.
The scat between Sastre and Moreau was about 3 stages ago and I haven't heard what was it about but it wasn't that bad, I mean how hard can one punch while riding a bike at 28mph or so? But usually, the TdF is fairly hard on any kind of scat because it could be dangerous while riding, ya know!
Jay

 

[Jay H]

Hey CameronJ, did you know that Jacky Durand got booted from the race for "towing"!!! Supposedly 2 miles on the last climb on the Bielle climb. He denies it ever was that long, it's not like he is that close to any of the leaders anyway. I wonder where he gets all his energy from
Jay

 

[Aurel Savin]

Here is the official site for the NYC Race
http://www.nycbikerace.com
I'll be there!

 

[Peter Kim]

What an incredible Tour de France! The 15th stage has been epic...Lance Armstrong is showing what he's made of when placed under great duress.

Check out the details of the 15th stage...wow!

 

[Andrej Dolenc]

For those of us without OLN (or Eurosport, grrr), Lance Armstrong's web page has excellent reports and writeups of each stage. Lots of details as to when attacks happened, who was there, who couldn't keep the pace, etc etc.
http://www.lancearmstrong.com/
Don't go to the main page if you don't want to know today's (Stage 15) results, results are right on the main page. Instead, skip directly to the reports page where you can pick out previous reports to read:
http://www.lancearmstrong.com/lance/...mltdf03/stages

 

[Brian Perry]

What exactly is the etiquette when it comes to crashes? I read that Armstrong wiped out but then the other racers stopped to wait for him. Does it always happen that way?

Similarly, Armstrong crashed earlier in the race and was actually allowed to use a teammate's bike to finish the race. What happens to the teammate's race time, as he had no bike to use?

 

[Peter Kim]

Apparently this is standard race etiquette, according to OLN broadcasters. In fact, they stated that this was payback for what happened a couple of years earlier, when Armstrong waited for Ullrich when he had crashed.
Good sportsmanship still alive

 

[Edan W]

Armstrong and Ullrich have a history...in 2001, they were both descending the Peyresourde (a climb on yesterday's stage) and Ullrich went over the side on a sharp bend (pretty funny footage really in retrospect, knowing that Ullrich was unhurt). Armstrong, who was well ahead of Ullrich in the overall classification, slowed his descent and refused to attack, waiting for Ullrich to rejoin him. At the finish line, Ullrich reached out and shook his hand in thanks for the gesture. It seems Ullrich was just repaying the favor today, although the race is alot closer now than it was in 2001.

As far as the bike incident, Lance's teammate would just wait for a team car to bring him another bike. Naturally, that might take a minute or two so it's best if Armstrong takes the nearest available bike and in the process losing as little time as possible while his teammate waits for the replacement. His teammate's time isn't important, only Lance's is (the team goal is for Lance to win the overall race, and his teammates will sacrifice their placement to help him).

 

[Lew Crippen]

Tradition and etiquette require that opponents don’t attack when someone has a crash or is answering a call of nature (the Ullrich/Armstrong incidents are only very visible recent incidents). In one of the early stages of this year’s tour, you could see Armstrong tell one of the other riders not to attack in such a situation (this btw, is another tradition—usually one senior rider is considered as the boss or patrón[./I[ of the tour and sets the overall tone and unwritten rules by which the other riders govern themselves).

It is standard for the team leader to use teammate’s bikes after a crash or some equipment failure. So much so that on well organized teams, one or two of the other riders will be riding bikes with the exact frame and gear ratios, etc. as the team leader and their job is to ride close to him so that in the event of a problem, the team leader can get on a bike that is set up for him. The teammate will just get a bike off the team manager’s car (you see them driving all over with the bikes on the roof racks).

 

[Brian Perry]

So let me get this straight...

1. If a rider needs to take a bathroom break, he is not penalized?
2. The goal of the team is not to have the best overall combined time from all riders but rather to ensure that one of your teammates wins the individual honors? In other words, if Lance wins but all other teammates finish in the last positions, they still win?

 

[Andrew W]

2. The goal of the team is not to have the best overall combined time from all riders but rather to ensure that one of your teammates wins the individual honors? In other words, if Lance wins but all other teammates finish in the last positions, they still win?

There are really about 5 or 6 different races going on. The winner of the General Classification (GC) is considered the "winner" of the race. He is the rider that finished overall in the least amount of time. There is also a first place team based on summed time of the team. The first place sprinter, first place climber and first place "youth" competitions are based on points earned during the race at sprints or mountain peaks.

The GC winner get the glory and the big euros, so that is why the Postal team is working for that goal.

 

[Greg_R]

2. The goal of the team is not to have the best overall combined time from all riders but rather to ensure that one of your teammates wins the individual honors? In other words, if Lance wins but all other teammates finish in the last positions, they still win?

Also keep in mind that the team's overall time is not majorly affected by the bike swap. Whether Armstrong or one of his teammates loses 2 minutes, it's still 2 minutes lost for the team. Since they want Armstrong to win, it's best that the teammate lose the time.

 

[Nathan_F]

And the bike swap we're talking about was somewhat irrelevant.. since the crash occurred in the last km of a flat stage, all riders in that last km received the same time.

 

[Chris]

Armstrong captures his SIXTH straight Tour Win!

 

[Steve_Tk]

This year was a great year.