ruben wrote:
Indeed, worst first week ever I'd say. Crashes are no fun and splits caused by crashes are extremely annoying.
Plus half of the GC contendors are either out or at least injured and can't perform at their 100% shape anymore.
Every year you hope for an epic battle in the mountains between fit GC contenders.
And every year the first week of the Tour is a lottery and when you finally get to the mountains there are only 2/3/4 really fit people left. The rest are battered and bruised and have no chance really unless they are inhuman supertalents with unbelievable recovery.
I think many of this can be prevented if you put a mountainstage or 2 in the first week of the Tour. Then many of the GC is already made up and the peloton is far less nervous.
But no, the direction has to make flat stages and finishes with 100 corners on small roads.
Hill finishes are good, as long as they come on the right moment. Now, they really don't
100% agree, this is a shit Tour
First real stage coming and : Brajko and Horner almost dead, Wiggins out, Boonen out. Uran, Coppel, Kreuziger fell because of the other riders and now bruised and probably without chance on white. Leimpheimer, Sanchez lost....
Ant that all because some fockers HTC and GARMIN are competing who has the bigger balls on flat stages
Thank you for ruining the Tour
Stijn_vranken wrote:
to rubens response: i have to agree, even a mountain stage in the first stage won't change anything. the peloton is just too nervous.
Well in that case you don't seem to agree...
Imo the beauty of the Tour is that you have to be a unique rider to be able to win the race. Not only the best climber and TT'er, but also able to concentrate and focus on the flat parts. This year Evans seems the most focussed, and looking Pre-Tour and now I find the battle for the overall win much more exciting.
Pre Tour it was AT BEST a battle between Contador and Andy Schleck, with Contador already a huge favorite.
At this moment we have Cadel Evans as real contender, Andy Schleck with an advantage of 1'30 or so on Contador and riders like Robert Gesink, Andreas Klöden and Jurgen van den Broeck are yet to show any sign of weakness. Hell even Basso and Cunego are still ahead of Contador, and might be able to battle it over on the right conditions.
So imo, even if the Tour so far has been boring taking out the crashes, then the future of the stages are far from boring, which is thanks to the race route so far. Also the battle for green is much more open than normally. With the condition Cavendish is in he would have won 6-7 stages had they been flat like normally. This year both Rojas, Hushovd and Gilbert have a real shot at making it.
Ouch that doesn't look well for Horner, any news on him. Looked totally in shock or some kind of concussion.
Hoogerland will probably in the breakaway, defending his jersey. Contador wants to make up some time early in the tour I think. So will aim for a better result than the gc contenders. I'll just hope that gesink is enough recovered that he will be able to follow.
I think Horner is anything but starting today. He has abandoned according to various sources.
Again gutted for Wiggo and Horner. Particulary Bradley because he was looking strong in dauphine and would be exciting to watch and the Pyrenees and Alps
Johan's Bruyneel twitter:
JohanBruyneel JohanBruyneel
Update on @hornerakg: doing much better, 2nd head scan ok. Broken nose & big haematoma on right calf. No start. Wish him a speedy recovery.
Edited by Kirchen_75 on 09-07-2011 10:02
Break: Rui Costa, Christophe Riblon, Xabier Zandio, Addy Engels, Julien El Fares, Romain Zingle, Tejay van Garderen, Cyril Gautier and Alexandr Kolobnev.
I really don't get why a lot of people like this guy and think he's actually a 'nice' guy. Then again, a lot of people like Leopard too, so...
What is wrong with spraying some water? It's not like it hurt Cavendish.
Contador will win today with Evans taking yellow.
Edited by litllemagnum on 09-07-2011 13:00
cunego59 wrote:
According to a German forum, Horner has no memories of the last few stages, last stage he remembers shall be the TTT
Well, our (human beings) memory works a bit like computers'. When something is saved on the hard drive, it's safe in case of a reboot, but it won't survive a massive destruction. Though, when something is only in the ram part, it'll vanish during the reboot.
Recent stuff is the first to be forgotten when you bang your head. The more serious the crash, the longest far back you forget. "Usually" it'll rather be a few seconds or a few tenths before the crash that are forgotten. 5 days is quite a lot.
