Tour de France 2024

Jeremy McCreary said:
Finally, Vingegaard, Pogacar, and Evenepoel actually look tired after a stage! These guys may be human after all!

So glad no one wiped out in that final wet descent.
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I don't have access to the full stages (nor the time at the moment) Used have GCN/Eurosport which was brilliant & after Discovery killed Gcn I'm boycotting them this year! So just saw the last 5 mins on YT. Impressed with Remco hanging on for third and staying 2nd overall. And unsuual to see Pog beaten in that sprint. Long way to go yet and Jonas looks better then I expected after that early season horror crash. Ineos are leaderless and adrift. Roglic clinging on but that silly crash (he's not great on a bike is he) cost him. TdF's are nearly always decided on just a few days of high mountain passes and it's looking like a two horse race. IF Jonas V is in top form (despite crash) or building to top form, then is Pog's 1.14 minute lead enough of a cushion? It wasn't enough the last 2 years in the high Alpine passes. Lets see this year. I do want him to win. He's such a perfect all round bike rider with a great personality to go with it.
 
Holy crap - Not sure about carbon for riding gravel! Vlasov's bike after he crashed on the gravel stage the other day:

www.stickybottle.com

Vlasov rode final 50km of Tour gravel stage with fractured ankle | Video

Geraint Thomas believes Vlasov had concussion, despite continuing in the Tour, adding he saw him throwing up as the stage continued
www.stickybottle.com www.stickybottle.com

Valsov-1200x874.jpg
 
Actually reading the full article it says he crashed on a fast descent on a normal road, not a gravel section. Big f***ing crash that! Fractured ankle and probable concussion, looks like he got off lightly.
 
Rás Cnoic said:
Actually reading the full article it says he crashed on a fast descent on a normal road, not a gravel section. Big f***ing crash that! Fractured ankle and probable concussion, looks like he got off lightly.
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He's lucky he didn't break his neck on that crash. Can't believe he got up at all, much less back on the bike.

The retired MD in me is having a hard time processing how anyone could finish the way he did on a fractured ankle. Maybe it was just a chip and not structural, but with the ankle loads involved, it had to hurt.
 
Jeremy McCreary said:
He's lucky he didn't break his neck on that crash. Can't believe he got up at all, much less back on the bike.

The retired MD in me is having a hard time processing how anyone could finish the way he did on a fractured ankle. Maybe it was just a chip and not structural, but with the ankle loads involved, it had to hurt.
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For sure. It says in article he was puking on the bike afterwards, hence suspected concussion.

I'm trying to analyise the bike damage. In the clip in the article from a distance it looks less dramatic shall we say then the results - a fairly ordinary road with shallow drainage ditch. I'm guessing it was front wheel down first with all the momentum and weight on the front BUT suspect a twisting motion, possibly Vlasov still clipped in going a different direction to the bike so you get those breaks - to me very unusual - seat tube snapped and seat stays snapped. So a heavy front loaded crash with some frame twisting at moment of impact. But the forces must have been enormous. And he's a very lucky boy.
 
Rás Cnoic said:
For sure. It says in article he was puking on the bike afterwards, hence suspected concussion.

I'm trying to analyise the bike damage. In the clip in the article from a distance it looks less dramatic shall we say then the results - a fairly ordinary road with shallow drainage ditch. I'm guessing it was front wheel down first with all the momentum and weight on the front BUT suspect a twisting motion, possibly Vlasov still clipped in going a different direction to the bike so you get those breaks - to me very unusual - seat tube snapped and seat stays snapped. So a heavy front loaded crash with some frame twisting at moment of impact. But the forces must have been enormous. And he's a very lucky boy.
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Also for Vlasov's injuries - the main instinct from rider and team is to get to the finish and have the doctors take a look then, once you've crossed the line and are safely still in the race. On a one day race a crash like that ends any hope of winning so it's an easy decision to pull out and get medical attention. But tours are a different bag. Tom Simpson the British cyclist who collapsed and died on Mount Ventoux in the 1967 TdF (from heat exhaustion, amphetamines and alcohol cocktail not usual at the time) - his final words were "Put me back on the bike". :(
 
Rás Cnoic said:
I'm trying to analyise the bike damage.
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That interests me, too. Part of me wants a better look at how the bike ended up like that, but I really don't want to see what's happening to Vlasov in the process.

One thing's quite clear from the video at a distance: Bike and rider are both dissipating a lot of kinetic and potential energy as they tumble and tangle in the ditch well below the road.
 
Vingegaard's winning Stage 11 sprint shows a lot of muscle power. Ditto for his amazing TT in 2023's Stage 16.

But where's the beef? Where could a guy that skinny be hiding all that muscle?

If you saw Vingegaard at the beach, you'd never guess that he's an athlete — much less a pro at the top of the heap in one of the most physically demanding sports on the planet.
 
The more I think about the Great Tour de France Bike Heist of 2024, the more I think there should be an 90s-style Euro action film about it.

O881816-8947d.jpg

Acting on intel gathered from a beautiful, well-connected heiress by Inspector Clouseau, Jean-Claude Van Damme's lead character comes out of retirement to lead a team of heavily armed UCI commandos in a daring raid on the thieves' secret high-tech hideout atop Col du Tourmalet.

When the thieves, who are really Russian agents, narrowly escape on the stolen bikes, a harrowing bike chase through the High Pyrenees ensues. Machine gun fire and RPGs and bad guys flying off the mountain on the nail-biting descents fill the air.

Once van Damme dispatches the last of the thieves with his bare hands, the remaining bikes are returned to their riders, who go on to win the TdF against all odds.

And despite a 40-year age difference, Van Damme gets the girl.
 
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once upon a time we had a little thing called the "tour dupont" sponsered by the "homestead"(partially i am sure) bought a little savior faire' into this poor little sleepy county( turning into a gated community these days,alas the ptb at the"homestead" decided it was costing them too much,so they axed it.
 
It looks over now doesn't it? It's Pog's to lose. Those terrible accidents that Chris Froome had and Bernal and now Jonas. It's hard to hide throm the effects in the high mountains. Bernal is back to top 20 place but can he ever get back to his peak? And even at his peak would he be competitive with Jonas and Pog? Age and injuries did for Froome. Vinegard's crash was not half as bad as those too (Froome and Bernal) so hopefully he just needs more time to recover and next year will be back. Or this week maybe! Young Ben Healy has been attacking and attacking and now sits at 14th an amazing achievement for first TdF. And Remco who already was a legend for one so ridiculously young, but here's he's confirmed he can do the big climbs and looks set for a podium finish. Plus he was in the same crash as Vinegard, so has done very well, he might not have had so many injuries but it would have disrupted his prep. Plus with the TT on the last day, he might get 2nd still!
 
Rás Cnoic said:
It looks over now doesn't it? It's Pog's to lose. Those terrible accidents that Chris Froome had and Bernal and now Jonas. It's hard to hide throm the effects in the high mountains. Bernal is back to top 20 place but can he ever get back to his peak? And even at his peak would he be competitive with Jonas and Pog? Age and injuries did for Froome. Vinegard's crash was not half as bad as those too (Froome and Bernal) so hopefully he just needs more time to recover and next year will be back. Or this week maybe! Young Ben Healy has been attacking and attacking and now sits at 14th an amazing achievement for first TdF. And Remco who already was a legend for one so ridiculously young, but here's he's confirmed he can do the big climbs and looks set for a podium finish. Plus he was in the same crash as Vinegard, so has done very well, he might not have had so many injuries but it would have disrupted his prep. Plus with the TT on the last day, he might get 2nd still!
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I'm convinced now that Pogacar is an alien from an advanced cycling civilization. Leaving the likes of Jonas Vingegaard far behind in brutal climbing finishes 2 days in a row — who does that??

The so-called "fans" are totally out of control. How can you be so disrespectful of these supreme athletes who devote their lives to training for this event?

I fantasize about death-ray barriers.
 
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Rás Cnoic said:
It's those pink flares makes me so angry. It's not bloody football. The riders gasping for air on those oxygen deprived heights only to get a lungful of carcinogenic pink smoke? How stupid can they get!
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Yes, for those flare folks, my death-ray barriers would be set to slow (smokeless) burn instead of vaporize.

 
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Flattish Stage 16: Great sprint victory for Phillipsen, his 3rd and most definitive stage win. Sad crash for Girmay near the finish, but he still holds the green jersey by a narrow margin.

With no more sprint finishes likely now, the intermediate sprints will be hotly contested from here on out.

With a couple of notable exceptions, fans much better behaved.

CORRECTION: An incident around 20 km out got an f-word heard round the world from announcer Bob. Dead silence from Phil, then a profuse apology from Bob a minute later. Thought it was a fan stunt at the time but might have been a rider on replay.
 
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