I guess today Cancellara did not ask the group to slow down. I guess when your team leader is down you slow down the race, but when somebody else has a mechanical or is slowed down because crashes on the road it's OK to ride hard to put time on the rest. Well done Fabian and Saxo. I wonder if Lance and Contador feel stupid today. They should have ignored Cancellara yesterday and leave Andy Schleck's ass behind. Crashes, mechanicals, etc. are part of racing. Many Tours have been lost due to crashes and mechanicals. It is the way it goes. The other contenders should have eliminated Schleck yesterday. They were too nice and look how he returns the favor.
TERRIBLE TDF Coverage... On a side note, anyone else notice how awful, terrible, crap, crap, crap Versus coverage has been? Almost unwatchable. Pathetic analysis, tons of filler, little racing footage, no meaningful stats...they didn't even know Lance had a flat today until after the finish.
Real shake up today, happy to see evans moving up to 3rd after the pavé, lance quoted as saying "Some days you’re the hammer, some days you’re the nail. Today I was the nail............"
I was tracking the live french feed and velonews at the same time as the tour tracker and the tv on versus...everyone missed Lance's flat tire through the final section of the pave until they noticed he had a different front wheel and went from in front of Contador by a minute until a minute behind. On a stage like today, its just chaos. Its great to watch the live action but with so much going on in such tight quarters, you can't really get any analysis unless you re-cut and re-narrate like Phil and Paul used to do when the Hell of the North was re-broadcast a week after it occurred. The same-day rebroadcast at night doesn't really add info to that day's action or analysis, but gives them more time to stitch in interviews and features from the previous day's action. Versus has to live with the same race feed that everybody else all over the world gets from ASO, as well as the reports on race radio. Until each rider has a GPS attached, I don't think we'll ever know what went on during a stage like today.
Nice to see Cadel Evans up front amongst the GC guys. Former Mountain Biker who used to race in the US too (believe he raced at Big Bear here in SoCal at one time) knows how to handle the pave. He also ended up jumping ahead during the unpaved road section in the Giro. Go Cadel! Still believe Lance has a good chance to make up the 50 seconds to Contador. And I do like Andy Schleck for th win from the start so I think this TdF is going great so far! Exciting!
I watch delayed on the DVR. Discovered that the "Page" button is good for a 5 minute jump! :lol: (reply to cosmo64)
Yesterday, Vino showed how he helps AC and also how he strikes out on his own. He helped AC back to the chasing group but then dropped him right at the finish, what a teammate! AC did do much better on the cobbles than I thought he would, as did Cadel. Bummer for Frank and that hurts Andy. Lance didn't look like he could keep up in some sections, though he did fight back pretty well. I think he lost some very valuable time to the GC contenders.
Brent Musberger, the sportscaster summarizing the game, saw her in the stands during the game and made a haphazard comment about her attractiveness. "15,000 young red-blooded American men just signed up to go to Florida State next semester." thanks, joe. we now return you to the tour de...whatever.
Fantasy Cycling Challenge Another stage today that was fun to watch for the last 10K and kinda boring for the 177.5K prior to that. Looks like we have 12 teams in the STR group for the Versus Fantasy Cycling Challenge. Not to late for other people to join in the fun. It's Free! It's not just about getting an overall top score. There are also daily prizes for each stage so it's not to late to join in. Interesting to see what other people's strategy are. It would be fun to know who is who in the group. The top person right now looks to be "Team Vegetarian" but I looked at their team and he/she picked all sprinters. Not sure if this strategy will prevail for the whole 3 weeks. I'm "Van's Picks" and sitting solidly with a C+ right in the middle of the pack. Hope to see more of you there! http://fantasy.versus.com/cycling/index.asp
^^ Wow! Today was an absolute snore-fest compared to what's been happening prior. I mean, even Cavendish cried on the podium today (big relief to be there, eh?). Let's get back that MMA-meets-TDF thing. Woot! I'm just kidding (sort of). Glad I could zoom through most of the day's ride when I got up. I did watch the last 10k or so as well -- mostly the only thing at all worth watching today. - shud
I'm in the Vs challenge as Team Bohica. Not sure about my team, but we'll see. Today's stage was like many flat sprint stages.
Yeah, I dislike the sprint days too but it's still a part of it. I just wish they'd turn these days into a real race and have everyone trying to win. The sprinters could not hang if they went full out, but then again could the climbers climb as well if they'd used all their strength on the flats? Who knows, but that's what I'd call a race. I'll be glad when we get to the mountains. They say the race is won on the climbs.
