Mountain Bru

I'm not buying the "I have narrow shoulders so when I bump people with my shoulder I hit them with my head" story....

Morkov is worth his weight in gold

This "extended the 3km zone to 4.5km" is actually nonsense. It won't reduce crashes, just the consequence of crashes. If they want to reduce crashes, they have to take the times at 4.5km, not just give the same time to the guys who crash in the last 4.5km.

Cav looking strong... But Wout is right there ready to pounce....

Pogacar in good position

Ineos trying super hard to force a split. Looks like they're gonna cook themselves again

Mild Crosswind Chaos.... Will there be a real split?

He obviously thinks the combativity award is still up for grabs.

And not to be outdone, TJV also put a man in the off-road breakaway

Shooting yourself in the foot isn't the kind of combativity that should be rewarded.

Can someone explain why the 2 guys up front aren't working together with 56km to go and are constantly attacking each other? What are they hoping for?

Fetching bikes from the ditch.... Looks like guys went flying

Big crash in the pelo . Guys all over the show

Sean Bennet cracks. Day over for him after 35 meaningless attacks. Well done buddy ????‍♂️

Seems the pelo is starting to wake up.... Sean Bennet from Quebecka seems intent on slowing down the 3 man break by attacking it every 10 seconds..... with 65km to go. Now the ISN guy is attacking? Is there free Pizza for the first guy into the next town?

Well that escalated quickly.... At least the fees are included in the R50mil price tag. What's amazing though is that Nkandla costs 5 times more than this.

Looking at these two pics, it's almost surprising the difference isn't more than 6km/h. But having said that, drag force increases exponentially with speed which is significant when it comes to the hour record. When you go from 49km/h to 55km/h (12% increase) , the drag force you have to overcome increases by around 25% (provided everything else is the same). So I would expect the speed increases to get smaller and smaller over time as the power increases result in smaller speed increases the faster you go.

On this whole topic of improvements.... If you believe the marketing hype, these guys bikes are saving them 50W, their helmets are saving them 20W, their shoes are savings them 10W, their 1 piece stem & bars are saving them 12W, their jerseys are saving them 7W, and their aerodynamic jumbo pulley rear derailleurs are saving them 30W, not to mention the fancy BBs, ceramic chain lube, aero glasses, etc. Not sure what those savings are compared to, but I assume it's to other modern bikes? If you add it all up, and compare it to the kit the old guys had, they must be savings like 200W over Lance's Trek and baggy yellow jersey. (And thats not to mention new wheel and tyre technology which I genuinely think really does make a huge difference in rolling resistance and aerodynamics, and therefore energy used and speed) But if you believe the ridiculous hype, the improvements are actually pretty weak considering they're saving an easy 50% in power compared to the boys on the speedy juice.

What's very strange is that he wasn't thaaaat terrible at the Dauphine last year, and even did some decent turns in the mountains. He would at least stay in the front group until TJV lit things up in the front. And now his main GC rivals are Cav and Griepel? ????‍♂️ To be clear though I think Froome is clean (as in not doing anything illegal), and I'm not implying anything about him or his past performances. I think he's just too old to fully recover back to his old form.

Maybe they just want a Slovenian. They're very popular at the moment. Is Mohoric a real GC contender? Apparently Gee's contract is up at the end of the year. Wouldn't be surprised if he ends up leaving... Maybe to go be a domestique for Froomey at ISN ????

vs REMCO! ????

Was hoping for a mental crosswind stage, but it's looking like a normal sprint stage snoozefest at the moment

Sagan says he banged his knee on his handlebar and hurt it, and thats why he left. Was this always a thing? It seems knee injuries have become really common among the sprinters?

I think I saw him in the front group

Wouldn't want to put all your eggs in 1 basket/echelon