Bonus

Thanks for the insight Morne.

I hadn't heard of him before now, but he's been walking laps of his garden for sponsorship, to raise money for the British National Health Service. Not sure how far he's walked so far but he's trying to get as far as he can before his 100th birthday at the end of the month.

I wondered if leaking this news - "firing everyone" - was a way of trying to make the government come up with the funds?

Depends on how the world "operates" after this financial crisis . . . . not just in terms of what a Slot is worth but also in terms of how much money airlines have available to buy them.

Is this it then? South Africa will no longer have a national airline? I think if they don't use the slots at various airports they actually lose them. Not sure if they can keep them for as long as it takes to sell them. Maybe Star Alliance partners can use them meantime?

What the British Royal Family thinks . . . . . https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3kPMYaQ95c

A Chinese company for instance?

Imagine a group of kids playing with these in 2020? A Coronavirus nightmare!

Sorry I should explain . . . . If the race had been cancelled, the spectators would have been entitled to some sort of a refund. By pushing on with the race, no refunds had to be given and the teams that didn't participate (on grounds of safety) took the brunt of the anger. Not fair, but when there's BIG MONEY involved . . . . .

I had a Pink Panther one. Too fast for indoors but not rugged enough for outdoors!

Remember the start line at the 2005 USA Grand Prix at Indy?

Possibly . . . . Edit: No, I think there was an occasion that Niki didn't want to drive but did in the end - its in the film about him, but Prost said no and didn't change his mind.

Mate - that joke is so old!!! ;-)

Like the joke about a huge stash of drugs and illegal weapons being found behind the Public Library in Hillbrow .... people were astonished .... they didn't know Hillbrow had a Public Library.

Wish we had a patio :-(

I doubt any of the bigger teams would be willing to risk their "investments" for a short term return. Some of the smaller teams might though. Was it Alain Prost who said he had "no need to risk his life at this point in time" at the beginning of an F1 race when it was raining heavily, while lots of other drivers, not having the luxury of being able to call the shots, went ahead and raced?

As you say, interesting. And very complicated. Each town that hosts the Start or Finish of a Tour Stage pays a huge amount of money for the pivilege. Whether they have already paid that money to ASO or not for the 2020 Tour I don't know. There are bound to be "clauses" written into all the ASO contracts regarding the cancelling of a stage, and what those clauses say will be interesting. Is the Coronavirus an Act of God for instance? I assume that trying to push the Tour through and then cancelling it half way through would be better for the ASO financially than cancelling it in advance.

And ricochetting off the skirtings!

The ASO are pretty powerful, and there is a TON of money at stake. . . . . so expect them to try and do everything they can not to lose out. In the end it will be up to governments to make the decisions and the riders & fans to attend or not attend.

I had a look at the ASO website this morning and they haven't updated any dates yet. Possibly because it's still a bit of a moving target. https://www.aso.fr/en/our-sports/cycling

Wow! I have a PDF copy of "Sled Driver" here which is what I'm going to read after I finish my current book.

So La Vuelta will be End of October and into November. The weather is still nice in November so should be good!

So as things stand right now, la Vuelta and le Tour overlap each other by just over a week . . . .

Not sure if it was this guy or a previous guy who said "I knew something was wrong when I found myself outside of the airplane" ;-)

Cool - I'll watch that tomorrow :-)