I'm beginning to wonder if Cadel Evans is....

[Eldron]

Methinks my age is showing - recently I've found myself more and more interested in the scenery?!

 

HD turns a TdF into a National Geographic and the cheat sheets they give Phil and co about the local landmakrs really fill in the 4 hour gap between the suicide break forming and being caught.

 

Sagen has added some interest, Voekler is his usual entertaining self (I'm sure he spends more time practising his "suffer face" than he does riding!), The Froomster has added fantastic local interest, Robbie's short lived SA flag shirt was fun to try and spot, Nibali has done some fine work livening up the peleton, Cuddles had one or two half hearted digs too.

 

All in all I'd say this is my best Tour in years!

[petatodd]

Will it be out of place if I said that Evans actually never really had it, and that he was quite lucky last year for a fat climber ?

That would be spot on imo...the class outfit that is sky is making him look really average

 

Posted that earlier, he was way lucky Twiggo crashed.

 

Lucky enough to land a $3.3 million contract with BMC. Which is why he is k@k this year.

 

and I thought I was the only one thinking that, especially listening to Phil & Paul but then again maybe they were just being polite.

 

I think Evans is an average rider compared to the other GC conenders and was lucky last year and the reason it might seem boring this year is due to lack of contenders. But don't take anyhting away from Team Sky - they are good.

Big mistake that. They really do just promote the riders from the countries they broadcast to, listen to how often they say RSN are having a great tour. Bollocks, RSN are having an awful tour with no GC contenders at the start and less at the end. How can all that talent not have a GC rider? But they do have the Devil himself JB. Coincidence that AC left him and had a positive test for something he knew nothing about. The FS, same thing? Revenge theory?

[SwissVan]

 

But they do have the Devil himself JB. Coincidence that AC left him and had a positive test for something he knew nothing about. The FS, same thing? Revenge theory?

 

 

You and Lance have something in common LOL

Conspiracy theorists

[DIRT EATER KZN]

Eintlik is dit nog net Froome wat uigestaan het. Daar was vanjaar nog geen groot aanvalle nie. Dit was maar n boring tour de France.

I agree

[Grebel]

Methinks my age is showing - recently I've found myself more and more interested in the scenery?!

 

HD turns a TdF into a National Geographic and the cheat sheets they give Phil and co about the local landmakrs really fill in the 4 hour gap between the suicide break forming and being caught.

 

Sagen has added some interest, Voekler is his usual entertaining self (I'm sure he spends more time practising his "suffer face" than he does riding!), The Froomster has added fantastic local interest, Robbie's short lived SA flag shirt was fun to try and spot, Nibali has done some fine work livening up the peleton, Cuddles had one or two half hearted digs too.

 

All in all I'd say this is my best Tour in years!

 

I agree with you. The scenery is what keeps my wife watching (albeit not as long as me but having her sit and watch parts of the tour with me and share comments is special) and having the privelege of being able to watch it in HD is awesome!

 

(I have only really been following the tour from the year before they introduced helmets and made them optional on a mountain finish so not sure how long ago that was)

 

The nice thing since Armstrong left is that each year so far has been largely unpredictable. If I am not mistaken, there has been 5 different winners since Uniball hung up his cleats after #7...

 

Tommy's "Suffer Face" made me laugh watching the highlights last night. All this moaning about the Sky train... it has been a clinical display from them. Froome will have his day. He's paying "school fees" at the moment.

 

All in all, not a bad few weeks IMO.

[GrumpyOldGuy]

Methinks my age is showing - recently I've found myself more and more interested in the scenery?!

 

 

Ha,Ha, soon you will be getting all grumpy..........then its all over bub, all over.!

[T-Bob]

Evans is finished !!!

Doubt he'll ever win another TDF again.

 

Mate, doesn't matter. He won one and so far that is a pretty exclusive club. Some of the greats have only managed one and a lot that should have never did.

 

If you've won a monument then you deserve respect. If you've lost one then there are a lot that never even got that far.

[canfan]

Being slower doesnt mean he is clean. Just look at Frank.

[GrumpyOldGuy]

I actually felt a little sorry for Cadel today, he looked like a broken man and I think he may start to think about retiring now, which is sad, because like him or not he has remained squeaky clean and in my opinion has been a good ambassador for the sport.

[Jaco-fiets]

I actually felt a little sorry for Cadel today, he looked like a broken man and I think he may start to think about retiring now, which is sad, because like him or not he has remained squeaky clean and in my opinion has been a good ambassador for the sport.

 

+1

[The_Break]

Ek agree met jou. It has been moerse boring. Nobody attacks Wiggens. Just little short attacks and give up almost at once. It has been a flippen boring tour. Wiggens is ripe for the picking and nobody attacks him.

Probably cause they cant attack him cause they are suffering just as much. I recon you get 3 general types of tours:

 

Tours were a rider gets yellow and keeps it for the tour with little need to defend it too hard (or appear to at least), this is normally when the talent pool is pretty even, but team tactics and good luck play a part (as with sky in this tour).

Tour were a rider get yellow and keeps it for the tour and is the one doing the attacking so just increases his lead with a few attempts that make progress on claiming yellow (but just not enough). Like most of Lance's winning tours.

Tours were the yellow jersey swaps between a few riders at the top and there is not one clear rider who stand out. Generally when teams and individual riders are closely matched on most apsects.

 

The tours get more exciting as one goes down the list. Funny thing is the first and last have almost the same characteristics, except that in the first (this tour) there is a team who has stamped dominance.

Edited July 21, 2012 by The_Break

[Delgado]

I hate the way that every single year, everyone bitches and moans about how boring the tour is. Maybe you should watch WWE or desperate house wives.

Didn't hear much of that in 2011 if I recall ..?