Which bold rider has this stage circled in their tour bible? Wednesday July 18th, Stage 16, 197 km. The day after a the final rest day. A climbing day with two HC climbs followed by two Category 1 climbs and a serious descent toward the finish. The Aubisque, Tourmalet, Aspin and Peyresourde: you better be a fearless climber and a good descender, but a better climber. This is not a stage for Sagan or Fränkie Schleck (sorry Frank). If Wiggo was going to have a bad day, this would be a special one to have it on. And this follows a rest day? Could the weather finally make a difference? Will the mad tacker return? Will climbers just try to survive this stage to perform on the fearsome Stage 17? More questions than answers in the Velominati Super-Bunker.
All VSP bettors better give an extra shake of the monkey bones before casting them down. Study them well. There is much at stake: Fizik R3s for the winner, 2 pair of DeFeet socks for first loser. The rules are the same as for the first single stage VSP. Points are awarded for correct place only. Delgado might have enjoyed this stage but don’t be like him.
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@brett
I'm done and over the swivel brothers. I really tired to get behind them, but it's always an excuse "my chain came off and now my stomach is filled with anger", " I was poisoned", "my vajay jay hurts", "I wasn't really prepared for the Giro". Go away now and leave the racing to the real hard men of climbing.
@Oli Wiggins has massively gone up in my estimation. Everything he said in that interview was spot on, always about the team, the sacrifice and the workload of your team mates, never a singular thing.
He speaks a whole lot better than he did after the 2009 TDF and it's great that he is seeing and appreciating how hard everyone has worked for him and not just in the race. Would ove to see him domestique for Froome next year but I don't see it, also hard to see where Cav will fir into this GT hungry team.
Froome in the Vuelta against Clenbutador and Grimpedler's slightly more pissy brother should be good.
@scaler911
+1
@Marcus
A rewrite to appease three unnamed Velominati assholes:
Marcus you don't undertsand the sport then "” entirely. For me today's ride was about using the biggest effort the entire time. Not your ideal of the smallest effort possible at all times. I was not planning to sit in and wait. I planned to go off the front today with The V Meter and would not look back to the chase. This is how my day was won and I realize that you are expressing the tactic of sitting in the overall stages to survive the Tour.
My point: the effort in a bike race is "never little" if at all possible.
No response from the three unnamed Velominati assholes is required, but would be appreciated by others here.
@versio My problem is not Marcus' understanding of the sport but anything that you ever posted. You're borderline incoherent.
Why would Wiggo take it upon himself to ride off the front at any point other than the very end of of today's stage? Assuming he could have done so, which today's distancing of niblles suggests that he could have done, he may have broken one or two riders earlier but that would leave him open (and unnecessarily tired) to attacks from other teams in the days that followed.
I wouln't say it's been the most exciting race in terms of the GC but put that down to an embarrassing failure by anyone else to take the challenge to him. What the fuck do you want him to do? Wait for Cuddles to catch up?
@Chris
"Everything" ?? That's not good. I will make an effort to only contribute when needed.
Why are you now discussing Wiggo going off the front? I never mentioned Wiggens. I was only adding to Marcus' statement that the sport is about "using as little energy as possible at all times." And I simply gave an example (my personal experience this week training) that sitting in is not what the sport is about "at all times". You fellas need to read more often and look at the context of each post. So let's leave it at that.
@versio Indeed, if you can't understand your previous post then what hope do we have. You're right, lets leave it at that.
@Chris I do estimate that you will become an incredible attribute here and contribute to the nonsense when needed. Don't become so exclusive while you're at it.
Gone riding for the next 3 hours. Hope to return to this wonderful site for some positive-cycling-affirmation afterwards.
A certain poster who will go unnamed seems to think he has "deep" posts. In reality his posts are a sophomoric attempt at intelligent discourse, not too different from the garbage I handed in to my English professor last year (which would really make them freshmanic). Need to pad up a word count, sweet, grab a thesaurus, then throw adjectives around like a madman.