London Fixed-gear and Single-speed

Lazy comments like that get my goat. If the route was devoid of challenges everyone would complain, yet if it's deemed too hard everyone complains it encourages doping.

It's the Tour de France, it's meant to be a fucking challenge.

Agree to an extent, but the proliferation of vertical finishes at last years Vuelta was a bit silly. More like a circus than a bike race. And the best day of racing was actually on a more moderate stage.

Anyway, I don't have a problem with the route. Should be good. Barring a ban, I will put my money down now on Contador.

This could be a very tasty Tour, Brailsford will prob be thinking of how to neutralize the Spanish climbers. Twice up the Alpe on the same day, wow! Will Brad target the Giro & support Froome?

The Alpe isn't that hard, it's an even graded wide road with a beautiful surface, so is more suited to a steady climber like Wiggins. The summit finish on the Semnoz is more challenging.

Nonsense, it's a savage race. Always has been. Rider Octave Lapize saw the route in 1910 and said: "You are murderers! Yes, murderers!"

HTFU

They should go back to the good old days... starting in the early hours, riding for almost a whole day, no outside assistance. Riders these days are fucking soft.

Think they might be hinting at that by having the longest stage finish on Mont Ventoux.

They're not soft, but we have lost something. There's a wonderful charm to the idea of them all setting off, no domestiques to drag them to the line, no team car with replacement bikes, boxes of gels or live video streams.

I'd love to see a big, week-long event where riders had to compete on their own, fix punctures, grab their own drink from aid stations...

Also, if the etape does that stage there's going to be a pile of dead middle-management MAMILs at the foot of Ventoux next summer.

This. But this looks a good route, most of it we've already heard about in rumour. Glad they didn't shelve the Champs srpint stage for a MTF though

How would you 'see' it though? It wouldn't get on the television.

All the newbies are clean and you are still on drugs?

Of course it would be on television. Why not? I'm not saying don't televise it.

Teams/Riders will only prioritise races in the calendar that have TV coverage. For good TV you want action. Your Super-Audax would probably make for a great documentary (like RAAM) but that's about it.

This is a nice insight into why races have had to change over the years.

As amusing as it would be to send the etape crowd on a 242km ride finishing on top of the ventoux, the organisers have seen sense and opted for stage 20.

http://www.letour.fr/le-tour/2013/us/stage-20.html

I'll be in Valance for the 15th Stage as they head through to Mont Ventoux. Going to be killer. Then back up to Paris a few days later to catch the final sunset roll in. ACE

Riders should not have communication through ear pieces, its too controlled, i remember a stage around 2000 when Armstrong panicked & they had to contact Ferrari as to whether Lance should pursue Pantani! Dr Evil said The little Italian couldn"t maintain the pace don"t panic you will catch him! Wouldn"t it of been better if Lance hadn"t had the info & maybe went for it & blew up! A much more exiciting race. I say ditch the radio communication between rider & team director. Its was a much better sport in my opinion in the 80"s alot more wild west.. ps regarding the riders are soft now a days, nonsense. As Robert Millar said in his excellence articles for Cyclingnews, Team Sky set such a high pace on many stages it was simply impossible to attack, riders were hanging on to the pace..

Wiggins has announced on his facebook page he will "probably concentrate on the giro next year".

Did you see Wiggins' coat? Sod the Giro, the title he's going for is King of the Mods

Brailsford asked on Channel 4 news about running a clean team. "we won"t set a time limit" huh? how long does it take to ask Rogers & Yates. If they don"t go Team Sky are gonna look piss poor..

What was the question?

He was asked specifically about Rogers and Yates, then about timescales.

He stated he'd not set deadlines when he announced the idea. I imagine they'll only ask the questions when they've dug into the background at least a little. How else can they hope to spot the lies?

Maybe Brailsford can give Rogers the benefit of the doubt about Ferrari or at least time to explain. But Sean Yates has failed a drugs test! He should be out on his ear..

It is ridiculous and hypocritical to turf Rogers out on his ear given the job of work he did for Wiggins at the Tour. They new full well his background when they hired him.

I find it odd Yates has said i saw nothing at Discovery/ US Postal considering doping was rife. Indurian & Contador backing Armstrong i find that very odd, then again Contador has failed! Big Mig was he a doper?

Not exactly. He had an adverse analytical finding in his A sample, but not confirmed by B sample
Only one +ve test, and for salbutamol which wasn't on the UCI banned list at the time. On the other hand, he won tours after EPO became rife but before there was a test for it, and he is now protesting that a lack of analytical positives makes Armstrong not guilty in spite of massive circumstantial evidence, so do the maths. Mig is in the clear for being sanctioned due to the passage of time, but if people start confessing everything from ancient history there might be a big question mark over his results.

Indurain worked with Conconi:

At the Winter Olympics in 1993/94 in Lillehammer, Conconi gave a talk to members of the International Olympic Committee and informed them about his work on an EPO test. He described how he had carried out controlled experiments with 23 amateur triathletes and other athletes with EPO treatments but that he had not come up with a test to detect EPO use. The details of Conconi's 23 amateur athletes were later discovered by police after a raid at the University of Ferrara and that there were no 23 amateurs but elite professionals, six of which were from the Carrera Jeans-Tassoni cycling team.[12]

Conconi had listed subjects' names, gender, sport, date of analysis as well as whether or not they were treated with EPO. Despite funding by CONI and the IOC to come up with an EPO detection test, Conconi was using the money to buy the drug and then administered it to athletes who were also paying Conconi.[12] Conconi is said to have made a technique to balance EPO, Blood Thinner and Human Growth Hormone in a mixture that Athletes could take safely and pass doping tests without testing positive.

of course Stephen Roche is linked with Conconi, i used to love Roche when i was at school watching my 2nd tour. But i must admit i have tainted views of him now, he becomes very agressive when questioned about doping! I know his fellow countryman David Walsh has clashed with him. The PDM affair was strange from 91 Tour, food poisoning my arse! Its rumoured it was early EPO, when retired Gert jan Theunisse & Rooks both admitted to doping.

Yes, I think blood doping is the key here. Doesn't Robbert Millar more or less admit to using various substances in that excellent blog from a couple of days ago? Fignon admitted to doping. But no one wants to admit to blood doping. It's a bit of a double standard but also fair enough: it skews results in such a dramatic way.

while surfing i found an interesting article, On doping and David Walsh from Podium Cafe, i don"t no how to do the link, i"m a bit shite on a computer. But if you google it, its a good read from a couple yrs back! Also regarding Fignon, i wonder if his early death was related to drug use in his career..

Fignon said this in 1993

"The whole world thinks we are doped our whole lives, which is totally false. They can say what they want. Perhaps I was doped, but that is only my concern. I endured, I was serious and I did what I had to. If I die when I am 50, that is my problem"

He did die at 50 but whether or not it was because of doping no one can say. His contemporaries are mostly still around.

It's not that even graded! The first few lacets are 10%, and the centre section eases through Huez, and then kicks up again. Ok, it's not crazy steep, but it's still pretty hard.

The Ventoux and Alpe stages are easily accessible by the Avignon Eurostar, Saturday to Saturday. I'm thinking of going. Tickets for the Avignon service go on sale in January, I think.

There IS a big question mark over his results.

Needs Merckx sticking out of a Skoda sunroof. How tight a fit was that Eddy?

I love the cartoon but my recollection is that it has missed out the injured spectator hit by the over enthusiastic mechandising employee and the helicopter

has it started yet?

Froome gets the nod..

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cycling/20516939

With who as teammates? If Wiggins rides the Giro he will want as strong a squad as he had at the Tour this year. How many of them will then be in top shape for the Tour to support Froome? Or do Sky think they can put together two teams of equal quality?

They've strength in depth, with the likes of Uran, Henao, Dombrowski, Thomas and Keannaugh all able to ride a hard pace in the high mountains and who all missed the Tour this year.

It'll be more interesting to see how Froome copes with the pressure of leading the team at the Tour.

It will be interesting if Wiggins, as expected, rides the Giro and then rides the Tour as a lieutenant. It's possible also Sky may want Uran to lead at the Vuelta, in which case he may be deployed at the Giro in support of Wigs.

I would say there's a massive question mark over Rogers' future at Sky, so that's one of Wiggins' key support riders out (if he doesn't sign the declaration, and he shouldn't. Also it will be interesting to see how they use JTL. While I think they will look to him to challenge in the early season classics I'm certain they will use him in one or more GTs, but as a climbing domestique, possibly in the Froome role?

JTL has never ridden a GT, so he's going to have to wait until the Vuelta before he'll get a look in.

Is it correct to assume that Sky's tactics will stay the same? Wiggins likes a high, but steady pace, but Froome is much more of a traditional climber so he might prefer a different approach.

I hope Froome learnt from the Vuelta, because Sky got their tactics well off time and time again. That a fresher Froome may have stayed with the Spanish Armada more, but they way they burnt up Uran and Henao at stupid moments on climbs, and that ridiculous lead out for Ben Swift with Froome taking multiple turns on the front, he and whatever team they put behind him need to ride much cleverer then that.

As for JTL, I've found out he was with Sky at the Tenerife training camp last year (which the cynics will say accounts for his form) and his climbing performance was on a par with the TdF core so Sky may unleash him before the Vuelta.

As for the Giro, I think they will try to recreate the Sky train exactly. It remains to be seen whether Contador will ride it, and whether his talents can combat it. My thinking is that he probably can, and Wiggins will struggle to match him on the climbs.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cycling/20516939

I'm not even sure wiggins will be able to chaperone froome on next years routes anyway due to the bastard hill routes, but apprarently they are switching roles

TBH if I was Froome I'd want someone else, Wiggo's teammanship is prone to lapses

I'm pretty sure that this is a mis-quote. Never mind though..

What he actually said was "I'd love to rides that fixed, with my tools in a cut down water bottle".

he would have been fixed - epic suffering and skidz. Something for everyone

Agreed. As David Millar pointed out in his book, during the 2009 tour - having drawn deeply from the well of support his teamates offered - Wiggins effectively skanked on the Champs Elysees. As Millar writes:

"Our sprint lead-out for Tyler (Farrar) on the Champs Elysees went almost perfectly, as the whole team did their job - except Brad [...] Christian (Vande Velde) and I led the peleton into the final kilometer, and when I peeled off, expecting Brad to be in his designated position to set up Tyler's finishing sprint, he was nowhere to be seen [...] I was furious. it was the one day that Brad was asked to give something back to the team, after we had given him everything for three weeks. Yet I felt he hadn't even tried..."

Now I know he risked a lot for Cavendish on the Champs last time round. But that seemed a little like spectacle; or at least a token return for a clearly miffed Cavendish. Over the three weeks of next year's tour, is he really capable of working as a reliable lieutenant for Froome? Would Froome even want him?