2018 PRO thread

[spud]

For a few minutes, I thought Van Garderen was going to step into the void created by Porte's departure. But only for a short time, then I figured out he was probably going to lose 5 minutes on the stage. Too bad.

[Rondje]

The chaos in the background. Bernal crashes into the back of a BMC team car: https://twitter.com/aalzatev/status/101 ... 78/video/1

[RTW]

Super disappointed I didn’t record live to watch later, the ITV highlights felt rushed and half as long as they probably could have been, felt like I actually missed more because they tried to squeeze so much in to the hour slot.

Moto’s looked way too close all day IMO, I get we love seeing the action but there’s no way it didn’t effect the race at basically every point.

Ref the spinning crank discussion, my wheels do that every time I clean out the old grease and put some fresh stuff in the pawls, doesn’t last long unless I put too much in, not hard to imagine mechanics just putting a tiny bit more in on a stage like yesterday’s...

Get a Eurosport subscription for their online viewer. You can replay the entire stage. Their highlight packages are fewer adverts / competitions / patronising eplainations and more cycling too.

[Vagabond]

The chaos in the background. Bernal crashes into the back of a BMC team car: https://twitter.com/aalzatev/status/101 ... 78/video/1

There’s no way in any universe I’d climb on a carbon frame and start hammering down a road on it after impacting a car like he did.

[Rondje]

The chaos in the background. Bernal crashes into the back of a BMC team car: https://twitter.com/aalzatev/status/101 ... 78/video/1

There’s no way in any universe I’d climb on a carbon frame and start hammering down a road on it after impacting a car like he did.

If the tweet is right, and he really did break 1 or 2 fingers then you have to ask yourself if it's even responsible to ride if it influences his braking.
Plenty of chances still to come for Bernal.

[fa63]

I have said this before, and after having a chance to ride on some real cobbled roads this summer while in Europe (where I found them to be a lot worse than they look on TV) I will say it again, I think stages like these have no place in a Grand Tour. It is a spectacle at the expense of rider safety in my opinion. I am sure others feel differently, so just my two cents

[Nefarious86]

So we make them all flat straight stages like the start to the Giro?

Sent from my SM-N950F using Tapatalk

[fa63]

I would rather make the stages shorter instead of throwing cobbles in for excitement.

[davidalone]

I am curious about the distinct lack of disc use at the roubaix stage. surely if there was a stage for it this would be it?

[Nefarious86]

Not really, it was dry so the safety net of a random rim brake wheel to keep moving was better to have.

Sent from my SM-N950F using Tapatalk

[LeDuke]

I am curious about the distinct lack of disc use at the roubaix stage. surely if there was a stage for it this would be it?

Seems that disc wheels worked out well enough for John Degenkolb.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[wingguy]

So we make them all flat straight stages like the start to the Giro?

Are those the only two types of stage you can think of?

Cobblestones or 100s of km’s of pan flat?

[themidge]

I am curious about the distinct lack of disc use at the roubaix stage. surely if there was a stage for it this would be it?

I suspect the people who got loads of punctures were quite glad that they were on rim brakes

[BdaGhisallo]

I would rather make the stages shorter instead of throwing cobbles in for excitement.

I think the beauty of this stage, apart from the obvious excitement we witnessed on the day, is the knock effect of it in the remaining days to come. Big things happen in the final week of a GT when the fatigue, both mental and physical, begins to mount and degrade the capacity of the contenders. A day like yesterday with all the stress and chaos will have the effect on the riders of three or four "normal" stages. Every little effort counts and there were surely a lot of them yesterday from all the riders, GC contenders and not.

I think we will see in the final week that the riders will be, in effect, almost riding with a few extra days of fatigue in their legs and heads and we should see more riders suffering bad days, leading to unpredictable movements in the GC. I can't wait.

[bilwit]

as much "carnage" as there was, nothing in the GC really happened except Porte crashing out but he didn't even make it to the first cobble section anyway so the fact that it was a cobble stage was pretty much a non-factor