Monday, July 13, 2015

FTDF 2015 Stage 9 - Top Teams Tested in Team Time Trial

As we put our feet up and have a nice cup of tea on this, the first rest day of the Tour, I think we can all agree it's been a pretty good race so far. Well Tony Martin, Fabian Cancellara and a few others may not agree, but them's the breaks. As it is, we're over a week in and we still have all the pre-race favorites still in the race, so things are looking a lot less predictable than they were last year, when Nibali had the race pretty much to himself by now.

Yesterday saw the riders take on the Team Time Trial over a tricky 28km course. Some teams did well to limp round (Orica) some teams did pretty well (Astana and Tinkoff) and some did very well (BMC, Sky and Movistar). In the end there were just 0.6 seconds between winners BMC and second placed Sky. 

In fact if it wasn't for the tardy slacker Nico Roche, the stage would have been Sky's - still they kept hold of the Yellow Jersey and should be pretty pleased with themselves.

As the usual rest-day analysis begins, we see that the "Fab Four" remain in contention, but that in most people's opinion the "Fab Four" now consists of Froome, Contador, Quintana and TJVG. Nibali has seemed to be a bit lacking in the opening week and I suspect the mountains will see him lose more time. Also today we had the news that Ivan Basso has left the race after being diagnosed with testicular cancer. I wish him a speedy recovery, but his departure now sees Contador losing one of his key domestiques for the mountains.

Porr De Yorkshire had the cream of the Team Time Trialists.
And that bastard Drew maintains his lead for a little bit longer.

 Tomorrow sees the race resume in the Pyrenees and it should be a select group that comes into the finish. It's also Bastille Day tomorrow, so expect that showboating bellend Thomas Voeckler to try and get his stupid face on TV.

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1 comment:

  1. Drew StephensonJuly 14, 2015 at 5:00 PM

    Testicular cancer? That never stopped Armstrong and look where...
    Oh wait.
    As you were.

    Anyway, stage 10 has royally buggered my team.

    ReplyDelete

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