Tour de France 2009

Le Tour 2010

pollaghgirl — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 10:08:34 GMT

Yeeeee Haaaaa!!!!

Have you seen next year´s route?? Just too fab for words - three whole days in the Pyrenees with every major peak (and a number of lesser ones) included.

I so hate wishing my life away but next July can´t come fast enough. I bet the Basques are gearing up already for a three day party in them there hills.

I've lost ITV4!!!!!

saharalass — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 15:34:05 GMT

Hello, I'm back....been on holiday to India then rushed off my feet with work, sorry to have neglected you...I see a couple of you have been holding the fort

Huge trauma, due to the big re-tune I've lost ITV4!!!

What am I going to do?

No Gary, no Ned.....oh and no cycling!

Managed to see the World Championships before the re-tune and was equally aghast to see Cadel win....he'll be a a total bore come next year in Melbourne!

So, any good ideas about how to get my signal back?

Cadel Evans - World Champ

pollaghgirl — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 11:32:05 GMT

Nooooooooo!! Make it stop!!!

I´m afraid I don´t rate him, never have and winning this most prestigious title will induce some cringe inducing TV interviews from now on.

Gary Imlach Fan Club

labiche — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 13:21:36 GMT

Since Ned has one, I want to create one for Gary who, for nigh on 20+ years, has been my favourite sports presenter.

I was going through some old C4 American Football videos recently and Gary was consistently entertaining, smooth and unruffled when he used to be the presenter / reporter. His superbowl shows with Marv Levy of the Bills were particularly good. One clip took me back - Gary with a very distinguished late 80s / early 90s floppy fringe commentating from the Vikings sidelines when he turns his head into an oncoming linebacker's shoulder pad. I recall Gary lost a tooth after that altercation!

Phil and Paul are superlative commentators on the TdF, but Gary is invaluable too with his seemless links and well-written, witty lead-ins. Along with Ned, they make a winning team. Well done ITV4 - any chance of the Vuelta or Giro coverage in the future - since they tend to be the only other races attracting the most top level talent?

Vuelta

pollaghgirl — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 09:44:27 GMT

Hey cycling fans ...........I feel like I just had a holiday romance with you lot and we all agreed to keep in touch!!! ........And didn´t!

Is no one else following the Vuelta? OK it´s not the T de F, and comes right at the end of a hectic season´s racing but it is proving to be a fascinating tussle of a race this year with exciting "races within races". A great number of the major stars are not there but we have a chance to see some of the up and coming youngsters and some of the teams who will provide stars of the future.

Nancy in the morning

fanboy — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 20:53:58 GMT

That line is from Tony Cascarino's book, 'Full Time', about his footballing career and personal life as told to Paul Kimmage, an ex-pro cyclist turned journalist (it refers to him waking up in the town of Nancy where he played football with busted knees pondering it all - it hooked my wife into reading it and she does not do football, heck neither do I really, but this is a great book nontheless). Anyway, after reading this I turned to Paul's own autobiography about his time in the pro racing scene of the eighties and a polemic against the endemic nature of doping in cycling then and now - rather contraversial from what I can gather - which I again really enjoyed. After this I blitzed through several other bikie books including 'The Escape Artist' by Matt Seaton (about his time as an amateur rider whilst his wife, Ruth Picardie, was dying of cancer), 'The Hour' by Michael Hutchinson and 'A significant Other' by Matt Rendell (about domestiques), before pausing for a while to read some fiction and then resuming the care of my two young boys...sorry lads, dad got a bit distracted. Anyway, apart from sharing a few recommendations of my own has anyone else read stuff worth raving about. But please lets not do 'It's not about the bike', I'm sure its great but he doesn't really do it for me...

Wot!! No drugs???

pollaghgirl — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 10:30:43 GMT

I´ve only really just sat back and thought about this - no drugs busts on the Tour.

Let´s just hope that this is because there were no drugs not that the cheats have stayed several testing steps ahead!

Week 3 playlist on itunes

sputnikboy — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 20:39:38 GMT

WOW you did it, thank you so much it was worth the wait.

Try this link, it gives you a listing or go back and get an earlier link for week 1 or 2 then select 'see all imixes by this user' http://ax.itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStoreServices.woa/ws/RSS/imix/imixid=326161616/sf=143444/xml?v0=9984

My turbo training sessions will be alot more fun. I hate the fact its a year till you lot get let loose again to do some great music / image montages. Do you have any tracks you didnt get to use?

Once again Thank you

Armstrong's comments about Contador yesterday

calumm — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 11:58:19 GMT

Were these just a surly recognition that Armstrong is in this race for himself, and resents Contador gaining time on him, or was it a justified dig at Contador for splitting the team on the final ascent, and possibly losing Astana the chance of other podium placings (ie Kloeden and Armstrong)??

Surely if Contador hadn't attacked the Shlecks would have done, and better to attack than to defend?

Who is the Moderator...

fanboy — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 21:01:00 GMT

Is it a man or a machine? If it's a machine has anyone tested what it moderates out?

(I'm referring to the forum's online moderator here by the way)

Wiggins is going for the big one next year

fanboy — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 19:56:49 GMT

Just read Wiggins' newspaper interview on the Guardian online site (good for a lunch time perusal) where he talks about aiming to win the TDF next year. Any thoughts? Here's some of mine.

It's great that he's gained such confidence from this year's race so that he can aim this high.

Whose going to be team leader at Garmin? Vandervelde helped, very sportingly I think, this year because he was just returning from injury and knew Wiggins was in better shape, but next year...I don't know, Vandevelde still came 8th this year, so is he better? Garmin certainly thought so at the start of the race.

Wiggins is still knackered and ill after getting down to 4% body fat for the tour - hence the great climbing, whilst Cav has just won a one day race in Germany without any dieting that I am aware of (beyond that required by all athletes obviously). Wiggins distorted his body to perform at such a level, will he be able to do it again next year? Will he be like a boxer always struggling with his weight, who has perhaps dipped down to too low a weight category in an attempt to win a new belt and finds his performance hampered rathered than enhanced by the effort?

Will Wiggins ever be better than Contador or the younger Schleck?

Just some musings. Comments welcome.

What are we going to do next week?

kieron mcmahon — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 09:27:35 GMT

Although I watch other cycling events on the 'free' telly and, indeed, attend track and road events in person, I spend most of the year looking forward to the Tour - everything else on the calendar gets scrapped. The phone is ignorned between 7-8pm. Meals are scheduled between live and highlights shows. But already I'm staring into the Black Hole of next week when it is a whole 49 weeks until next year's race.

Does anyone else suffer this void?

Kind regards
Kieron

Fernando Alonso - Cycling team

pollaghgirl — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 10:09:50 GMT

There was a brief, maybe throwaway, comment during the Tour that Fernando Alonso was planning to found and sponsor a cycling team.

Is this true? I haven´t heard anything anywhere else.

And if true, any idea who he´s hoping to recruit? Alonso is madly popular in Spain and I guess, if he wanted to start a team, he could attract some mighty big names.

The best way to watch a stage?

grimpeur1 — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 19:33:09 GMT

I would be grateful for some guidance....... As a newcomer to the Tour de France I have obsessively followed the last two years on television but have decided after seeing the Ventoux stage that I should experience, in the flesh, a mountain finish next year if I can. Or should I? What makes it exciting on TV is the ability to see the attacks as they happen with the commentary to guide you? I guess that element would be lost and it's a trade off versus the atmosphere of being there. Maybe its better to go to a time trial and watch the mountains on TV?

Keep this message board going?

pollaghgirl — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 09:04:22 GMT

Yes, it´s called the T de F board but there are plenty of cycling nuts out there who follow the racing throughout the season, not just the Tour.

I, for one, would love to be able to post and read messages about the Vuelta later in the year and then the "Spring Classics".

Any chance?

Week 3 Music List ????? When you gonna do it? I am getting bored waiting now zzzzzzzzz

bungobungomungooi — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 13:52:47 GMT

I need to know the tuneage guys!

Chris Boardman

burton sylv — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 15:05:16 GMT

Where has he gone?

O/T Eddie Merckx and Bathing Suits

13eastie — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 09:44:33 GMT

The move by the UCI not to recognise attempts at the hour record where the bikes involved did not correspond to the spec of Merckx's 1972 machine was forward-thinking - it created a level playing field and stopped the hour record from becoming ridiculous.

The new polyurethane swim-suits are simply nothing like what Joe Public wears to the local baths and the success of those wearing them is making a mockery of others' previous efforts.

I hope FINA goes further than banning the suits prospectively by discounting records that have been set using these suits.

Also in 1972, at the Munich Olympics, Mark Spitz won seven gold medals in the pool wearing a pair of trunks that might well be branded obscene nowadays, with no goggles or cap over his huge Barnet, and sporting a moustache to boot. And he broke the world record in each of the seven events while he was at it.

It's a no-brainer...

Cavendish, an alternative view

novosibirsk — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 19:22:46 GMT

Am I the only one getting sick of all this Cavendish Rock Star fest?

IMO he's only good at one thing: going very fast over very short, flat, distances, and he wouldn't achieve any of those stage wins without the other 8 team members pedalling their guts out to put him in the right position. He's useless at climbing stages - like all specialist sprinters.

Lets not forget that he pulled out of last year's Tour to "prepare himself" for the Olympics, in which he was in only one event (the Madison) which he lost. He was the only one of the GB Team to come home without a medal and apparently didn't speak to Bradley Wiggins for months afterwards.

Lets not forget also, that in last year's Tour other riders the same age or younger finished the Tour and then went on to Bejing with none of that precious "I need to prepare myself" posturing.

To me, he's an arrogant, bumptious, immature, young man who needs to learn some humility. Here's a quotation: "The fact is, you look at the replays of my wins at the Tour, and I'm the fastest sprinter. I'm stating a fact. It's not just me saying 'I'm the fastest sprinter' without backing it up - I'm stating a fact, you know?
I don't see how that can be seen as arrogance when it's just telling the truth. But people can take me as they want? I don't give a *** really."

Give me an all-rounder any day of the week. Give me a devoted domestique without whom none of these massive egos would get over the finishing line. To quote the Stones:

Say a prayer for the common foot soldier; Spare a thought for his back breaking work; Say a prayer for his wife and his children; Who burn the fires and who still till the earth

Sorry to offend anyone who thinks we should support him just because he's a Brit. It takes more than a passport and winning stages to get my vote. I'd be interested to hear anyone else's view on this.

Phil'n'Paul Bingo!

carbone — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 16:36:33 GMT

Let me start by saying how much I love Phil'n'Paul and think they're the best sports commentators in the world. But they do have their idiosyncracies. Listen out for the following phrases and score points for each one you hear. (Ok, this isn't strictly 'bingo' but you get the idea...)

1. 'They're going mano a mano' - often used during mountain stages - 10 points.

2. 'He's digging into his suitcase of courage' (Paul) - not heard so far this year. Maybe the riders aren't trying hard enough. And why suitcase?! - 20 points.

3. Paul mixing his metaphors, eg. 'It's like a strawberry in front of donkey' - alright, that's a simile, but you know what I mean - 20 points.

4. Phil refering to a (usually French) rider by the name of his father / older brother, even though the latter hasn't been in the Tour de France for 15 years - 15 points.

5. Phil making a hash of the commentary at the finish and having to re-record it on a poorer quality microphone, with suspiciously accurate judgements about some lesser-known rider and how this will affect the GC - 25 points.

6. 'Look at his face!' (Phil) - he always says this - 1 point.

7. 'Look at his face!' (Phil) - said just as the camera cuts away to a back-marker 'relieving himself' at the side of the road - 100 points.

8. Gary Imlach getting through a link without a knowing smirk or sarcky remark about 'the French' - 1000 points.

I'm afraid there are no prizes, as I couldn't convince Bikehut at Halfords to sponsor it, so it's just for fun. First to 100 points wins! And feel free to make other suggestions...

Biased

limosa — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 17:02:31 GMT

Is there anyone else out there who thinks Chris Boardman should leave the ITV panel with his negative and anti Lance Armstrong comments at the start of this Tour and now at the end?

Music List for week 3 ?

bungobungomungooi — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 14:41:53 GMT

When will the list for week 3's highlights music be updated? I need to know the name of the Technoish track used at the end of Saturday 18ths program.

life after the Tour

jumpingbuddhist — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 18:12:16 GMT

So what now,how to ward off the depression,please can some one enlighten me to more races to watch as am having sever withdrawal symtoms

Respect to Thor Hushovd

kieron mcmahon — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 21:18:28 GMT

Despite the disappointment of Mark Cavendish losing points through the disqualification, you have simply got to admire how that big Norwegian hauled himself over the mountains today to win 12 points. A terrific ride - perhaps inspired by some of Mark Cavendish's remarks in the press. Anyway, well done to Thor, a worthy winner of the Green Jersey. I think the best thing Cav could do is walk up and shake his hand. Then we can settle down to a British winner in Paris, Thor winning Green and everyone goes home happy.

Regards
Kieron

itv4 covering la vuelta

redvll — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 19:54:28 GMT

Is there any chance of having similar coverage of la vuelta as we have for the tour? I think it's been a great 3 weeks from itv4 and would love to see the same focus on the other big events. Surely there are enough viewers to warrant it?