Tour De France 2024 - chasing yellow

[weepiper]

There’s a lot of twitter eyebrows being raised. But it really is a different sport now, the way they race, the bikes, the kit, the training, the nutrition, the recovery… everything.

Plus the top riders must be amongst the most tested athletes out there.

There will always be cheats, new as yet undetectable drugs etc. But it’s also possible we’re just watching a once in a lifetime rider.

I know all that, and I really like Pogacar. But beating a notorious cheater's record by four minutes is not a great look. I would much rather he was just a natural absolute beast on a bike though.

 

[petee]

There’s a lot of twitter eyebrows being raised. But it really is a different sport now, the way they race, the bikes, the kit, the training, the nutrition, the recovery… everything.

Plus the top riders must be amongst the most tested athletes out there.

There will always be cheats, new as yet undetectable drugs etc. But it’s also possible we’re just watching a once in a lifetime rider.

pogacar seems consistent, but i was watching when landis had that stage in 2006 (iirc), and ... well, it was unusual.

 

[hash tag]

Phew. Cav's home and races another day.
First thing he did after crossing the line before collapsing...he thanks all his team. What a star.

 

[stavros]

Evans was bold at the end, saying Pogacar's the best rider the Tour's ever seen. I suspect he'll be getting royally flamed if he's on social media.

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

Evans was bold at the end, saying Pogacar's the best rider the Tour's ever seen. I suspect he'll be getting royally flamed if he's on social media.

He’s arguably correct though.

 

[pbsmooth]

Maybe it’s all that carbon monoxide. They’re clearly ahead of the science one way or another, as well as Pog being a freak.

 

[hash tag]

Maybe it’s all that carbon monoxide. They’re clearly ahead of the science one way or another, as well as Pog being a freak.

Reminds me of Indurain who had incredible resting heart rate, capacity to get oxygen in to his body etc. his wiki entry has a section devoted to his physiology

Miguel Induráin - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[twistedAM]

Evans was bold at the end, saying Pogacar's the best rider the Tour's ever seen. I suspect he'll be getting royally flamed if he's on social media.

That's a tad unfair on Jonas. He's coming back from serious in try with no race days in his legs and the only other time Pog beat him was in 2021 when Jonas was a debuting domestique for Crash Roglic yet he still came second with no team support.
We'll see next year.

 

[1927]

Phew. Cav's home and races another day.
First thing he did after crossing the line before collapsing...he thanks all his team. What a star.

And then had to ride back to team bus. 16km away.

 

[Richard46]

And then had to ride back to team bus. 16km away.

That must have been nearly the last straw. Well done Cav. Things are definitely tougher for sprinters these days. Cipollini (The Lion King) won 12 tour stages but managed to get away with hardly ever (if ever) riding a mountain stage. Indeed he never actually finished a tour, I cannot remember him making into week two when the climbing stages tended to start back then.

 

[stavros]

Cipo did finish the Giro six times, which must've involved some mountains.

 

[Richard46]

Cipo did finish the Giro six times, which must've involved some mountains.

True but they were Italian mountains. Seriously they were the only GT stages he did finish against 20 DNFs in the Tour/Giro/Vuelta. His deliberate strategy of not finishing did start to attract criticism and it seems the practice pretty much ended with him for one reason or another.

 

[hash tag]

That must have been nearly the last straw. Well done Cav. Things are definitely tougher for sprinters these days. Cipollini (The Lion King) won 12 tour stages but managed to get away with hardly ever (if ever) riding a mountain stage. Indeed he never actually finished a tour, I cannot remember him making into week two when the climbing stages tended to start back then.

Didnt cipo say of the tour went uphill he went to the beach. Being an Italian he was loyal to the giro.

 

[petee]

Reminds me of Indurain who had incredible resting heart rate, capacity to get oxygen in to his body etc. his wiki entry has a section devoted to his physiology

Miguel Induráin - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

i re-read that very article too, remembering it from some years back.

 

[hash tag]

Am I alone in thinking Cav has an amazing memory. He appears to recall specific sprints from years gone by.
Talking last night maybe this morning, he was talking about when he arrived in todays finish 18 years ago
but corrected it to 16 years ago.

 

[sleaterkinney]

There’s a lot of twitter eyebrows being raised. But it really is a different sport now, the way they race, the bikes, the kit, the training, the nutrition, the recovery… everything.

Plus the top riders must be amongst the most tested athletes out there.

There will always be cheats, new as yet undetectable drugs etc. But it’s also possible we’re just watching a once in a lifetime rider.

After a mountain stage the day before, after a hard tour, after winning the Giro. It stinks.

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

After a mountain stage the day before, after a hard tour, after winning the Giro. It stinks.

Does it though? People are calling foul on something they are comparing to results from 20 years ago or more. It’s daft. It’s barely the same sport.

 

[stavros]

But it’s also possible we’re just watching a once in a lifetime rider.

Or as Jack Haig put it before the start today:

"Him and Jonas are once in a generation talents."

 

[sleaterkinney]

Does it though? People are calling foul on something they are comparing to results from 20 years ago or more. It’s daft. It’s barely the same sport.

In what way is it different?. You say a clean athlete can beat a doped up one from back then?

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

In what way is it different?. You say a clean athlete can beat a doped up one from back then?

Either pretty much every single rider in the peloton is doped up - which I simply don’t believe - or yes, of course a modern rider would beat the guys from back then. Just look at the speeds things are raced at now.

As to how it’s different - bikes, kit, training, nutrition, recovery, tactics… everything.

 

[Cid]

Thing with doping, and kind of think this every time this comes up, is; what's the mechanism? The entire point of the last 15 odd years of development in prevention is that they don't just test directly for substances, they test for markers. Something like EPO can only work if you increase red blood cell production. Something like HGH er... increases HGH. They're physiological pathways. There are a limited number of them that will have a significant enough effect... You can invent new substance, but you can't change how a body actually works.

There are other factors here too... The money and the setting behind doping has changed. I mean what's cycling relative to tech-bros/celebs/business types etc looking for the latest thing/life extension etc? Peddling shit in some exclusive LA clinic vs risk of arrest in a shitty hotel basement. Or indeed just other sports with vastly higher budgets and more lax regs.

Not that I think this fully excludes doping; there may be relatively safe fiddles you can do around altitude training etc, dunno. But not on anything like Pantani's level.

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

Thing with doping, and kind of think this every time this comes up, is; what's the mechanism? The entire point of the last 15 odd years of development in prevention is that they don't just test directly for substances, they test for markers. Something like EPO can only work if you increase red blood cell production. Something like HGH er... increases HGH. They're physiological pathways. There are a limited number of them that will have a significant enough effect... You can invent new substance, but you can't change how a body actually works.

There are other factors here too... The money and the setting behind doping has changed. I mean what's cycling relative to tech-bros/celebs/business types etc looking for the latest thing/life extension etc? Peddling shit in some exclusive LA clinic vs risk of arrest in a shitty hotel basement. Or indeed just other sports with vastly higher budgets and more lax regs.

Not that I think this fully excludes doping; there may be relatively safe fiddles you can do around altitude training etc, dunno. But not on anything like Pantani's level.

I think people also overestimate just what gains doping can actually produce. It doesn’t magically turn people into super humans. It’ll give you an edge, that extra bit to put you in front, help you recover etc. But the huge gains we’re seeing compared to 20/30 years ago? No chance. That’s an entirely different thing.

 

[twistedAM]

Can we move this crap to the drugs forum?

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

Anyway…

What an utterly bonkers stage today. Contained pretty much every bit of cycling tactics there is

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

Am I alone in thinking Cav has an amazing memory. He appears to recall specific sprints from years gone by.
Talking last night maybe this morning, he was talking about when he arrived in todays finish 18 years ago
but corrected it to 16 years ago.

He’s famous for this. He can recall in ridiculous detail every win he’s had.

 

[hash tag]

Just caught the finish. It looked like Kwiatowski for Ineos might get it, but they missed out again.

 

[twistedAM]

So pleased for Victor Campenaerts - a real battler with big balls.

Hoping Remco copes in the mountains and claws more time back.

 

[Hollis]

Some folk on twitter appear to be bored with Pogacar winning everything. Weird really.. I don't watch as much cycling as I used to.. but this is vastly more interesting than peak-Froome era..

 

[Richard46]

Just caught the finish. It looked like Kwiatowski for Ineos might get it, but they missed out again.

I believe Ineos have the biggest tour budget. In any event they are clearly underperforming and need a drastic change to their business model.

 

[pbsmooth]

Some folk on twitter appear to be bored with Pogacar winning everything. Weird really.. I don't watch as much cycling as I used to.. but this is vastly more interesting than peak-Froome era..

And Jonas won the last two Tours.