A ride doesn’t just clear my mind, it fills it with fresh ideas. If I go out for more than an hour then often answers appear and new ideas flash into my mind. This might sound like spurious justification but for me it’s true, issues I might have been weighing up can often get resolved. Some say sleeping on a tricky decision helps, I say go for a ride.
Tour fever might be building but ahead of daily previews, TV, L’Equipe and more, it’s time to go away for a few days riding.
Looking at the stage profile and then looking at the start list, this preview could very well consist of just two words: Peter Sagan.
The French say riding your first grand tour is worth an extra tooth, un dent de plus. The idea is that you come out stronger from the race and can turn over a bigger gear, shift one sprocket. FDJ’s Laurent Pichon has gone about things a different way, he crashed hard yesterday in the opening stage of the Giro and knocked two teeth out of his mouth. Emergency dental work done, he started the team time trial with two brand new teeth. Here’s hoping he gets a third tooth in Brescia, this time on the cassette rather than the gums.
The Tour de Romandie used to be a race where you got clues for the Giro but this time we saw a glimpse of July through the icy clouds. The last two winners of the Tour de Romandie have gone on to win the Tour de France. It’s a neat stat that doesn’t guarantee anything but right now Chris Froome is the obvious pick to win the Tour de France.
André Greipel’s won two stages of the Tour of Turkey so far and there’s an interesting story behind current race leader Natnael Berhane of Eritrea. But the race isn’t over. One curiosity from the race so far has been Adam Hansen’s custom shoes. Now prototype gear gets tested in races but the difference here is that the Lotto-Belisol rider is making his own shoes.
With 200m to go Daniel Moreno accelerates, building momentum on the last part of the steep slope to distance Philippe Gilbert and pass an increasingly static Carlos Betancur. This was the moment the race was won.
Often there’s plenty to analyse in a race because each event is page in the script and Sunday brings one of the season’s biggest one day acts. But it’s hard to draw too many lessons from today in advance of Liège-Bastogne-Liège. The problem lies with the formula and status of the race.
With 7km to go Roman Kreuziger ditches his breakaway companions to ride away for a solo win in the Amstel Gold Race. We expected a Slovak and got a Czech.
In a season of classics so far dominated by the favourites, this was a surprise result and a reward for attacking riding.
Oscar Gatto won the Dwars Door Vlaanderen race this week unleashing several “Gatto pounces” headlines. No doubt he was feline good after purring on the power to claw his way past Thomas Voeckler. Why the cat puns? Gatto is Italian for a cat.
Many riders have names that might sound foreign and even exoticbut in their native language they are nouns and come loaded with meaning. For example contador is Spanish for accountant, probably the last word you think of when the swashbuckling Spaniard is launching his aggressive attacks.
Here’s a look at some of the names in the peloton.
How does hotel look? Well it’s Garmin-Sharp’s place for the night during Paris-Nice and seems comfortable. But it’s nothing on what Lotto-Belisol and Team Saxo-Tinkoff have for the night…
This is the same team time trial stage that opened the race last year. It’s only 16.9 km but most of the route is alongside the sea and the wind and the rain could easily be a factor. The weather forecast isn’t very promising but let’s hope all teams get the same conditions – wet or not.