No Way To Run A Sport

Do other sports hang out their dirty washing so obviously at times? Probably but pro cycling has its moments, see how the ex-Lampre team doesn’t know if it’s going to ride or not just weeks out from the start of the new season or the farcical decision by the major races to shrink the number of participating riders without agreeing with anyone else resulting in a rapid climbdown.

Sometimes pro cycling seems trapped in a loop with regular failings and flops that repeat themselves. It’s tempting to launch into a rant but the irony is that a lot of these flaws can be fixed.

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Highlights of 2016 – Part IV

Esteban Chaves Bergamo

Recollections are often biased to recent events. A list of the best albums of all time can often be disproportionately weighted with music that was riding high in the charts just the other day. So picking the Tour of Lombardy can seem a recent recollection but hopefully it stands the test of time.

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Why Have So Many French Cafés Closed?

Riding some of the Tour de France route last summer under the pretext of route recons for this website’s stage previews was a pleasure. Cycling through rural France in the height of summer is always a joy.

Along the way there was a common theme of closed village cafés. Place after place so many had shut for good that there had to be a reason behind this trend and a mental note was made to explore what’s happening.

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Supporter Kit

A reminder that supporter kit is for sale. If you’ve enjoyed reading this year then why not get something for yourself and tip some coin this way at the same time.

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Roads to Ride – The Kogashi Forest

Kogashi Forest Japan Cup

Alpe d’Huez, Mont Ventoux, the Muur van Geraardsbergen… the Kogashi Forest. You probably know the first three so here’s a closer look at a mountain road that’s packed with passionate, knowledgeable fans when the Japan Cup comes along.

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Highlights of 2016 – Part III

Greg Van Avermaet and Peter Sagan come first and second in the Omloop Het Nieuwsblad. It sounds so plausible, so probable as both have enjoyed an outstanding year. What a difference a season makes because rewind to February and both were in a losing streak and often made the headlines for the way they lost races rather than won them.

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Book Review – Ultimate Etapes

Ultimate Etapes, Ride Europe’s Greatest Cycling Stages by Peter Cossins

Imagine you could ride anywhere in Europe, where would you go? It’s a nice thought experiment, perhaps begin by picking a preferred region and then think of some special roads and extrapolate this into the best part of a day’s ride. That’s the genesis of this book, a collection of 25 rides that are illustrated by lavish photos, route maps and plenty of detail on each of the proposed courses.

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Shrinking The Peloton

Less is more. Yesterday ASO, RCS and Flanders Classics announced in concert that they would shrink the team size for their events down by one. The grand tours go from nine riders per team to eight and the major classics from eight to seven riders. The race owners say it is to improve safety and enhance the sporting spectacle.

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Highlights of 2016 – Part II

There’s a lot to be said for one week stage races. The good ones are concentrated versions of a grand tour with a varied mix of terrain and stage types. The brevity of the contest means every mountain stage counts and there’s rarely time to recover from mistakes. This year’s Paris-Nice was a textbook example and the final stage saved the best for last.

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