Highlights of 2014 – Part II

Lars Boom Tour de France pave

Let’s limit this to one Tour de France highlight. It’s a tough pick, do we celebrate Tony Martin’s enormous ride across the Vosges? Celebrate Ag2r’s joy as the team stood below the podium in the pouring rain while Blel Kadri took the applause for his stage win? What about the French pride at two riders on the podium, the way the sport was reaching people like it used to? Or those huge crowds in Yorkshire and London?

The highlight was the stage to Wallers-Arenberg, 155km and several cobbled sections.

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Roads to Ride: Colle di Fauniera

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The hardest climb you’ve never heard of? The Giro d’Italia has included the Colle Fauniera sparingly and perhaps needs to go back at some point to correct this. For everyone else it’s open all summer and is one of the most spectacular climbs in the Alps.

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Book Review: The Bike Deconstructed

The Bike Deconstructed

The Bike Deconstructed: A Grand Tour of the Modern Bicycle by Richard Hallet

How many parts does your bike have? You can start counting the wheels, frame, bars, pedals and so on but it’s all the small pieces you forget about. Take the seatpost, it’s got clamping bits, bolts, fasteners and washers. Even a headset can have ten more component pieces when if you include any spacers and the compression nut and that’s before you count the individual ball bearings. The point is that even the lightest race bike is made up of a very large number of parts. Too much? That’s for later but first the book review.

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Highlights of 2014 – Part I

Dauphine Froome Contador

I’m going to pick five moments from 2014. They are a personal choice. With any list you often omit more than you include but I’ll explain each moment. They’re presented in no particular order.

First up is the Critérium du Dauphiné, we got the duel between Alberto Contador and Chris Froome but it was Andrew Talansky who won with the suspense lasting until the last minute of the last day.

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What’s The Point of the Off Season?

Joaquim Rodriguez

Pro cycling’s calendar runs from late January to mid-October leaving a vacuum that lasts longer than three months. All riders deserve a vacation and a chance to do something else. Why stop the show? Could the sport race all year instead?

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On Mud and Gender

The cyclocross season has started and there’s been a few emails and tweets to say “looking forward to your cross coverage”. But as loyal readers know there is no cyclo-cross coverage. It’s also a chance to address why there’s little coverage of women’s racing here too.

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Thursday Shorts

George Hincapie Lance Armstrong

There’s a fuss about George Hincapie’s gran fondo because it’s resembling a US Postal reunion. Lee Rodgers sets out the moral case on crankpunk.com. But whether your sympathetic to Hincapie or Armstrong or not doesn’t matter. The UCI rules are clear:

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The 2015 Tour de France

2015 Tour de France route map
The route for the 2015 Tour de France is out. As usual a lot leaks out before, velowire.com sleuths the stages and yesterday race organiser ASO accidentally put a PDF online with the route yesterday. But it’s still a comforting ritual, a projection to the other side of winter.

This is a chance to see the map for real and to get more info on the route such as the intermediate climbs, the amount of time trialling and novelties such as the return of time bonuses. Plus race organisers can sell us a story, a theme for 2015.

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