Sunday housekeeping

A quick hello to all the new readers. Word seems to be spreading and there are more and more of you these days. I’m not really into chasing hits for the blog, instead the best thing is all the comment and emails from readers. I read each and every comment and try to reply and chip into the debates as much as I can. Note that if you want to leave a comment, it asks for your name and email but you can just put “anon” or whatever you like in these fields, you don’t have to supply personal details to take part.

Feel free to email as well, I’ll always reply to your messages; if you haven’t got a reply it’s 99% probable that I never got the message, it got flicked by the anti-spam filter. I’ve got a “to do” list of topics to cover that’s getting very long already so if you’ve sent in a suggestion and I’d said “yes, that’d be good”, it’s probably on the list.

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French dropouts cost time

French puncture

A tiny detail for today but sometimes that’s what the Inner Ring is all about. French teams take longer to change wheels in the event of a front wheel puncture than other teams.

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Adieu Jean-Paul!

Jean Paul Brouchon

Chances are you don’t know of Jean-Paul Brouchon. Most readers here are English speaking and JPB was a French journalist who died today, aged 72. But his departure is a loss to cycling because he was a sort of the guardian for cycling’s history.

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It’s impossible to treat Contador normally

Sword of Damocles

The Sword of Damocles is an ancient Greek fable that tells of a sword suspended by a horse’s hair above the head of Damocles, a courtier in Athens. At any moment the hair could break and the sword will plunge towards poor Damocles. It’s a tale that says the threat of something looming over us can be as disturbing as the act itself, that we would be unable to live normally with this threat to our life literally hanging over us.

That’s exactly where Alberto Contador is today. With the positive tests for last July still unresolved, there is a giant question mark over him and it could land on his head sometime soon. Faced with this the UCI has issued a communiqué asking that everyone treats him normally… but the very fact that Contador is the sole subject of a press release proves things are not normal.

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Could the first week of the Tour de France be the best?

Stage 4

When you look at the Tour de France route you often tend to skip the first week and look up the mountain stages. For good reason, often the opening days are a parade around the more northerly parts of France where sprint finishes are almost inevitable and nothing of great tactical consequence happens, apart from maybe some crosswinds or every few years, the use of some pavé.

But this time it’s different. The opening stage features an uphill finish with 2.2km at 4.7% and Thomas Voeckler lives just down the road. Stage 4 has 2km at 6.9% to the Mûr-de-Bretagne finish and it’s Philippe Gilbert’s birthday. Stage 6 has a 4% gradient just before the flamme rouge. Stage 8 finishes in a small ski station in central France.

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Cavendish to Team Sky

Wiggins and Cavendish

The news this morning, scooped by Richard Moore, is that Mark Cavendish will ride for Team Sky for 2012. I believe the deal was agreed on the first rest day of the Giro d’Italia, that he will be accompanied others from HTC-Highroad and that Sky will also announce other significant signings in due course too.

It marks a long journey for Cavendish, once spurned by the British track system, he made his own way into the pro ranks via the lowly Team Sparkasse, whilst contemporaries were shepherded by the state-funded system. But this gave him the focus on the road and the rest is history.

It’s not a surprise but still, some were discounting the idea given the frosty relationships between Cavendish, team boss Dave Brailsford and – until now – team leader Bradley Wiggins. But personal problems can be fixed. Especially when millions of pounds change hands.

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The Highroad paradox

Degenkolb

On some measures HTC-Highroad is the most successful professional team going. At the time of writing they have 29 wins this year, the next UCI ProTeam is Rabobank with 17 wins. It was the same story last year, with the team finishing a long way ahead of Liquigas at the end of the season. And that’s before you include the wins of the women’s team too. Victory wise, this is the equivalent of a solo breakaway, dropping every other team going and finishing far ahead of the pack.

Yet for a team so far ahead of its rivals, it’s struggling to find a sponsor. I covered this subject back in March but now want to revisit the idea to explore a couple of new angles.

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New rules for Tour de France competitions explained

Green jersey

At last, I’ve found a source quoting the new rules for the Tour de France points and mountains competitions. These rules have changed after Tour organisers ASO wanted to liven up the race a bit, to ensure the green jersey is more closely correlated with a stage winning sprinter and also so that the mountains jersey goes to a proper climber, rather than a calculator-wielding rider who takes off early on a couple of mountain stages.

Anyway, there had been talk of rules changes… but then more talk of more changes and nobody’s had a definitive version. Now it seems LiVE-Radsport.com have got their hands on the rules. Here’s how it works…

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Thibaut Pinot

Thibaut Pinot

Just 21 years old, FDJ’s Thibaut Pinot impressed in the Critérium du Dauphiné, notably with second place on the final stage. After spending half of the stage on the attack, when caught on the final climb he was still able to lead the sprint in front group behind Joaquim Rodriguez.

Prior to this race he’s grabbed some other good results, notably a third place in a stage of the Dauphiné last year and winning the mountains competition in the Tour de Romandie in 2010 too. I’ve long kept an eye on Pinot, tipping him in the winter as a rider to watch for 2011.

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