Tour de France

A 'rolling' stage today, with only one Cat 4 climb near the start.

There will certainly be a break-away, but will it stay away this time? And how much time will they spend looking over their shoulders, because it is a sprinter's finish and their teams will be moving them up towards the end.

I'll go for Cav in this one. Although, I don't think that, even though he might equal Hinault in terms of number of stage wins, his won't be of anything like the quality of Hinault's.

Can't see how you can say that, Ian! Different time, different circumstances, different type of racer. Cav is against some of the best sprinters that there have ever been. Didn't Hinault win most of his stages in induividual time trials. But of course Cav is British so won't be a match for any other racer born on the continent in your eyes, would he?

Hinault (and Merckx) won their stages while also winning the Tour. They did it under enormously greater pressure.

They did win time trial stages, but also mountain stages - vastly more difficult, in my view.

They also won sprint finishes. Hinault won the final sprint on the Champs Elysees (1979) while wearing the yellow jersey. He had no need to go for the win and no-one would do that these days - he just did it for the hell of it.

Hinault also took his wins in the Tour in tbe same years that he was also winning other major races. He regularly rode the Giro prior to the Tour. What else has Cav done this year? What else has he even raced in?

That's why Hinault's wins were, in my view, more impressive.

Well anyway, it was a close call today, but in a photo finish Cavendish took the win from Greipel.

Peter Sagan came in fourth and retained the yellow jersey. Cav took the green jersey officially (having 'borrowed' it from Sagan today).

Tomorrow is another sprinter's stage - and a long one by today's standards at 232 km. as they skirt the Masif Central. It slopes upwards towards the end with a cat 4 climb, but nothing too serious.

The main contenders are still all together 14 seconds behind the lead, with just Contador 1min 2 secs behind, and Richie Porte (after a badly timed puncture yesterday) at 1min 59 back.

I've a theory that Cav has no intention of finishing the TDF. When the race involves big climbs,Cav will retire.  He has achieved a yellow jersey and done reasonably well on the flat stages.

K

You may well be right, Kennine. Although that would be a great shame as it is disrespectful to the Tour, to start with no intention of finishing. That doesn't seem like him, but he does seem to have this inexplicable fixation with winning an olympic medal for some reason.

I do actually like Mark Cavendish. We saw the end of the 2010 Tour (where he won on the Champs Elysees but just missed out on the green jersey to Thor Hushovd) and when they did the lap of honour he spent more time than most coming over to the crowd line and chatting to the audience. Nice bloke.

You may well be right, Kennine. Although that would be a great shame as it is disrespectful to the Tour, to start with no intention of finishing. That doesn't seem like him, but he does seem to have this inexplicable fixation with winning an olympic medal for some reason.

I do actually like Mark Cavendish. We saw the end of the 2010 Tour (where he won on the Champs Elysees but just missed out on the green jersey to Thor Hushovd) and when they did the lap of honour he spent more time than most coming over to the crowd line and chatting to the audience. Nice bloke.

There's been plenty of those in the recent past, Mario Cipollini comes to mind.

For Cav the world doesn't just revolve round road racing, as you obviously think it should. As he started his career as a track cyclist, so his desire to win an Olympic medal on the track. It would complete the full set as far as he's concerned, with World Championsip Gold in the Madison (2x),  a Commonwealth Gold, a World Road Race Championship, a Classics win, points winner in all three Grand tours, and now a Yellow Jersey. Not bad for a lad that can't climb!! 

There have indeed been many who have planned to abandon and Cippollini was one of the worst offenders.

Anyway......an even closer finish today, with Kittell just scraping it. He looked well pleased.

No change in the standings of the GC contenders.

Tomorrow will be a somewhat different day! We are into the Massif Central and 6 categorised climbs, four of which are at the latter end of the stage and two of them are cat 2.

There will almost certainly be some changes in the GC standings, but who and what? It's a day of strength sapping ups and downs. The sort that Contador might use to pull a bit of time back maybe? Or will his injuries prevent that?

I'd really love one of the French riders to go out on a successful break. Can't wait! 

Better race today, not much in the way of challenges and sudden breakaways.

Everybody playing safe. Sky team doing everything right but are dull and boring with it. 

Lets hope the race improves and we see some real sparkle from the three leading teams, otherwise this will go down as the most boring TDF ever. 

K

Agree today things started to liven up a bit. Also agree that Sky are such a boring team.

That's a heck of a lead that Van Avermaet has. I don't know much about him, but if he can climb, he could become a tbreat to the GC with that sort of lead at this stage.

Contador lost a bit more time, as did Richie Porte, but otherwise most of the main contenders are still together. Peter Sagan had a surprisingly bad day.....presumably saving himself.

The GC riders get another 'day off' tomorrow, in another day for the sprinters. Then we get into the mountains!! 

Beginning to think I've put a hex on Richie Porte by backing him, he's not doing very well at all??

Poor Contador really seems to be suffering from his injuries. Think he'll find it hard to pull back the time even if he starts to feel better in a few days.

thought some of the roads towards the end today were a bit interesting - narrow, sudden bends and sharp shade and sun contrasts