From the replay I keep seeing the car closing on the group which I think partially leads to the crash. Not much of a gap there.
Yes, I agree. Mavi was also like on her second bike change. Had been chasing for a while. She was likely at her limit… but I think the the driving was sketchy to say the least.
I don’t see it closing on the group. I think the car was close to the group because they were riding beside her I’m assuming because she was interacting with them and she was getting close to the group, but the clip I saw from the moment she was still beside the car, to the moment she hit the car, I saw no closing of the gap with the group. I think she kind of enters the equation as she starts to get around the front of the car making it look like the car is getting closer, but if you look at the position of the last rider in the line, I don’t see them any closer than they were before.
Now she handled it like a champ. She laid there in the road for a sec and then just popped up like nothing happened and calmly waited for her bike. Kind of a surreal situation.
Guess I’m on the other side of that view … I keep seeing a clear closing of the gap between the last rider and the car
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All the riders should be doing is focusing on the race. Everyone else is responsible for creating this environment for the racers. Team-staff’s job is to aid its racers. That is racing strategy for dummies.
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I think Mavi was just on a “fucking shit day” (Is this going to be the quote of the tour???)
Two punctures, clotheslined Manly, and spent the difficult portion of the race constantly chasing. I’m surprised she could still see straight at that point and her team car wasn’t exactly doing her any favors. But she kept fighting on like a champ. She won me over as a fan today!
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Nice time trial to the finish
The second group of riders also started as a super nice move. Peloton was bunched up and going slow, promting the attack.
I’ll be sure to check it out - thanks 
So weird… I’d definitely expect the car to have dropped back sooner but she must have known it was close 
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She had been using the stickiest of bottles and was being launched forward. I think the driver should have slowed, but we don’t know who or what was behind them.
Poor situational awareness from Garcia it seemed.
I loved that stage though. The gravel was so good, and really added a great technical element I thought. Super strong TT off the front and lots of tactical manoeuvring.
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this race is pretty enjoyable so far. random thoughts:
i’ve yet to see any real breakaways, which is…odd. all of them go to like a minute or so and are chased back within a dozen miles or so.
it’s pretty cool to see things like riders changing their own wheels, and disc ones at that. VERY rare for me to see in the mens race. they just kind of stand there like helpless babies most of the time, and i wonder why it’s such a huge struggle for the mechanics in the mens tdf to get the disc wheels off. that woman today made it look very easy (and it is very easy). it’s weird…
in that stage 3 race if they mentioned julian alaphilippe’s name ONE MORE TIME i was going to lose it.
why the hell is the coverage always shortened? i know it comes from the organizers and gcn/whoever have nothing to do with it, but it’s shameful all the same. a long way to go for equality here…
the commentators, all three but especially the guy, are TERRIBLE. no insights, no pointing out of any of the scenery (even though he promised he’d get better at it. spoiler- he hasn’t), seems to lose his train of thought mid sentence, says “you know” A LOT. the best asset in the gcn broadcast by far is that iris woman on the motorbike. you learn more from her in 20-30 seconds than 3 hours with that stupid guy. i said in the gcn thread and i’ll repeat it, i never thought i’d see the day when i longed for rob hatch…
they’ve mentioned nature breaks a few times, but i can’t wrap my head around how this would work for a woman logistically. you see on the men’s race they just kind of go while riding most of the time. don’t think that works so well here. have to research this more as i’m genuinely interested.
most of the crashes so far have been stupid mistakes or just terrible luck, but there sure seem to have been a lot so far through 4 stages. when they happen you can really see the disparity between the men and women. for men the cars (plural) are all over them in a minute and the race doctor is there as well. for the women they seem to be just out there for a bit until the car (singular) can get there. and today was the first time i’ve seen the race doctor. maybe it’s just a coverage issue and they’re not showing all of the assistance they’re really getting, but as i said earlier, they seem to have to fend for themselves a lot more than the men…
it’s a shame the race is only 8 stages but i guess it’s a symptom of the state of womens racing. they mentioned at the end of today that the 170 or so km in stage 5 is more than most women’s tours combined. again, a shame
Zwift is a funny company with a weird strategy. They no doubt spent a fortune on sponsorship of this race yet when it comes to expanding their own app they seem to invest very little. They already have France built in the game but have added a grand total of zero new courses there in two years. They seem hell bent on doing the absolute minimum necessary to keep their own customers happy and engaged
The team sponsorship is interesting. A lot of companies I’ve never heard of, and many of the ones I have seem to have different sub sponsors. I suppose it’s a cost issue but I wonder if some of them just didn’t want to sponsor women and needed to be replaced. Only jumbo visma and trek Segafredo seem to be intact which is very cool to see. Even cooler though are the sponsors that JUST sponsor the women, like canyon sram. VERY cool. Everyone else is either entirely different or slightly different (like FDJ, where is Groupama?). i’d love for the SJWs to put it to them (not just Groupama, there are many examples) and ask that question. why are you sponsoring the men’s teams and not the womens? if they say something like, well the men cost $6m and the women cost $4m and we only have $7m budget, then i’d understand. if they say something like, we just don’t want to sponsor the women, then we’d have some issues. should be uncovered…
The crowds seem to be more plentiful than I expected. Great to see!
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My take on this (might be way off) is it’s to do with the peloton being ripped apart so early and so much. As in, where do the cars fit in. Of course they don’t have the budgets of the men’s teams, but it sounds like they all bought lots of staff.
Stage 2 especially the roads were all pretty narrow so assume the cars would have issues getting though - also the race was pretty fragmented.
Also interesting to see wheel changes - think it was always a bike change in the men’s race - I assume this is a funding thing?
I did notice something odd with the coverage video. When they do the summary of who is in which jersey and they start with the rider’s stock image and transform it to the rider-in-the-jersey, they are doing a body swap. All of the jersey bodies are the same, with the rider’s head changed out to the current jersey wearer. I thought for the men’s presentations they mapped the jersey over the actual image of the man in the jersey, but I’m not sure.
My husband and I noticed that too and think it’s weird. The woman whose form is used for the jerseys is…ummm…different than that of most of the riders and I’m really hoping that’s not the reason for it. I’m 99.9% sure that for the mens’ jerseys it was mapping the jersey over each man’s body rather than trading out heads.
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they’ve mentioned nature breaks a few times, but i can’t wrap my head around how this would work for a woman logistically. you see on the men’s race they just kind of go while riding most of the time. don’t think that works so well here. have to research this more as i’m genuinely interested.
I read an article about that. It’s just “butts out” on the side of the road. Thank goodness for drop-tail bibs!
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In my experience, it’s also not uncommon in longer road races to see the entire women’s peloton sprint for a bathroom break en masse at railway crossings and the like. Fairly pro-butts as a whole.
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Honesty haven’t spotted any difference to the mens race. Bike changes only occur if the is a problem with the bike or its critical point with no time to chase back on and the car is close. If its a wheel unless the race is “on” a wheel change is normally occurs which is a surprise to me with the change to discs. Did you see the number of wheel changes in the mens Tour with the mechanic getting his drill out to take the thru-axle out?
It is just about where the cars are and where it occurs and whats happening in the race. Having said this the lower womens teams probably have much less choice.
In the highlight program for the gravel stage I think it was 4 each of wheel and bike changes shown.
We have equality here - neither race is available…
sure i’ve seen the mechanics do it, never the riders themselves. the woman yesterday changed the disc wheel by herself. cool to see and it looked like the team was using qr levers. i have ridden disc brakes most of my life, all with thru axels all with quick release levers. no idea why these pro guys don’t do that. pretty damn easy to take on and off. then again, i’m also tubeless, so flats are nonexistent…
A few men’s teams did use QR levers but I say not the majority, that is just my perception though, getting the drill out sticks in the memory more, I wonder what the actual ratio is.
Loving the Women’s racing not watched today’s yet.
I mean I know my bike mfr makes optional bolt on thru axles you can swap to but I still don’t get the value in it, even if I did have a car following me with a drill (which would be hilarious on the trails I ride on). I was also pretty surprised to see a few of the teams in this race are still rocking rim brakes.
Yeah same the race is so good that I reserve it for the couch at night. One good thing is that it’s much easier to avoid spoilers in the femmes race unlike the men’s one