I moved from Houston to Washington last fall. Do not miss the scorching 6 month summers at all. This is heaven..
I’m a bit of a tactics numpty but if I were JV, or any other challenger, I think I’d be sending out some team members on some high level efforts to try and wear out Tadej, and then leave enough in the JV tank for a really massive effort somewhere.
I suppose I’m thinking about how Yates was leading the Giro for almost the entire race until a super effort from Froome.
I am in south Louisiana and i’m ready to move north for retirement. Enough is enough and its only getting hotter.
I am headed to France next week for a cycling camp in Oisan valley. We will catch the stages in/around Bourg / Alp D’Huez/ Allemond. i’ll get to ride up ADH in the morning before the tour goes through…it is stupid amounts of fun with the crowds, especially the Dutch corner, but hard riding (for me). hope it cools off a bit before i get there.
I’m in mid-GA. Would be happy to move north a couple of states but my wife loves the heat and tries to turn on the fireplace when it’s 1 degree below 70
Off work and stuck inside due to AQI, what a good day to watch the entire stage 13. Interesting from start to finish. Love how the TSF is race these days.
Now the Tour GC is really over with Jonas crashing out 
But the race for 2nd & 3rd should really heat up now
Ah that’s what happened. I’m not watching but was looking at live tracking and wondering where Jonas was
I did not have today on my Bingo Card
- Stage win by Remco - gift from Pog - and up to 2nd
- Jonas out
- Quinn Simmons pacing Ayuso the last part of the climb after being in the break
I certainly think that 2am doping control wake up for Jonas may have had a factor in his crash. Glad to see Pog calling that out in his post race.
Was a good stage aside from Jonas going out.
Quinn Simmons is certainly pushing things this year. Wondering if he sticks around Lidl Trek or ends up somewhere else. Feel like I’ve heard Modern Pro Adventure looking to get a big American on the team and wonder if it’s him.
I don’t see him going there now - when’s his contract up??? - or in the near term, until / unless Modern Pro Adventure starts getting consistent invitations to the biggest races. But going there would follow the pattern of Pidcock going to Pinarello Q36.5
Chapeau to Pog calling out the testing. Without Jonas he’s going to have to find other ways to test himself like we saw with the pull for Del Toro today. Victory this year may feel hollow, even if still hard fought for three weeks.
Is this the 1st time they’ve done middle of the night testing?
From all of the media I’ve read / heard the answer is a resounding YES
I don’t think it will be hollow, he’s still got goals. Winning on Alpe d’Huez (twice?!) will certainly be one. Winning in Paris might just be another. Helping Del Toro to a white jersey and/or podium would be another. I think he’ll also relish the fact that we seem to be seeing a better GC version of Remco than we have before, and that Pog is the oldest rider in the top 10 with 4 white jersey contenders in there which bodes well for more competition in future years
Meh, I don’t think so. Why would he gift it? Remco did nothing up that climb and the gift hurts his teammate. Pog played it wrong to help Toro and couldn’t beat Remco in the sprint.
Let’s be honest: If Pog wanted the stage win he could have dropped Remco at any point. But instead UAE played it too cute to get del Toro on the podium gift the stage win to him (del Toro). And in the end, Remco won the stage.
This is why I say it was a gift: Pog didn’t race to win
With a young French rider sniffing at the podium and the potential loss of viewership from Tadej totally dominating the tour, it wouldn’t surprise me if there was a serious effort behind the scenes to find something dirty on these 2 guys. And as much as I like to believe modern cycling is clean these days, I doubt it is. I don’t know if they are doing things blatantly against the rules, but I bet they are playing in some grey areas and/or doing questionable things that the rules haven’t caught up with yet.
I see the intervals.icu folks are fans of Claude Code.
I think Tadej/Jonas getting busted for doping would have a much worse effect on Tour viewership than Tadej dominating the race. The narrative would switch from “we’re watching the greatest cyclist of all time” to “cycling hasn’t changed a bit, they’re still all doping”. Viewers would switch off in droves, sponsors would pull out, would be disastrous for the sport.