clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

Musette du Jour

On the eve of destruction...

[Cycling inspires awfully dramatic metaphors, doesn't it? Read any OLN transcript, at least a mountain stage, and I'd bet it's choc-a-bloc with explosions, invasions, storms, etc. I may have to break out my book of Phil Liggett's found poetry tonight to pin this down. But there's a reason for all this... the hours, the hours. Spend half a day in the saddle and you'll accept almost any description. Imagine if NFL games lasted seven hours and players burned 10,000 calories?]

Anyway...

  • Race reports from BicyclingMag or M. Pez. Nice shot of Forza Mario riding in the LeakyGas car waving his Tricolore at pissed-off French fans...
  • It pains me to do this, but the best way to recap today's stage, which consisted of about 15 kilometers of racing, is to watch VeloNews video where Freire and McEwen give interesting descriptions of the run to the line.

More, always more...

  • Get all historical with Cycling Revealed who are covering the stages through the eyes of past legends.
  • And finally, couple sprinting legends look into Boonen's problem: you can't build a team to win everything at the Tour.
Former world champion and master of the sprint, Mario Cipollini, was also present at the stage in Dax. The Italian of course gave his analysis of the sprint. "To me, it's strange to see that the sprints are very badly organised by the teams. There's no team controlling the bunch in the last 500 metres, not even in the last kilometre. I think Boonen needs a good train, as he is favoured by a sprint at higher speeds. McEwen and Freire have the same capabilities; they're both fast but also very agile in the sprint."

Laurent Jalabert, former winner of the green jersey, gave his opinion on Boonen's failures. "Quick.Step wants the green jersey with Boonen, but they also want a good GC with Garate and Rujano. The team might not be strong enough to chase those two objectives," he analysed.