Author: Alex
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Vincenzo Nibali cares not for gravity
If Richie Porte is ‘flying’ then Vincenzo Nibali’s in orbit, effortlessly circling the earth. Just as it did in 2012, La Planche des Belles Filles brought clarity to proceedings. Searing, searing clarity. What happened? One of the greatest aspects of the Tour de France is the sheer number of different stories unfolding simultaneously. Sometimes it…
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Tony Martin gets his revenge on the peloton
Here are three facts about Tony Martin. He would have finished sixth in the world team trial last year, competing on his own He once told Lance Armstrong to get fucked He raced the entire peloton over the full length of a stage of last year’s Vuelta a Espana and almost won On that Vuelta…
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Blel Kadri ushers in a general classification which makes sense
Simon Yates spent a long day in the break, but couldn’t salvage anything for the Brits, fading on the last couple of climbs. The only man to succeed in staying away was Blel Kadri, who won Roma Maxima last year. He pushed on for France to take the stage win. Behind him, the general classification…
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Peter Sagan is getting really rather annoyed
Matteo Trentin is a rider so anonymous that I’d actually forgotten that he won a stage of the Tour last year, even though I wrote about it at the time. If you watch a lot of cycling, you’ll know his name, but you’d never have him down for the win. He’s one of Mark Cavendish’s…
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André Greipel finds a way to beat Marcel Kittel
Greipel wins! Take that, pedals! Cycling’s beefiest, stompiest sprinter finally got a result on stage six. Usually one of the fastest finishers, Greipel had been oddly anonymous up until now and I’ve heard it said that he might have lost his nerve a bit. There was no sign of that today though. How did he…
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Boom! Cobbles and crashes
The Boom in question was of course Lars Boom, the former Cyclocross world champion, who won one of the hardest, most miserable stages in recent memory. Miserable for the riders, that is. For those of us watching on TV, it was absorbing. Was it carnage? It was carnage. Commentary basically consisted of: “There’s been a…
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Tommy Voeckler was in the break so the Tour’s started now
Okay, the Tour is officially underway. I know we’ve already had the Grand Départ and millions of people watching, but two crucial things happened on stage four. One, we got to France. Two, Tommy Voeckler got in the break. It isn’t the Tour until we’ve had Tommy’s TV time. Tommy Voeckler’s faces are quite simply…
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Marcel Kittel wins stage but loses hair gel
Not everything’s going Marcel Kittel’s way. Big disaster at the airport in London: my hair gel did not make it through the security check… 😛 — Marcel Kittel (@marcelkittel) July 7, 2014 But other than that, he’s having a fine old time. Kittel notched his second win out of the three British stages in London,…
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Vincenzo Nibali enjoys the terrain
The various jerseys of the Tour de France serve a valuable and underappreciated purpose. No-one can identify with a genre of cyclists, but give us an individual and we can empathise. Take Marcel Kittel, for example. At the end of stage one, he proved himself to be the fastest cyclist in the biggest bike race…
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Mark Cavendish and his oddly bouncy skeleton
The people of Yorkshire followed the script, lining the route like yellow human fencing. Jens Voight followed the script, getting into the day’s break, despite being 42 and there being little chance of success. He’s not unduly troubled by petty concerns like that. The peloton followed the script, racing into the finish in Harrogate at…