Author: Alex
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Simon Yates sprints to a win up Haytor in the Tour of Britain
It seems I may not be quite so in touch with modern youth culture as I once was. I simply cannot understand youngsters’ perennial ill-feeling towards ‘Haytors’. Haytor provided a sparkling summit finish on stage six of the Tour of Britain. What’s not to like? Before the race, I told you to watch Simon Yates,…
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How are Tom Boonen’s buttocks?
Never let it be said that this website is overly focused on Tom Boonen’s barse. We’re not afraid to shift our attention by a few inches. Omega Pharma-QuickStep team manager, Patrick Lefevere, describes the current Boonen situation thus: “The buttocks injury put him out for the autumn.” To be honest, he probably meant barse.
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Bradley Wiggins makes nothing happen on Caerphilly Mountain
When you’re ahead in a stage race, you basically want nothing to happen. If nothing happens, you win. If something happens, you might not. Sometimes, it can take a hell of a lot of effort to make nothing happen. Caerphilly Mountain invited attacks. Attacks came. Bradley Wiggins and Team Sky chased them down. Everyone important…
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Pen y Pass sort of does its job in the Tour of Britain
I said that Pen y Pass could prove a good point at which to attack. Being as the stage finished in a bunch sprint, you might think this didn’t happen, but it was actually a small barrage of attacks on the climb which led to that sprint. Prior to that, it looked for all the…
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Bradley Wiggins wins a 10-mile time trial
Because road racing used to be banned in Britain, time trialling became a big thing because it allowed covert competition. Even though road racing has been legal for many years now, modern culture still reflects this history. You can see it in the distances. Road races are measured in kilometres; time trials are measured in…
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Using Honister Pass and the Lake District in the Tour of Britain
If you use Britain’s geography properly, you will get good bike racing and spectacular scenery. They really got it right with stage two of the Tour of Britain. Apart from the weather, it was the ideal advert for road cycling in this country. Cycling’s not about sprinting down the Mall. It’s about having the freedom…
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Elia Viviani won stage one of the Tour of Britain
I thought he’d done a piss-taking pinky-fingers-out reference to us being a nation of effete tea-drinkers as he crossed the finish line, but it turned out that the website we were reading had used a photograph from a completely different race. Mark Cavendish? Sort of boxed in. Didn’t really compete for the sprint. Bradley Wiggins?…
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Michael Matthews was the sprinter who was glad he turned up for the 2013 Vuelta
No-one else was. Two sprint finishes. Two Michael Matthews wins. The Chris Horner post-Vuelta interview on ITV4 Was one of the most extraordinary slabs of gibberish I’ve ever heard. It was a bizarre collage of amazings and beautifuls. UK readers can see and hear it here. The gibberishiest gibberish comes from around 39 minutes in.…
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Chris Horner’s standing climbing style wins him the Vuelta
There’s a phrase in cycling: ‘dancing on the pedals’. It’s used when a rider gets out of the saddle on a steep slope. The finest exponents sway sinuously, the bike flicking from side-to-side beneath them. Several times during this Vuelta, commentators have said that Chris Horner has been dancing on the pedals. If Chris Horner…
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Joaquim Rodriguez would like a bit more Vuelta
Perhaps irritated by Chris Horner’s habit of making him sound like he’s from Turkey or somewhere, “Hakim” Rodriguez finally found the zip he seems to have been lacking for most of the Vuelta and won stage 19 with one of his vertical sprints. Just as in the Tour, Purito appears to be coming into his…