Tour de France on TV

Author: Alex

  • Joaquim Rodriguez can sprint uphill

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    If the finish is short and steep, look for a strong short-arse. Joaquim Rodriguez sprints uphill with precisely no respect for gravity. They said he’d win stage six and he did. Sprinting uphill is a demented thing to do. On the flat, you push the pedals until it feels like someone’s doused your thighs in…

  • Ian Stannard leads the peloton

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    You’ll hear that phrase a lot if you watch much bike racing. The man’s basically a locomotive. Yesterday, Alejandro Valverde fell while wearing the red jersey. Sky were trying to take advantage of some cross-winds at the time. It was immediately clear that no-one was going to slow down, but we didn’t really fear for…

  • The urgency of the Vuelta

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    Bloody hell, my five riders to watch have already become three. Juan José Cobo lost almost a minute and will now support Alejandro Valverde, who’s in the red jersey; while Thomas De Gendt’s almost three minutes down. The Vuelta doesn’t muck about, does it? The Tour de France has frenetic cycling from the start, but…

  • Five riders to watch at the 2012 Vuelta a Espana

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    It’s the Vuelta tomorrow. After so much excitement, it’ll be good to have some cycling to follow where I don’t have too much vested in the outcome. Eurosport’s David Harmon says he likes the air of melancholy that pervades the Vuelta. It’s a slightly sad sort of a race, coming after the Tour and marking…

  • Seven cycling highlights for Great Britain from the London 2012 Olympics

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    Great Britain has been successful at cycling in previous Olympic Games, but I can’t imagine that they’ll ever do as well as this again. Britons should really stop and wallow in this while they can. They changed the format of track cycling for the 2012 Olympics and many people felt it was to prevent GB…

  • Why Vicky Pendleton didn’t enjoy competing

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    Vicky Pendleton once said that while she enjoyed training, she hated competition. Some people couldn’t get their heads around this. Surely winning things was the good bit? Well, look at it this way. She has just retired from cycling having won a gold medal and a silver medal and the BBC say: “Victoria Pendleton’s career…

  • Why I want Victoria Pendleton to win the Olympic women’s sprint

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    I wouldn’t say I was an enormous fan of track cycling, but it can definitely hit the heights every now and again. I support Britain’s male cyclists, but I don’t know them quite so well. Victoria Pendleton’s a different matter and this means that I give a toss. When you give a toss, sport’s a…

  • Bradley Wiggins – how many Olympic medals?

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    Seven. Seven Olympic medals. Four gold, a silver and two bronze. Bradley Wiggins has won more Olympic medals than any other Briton. Even more impressively, this isn’t one of those gargantuan medal hauls that comes about from the particular nature of the sport. It’s not like the swimming where if you’re good at freestyle you…

  • Bradley Wiggins’ body fat

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    Cyclists’ bodies are famously freakish. Thighs, lungs and hearts are enormous, while the arms and torso tend to be all emaciated. For such fit people, they can look damn sickly. Bradley Wiggins is 6ft 3in (190cm) but only weighs 10st 9lbs (69kg). In terms of body fat, he said he was down to four per…

  • Bradley Wiggins quotes from the 2012 Tour de France

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    Bradley Wiggins isn’t media-trained. It shows. He’s worth listening to. As a result of this, I thought it might be worth bringing together just a few of his best quotes from over the course of the 2012 Tour de France. What does he think about the people on social networks who point fingers regarding doping.…