Dan McLay looks like he can sprint
Let’s first deal with the inevitable ‘who?’ Dan McLay is a young British rider. Born in New Zealand and brought up in Leicester, he’s been plugging away in Belgium for the last few years, trying…
Chris Froome earns himself a second place
Chris Froome’s been runner-up in Grand Tours three times now, but whereas on the two previous occasions, he could blame Bradley Wiggins for not being a place higher, this time it was all his own…
Alberto Contador has the legs – even if one of them’s a bit skeggy and slightly knackered
I can only presume that having prepared for the Vuelta by riding around with a fractured leg and a huge infected wound, racing Chris Froome up a mountain suddenly seems like a pain-free doddle for…
Fabio Aru is a grooved rider
Fabio Aru won his second stage of this year’s Vuelta and was followed over the line by exactly the same four riders as last time – albeit in a different order. But if Aru’s emergence…
John Degenkolb stays at the right end of the spaghetti
John Degenkolb says his favourite type of training session is the rest day, or failing that the leisurely coffee ride. I doubt all the riders having the previous day off was what allowed him to…
Przemysław Niemiec troubles the commentators
There can’t be many riders whose names offer as many phonetic pitfalls as Przemyslaw Niemiec. Phil Liggett long ago settled on ‘Yakim’ for ‘Joaquim’ and so generally doesn’t even bother with Niemiec’s first name. In…
Awareness of Daniel Navarro becomes slightly less dim
If I had to categorise Daniel Navarro, I’d class him as being ‘a cyclist whose name I know’. If a Cofidis rider ever attacks on a climb, I reflexively think: “That’ll be Daniel Navarro,” because…
John Degenkolb doesn’t have a knackered leg
Or maybe he does. After all, bust limbs seem to be performance enhancing if Alberto Contador’s form is anything to go by. Before the stage, Degenkolb was bandaged from a crash and saying he couldn’t…
Alberto Contador steals Tony Martin’s headlines
I think I’ve said this before, but the problem with being Tony Martin is that everyone expects you to win time trials, so when you do, it’s literally unremarkable. What’s newsworthy is when you lose….
Resting with Carlos Betancur
It occurred to me that I neglected to keep you up to speed with Carlos Betancur’s performance after stage nine – although ‘up to speed’ would appear to be entirely the wrong phrase to use….
