UKC

I know very little about cycle racing but have taken more interest in recent years as the Brits have become serious contenders.

Apart from the convoluted scoring system (for many years I suspected they drew straws half way around to announce somebody's "unassailable lead") and the endemic drug cheating the thing that is utterly bizarre to the uninitiated is the "marshalling" or lack of it": people in weird costumes waving in the faces of riders busting a gut up hills or taking bends at high speed downhill, spectators all over the road, motorbikes flashing past cyclists and honking them for being in the way, cars weaving between riders, and now bloody tacks on the road!!

I understand the festival atmosphere and proximity to the action is part of the magic but isn't all a bit mad, not to say dangerous? What about 'elf and safety?

Oh, and is the ESPN commentary the dullest and least informative commentary of any sport by any broadcaster?

In reply to Postmanpat: You forgot the radges chucking tacks on the road at the top of passes....

It is totally bizarre, but stick with it, a wonderful event.

In reply to Postmanpat:


Try British Eurosport, its got to be better than ESPN who contrive to make the viewing of all sports unbearable with the drivel of their commentators!!

In reply to Postmanpat:

Tacks and doping aside - all the things you mentioned are why we love it. Most other sports are now sanitised beyond belief.

It's actually marshalled pretty well - if you've never watched a stage live you've never had a run in with a Gendarme!

The "scoring system" is pretty simple really. The rider with the lowest time for all the stages added together is the leader and he wears the Yellow jumper - Bradley wiggins.

E

In reply to Postmanpat:

With ITV 4 you get the old guard - Ligget and Sherwin. Classic.
Yesterday Sherwin said "as the Peleton approach the stunningly beautiful department of the Herhault" just as the helicopter flew over a massive Lafarge cement quarry.

E

In reply to Postmanpat: I didn't realise ESPN covered it. Did you mean Eurosport, in which case I'd have to disagree, I enjoy their commentary and both Hamon and Kelly are rather knowledgeable.

To your main point, I do think a lot of fans and riders dislike the way some spectators behave, and accidents involving collisions with them do happen far too often ( a crash with a man standing in the course taking a photo occurred earlier this Tour). I suppose the difficulty is doing anything. They have loads of outriders, requests to keep off the road and near the start, end, summits or sprints have a few km of barriers, but managing to barrier off all of the course for 200km+ most days would be an epic logistical task.

I'm not overly sure how they could improve it, if there was a particularly strong desire.

In reply to Enty:

But... riders finishing in the same group will be given the same time. For any given (standard) stage everyone could get exactly the same result, regardless of where in the peleton they are, if there are no significant gaps... may seem odd if you aren't used to it.

In reply to troglodyte:

Possibly for stages, that's wehy they have the green jersey - first across the line.
But pretty much impossible in the GC for everyone to have the same time when the first stage is the prologue.

E

In reply to troglodyte:

It's to avoid a dangerous sprint of the whole peleton - the sprint is left to the specialists.

In reply to Enty:

Aha - gendarmes

Couple of years ago I was riding up the Col de Port while visiting Mr and Mrs Interdit. The top out had the usual mountain points banner ans was suitably rammed, and the tour was about 2 hours away.

I was about 2 km from the top, from the quieter Masarat side, when a pair of gendarmes on motorbikes and a police van puled up alongside. They noted my Union flag top, and I then got one bike either side and a blue light van ahead and a full impromptu escort to the top. Then they were gone with a cheery wave leaving the crowd to figure out exactly who the clearly famous but middle aged tube in the blue jersey was.

In reply to Postmanpat:

A lot of sports have scoring systems that are surely way more difficult to understand? e.g. in Ice Skating, you have to factor in the negotiation between the judges to get the other judges to vote for their competitors in another event and they will vote for your's in this one. In football, you score if the ball is over the line, except sometimes you don't, and other times you do if the ball doesn't cross the line...and if a bloke standing at the side waves a flag, then you never score.


In no other sport that I know of could you run right beside your favorite shouting encouragement.


dunno, never listen to it. try ITV4, ok except for the dour Yorksheerish bloke they have on

In reply to Postmanpat: It has been sanitised already.

Night riding was dropped after the 1904 tour, since cheating went on when judges couldn't see the competitors.

In 1913 Eugene Christophe was disqualified when after carrying his broken bicycle for 10 km to a blacksmith's forge he allowed someone else to help him by operating the bellows while he repaired his bike himself.

The longest stage in history was 482 km in 1919.

Bicycles used to have two gears, one either side of the rear wheel. To change gear a competitor dismounted and put the wheel in the other way round.

In reply to Tiberius:

Do you mean Imlach? I am pretty sure he isn't a Yorkshireman, Boulting is a southerner and the rest of them are to various degrees Scousers.

In reply to The New NickB:

Imlach is funny - very dry.

E

In reply to Enty: I quite like Imlach, Boulting and Boardman for the pre and post race stuff. It's the in race commentary on ITV4 that I find grates somewhat.

In reply to Liam M:

I could do without the Sherwen Travelogue.

In reply to Postmanpat:

Thanks for the comments. I can see that it doesn't want to be oversanitised but apart from the danger it does seem odd that the spectators can have so much influence. In a rare moment of enlightenment the commentators pointed out that if somebody made a break on the narrow climb it would be difficult to follow because the spectators were in the way.

"Jason Robinson, takes the ball, 10 metres out, he's going to sco......oh no, the bloke in row 2 has tackled him on the line....."

The commentators were actually Eurosport. I guess the problem is they make no allowances for people who don't understand what's happening already, (and they have very dull voices).

So, the breakaway group is apparently 13 minutes ahead of the pelaton. Wiggins,in the pelaton, leads the Tour by a couple of minutes. Apparently this is not a problem and Wiggins is not even mentioned for 20 minutes. There is obviously a simple explanation-these guys are 30 minutes behind overall? They'll be hauled in? It's a special stage? I just wish they'd mention it.

The rise of the British challengers is a massive opportunity for Eurosport to turn cycling into a major audience puller but they seem to be completely ignoring it.

In reply to Postmanpat:

The Eurosport commentary is the best imho.
Especially when you get commentators on other channels and in the press regularly quoting Sean Kelly (who commentates for Eurosport).

In reply to Postmanpat:

Anyone that quick would have deserved to be in the team anyway!

In reply to Postmanpat:

The Eurosport commentators did say a few times that the people in the breakaway group were at least half an hour behind the overall tour leaders, so the main contenders for the overall tour win (aka General Classification aka GC) wouldn't want to work hard to catch them.

So each day you have several different competitions going on:
there is the race to win the stage that day and there is the race to win the overall "classifications" for the whole race.
There are 6 classifications for the race as a whole:

* overall leader - yellow jersey - lowest overall time.

* points - green jersey - there are a number of set "sprint" lines set during the race. The first person over that line gets a number of points, the next person gets fewer points, etc. The max points tend to be at the finishing line. The person with the most "points" wears the green jersey.

* mountains classification - red polka dot jersey - like the "points" but with mountain points awarded to the people first over the tops of climbs.

* best young rider - white jersey - lowest overall time for someone under 26.

* team classification - team were black numbers on yellow background - the team with the shortest cumulative time calculated from their top three cyclists each day.

So you will get different riders and different teams employing different strategies each stage and for the overall race.
So today Rabobank were happy because their rider won the stage. Due to various accidents, the team only has 4 riders left in the race, and were unlikey to win any of the overall classifications, so their best hope for glory (and sponsorship money) was to win a stage. Ditto for the team of Friday's winner, David Millar. Their best hopes to win the race overall and to win the green jersey both had to leave the race due to injury, so one of the remaining riders winning a stage was the best they could hope for.
Likewise Greipel and Sagan want to win as many sprint points as they can because they want to win the green jersey. Last year's winner of the green jersey was Britain's Mark Cavendish.

Hope this helps...

In reply to Postmanpat:

They did mention it. When I tuned in at about 4:30 Sherwin explained that no one in the break (with 15 minutes) was going to be a problem.
You can't expect them to mention this every 10 minutes on a commentary of the 14th stage of a 3 week long race.
That would be like watching football and the commentator telling you the score every two seconds.

E

In reply to Postmanpat: If the breakaway contains a GC (general classification) contender then the yellow jersey must chase and avoid losing time. This is usually done with the yellows team pace setting (or anoter GC contender team). It's not a problem for the yellow jersey to be 15 mins or more behind the breakaway if the riders in the breakaway aren't a threat in the GC. The peleton will then take it easy.
The riders in the breakaway at this stage of the tour are usually an hour or more behind the race leader in yellow, therefore a 15min advantage and a stage win won't matter that much to the leader or their rivals.
Sometimes the breakaway are hauled in, sometimes they ride well an can grab a stage. For some riders, a breakaway is their only way to win a stage.
As for wiggins not being mentioned, the breakaway are usually more interesting to watch than a slow moving peleton. If there is an attack or crash relevant to wiggins, then that would be of more importance than the breakaway.

In reply to Enty:
I take your point but given the stage lasts several hours many viewers are going to be dipping in and out and in the uk many viewers are simply going to be ignorant, like me, so I think they should recognise this.

In reply to Postmanpat: For the best potted TdF prog watch the ITV4 highlights. Unfortunately I think Phil Liggett is getting a bit "Murray Walker" during the live coverage.
Eurosport show tons of live cycling e.g all 3 Grand Tours, all the 1 day classics, Paris-Nice, Criterium de Dauphine, Tour de Suisse, Tour of California etc etc.

David Harmon and Brian Smith are the best live pairing IMHO but I like Sean Kelly. If you watch the live coverage you'll find the answer loads of email questions, explain tactics etc. There is simply nothing better than sitting and watching a whole stage with a plentiful supply of tea etc :0)

In reply to Postmanpat:

This sort of thing is part of the tactics of the race. The leaders make sure that no rival can get in a situation where they can take advantage of something like that. Not just themselves, but this is part of where they use their team.

Tactics in most sports consist of both attacking and defending. It's a bit like saying that Khan would have won if his opponent hadn't hit him. It's not just about attack, you have to think of how you are going to prevent your opponent from attacking too.


I think in all sports, there's a balance between commentating for beginners and those who know the rules/tactics. Football commentators don't explain that only the goalkeeper can use his hands, and the person who scores is allowed to use his head.


tbh they usually do, pretty much always they will mention that there is nobody who is a threat in the breakaway. Very occasionally, especially at the start of the tour when the gaps are not so big, you do get someone in the breakaway who is a 'minor' threat and the commentators then mention that the peloton will be keeping a close eye on the breakaway.

The 'politics' of the breakaway are probably the most difficult to understand. Especially when you hear so much of how it's a 'team' sport, and the sky riders are all there to help Bradly Wiggins get yellow, how then does anyone get in the breakaway?

Many reasons, but the main one is sponsorship. a team that has no hope of winning anything overall will try to get someone to win a stage. The winner of the stage is always on the front page of le'quipe, and featured in many other papers too, and as you've seen, they all sit up, hold their hands in the air and proudly give the sponsors prime coverage.


I understand what you're saying for England, but you have to appreciate that cycling already is a major audience puller in most other countries in Europe. It's only a real minority sport in England.

In reply to Tiberius:




I thought he said " British"

In reply to Tiberius:

But the English language feed is presumably aimed at uk and Irish audiences, hence my suggestion that they should tailor their commentary accordingly. My feeling is that they have always assumed that their audience is "minority" ie.small but knowledgeable,and it probably was, but that is probably no longer true. It is growing fast (along with the sport) but less knowledgeable.

I recognise the difficulty in balancing different demands. Personally, in sports I know about what I object to is dumbed down emotional hype (bbc rugby's nonsense about agincourt and culloden). Basic explanations and information for non aficionados doesn't bother me.

I know I'm a Brit and therefore, by definition, love watching most sports but I have never bothered with the TdF and am now watching it and am engrossed. I'm not watching every minute, as I do have a life (despite being unable to climb), but I have to keep checking in and I'm getting friends and family into it as well. It's fascinating. Teamwork, tactics, amazing endurance, cheating, craziness, european tensions and, yes, beautiful countryside (with the odd cement work thrown in for good measure).

I feel like I'm on an, er, journey....

(and I want to buy a bike and we've not even got to the olympics yet!)

"Yesterday Sherwin said "as the Peleton approach the stunningly beautiful department of the Herhault" just as the helicopter flew over a massive Lafarge cement quarry."

Love it - but Herault is stunningly beautiful (despite quarry and Palaver les Flottes.) Shame they took the route through dullsville on Bastille Day this year.

In reply to JonC:


Yes, just do it

In reply to woolsack:

Yes, just do it

Do Nike make bikes?

In reply to Postmanpat:

Yep, wonderful, isn't it. Can you imagine this in the UK? Me neither



Could do without that.

In reply to Postmanpat:


The British Eurosport feed with commentary from Harmon and Kelly is also the Eurosport international feed going to all countries without their own channel. Given the popularity of cycling in those countries UK/Irish viewers could well be the minority.

I was always a bit unsure about Kelly as a commentator, massive respect for his achievements in the sport and knowledge notwithstanding. I don't think he's changed one bit but this year he is hilarious, he'll say 3 words in 20 minutes that will have me giggling like a schoolgirl. Shame about Carlton Kirby though (although even he seems less annoying).

In reply to Postmanpat: Try watching it in Norwegian without knowing the quirks

In reply to Postmanpat:

ITV4, in the highlights program, 7 - 8 have been taking a topic a day. Chris Boardman takes something, like 'how do they feed', and he shows you how it happens, and explains the things that occasionally go wrong.

btw, he was the 'dour yourkshireman' I referred to above, a bit cryptic I know, he's a scouse but always seems a typical yourkshieerish grumpy bastard to me.

In reply to Fat Bumbly2:
No-one's mentioned Wiggo getting burnt by a fan holding a flare!

In reply to Removed UserStuart Mitchell:

A rider was very close to being taken out on a corner by a spectator in the National Crit in Otley a few weeks ago. That was a UK race where you could be within inches of the cyclists.

In reply to Tiberius: That was one of the best little topics... As i'd been wondering how they did that! I always thought they just had to stock up in the back pouches at the begining of the day.

In reply to Bob Hughes: amongst a few others.

In reply to Tiberius:

Chris Boardman's not a scouser he's from the Wirral. A woollyback.

In reply to Liam M:

Heretic !!!!

Liggett and Sherwen have been doing a great job for all the 25 years I've been watching. Really good at explaining the complexities of the sport. One thing you have to remember is that they have no control over the footage - they just have to commentate on the live feed they receive.

I quite like the way Paul Sherwen has this little nuggets of facts up his sleeve to throw in when the oppurtunity arises - the footage of the French countryside is one of the great aspects of the coverage. Another thing to bear in mind is that they are stuck in a portable studio a mile or so from the finish, and Sherwen will be listening to the Tour Radio (in French) whilst simultaenously commentating in English - impressive !

In reply to Chris the Tall: I agree in many ways it's impressive, but a few times over the last week I've watched the ITV highlights and then switched over to the Eurosport ones ( sad I know) and have enjoyed the latter more. They both have the same International feed, but I just find I prefer Hamon's presentation of it. Just a personal thing.

In reply to Swirly:

CK must rank as one of the worst commentators, period.
Indeed, yes, so, yes there you have it indeed..............

Harmon, Smith, sherwin. Could commentate on paint drying/grass growing or even cricket and make it watchable ;0)

In reply to Bob Hughes:

Loved his comments about sending the people who dropped the tacks to a football match :-O

In reply to Postmanpat:

How does your lowest common denominator coverage argument apply to other complex sports that get excellent viewing figures: say test match cricket coverage, or better still Rugby Union with its byzantine rules.

Go look at Letour website or wikipedia if you need more details: it hardly takes a brain surgeon to work out the answer to some of your questions. You've got this huge number of highly sponsored riders flogging themselves round France for pretty much 3 weeks and you wonder why they need a complex scoring system with lots of different prizes to act as an incentive?

In reply to Postmanpat:

really? i don't think ive ever watched a stage of any bike race - but more so the tour, where there isn't explanations for those that are new to bike racing.