Tour De France 2013

[bennydorano]

Off to France on hols tomorrow & hoping to take in a stage, prob going to miss most of the TV coverage this year.

Was looking at the betting last nite & the race for Yellow & Green are 2 non events betting wise.  Only bet i've done is for Thomas De Gendt (Vacansolieu) to finish in the Top 10 @ 6/1. Cavendish unbackable for the opening stage, i'll have an EW bet on Nacer Bouhanni of FDJ @ 17/1 for an interest, he's been having a good year.

[Billys Boots]

Did I see mutterings that Dan Martin had a decent chance of leading the Garmin team on this outing?

[Donnellys Hollow]

He was interviewed on the radio by Myles Dungan the other day and he said that both he and Hesjedal would start out as joint leaders. They will then narrow it down later in the race. It would be great to see him win a stage and the route this year should provide him with some opportunities.

Hopefully the GC will not be another Sky procession this year and Contador puts up a good fight. Froome looks very strong though.

The green jersey might be the most interesting of the lot. Sagan probably the favourite but Cav will have a whole team behind him unlike last year.

[bennydorano]

Sky have no chance of repeating last year's tactics successfully, although Froome will probably still win, Contador, Rodriguez, Cadel, Schleck, Betencur, Quintana, Valverde, Hejesdal & Martin will be attacking all over the shop, plus they'll have to watch opportunist punchers like Voeckler, Chavanal, Sandy Casar, Sammy Sanchez,   Infinitely stronger field this year and a climbers course as well.

[Syferus]

I got an email from the Sindo loudly proclaiming Paul Kimmage would be 'living and breathing' this year's tour within their pages. The Armstrong bump, if you will.

[bennydorano]

There hasn't been a peep from Kimmage on twitter since some of his UCI fighting fund went missing (not him Father Tedding it btw).  His documentary should be well worth the viewing when it appears.

[gerry]

Off to France on hols tomorrow & hoping to take in a stage, prob going to miss most of the TV coverage this year.

Was looking at the betting last nite & the race for Yellow & Green are 2 non events betting wise.  Only bet i've done is for Thomas De Gendt (Vacansolieu) to finish in the Top 10 @ 6/1. Cavendish unbackable for the opening stage, i'll have an EW bet on Nacer Bouhanni of FDJ @ 17/1 for an interest, he's been having a good year.

if your on alp de huez on the thursday and see a guy with a tricolour and a tyrone flag what will be me

[maddog]

Crazy finish to the first stage into Bastia. One of the team buses got stuck under the finishing banner when the riders were about 15mins from the finish. They tried to relay to the riders that the race would finish at the 3km to go banner which looked to me to be on an S bend , eventually they got the trapped bus moved and managed to relay to the riders that the finish would be in original place although Kittel said after they knew nothing about the trapped bus which means had it have stayed there they would have had to stop the race.
In the meantime Andre Greipel looked to take out about 30 riders including Sagan and Cavendish, leaving Kittel to win fairly handy in what was left of the bunch. How the hell could they have set the finishing banner lower than the height of the team buses. All in all a chaotic first day. Sprinters will probably struggle tomorrow with possible exception of Sagan. A 4000+ foot climb 50km from the end should see a good few of them off. Could be a day for the strongmen like Gilbert Boassan Hagen or maybe even Voeckler. Corsica looks like some spot

[gerry]

very quiet with benny gone.

an interesting video here, if this was a big name rider he would still be cycling

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIVzJ2kKh5U

[Eamonnca1]

Is it just me or is Cavendish an arrogant p***k?

[gerry]

its you,  he has to have self belief to win the stage but he is the first to thank his team after each win

[ONeill]

Roche going well again.

[nrico2006]

Is it just me or is Cavendish an arrogant p***k?

An arrogant p***k he is, and one that will probably finish about 200th in the TDF this year but will be lauded by the Brits as being brilliant for winning a few wee stages.

[ludermor]

Is it just me or is Cavendish an arrogant p***k?

An arrogant p***k he is, and one that will probably finish about 200th in the TDF this year but will be lauded by the Britsd as being brilliant for winning a few wee stages.

What a stupid ignorant post, happens every year

[nrico2006]

Is it just me or is Cavendish an arrogant p***k?

An arrogant p***k he is, and one that will probably finish about 200th in the TDF this year but will be lauded by the Britsd as being brilliant for winning a few wee stages.

What a stupid ignorant post, happens every year

What a stupid, ambiguous post.