Vuelta a Espana

Tour of Spain (Cycling) in otherwords starts later today (Saturday) and what a race in pronises to be!

Normally the Vuelta is a sort if bridesmaid to the Tour de Feance but things are a bit different this year.

The top two favourites for TdF, Froome and Contador will both be here in a sort of last ditch attempt to get something out of their season. If they had both finished the TdF neither one of them would have recoved their 'legs' in time to race here.

Ok, so far so good. Another great rider who will be here is the Colombian super climber (drug free one asks?), who finished a close second to Froome is last years TdF and was expected to push him hard ahain this year, but for some unfathomable reason his team decided not to ride him in this years TdF and save him for this race.

We therefore have probably the top three riders in the world, unexpectedly riding in this race - Contador however may not be fully match fit after him crashing our of the TdF - hope he mind you.

If that isn't enough Spain's Joaquim Rodriguez who is one of the very best climbers in the world is here too after a very nasty crash in the Giro (Tour of Italy) and although he rode the TdF, he was clearly nowhere near fully recovered from it.

If this man is fit, he will produce fireworks on the massive mountain finishes the Vuelta is noted for.

Still not enough? Well Bury rider and star of the future Adam Yates will be riding in his first ever Tour and is aiming to win a stage (which he is capable of). Yates thinks his best chance is Stage 6, I hope he does it.

There's at least three other British riders in the Tour, with David Millar riding probably his last race, so expect him to try and win a stage from a long break away sometime throughout the race.

I'm really looking forward to the next three weeks, hope you get hooked on the race to.

Day's highlights usually on ITV4 at 7pm.

I hate cycling.It's right up there with Kabbadi. But each to his own,I'm always ready to be converted.
A recent cycling mishap of my own hasn't helped it's cause.

There's a lot more to the Tours than anyone who isn't into cycling would imagine.

(I like your cycling emoticon by the way)

In reality only a small hanfdul of riders can actually win the event itself, and even then they can only do it with the support of their team mates.

There are also a number of races within races, so sometimes different teams and riders will help each other but for different reasons.

There's also a lot of strategy involved and sometimes what you 'see' on the tv is not always what it appears.

Every day there is a 'race', known as a 'stage'. Some teams will not be bothered about them, whilst other teams will!

Teams which have riders who are capable of winning the Tour, will 'look after' them and nurse them through the bulk of the three weeks, whilst teams that aren't in with a top finisher will try to win stages, so as to get publicity for the team and more importantly its sponsor who basically pays their wages.

It can be quite complexed what is actually going on and why, yet on the surface to a casual viewer it is just a bunch of blokes cycling along a road.

Chuck in the randomness of chance, falls, drug failures, even sabotage and it all makes for a quite engrossing specticle.

Hope you can get into it Bonce, it is worth the effort because if you do get to like it, you will become hooked on just like Bread and myself have.

You already know my thoughts, Sluff.

Hasta La Vuelta!

Hope Yates can do his stuff, but as for Millar........his day is done. (As I suspect you already know, Sluff. Proper stuck in my craw seeing him delivering his "expert" advice during the Commonwealths about how hard it is to knuckle down and take the pain, given his history...)

Contador's back, as are Froome and Cadel (wher've you've been and why?) Evans.

Two of them are recovering from injury.

The other's not.......

As for Quintana......

Who knows.........

Coming from a cycling family and having been dragged out every Sunday morning as a 9 year old to do 100 miles with the Touring Club returning home late at night, saddle sore and exhausted, I hate cycling. Heading back to Bolton up Bull Hill in Darwen in the rain with a cape and souwester in the dark was not the best advert for the sport. No wonder I stuck with footie.

The story on Quintana is that he is the 'star' of his team and the teams sponsor (they basically call the shots) were launching their product (some phone techy stuff) in Italy earlier this year and wanted him in the Giro to front their campaign.

Not many do the Giro and have the legs to do TdF any justice (not without drugs anyway) so he is doing this race instead.

Evans, a great rider who probably did ride clean and suffered for it, is past his sell by date, did the Giro but was crap in it.  Probably will be his last Tour.

I think Millar might surprise you, he is a good rider (despite his drug years) and it's going to be his last chance to do anything, so I expect him to go for at least one stage - possibly even a lone breakaway from some distance out.

I think Froome will be the one to beat, unless Contador wasn't as banged up as we were led to believe in France.

Looking forward to it anyway.

The act of actually cycling is fine (I was a champion cyclist) but watching mens road cycling is up there with watching the fire die out, or watching the grass grow.

It's very much like watching womens cycling, but in fast forward.

I'm not a misogynist though.  

Copper Dragon wrote:The act of actually cycling is fine (I was a champion cyclist) but watching mens road cycling is up there with watching the fire die out, or watching the grass grow.

It's very much like watching womens cycling, but in fast forward.

I'm not a misogynist though.  

Bit of a giveaway there Stan you sexist barsteward.

I honestly thought that if Millar still had he legs, he'd do it in Scotland in front of a home crowd as some kind of last hurrah. (And one last chance to prove his former stage wins in La Tour, La Giro and La Vuelta weren't "dirty".)

What more incentive would you need to perform, if you were actually capable and could still do it if you were clean?

He never looked up for it, right from the off and he lost time at every checkpoint throughout the race.

It  was quite sad by the end because I was willing him to kick on and prove me wrong but he just looked old, sad and beaten......

Millar is getting on a bit relatively.
I think Tony Martin will push the Omega team to win the Andalusia time trial but it's very open with Movistar, Sky, Trek and others in contention.

I pretended to do it in my spinning class and won easily.

Go to bed.  

I reckon we should all club together on Nuts and send Boncey to Spain to compete.

He's the only one of us who says he still cycles regularly and I believe him.

(Nobody would cough to falling off on the way to the Dentist would they, if it wasn't true?)

Just think of the advertising!

"Team Nuts" on his chest, fucks it right up on a bend and winds up careering down some Spanish mountain side in a hail of swear words and lineament.

Brilliant!

We'd be on Sky in a flash.......!

(Love ya, Boncey!)

Breadman wrote:Go to bed.  

I will but I'm wired ATM.

M-u-s-t- s-l-e-e-p.....

Breadman wrote:I reckon we should all club together on Nuts and send Boncey to Spain to compete.

He's the only one of us who says he still cycles regularly and I believe him.

(Nobody would cough to falling off on the way to the Dentist would they, if it wasn't true?)

Just think of the advertising!

"Team Nuts" on his chest, fucks it right up on a bend and winds up careering down some Spanish mountain side in a hail of swear words and lineament.

Brilliant!

We'd be on Sky in a flash.......!

(Love ya, Boncey!)

I could beat those bastards on a unicycle. Would be shite on two wheels though as my little trip to the dentist proved. Nice of Bread to mention it. Again.
I might be open to conversion,because my first sight of NFL football left me cold,and I'm now an avid fan. Just took a little effort on my part to get to know the sport.

It is well worth the effort although to be honest the first day's racing in the Vuelta is the Team Time Trial (TTT), which is as boring as fcuk.

It's idea is to prime the Tour from the start, by giving a 'team' rather than an 'individual' the lead in the race so that for the first few days one team as something to 'defend' and the others to 'attack' until the race begins to take shape naturally over the coming week or so.

The race starts getting interesting when it gets to the mountain stages, everything before that is setting the scene so to speak.



Another rider to add to my ones to watch is Fabio Aru.  He finished third in the Giro and was superb, I'd never heard of him before then.  He's done nothing else all season since then so I don't know what's happened to him.  His team, Astana, is the is the one Nibali (winner of the TdF) rides for and as had a doping history in the past - so who knows whats what.

I believe also that Pinot (third on this years TdF) is riding also.

Chuck in Talansky, Van Den Brock (both American's despite their names), Uran, Sagan and Martin, then this really is a top class field indeed.


One difference in this race to the TdF is that there are time bonuses to the winners of stages.

Do you have a fave Tight End Bonce?  

Soul Kitchen wrote:Do you have a fave Tight End Bonce?  

 

Into the mountains tomorrow so the race should start to get more interesting for anyone who is bothered at all.

Froome fell off his bike (again!) yesterday but he looked ok today.

He's rode well so far - falling off apart - and looks the man to beat at the moment but Contador is looking good considering his recent 'broken' leg (seems a bit hard to believe about that now?).

Also the 1-2 of Quintana and Valverde being riders in the same team together. One of the two riders sacrifices himself, so his rivals have to chase him down (otherwise he will simply ride away and win), whilst the other rider just tags along at the back keeping himself fresh - then attacks himself whilst the others are knackered after chasing the first one down.

Evenly balanced at the moment I would say.

Should be a great couple of weeks riding from now on.

Until my next report -

Hasta la vista amigos!

You've got to give Froome credit for falling off early and getting back in the saddle though......

If you're going to fall off your bike, do it early enough to be able to get back on and power your way back to the head of the Peloton and protect your overall time, surely?

I just fear that he'd developing an uncanny ability to fall off, get injured and keep going until it becomes impossible to do so.

Like them Knights in that Monty Python film......

Breadman wrote:You've got to give Froome credit for falling off early and getting back in the saddle though......

If you're going to fall off your bike, do it early enough to be able to get back on and power your way back to the head of the Peloton and protect your overall time, surely?

I just fear that he'd developing an uncanny ability to fall off, get injured and keep going until it becomes impossible to do so.

Like them Knights in that Monty Python film......

Just shows you even the best can fall off.
Mind you,probably not wearing a pair of brown corduroy pants and a Wanderers training top.