Riders knocked off by tour TV car

Fastlad
Fastlad Posts: 908
edited July 2011 in Pro race
Did you see the rider knocked off the road into the barbed wire fence??? Unforgiveable IMO The driver should be sacked immediately, irrespective of the fact he was avoiding a tree. :evil:
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Comments

  • oscar-j
    oscar-j Posts: 269
    Fastlad wrote:
    Did you see the rider knocked off the road into the barbed wire fence??? Unforgiveable IMO The driver should be sacked immediately, irrespective of the fact he was avoiding a tree. :evil:

    Outragous! Couldn't believe what i was watching.
    By the way,i think you've made a typo and accidentely added an 's' in the middle of your name! :wink:
  • RowCycle
    RowCycle Posts: 367
    Just seen it, unbelievable, unforgivable
  • brakelever
    brakelever Posts: 158
    Made for pretty grim viewing , bad day in general for crashes though, will action be taken against the media car involved ?
  • Neil McC
    Neil McC Posts: 625
    brakelever wrote:
    Made for pretty grim viewing , bad day in general for crashes though, will action be taken against the media car involved ?


    Latest is that car and driver have been ejected from the race. Hopefully more action to follow for the driver.

    For those who come into the thread having not seen the incident

    Video http://ewoud.home.xs4all.nl/cycling/201 ... crash.html

    Pic http://static.vg.no/uploaded/image/bild ... 48_900.jpg

    Pic http://www.nieuwsblad.be/Assets/Images_ ... pg.767.jpg
  • ademort
    ademort Posts: 1,924
    Johnny Hoogerland has just visited hospital he ended up having 33 stitches alltogether in three large wounds. He is very optimistic about starting Tuesda,s stage. Tomorrow Vacansloeil will lodge an official complaint about the incident. It really was unforgivable from the driver of the Car. Apparently the driver was given permission to overtake the group by the tour bosses but the only reason they wanted to pass the group was that Voeckler had asked for a bidon but his team car could not get through as the offending French TV car was blocking them.I,m currently watching the Dutch TDF programme and i can tell you the only discussion of the day is about what to do with the driver of that car. :(
    Ademort
    ademort
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  • MaxwellBygraves
    MaxwellBygraves Posts: 1,353
    Christ, that last pic :o:o really feel for the guy ,can understand the tears...
    "That's it! You people have stood in my way long enough. I'm going to clown college! " - Homer
  • Too old for this
    Too old for this Posts: 128
    Absoluteley disgraceful peice of driving, I thought that the cars were suppose to give priority to the racers. The idiot should have hit the brakes not the rider. Should be removed from the tour permanently. :evil:
  • Fastlad
    Fastlad Posts: 908
    Hmmm. I've never seen anything like it in the tour. I think Hoogerland was VERY lucky to escape with his life!!! His tears on the podium said it all!!!! I noticed in the highlights the driver was being filmed at the end of the stage, covering his face. He really should be handing in the car keys and going home. I hope he does. Hoogerland said it was just an accident but i reckon at best it was a serious lack of judgement!



    @ oscar. Yeah your correct, I USED to be fast lol
  • Yorkman
    Yorkman Posts: 290
    Hoogerland and Flecha won today's most combative rider prize, I bet they both felt it was worth it.....
  • erifles
    erifles Posts: 5
    Voeckler is the Don for managing to stay upright. Have another look at the video :shock:
  • campagone
    campagone Posts: 270
    It's a good thing the fence post was a bit rotten gave way when he hit it, doesn't bear thinking what would have happened if was a bit more sturdy. Hope he continues in the race but I don't expect to see him in any more breaks for a while.
  • NorwegianBlue
    NorwegianBlue Posts: 484
    Whether or not the driver hit the riders he should have been ejected from the tour. He was clearly driving on the grass to get round the riders, dangerous driving even without the tree which he clearly didn't see until the last second.

    The question is will the police be taking action against him for dangerous driving. Probably not since he works for a french TV company. Now if it had been a foreign TV company...
    "Swearing, it turns out, is big and clever" - Jarvis Cocker
  • rick_chasey
    rick_chasey Posts: 75,661
    NorwegianBlue wrote:
    Whether or not the driver hit the riders he should have been ejected from the tour. He was clearly driving on the grass to get round the riders, dangerous driving even without the tree which he clearly didn't see until the last second.

    The question is will the police be taking action against him for dangerous driving. Probably not since he works for a french TV company. Now if it had been a foreign TV company...

    Really? It's on French TV, on public roads, and as the inner ring tweeted, just because it's the tour doesn't keep them from anything criminal.

    They're not owned by news international anyway, so they probably won't bribe their way out.
    _
  • MattC59
    MattC59 Posts: 5,408
    Too old for this wrote:
    Absoluteley disgraceful peice of driving, I thought that the cars were suppose to give priority to the racers. The idiot should have hit the brakes not the rider. Should be removed from the tour permanently. :evil:
    He shouldn't have been given permission to pass. The problem is, if he'd hit the brakes there would have been an awful lot of other riders piling into the back of him, and if he hadn't swerved, he'd have hit the tree. I'm not excusing him, but he was somewhat stuch between a rock and a hard place.[/b]
    Science adjusts it’s beliefs based on what’s observed.
    Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved
  • cougie
    cougie Posts: 22,512
    There were no riders behind the French car. She was taking risks to overtake the riders on a narrow road. Just bad driving - unfortunately there is a lot of it around.
  • Fastlad
    Fastlad Posts: 908
    The driver saved his own skin....at the expense of a few riders. He must surely be the most unpopular member of the whole tour tonight? I really expect to hear he's been sacked by the start of tuesday's stage.
  • Too old for this
    Too old for this Posts: 128
    The other riders were approx 4 1/2 minutes behind.
  • tremayne
    tremayne Posts: 378
    Utter disgrace. No doubt in my mind she took a split second decision which was riders or tree. Decided on riders. Lock her up for a night please.
  • Fastlad
    Fastlad Posts: 908
    Was it a lady driver?? Please dont tell me it was :roll:
  • bicyclepirate
    bicyclepirate Posts: 229
    That crash was hard core. But as the rider said accidents happen, of course it was the drivers fault and I'm sure he knows it. It actually looks like the driver was concentrating on how close they were to the riders and didn't see the tree until it was too late. Braking wouldn't have done anything. It needed to be ditched, hope the rest day makes the difference and both riders make Tuesday's start.
    All hail the FSM and his noodly appendage!
  • dennisn
    dennisn Posts: 10,601
    MaxwellBygraves wrote:
    Christ, that last pic :o:o really feel for the guy ,can understand the tears...

    On that last picture my wife said he looked like someone "cained" him.
  • cougie
    cougie Posts: 22,512
    On the itv highlights it showed a woman driving it after the race.
    A lot of the drivers are ex riders so they at least have experience of the peletoton.
    I'm not sure what qualifications this woman had ? Driving in the tour doesn't look the easiest thing to do.
  • dennisn
    dennisn Posts: 10,601
    cougie wrote:
    On the itv highlights it showed a woman driving it after the race.
    A lot of the drivers are ex riders so they at least have experience of the peletoton.
    I'm not sure what qualifications this woman had ? Driving in the tour doesn't look the easiest thing to do.

    +1....Way, way, way more going on in a team car or media car than the usual Sunday drive. Cameramen trying to get the good shot, mechanics and doctors leaning out of windows doing all manner of crazy things, cars running bumper to bumper, narrow roads, motorcycles all over the place, and drivers are supposed to have it all together.
    Almost seems a miracle that it doesn't happen more often.
  • MattC59
    MattC59 Posts: 5,408
    cougie wrote:
    There were no riders behind the French car. She was taking risks to overtake the riders on a narrow road. Just bad driving - unfortunately there is a lot of it around.
    You're right, my mistake, but there would more than likely have been a couple of the motorbikes and team cars involved in the crash.
    Science adjusts it’s beliefs based on what’s observed.
    Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved
  • paulcuthbert
    paulcuthbert Posts: 1,016
    I was impressed by Hoogerland in the post-race interview. He wasn't angry at all. Can imagine some people flying off the handle and going for the idiot who caused it. But it seemed like he was very accepting of it, pretty much along the lines of 'these things happen'. I guess he feels lucky to be alive.

    Shocking stuff though. Can imagine there will be new rules about cars after this incident
    The most painful climb in Northern Ireland http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs200.snc1/6776_124247198694_548863694_2335754_8016178_n.jpg
  • cougie
    cougie Posts: 22,512
    MattC59 wrote:
    cougie wrote:
    There were no riders behind the French car. She was taking risks to overtake the riders on a narrow road. Just bad driving - unfortunately there is a lot of it around.
    You're right, my mistake, but there would more than likely have been a couple of the motorbikes and team cars involved in the crash.

    Hopefully team cars would drive better and not be right up the chuff of this idiotically driven car. I'd rather a possible shunt between cars rather than a definite knocking off of a rider ?
  • mididoctors
    mididoctors Posts: 18,795
    Its not unprecedented scott sunderland was taken out by pino driving a team IIRC
    "If I was a 38 year old man, I definitely wouldn't be riding a bright yellow bike with Hello Kitty disc wheels, put it that way. What we're witnessing here is the world's most high profile mid-life crisis" Afx237vi Mon Jul 20, 2009 2:43 pm
  • airwise
    airwise Posts: 248
    I think we need to know the sex of the driver - if only to spice up the odd "domestic" :wink:

    On a serious note the ASO are proving themselves to be completely incapable of running this event safely. Given how poor their organisation is of the Etape every year it should come as no surprise.

    Never before has the team's need for a properly organised and run breakaway series been more clearly put into relief.
  • BikingBernie
    BikingBernie Posts: 2,163
    Fastlad wrote:
    Was it a lady driver?? Please dont tell me it was :roll:
    Mmm. The old 'men are better drivers than women' fallacy rears its ugly head. Whilst it might be the case that, as a group, female drivers are slightly more prone to making errors of visuo-spatial judgement than males (with many women actually being far better than the average male in this respect) this is offset by the fact that males tend to drive more aggresively, be over-confident in their abilities and show a greater contempt for the law than female drivers. It is also the case that, in the UK at least, 94% of all drivers charged with causing death by dangerous driving are male.

    Viz once printed a rather accurate parody of the above observation.



    male_drivers.jpg
  • Anonymous
    Anonymous Posts: 79,667
    Not that it matters much (except for bar room banter :lol: ) but I think it was a bloke driving, then a woman took over?

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