No more prologues in TdF?

iainf72

It appears they get woeful viewing figures so ASO are thinking of not doing them

Which sort of sucks IMO, as I hate when grand tours start with a road stage

OffTheBackAdam

I bet money'll talk here. I bet host towns will get a better ROI from a prologue.

Paul 8v

I love the prologues, hope they don't go :-(

Tom Butcher

Can't say I'd miss them - the fewer time trial miles the better.

RichN95.

I'm surprised that they get worse TV figures than a bog standard flat stage, even if it finishes on a slope. Host towns surely like prologues - the spectacle goes on for hours regardless of where you are on the course.

secretsqirrel

I like a short almost insignificant prologue. The start of a GT can be a nervous time for a lot of riders, I would imagine getting that first smallish hurdle over might help to settle some of them down before the stages start in anger.

From a spectator point of view it is a bit like parading the racers around the paddock so that the punters can see what form they are in, and take some photos of their favourites. All good stuff.

Not sure about prologue TTTs tho', they are a different beast altogether. I prefer to see them as a shake up in the first week, which can otherwise be a bit dull.

Paul 8v

Yeah I wasn't a massive fan of the TTT prologue at the Vuelta, if they scrap the prologue at the start of the tour Boardman will hold the record forever :-)

emadden

I hope they dont scrap it... I love it as a start to any GT. I similarly hate massed-start opening stages. The Tour is quickly becoming a victim of its own success

deejay

SecretSqirrel wrote:

From a spectator point of view it is a bit like parading the racers around the paddock so that the punters can see what form they are in, and take some photos of their favourites. All good stuff.

Agreed.
We all can see the team colours on display Ie the smaller wild cards or any TDF rule changes like the Once team had.
The first road stage has a yellow (or whatever) jersey on show.

My only requirement would be to shoot stupid cameramen who only show bottom brackets, heads, brake levers or tyres on tarmac.

deejay

emadden wrote:

I hope they dont scrap it... I love it as a start to any GT. I similarly hate massed-start opening stages. The Tour is quickly becoming a victim of its own success

Remember the 2003 Giro start was changed from a Prolog to a road stage because Mario was world "ROAD" champion and they could show the Jersey on their hero for the day.

milton50

I personally would much rather have a short prologue to an entirely predictable and boring completely flat stage.

I'm surprised that they get worse TV figures than a bog standard flat stage

Same here.

afx237vi

RichN95 wrote:

I'm surprised that they get worse TV figures than a bog standard flat stage, even if it finishes on a slope. Host towns surely like prologues - the spectacle goes on for hours regardless of where you are on the course.

For a casual viewer, which is most of the people watching the Tour de France, what is more interesting? A road stage, which has ever-changing scenery, the potential for crashes, and an exciting sprint finalé... or a prologue with riders going one by one through the same bit of town centre for three hours.

TMR

iainf72 wrote:

It appears they get woeful viewing figures so ASO are thinking of not doing them

Which sort of sucks IMO, as I hate when grand tours start with a road stage

Individual TT is boring as hell. I'd be quite happy if they never featured ever again. Team TT however is total awesomesauce so they should keep that.

RichN95.

afx237vi wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

I'm surprised that they get worse TV figures than a bog standard flat stage, even if it finishes on a slope. Host towns surely like prologues - the spectacle goes on for hours regardless of where you are on the course.

For a casual viewer, which is most of the people watching the Tour de France, what is more interesting? A road stage, which has ever-changing scenery, the potential for crashes, and an exciting sprint finalé... or a prologue with riders going one by one through the same bit of town centre for three hours.

But conversely, they don't get to see the stars. They'll see Cavendish and Sagan for about 20 seconds, but there will be little sign of Wiggins, Contador, Gilbert, Cancellara etc, etc. Mostly they'll see someone like Bert Grabsch.

afx237vi

RichN95 wrote:

afx237vi wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

I'm surprised that they get worse TV figures than a bog standard flat stage, even if it finishes on a slope. Host towns surely like prologues - the spectacle goes on for hours regardless of where you are on the course.

For a casual viewer, which is most of the people watching the Tour de France, what is more interesting? A road stage, which has ever-changing scenery, the potential for crashes, and an exciting sprint finalé... or a prologue with riders going one by one through the same bit of town centre for three hours.

But conversely, they don't get to see the stars. They'll see Cavendish and Sagan for about 20 seconds, but there will be little sign of Wiggins, Contador, Gilbert, Cancellara etc, etc. Mostly they'll see someone like Bert Grabsch.

How's that different from a prologue? The first three hours are full of no-hopers the casual fan has never heard of, followed by a twenty minute period at the end where the contenders show their face. Part of the fun of a road stage is the nervous jostling, trying to spot where the GC contenders are positioned and waiting for a Schleck to crash. Much more fun.

Of course I'm only talking from a TV viewers' perspective. I understand how a prologue would be better for a host town or a fan by the road. You could have the best of both worlds if ASO had more stages where the start/finish was in the same town, or had a few laps at the end.

milton50

Part of the fun of a road stage is the nervous jostling, trying to spot where the GC contenders are positioned and waiting for a Schleck to crash.

You're being very generous though aren't you. What is much more likely is that there'll be four hours of absolutely nothing going on, with the break completely under control, then a completely predictable sprint at the end of it. The GC contenders will barely be seen all day as they are tucked away in the group.

At least with a prologue there is a build up because you know the GC contenders are going to have to battle each other right there on the first day. And a 20-30 second time gap after the prologue is often the catalyst for attacking as soon as the race gets to the first uphill stages. If you just start with a flat stage there'll be no time gaps and the GC guys will generally just mark each other for the first two weeks.

I mean I'm not against sprinters or sprint stages, I just would have thought that a prologue would be a better spectacle for TV viewers. And it certainly sets the race up better.

rick_chasey

Double stage.

Prologue in morning, 8-11. Shortish flat stage starting at 2.

inkyfingers

I like the split stages idea, used to be fairly common but apparently the the riders don't like them which I think is why they don't happen much these days.

rick_chasey

inkyfingers wrote:

I like the split stages idea, used to be fairly common but apparently the the riders don't like them which I think is why they don't happen much these days.

Pfft.

Fair enough if it's a chipper, but it's the Tour FFS.

Jez mon

I don't see anything to gain from a split stage, anyone want to enlighten me?

iainf72

Jez mon wrote:

I don't see anything to gain from a split stage, anyone want to enlighten me?

They used to have them quite a lot with road stage in morning (short, like 100km) and TTT in PM. It was quite good because it would be worthwhile attacking in the morning because you could get the yellow, for example, but it might be hard to hold it in the afternoon if you'd been in a break

FJS

iainf72 wrote:

Jez mon wrote:

I don't see anything to gain from a split stage, anyone want to enlighten me?

They used to have them quite a lot with road stage in morning (short, like 100km) and TTT in PM. It was quite good because it would be worthwhile attacking in the morning because you could get the yellow, for example, but it might be hard to hold it in the afternoon if you'd been in a break

Yep, especially for the grand depart weekend. In the 1990s the standard package the Grand Depart city/region used to get was a Saturday prologue, Sunday morning short stage start/finish, Sunday afternoon TTT and Monday start.

confused@BR

The split stage idea seems good. You could have a short prologue in the morning, say 25/30K and use the same route pm for, say, three laps. You would have a Yellow Jersey in the afternoon and the tight route would make it feasible to remove the worst of the Road Furniture to help with safety. Plenty of excitement for spectators and viewers alike.

greasedscotsman

confused@BR wrote:

You could have a short prologue in the morning, say 25/30K...

Short? At that distance it's not classified as a prologue!

Paul 8v

I thought they stopped the split stages because the riders said they were too hard and that's why they were taking drugs? That's what it said in my history of the tour de France book, can't remember when that was, some time in the 60's.Obviously this was just an excuse for the drug taking....

r0bh

afx237vi wrote:

How's that different from a prologue? The first three hours are full of no-hopers the casual fan has never heard of, followed by a twenty minute period at the end where the contenders show their face. Part of the fun of a road stage is the nervous jostling, trying to spot where the GC contenders are positioned and waiting for a Schleck to crash. Much more fun.

The casual fan does not watch three hours of a Tour stage :?

afx237vi

r0bh wrote:

afx237vi wrote:

How's that different from a prologue? The first three hours are full of no-hopers the casual fan has never heard of, followed by a twenty minute period at the end where the contenders show their face. Part of the fun of a road stage is the nervous jostling, trying to spot where the GC contenders are positioned and waiting for a Schleck to crash. Much more fun.

The casual fan does not watch three hours of a Tour stage :?

OK, the last hour, whatever.

Re split-stages: they're banned in grand tours. The Giro wanted a Ghisallo TT and a Milan crit in 2006, but it never happened: http://www.bikeradar.com/news/article/p ... tage-9849/

thomthom

The only thing they get from skipping the prologue is a half peloton by day 4 or 5.

Just start the thing off nice an easy with a prologue, shall we? Seems to work pretty well.

tailwindhome

Let's have the prologue on the Friday night.

Then we'll have a proper road stage on the Saturday.

inkyfingers

TailWindHome wrote:

Let's have the prologue on the Friday night.

That would be fun, but somebody would probably decide it's too dangerous to ride a bike in the dark and get it neutralised.

tailwindhome

inkyfingers wrote:

TailWindHome wrote:

Let's have the prologue on the Friday night.

That would be fun, but somebody would probably decide it's too dangerous to ride a bike in the dark and get it neutralised.

A neutralised prologue could be fun!

200 riders all doing coming off a start ramp and doing trackstands.