Tour of Britain 2014

ManOfKent

Maps are now on the website, http://www.tourofbritain.co.uk/home.php.

Stage 1 (Sun 7 Sep) - Liverpool - ITT I presume
Stage 2 - Knowsley to Llandudno - one for the sprinters I presume
Stage 3 - Newtown to The Tumble (Abergavenny) - MTF
Stage 4 - Worcester to Bristol - includes Fish Hill above Broadway and a run through the Cotswolds
Stage 5 - Exmouth to Exeter - basically a big loop around Dartmoor
Stage 6 - Bath to Hemel Hempstead - sprint?
Stage 7 - Camberley to Brighton - undulating
Stage 8a (Sun 14 Sep, am) - London ITT
Stage 8b (Sun 14 Sep, pm) - London

Obvious comment: despite the organisers' preference for visiting all three countries to justify the name, they don't have a Scottish stage this year. The teams should be happier, with much shorter transfers this year.

Looks a decent route to me... Might Wiggo be tempted again?

Disclaimer: I know the guy who designs the route although apart from some teaser pictures on Facebook I had no idea what he was planning.

specialgueststar

Yorkshire featuring heavily and capitalising on Tour visit!!

Looks like no Lancashire either

r0bh

This was all done earlier in the year when the start and finish towns were announced, but the very reason it doesn't include Yorkshire (Tour), Scotland (Commonwealth Games), East Anglia (Women's Tour) is because they have already hosted big races this year. Share the wealth and all that. Plus now it is HC status the transfers have to be shorter (I think).

Oh and Stage 1 is a city centre circuit, not a TT

hammerite

No Stoke stage either. They must have come to the end of their agreement.

Pross

r0bh wrote:

This was all done earlier in the year when the start and finish towns were announced, but the very reason it doesn't include Yorkshire (Tour), Scotland (Commonwealth Games), East Anglia (Women's Tour) is because they have already hosted big races this year. Share the wealth and all that. Plus now it is HC status the transfers have to be shorter (I think).

Oh and Stage 1 is a city centre circuit, not a TT

Fortunately Abergavenny didn't host any big races this year

Pross

It's a shame the Tumble stage isn't on a weekend but I suspect the crowds will be massive. It's a perfect finish really as the hill is so easy to close off without impacting on too many residents (about 3 or 4 farms). I did think a Tuesday might be a problem as it was always Abergavenny's busiest day (market) but the livestock market has now moved out of town and changed days.

mr_poll

Stage 1 in Liverpool isn't an ITT they are doing laps of the city - Crit style.

Ber Nard

hammerite wrote:

No Stoke stage either. They must have come to the end of their agreement.

The council can't justify the expense, apparently.

chrisday

<Insert obligatory moan about "not coming to my part of UK"/"not whole UK" here>

<Insert onligatory response about regional funding/interest>

So, now that's out of the way, what do we actually think about the route? First glance suggests pretty good to me - more rolling/hilly stuff in there to keep it at least a bit challenging.

slowbike

Coming within 10 miles of my home this time ...

Just need to find a suitable spot to park up the Campervan and erect the "Go Wiggo Go" banners ...

doesn't matter if he's racing or not - it'll just pee off some anti Wiggo's ...

specialgueststar

mr_poll wrote:

Stage 1 in Liverpool isn't an ITT they are doing laps of the city - Crit style.

chance for a domestic rider to take the jersey?

ManOfKent

SpecialGuestStar wrote:

mr_poll wrote:

Stage 1 in Liverpool isn't an ITT they are doing laps of the city - Crit style.

chance for a domestic rider to take the jersey?

Could be. Although a few WT riders turned out for the Nocturne. Forward planning?
Also might be a crashfest, or relatively calm to avoid that.

Mad_Malx

Finish at Bristol is going to make a great afternoon out for me - steep climb up Bridge Valley Road to the line.
Quite excited by this already.

redvee

Mad_Malx wrote:

Finish at Bristol is going to make a great afternoon out for me - steep climb up Bridge Valley Road to the line.
Quite excited by this already.

Got the Wednesday and Friday off work for this. Looking at the route through Bristol some of my Strava times will be beaten, though not up Bridge Valley. The u-turn at the bottom will slow the riders down a little.
Off to Bath on Friday morning too.

Mad_Malx

redvee wrote:

Mad_Malx wrote:

Finish at Bristol is going to make a great afternoon out for me - steep climb up Bridge Valley Road to the line.
Quite excited by this already.

Got the Wednesday and Friday off work for this. Looking at the route through Bristol some of my Strava times will be beaten, though not up Bridge Valley. The u-turn at the bottom will slow the riders down a little.
Off to Bath on Friday morning too.

Same for me, I'll look out for a sheep on a bike. They are following my daily commute home from Bath, down Brassknocker (where I have managed to fall off twice in the same place) and up Winsley Hill on the other side of the valley. The latter is about 800m 9% average, so they will be slowed down a bit, although won't be racing much since it isn't long enough to be classified.

redvee

Might go out to Brassknocker and see if they fall off like you do

thefog

Nice to see the benefit of the HC status of the race with a number of new teams entering the Tour of Britain;

Officially confirmed
Sky
Garmin
Movistar
OPQS
Belkin
BMC
Giant
Tinkoff Saxo

Great Britain team

Unofficial
Cannondale
Katusha

Colombia
Bretagne Seche
UHC
Giant Shimano Development
NFTO
Madison
Raleigh
Trefor Blue-water

1 more Pro Conti team to confirm

Pross

No Rapha Condor?

milton50

ManOfKent wrote:

Stage 4 - Worcester to Bristol - includes Fish Hill above Broadway and a run through the Cotswolds

Awesome. Fish hill is legendary with local cyclists. It's one of, in not the, hardest climb in the cotswolds so it will be awesome watching some pros riding up it.

rob churchill

Comes by me on a Saturday
Dilemma though - where to watch, Ditchling Beacon or the finish line?

sbbefc

Im happy its coming past where I live in N Wales but its a pretty bland route they've chosen.

frisbee

Milton50 wrote:

ManOfKent wrote:

Stage 4 - Worcester to Bristol - includes Fish Hill above Broadway and a run through the Cotswolds

Awesome. Fish hill is legendary with local cyclists. It's one of, in not the, hardest climb in the cotswolds so it will be awesome watching some pros riding up it.

Looking at the map, it's not going up Fish Hill (that's the A44 out of Broadway) but up Snowshill (which isn't that hard), down Stanway, over Cleeve Hill, Harp Hill (but unfortunately not going up Agg's Hill, which is one of the hardest in the Cotswolds) then up Leckhampton Hill.

Goes within about 200 feet of my house on this part of the route.

mfin

I think we need lots of complete strangers saying it's coming near them, so what, it's going to go by stacks of people, it's in this country FFS. Oh, I had a Twix this afternoon by the way, that's interesting, oh hang on, it's not.

mfin

Some of the stages taking in different areas than last few editions, are there any stage profiles or lists of key climbs?

Perhaps it would actually be good if people who know the routes could bullet out the key climbs they know of on each stage with some %ages and lengths. That might help people who want to go see it who aren't local to any of the stages? Naming hills with not much info doesn't help much.

FocusZing

mfin wrote:

I think we need lots of complete strangers saying it's coming near them, so what, it's going to go by stacks of people, it's in this country FFS. Oh, I had a Twix this afternoon by the way, that's interesting, oh hang on, it's not.

Berk.

mfin

FocusZing wrote:

mfin wrote:

I think we need lots of complete strangers saying it's coming near them, so what, it's going to go by stacks of people, it's in this country FFS. Oh, I had a Twix this afternoon by the way, that's interesting, oh hang on, it's not.

Berk.

Definitely

Good point though I thought, it is about as interesting, oh, I just had a glass of water too and earlier I bought some stamps as I had to send a birthday card off today.

FocusZing

mfin wrote:

FocusZing wrote:

mfin wrote:

I think we need lots of complete strangers saying it's coming near them, so what, it's going to go by stacks of people, it's in this country FFS. Oh, I had a Twix this afternoon by the way, that's interesting, oh hang on, it's not.

Berk.

Definitely

Good point though I thought, it is about as interesting, oh, I just had a glass of water too and earlier I bought some stamps as I had to send a birthday card off today.

Ha:) it's good to see people getting enthused.

frisbee

mfin wrote:

Some of the stages taking in different areas than last few editions, are there any stage profiles or lists of key climbs?

Perhaps it would actually be good if people who know the routes could bullet out the key climbs they know of on each stage with some %ages and lengths. That might help people who want to go see it who aren't local to any of the stages? Naming hills with not much info doesn't help much.

With the name of the hill, you can search for it on Strava and get a good idea of difficulty and popularity.

The hills I know on Worcester to Bristol.

Snowshill

Cleeve Hill

milton50

frisbee wrote:

Milton50 wrote:

ManOfKent wrote:

Stage 4 - Worcester to Bristol - includes Fish Hill above Broadway and a run through the Cotswolds

Awesome. Fish hill is legendary with local cyclists. It's one of, in not the, hardest climb in the cotswolds so it will be awesome watching some pros riding up it.

Looking at the map, it's not going up Fish Hill (that's the A44 out of Broadway) but up Snowshill (which isn't that hard), down Stanway, over Cleeve Hill, Harp Hill (but unfortunately not going up Agg's Hill, which is one of the hardest in the Cotswolds) then up Leckhampton Hill.

Goes within about 200 feet of my house on this part of the route.

Damn. It would have been good but the route still looks pretty decent.

andy_wrx

Will it actually have any difficult hills ?

The problem is that it's a rolling-road closure event, and they've only got a limited number of motorbikes, so they can't have a field which fractures-up into multiple breaks with decent time gaps between them because they just can't keep the roads closed for long enough so they're forced to pick a relatively bland route which keeps the field together.

It'll be different in Swansea because it's essentially a closed-off circuit at the finish, so someone can break away at the end, but for the other stages, for the sake of the telly, a break will be allowed to go up the road but it'll only be two or three minutes and it'll be pulled-in again by the finish.

jimmythecuckoo

I am travelling west on the day of the Bath stage so will try and intercept the race on the way.

Dare2B have taken over kit supply.