**Stage One** - Dusseldorf > Dusseldorf - Tour de France 2017 *SPOILERS*

craigus89

Quintana on a TT bike looks like my 11 year old nephew has stolen my bike.

Shame about Valverde, if only for the fact that he usually is relatively exciting to watch l.

Chuffed for G. Maybe he will pull a Froome on Froome!?

RichN95.

Bluemoon17 wrote:

Sky obviously nailed their tyre pressures- and who said marginal gains was dead?

I'd also add that the good early times from Kiryienka and Kwiatkowski would have left Froome and Thomas confident that they had the right set up as they went down the ramp.

Pross

Porte's attitude to this stage possibly summarised why he may never win a GT, he basically admitted to losing his nerve after following Roche and seeing him crash. I understand the cliche Rick complained about earlier of 'you can't win it on the first stage but you can lose it' but you still need to go for it to an extent when it looks on paper like the best chance you'll ever get.

rick_chasey

So lotto jumbo started on TT tyres which they now regret...

Lanterne_Rogue

I think it's too early to draw many conclusions other than Froome is in better shape than a lot of us expected, and Thomas must have had a heck of a ride.

Not even sure losing Valverde is that big a blow for Quintana - every GT they're both in features commentary to the effect of "Valverde's working for Quintana in this group. Not entirely sure how, but we presume he is. Ah, no, off he goes..."). There's a lot of time to get thirty seconds back.

salsiccia1

Rick Chasey wrote:

Spaniards complaining "if this was the Vuelta they'd be slamming the course route"

In fairness, looking at that corner being a relatively quick one, it's surely not beyond the organisers to have put some protection on the barriers. It does look negligent in hindsight.

Lanterne_Rogue

Rick Chasey wrote:

So lotto jumbo started on TT tyres which they now regret...

Not the only ones - Nicholas Roche confirmed to ITV he was on TT tyres. Millar pointed out quite a few others, and I'd doubt they were all Lotto Jumbo.

rick_chasey

Pross wrote:

Porte's attitude to this stage possibly summarised why he may never win a GT, he basically admitted to losing his nerve after following Roche and seeing him crash. I understand the cliche Rick complained about earlier of 'you can't win it on the first stage but you can lose it' but you still need to go for it to an extent when it looks on paper like the best chance you'll ever get.

What did Porte say?

Only heard Dutch speakers...

onyourright

All I heard was that Porte said he went extremely cautiously around the corners, something that was anyway obvious. Contador went even slower around some of them.

I think they were right to do that. This Tour will have plenty of other opportunities for risk-taking with a bigger pay-off.

Generally, the GC guys take unjustified risks on wet, short, TTs like today’s. The ones who get away with it might look clever, but that doesn’t change the fact that they relied on luck to get around. How do you think Valverde is feeling around now?

rick_chasey

You don't lose half a minute in a 14km time trial with 8 or so corners just by cornering a little slower....

RichN95.

If there's one cycling thing that the British are experts at it's flat ten mile time trials in the p1ssing rain

rick_chasey

RichN95 wrote:

If there's one cycling thing that the British are experts at it's flat ten mile time trials in the p1ssing rain

Fair.

Though how many flat TTs are there in Wales??

Honest question - never been.

Lanterne_Rogue

Rick Chasey wrote:

You don't lose half a minute in a 14km time trial with 8 or so corners just by cornering a little slower....

Quote in the Guardian is “I was nervous, tense, super careful on the corners. It wasn’t my best time trial.”

Implies that it affected his form elsewhere, as well as being slow in the corners. Being tense isn't really going to help your top speed.

m.r.m.

Rick Chasey wrote:

You don't lose half a minute in a 14km time trial with 8 or so corners just by cornering a little slower....

Why not? Wouldn't that just be like 4 seconds lost during run in braking phase, speed in the corner and subsequent more careful acceleration to not skid? Seems like you could easily lose that much to me. Especially if you get scared by the rain.

That being said, I don't think losing 30 seconds to Froome is not a big deal. I think it's pretty bad and puts enormous pressure on them now.

Pross

Rick Chasey wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

If there's one cycling thing that the British are experts at it's flat ten mile time trials in the p1ssing rain

Fair.

Though how many flat TTs are there in Wales??

Honest question - never been.

A fair few but they aren't as twisty as that one!

Mad_Malx

Froome looked cautious too though

onyourright

Froome did a French interview before he’d caught his breath. Said that Thomas’s win was great for the team, and he said that with more feeling than I’ve ever heard Froome say anything. He sounded genuinely happy.

You know what else he said? That he’s been doing nothing but time-trial training since the Dauphiné, and that it’s no accident that he did a good time trial today.

Pross

underlayunderlay wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

You don't lose half a minute in a 14km time trial with 8 or so corners just by cornering a little slower....

Quote in the Guardian is “I was nervous, tense, super careful on the corners. It wasn’t my best time trial.”

Implies that it affected his form elsewhere, as well as being slow in the corners. Being tense isn't really going to help your top speed.

Yep, that was about it. He said he'd been around in the car following Roche and saw him hit the deck leading to all that nervousness. Other than Valverde and Groenwegen I didn't really see anyone taking risks on the worst corners and Froome seemed to take them really carefully so it suggests Porte became over-cautious.

BelgianBeerGeek

Maybe a little complacency? The first week of the tour is about survival and day one is a rainy time trial. Perhaps some teams were a bit slack. Nico Roche when talking to Ned and David said pretty much "nah, leave the slicks on". The weather forecast was for pouring rain, and lots of riders/teams thought this?
Was this meant to be a dawdle in the park?

davidof

Above The Cows wrote:

Tony ain't galloping anymore.

Bad day for Gallopin, house broken into this AM. Car stolen, wife's knickers stolen and much else.

RichN95.

Patrick Bevin at Valverde corner - biggest hit a New Zealander took today

https://www.twitter.com/AshConing/statu ... 60/video/1

m.r.m.

Super common problem for athletes since their schedule is so public. Everyone tends to know when they are not home at specific points of the year.

m.r.m.

RichN95 wrote:

Patrick Bevin at Valverde corner - biggest hit a New Zealander took today

https://www.twitter.com/AshConing/statu ... 60/video/1

That bike clearly has a motor.

Is also quite amusing how little time is spent figuring out, "Am I ok?" and "Is he ok?" to get on the new bike and go go go. :shock:

lettingthedaysgoby

Froome with 30 seconds over his rivals.

Sky looking strong.

This could be a dull race

RichN95.

M.R.M. wrote:

Super common problem for athletes since their schedule is so public. Everyone tends to know when they are not home at specific points of the year.

I remember David Coulthard saying that while tax is the main reason sports people live in Monaco, another reason is the excellent security (he'd been robbed in England while at a GP)

m.r.m.

I can totally see that. Very common for NFL players in the US to get robbed as well when they are playing an away game. Mostly living somewhere with a door man, seems overly self important, but this is certainly one example of the benefit!

m.r.m.

davidof wrote:

Bad day for Gallopin, house broken into this AM. Car stolen, wife's knickers stolen and not much else.

I don't know. I couldn't resist.

The_Boy

RichN95 wrote:

Patrick Bevin at Valverde corner - biggest hit a New Zealander took today

https://www.twitter.com/AshConing/statu ... 60/video/1

The real news there is that canondale have fitted motors to both wheels.

m.r.m.

Or that Ryder at the Giro was the same team...

davidof

M.R.M. wrote:

Super common problem for athletes since their schedule is so public. Everyone tends to know when they are not home at specific points of the year.

Yes I bet, some local scroats most likely.