S*** Small Races 2024

I thought the collapsed lung sounded scary but Dr Google suggests that it should sort itself out fairly rapidly so long as the excess pressure around it has been drained properly and he avoids scuba diving. Even Sports Dr Google seems to offer an encouraging prognosis for competition.

Once again, I read many armchair experts using hindsight to criticise the organisers for not anticipating a problem with that corner.

Few seem to be listening to Pello Bilbao and other local riders, who have been at pains to point out that the peloton chose to ride that penultimate climb tranquillo.

This in turn led to an almost entire peloton taking the descent, on mass.

Then factor in the fight for the front and that teams often use speed to try and split the peloton on descents (it is, after all, a legitimate tactic) and you have the root cause of yesterday’s incident.

If folks wish to play the blame game, then riders cannot be exempt from the pointing finger.

Accidents like this makes you think whether Armstrong and Froome had a point in limiting their racing to a few appearances, in order to focus on being healthy for the Tour.

Less than 3 months to fully recover, probably less than 2 months of training and maybe only a few weeks of proper training… very difficult to see JV as a contender.

Line came 70m too late for Carlos Rodriguez, thought he had it with 200m to go.

Gregoire takes it in a reduced sprint despite Carlton deciding it was Buchmann who finished a minute or so later. He also had a massive hard on for Hayter, decided he wanted him to win and called any Ineos rider near the front as him. He was even arguing with the official result until seeing the photo finish for himself.

Never understand these complete outsider bets. Yes the upside would be huge, but it practically never happens. Pogacar will beat him with one leg even after doing the Giro. And Roglic is still in the running as well. He wouldn't even be number 3 or 4 in the depth chart.

Did you actually watch the stage?

TGH did do a great job for Skjelmose, he set the pace up the final climb, and was only dropped when the GC riders started attacking, then got back on after the descent and went back to the front to close down a late attack by McNulty. Once that was closed down and it was clear it was going to finish in a reduced bunch sprint, he sat up and rolled in.

Yes I did but Carlton was calling it about 3 ks from the end when he was long blown.

What's the viewing order today?

Both Basque and Paris Roubaix Femmes are 2-5pm so priority will have to be to one over the other

Unless..... I put one on via the FireStick and another on the tablet

Oscar Onley going solo atm.

Carlos Rodriguez puts Skelmose into difficulty.