Froome displays his prowess

One of the most anticipated stages of this years tour de France certainly didn't disappoint and it was yellow jersey holder Chris Froome (Team Sky) who showed who was boss of this years race.

The climb up daunting Mount Ventoux is 21 kilometers of unrelenting torture and it didn't take long before the pressure of Team Sky, namely Richie Porte, started to separate the contenders for the pretenders.

The anticipated show down between Froome and Contador was looming and when Porte dropped off after doing his jo,b within seconds Froome raised the pace. Contador was unable to match him and Froome rode away to join Quintana of MoviStar before leaving him behind as well and crossing the line for the stage win and cementing his right as race leader.

With all the talk of the possible weakness of Team Sky, they again proved they have what it takes and Froome can do it alone when necessary.

Contador admitted he couldn't keep the pace, but also said the race wasn't over. With the alps to come and days of multiple climbs he still believes he can break Froome. Only time will tell, but there would need to be a fairy tale come true for Contador to claw back the 4:25 he needs to in order to take the yellow jersey.

However, for me one of the highlights of the day was Peter Sagan. He managed to take off with the early break away in order to gain the sprint points for the green jersey which he took, now maintaining an almost unbeatable lead.

After his effort taking the uncontested sprint Sagan continued on only surrendering at the beginning of the Mount Ventoux climb. But in pure Sagan Style he didn't just casually rejoin the peloton, no, he marked the occasion with a one handed wheelie!

Gotta love his spirit!
You can view a snippet of it at http://video.cairns.com.au/v/123382/Peter-Sagan-pulls-wheelie-midstage-in-Tour-de-France

Reckless Cav?

Stage 10 of the tour delivered on an exciting sprint finish with Marcel Kittel taking the points over Andre Greipel, Mark Cavendish and Peter Sagan. But it was Cav everyone was talking about after an interesting incident with Tom Veelers only 100 meters from the line.

Amazingly after the 'shove' 'bounce' 'clash' 'shoulder' or whatever you like to call it from Cav, Veelers was the only one to come crashing to the ground, but many riders including Matt Goss were held up and taken out of the sprint finish. And after much deliberation, Cav was controversially cleared of any wrong doing.

So what do you think? Was Cav simply 'following the road' or was he reckless?

You be the judge.

Should Froome be worried?

During last year's tour I wrote a blog post titled 'You are only as strong as your team.........leader' where I wrote about how Chris Froome almost tore the tour apart by almost upstaging his team leader and eventual winner Bradley Wiggins. Fast forward twelve months and this week we saw the brilliance of Chris Froome during stage 8, where he took a stranglehold on this years race, with amazing support of his team, notably Australian Richie Porte.

But....Stage 9 saw things take an unexpected turn and I could have very well titled this post 'You are only as strong as your....team.' Full Stop.

Poor Richie Porte had a tough day and couldn't keep the pace and ended up losing a huge chunk of time and team Movistar worked well to isolate Froome from his team and really test the waters of possibilities, although disappointingly not doing much more than that.

So the question needs to be asked...Should Chris Froome be worried?

Well, firstly it is the Tour de France and anything can happen. The race is three weeks long and there is so much to come.

Secondly, Chris Froome was, coming into this years race, a red hot favourite. The tour is Froome's ultimate goal this year and his form has been great. But is Team Sky the Team Sky we saw powerful and dominating at last year's race? On paper the answer would have to be no. And although they are certainly a strong team they have shown that they are far from unbeatable.

Stage 9 has certainly opened up the race once again. Katusha (Rodriguez), SaxoBank (Contador) and Movistar (Valverde) will all be bouyed by the events of yeserday which in turn will hopefully lead to some motivated attacks in the mountain stages to come.

All bodes for an exciting next two weeks, in which yes, Chris Froome should be worried right up until he is standing on that podium in Paris!

Tour Down Under 2014 Race Routes Announced

I was pretty excited yesterday when I received an email from the TDU announcing the 2014 stages.

Again we are booked in to make the 10 or so hour trek from country Victoria to Adelaide for the Tour Down Under. It is probably my favourite time of the year. Next year marks our 11th year in a row.

For 8 of those years we have stayed in holiday apartments in Glenelg, right on the beach; and next year will be no different. It's perfect base for the duration of the tour.

The 2014 stages include the regulars; the prologue now called the Peoples Choice Classic, stage 3 finish in pretty Stirling, penultimate stage 5 finish on top of Willunga Hill and the final stage in the city. The race also returns for a finish in Victor Harbour as well as finishes in Campbelltown and Angaston.

There are some new routes and again the tricky climb up Corkscrew Hill introduced last year will be a feature.

All bodes for another exciting and successful Tour Down Under. And I can't wait!

Are you a TDU faithful?

Aussie Media : Get your act together

Photo Courtesy of ninemsn.com 

Once again I watched the news bulletins today, both morning shows and evening news waiting, hoping that they would give Simon Gerrans' yellow jersey and Aussie team Orica-Green Edge's TTT win the coverage it deserves, only to be disappointed...yet again.

I shouldn't be surprised. After all the Tour de France is in July smack bang in the middle of football season. You would think that something as prestigious as the coveted yellow jersey and an Australian-owned cycling team leading the biggest annual sporting event in the world would deserve 30 seconds of coverage headlining at least the sport. But no, it was relegated to last in the bulletin receiving about 20 seconds of dismal footage.

The sad thing is, if one of the cyclists was found guilty of doping there is no doubt that would be top headline news, even leading the entire news.

No wonder there are so many skeptics dismissing our great sport when the only coverage considered newsworthy is negative.

Do you think cycling deserves more coverage on our news?

Orica-Green Edge Rocks Le Tour 2013

What an amazing Tour de France it is has been so far for our own Australian team Orica-Green Edge. Not only does Simon Gerrans pull off a gutsy win over none other than Peter Sagan in a sprint finish for Stage 2 but he now finds himself in the yellow jersey after Orica-Green Edge wins the Stage 3 Team Time Trial.

Look at those smiles! Bloody brilliant!

Photo courtesy of eurosport.com

Le Tour 2013

Well it's been a long time between drinks. It seems that life got in the way in the past few months but as the most important race of the year is here, so am I.

And what a start it has been.

After what should have been a beautiful and exciting first stage in Corsica we were left with a shambolic race. The good old Orica-Green Edge bus getting stuck under the finish line really caused mayhem and then crashes galore changed what should have been an awesome stage. Although I'm sure Kittel would disagree!

There is no doubt there is a lot of speculation for this years Tour. After a somewhat lackluster race last year cycling fans and yearning for a real battle and although some commentators are already writing Chris Froome's name in the record books I think it will be more than a one horse (or dog) race.

A few names that spring to mind are Contador, Rodriguez, Valverde, Evans and of course Froome.

But it is the Tour de France and anything can happen and most likely will.

I'm geared up for late nights surviving on 4-5 hours sleep but it will be all worth it. It always is!