2016 TdF, Stage 12: Montpellier → Mont Ventoux (178km)

[The Hitch]

Re: Re:

Dumb fans boo Froome. Sky's charm offensive undone through no fault of their own.

Don't think it's that simple. The dumb fans who hate Froome for no reason will keep hating him, sure.

But real fans realise this wasn't his fault. And shouldn't hold the decision against him. You can hardly call for someone to act like a champion and complain when he tries to get back almost two minutes he lost through no fault of his own.

Fans who boo Froome are probably booing him for the wider fraud that he is, nothing to do with this incident. He's been booed before, that's why sky had to invent the urine narative to make the fans who boo him out to be bad

 

[infeXio]

Re: Re:

In 2011 stage 1 Contador's group got taken out by a spectator on a flat stage. He lost 1.20 and without that loss he would have been on the podium.

Why should spectators taking out riders suddenly be neutralised if its never been before?

I have lost a lot of respect for Quintana. What happened to not attacking an opponent that has suffered a mechanical or other misfortune as is the unwritten rule? Prior to the Porte/Froome crash Quintana had been dropped and was not going to be able to respond, he was loosing time on both of them. He should not have intentionally profited from their misfortune, that is just not done. Just another sign cycling is losing its traditions and etiquette.

Are you serious? :lol:

Did you expect Quintana to just climb off his bike and walk up the mountain holding hands with Froome?

 

[DirtyWorks]

Haha! Tejay denied again... I'm okay with that.

It's wrong that Yates loses time to Froome and Porte.

 

[Pricey_sky]

I'm fully aware that today was an absolute farce. I'm still extremely annoyed.

However please be aware that it is POST not POSTER. Any further personal attacks and you will be facing time off!

 

[SeriousSam]

Re: Re:

To me the best solution is to try and approximate what would have happened if the fans hadn't interfered.

I agree, but if this is done, it should be done consistently for misfortunes and it should be a very defensible approximation. To be fair to ASO, it is probably a lower bound of how much those 3 would have gained.

But because such adjustments aren't usually made it's just a big, bad looking double standard.

 

[doperhopper]

concerning the neutral bike - don't they have a version with strap pedals?

that would be a mercxian retro stunt

 

[myrideissteelerthanyours]

Are the creeps who mob up on the televised cols considered fans? When I am there it seems like a bunch of townies who want to stir up trouble and get on TV.

 

[vedrafjord]

Re:

WHERE IS THE PENALTY FOR FROOME? They've completely bottled this one...

Penalty for what? Technically according to the rules you can run the whole race as long as you cross the line with a bike (including in your hands like Rosa that time). He didn't break any rules.

 

[Escarabajo]

Re: Re:

In 2011 stage 1 Contador's group got taken out by a spectator on a flat stage. He lost 1.20 and without that loss he would have been on the podium.

Why should spectators taking out riders suddenly be neutralised if its never been before?

Because the whole situation would not have occurred if the race organisers had not stuffed up and only erected barriers for the last few 100 metres. Even the race winner stated he did not know where the finish was because there were no crowd barriers. Normally the barriers start a few km out from the finish line and if this had been done by the race organisers the whole situation would not have occurred. The organisers failed to protect the riders and the validity of the sport yet again.

I have lost a lot of respect for Quintana. What happened to not attacking an opponent that has suffered a mechanical or other misfortune as is the unwritten rule? Prior to the Porte/Froome crash Quintana had been dropped and was not going to be able to respond, he was loosing time on both of them. He should not have intentionally profited from their misfortune, that is just not done. Just another sign cycling is losing its traditions and etiquette.

What did he do? Am I missing something?
He was just bad!

 

[WillemS]

Re: Re:

Dumb fans boo Froome. Sky's charm offensive undone through no fault of their own.

Don't think it's that simple. The dumb fans who hate Froome for no reason will keep hating him, sure.

But real fans realise this wasn't his fault. And shouldn't hold the decision against him. You can hardly call for someone to act like a champion and complain when he tries to get back almost two minutes he lost through no fault of his own.

Fans who boo Froome are probably booing him for the wider fraud that he is, nothing to do with this incident. He's been booed before, that's why sky had to invent the urine narative to make the fans who boo him out to be bad

So, you're claiming that story was made-up?

 

[Gloin22]

Re: Re:

In 2011 stage 1 Contador's group got taken out by a spectator on a flat stage. He lost 1.20 and without that loss he would have been on the podium.

Why should spectators taking out riders suddenly be neutralised if its never been before?

Because times change??? 2011... different juries, different opinions.

And essentially, Tour PR. Tour would be mockery across the world and media if they let that stand like that.

So in other words, 1 rule for some, another rule for others. Why didn't they give Stybar the Paris Roubaix stone in 2013 when the fan took him out?

There's a right thing to do and a wrong thing to do. What they did back then has absolutely no impact as far as doing the right thing today.

In fact, I'm sure you bitched and moaned enough in 2011. What made you change your mind? If it was a fan and a fan alone in 2011 and the organizers did the wrong thing and penalized Alberto, the new organizers (or the same) can't learn with those mistakes?

You are only complaining because of irrational hate and blind fanboyism. You feel no one, Hitchens would've been sick.

For such an ''avid'' Hitchens follower it is surprising how for him one wrong has to be equalled by another wrong indeed.

 

[Matteo.]

In the end common sense and cycling won.

Even if we wanted to be precise, Mollema fell and he lost at least 15-20s.

 

[Ramira]

Re: Re:

And the yellow jersey losing almost 2 minutes due to a moron causing a bike crash isn't artificial? The simple fact is the crash caused an impossible situation. To me the best solution is to try and approximate what would have happened if the fans hadn't interfered. A bit like they have rules in baseball for fan interference with the ball.

You keep pretending as if no fan has ever influenced the outcome of the race. It happens.

Baseball is a terrible analogy unless you want barriers for every kilometer ridden.

Yes I want barriers in the final few km of every climb. This is getting out of hand. And it should never have happened.

And yes it happened before. But there was also an event earlier this tour, where a certain 1km banner dropped, which was in many ways comparable. Yet very few people complained about the time correction on that one.

In my opinion, when it's pretty clear what would have happened without fan interference, which in this case I believe is the case, the best course of action is to try and approximate those results.

 

[Lyon]

This is simply ASO trying to save face. *** happens.

 

[roundabout]

Re:

Should have neutralized at the crash, what would have happened if Mollema hadn't finished?

Probably would have been the Yates group time then

 

[Alexandre B.]

I fear commissaries will fan the flames of a Froome/Sky-hate among the public.

They only have themselves to blame for this.

 

[Jan the Man]

That it happened in the last KM is a factor in my opinion- notwithstanding the polemics concerning the 3km rule not generally applying for the mountain stages that is the obvious difference between this incident and a lot that have been quoted in the pages beforehand.

For example if this had happened on the flat stage with 1km to go and with identical gaps at the time of the crash nobody would back against the decision of awarding froome and porte s.t as Mollema at the end.

People's will always be clouded by favouritism toward one rider or another. In my view it is the correct and just decision from fairness point of view.

 

[The Hitch]

Re: Re:

I have lost a lot of respect for Quintana. What happened to not attacking an opponent that has suffered a mechanical or other misfortune as is the unwritten rule?

There is no such rule. You just invented it.

In fact, if there was such a rule, Froome and Sky would not have attacked QUintana's teammate Valverde in the 2012 Vuelta when he had a mechanical, thereby costing him 1 minute and the eventual win

 

[movingtarget]

I expect something strange in the TT tomorrow. It's been that sort of race.

 

[djpbaltimore]

Re: Re:

Well no, it's not artificial. Sure, it's a strange event that happened on the road, but the time gaps at the finish were still real. Taking them from a random point in the race, when riders would have been at different levels of fatigue/pacing themselves differently - is artificial.

Haha.. you are right. This is exactly what nature gave us. I hope that the time gaps blow up in the Alps and these finishing times do not influence the final GC too much. ASO was left with no good options, trying to figure out which was the 'least bad' one.

 

[huangho]

There are no fair results here, everybody lost today...

I'm waiting for a fan video showing what happened to the bike, this was unreal.

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Does anyone know what the time gap was when the accident happened ?

23 seconds

Wow I thought it was more than that.

Me too, such a gap suggests that the chasers were at least holding the gap, or perhaps even pulling the front three back slightly.

Of course, we can't be sure because we were forced to watch three minutes of the epic battle for fourth and fifth place on the stage instead.

 

[DirtyWorks]

Re: Re:

And then such an incident is happening insulting the whole Tour of France openly in the whole wide world.

In the long, long, long history of the Tour de France, plenty of fan incidents have occurred. It is part of the fabric of the event. ASO will get plenty of extra media attention today. Everybody wins.

 

[hfer07]

Just read The GC has been revised with Froome back in yellow. can anyone please post official GC to look up the results & time gaps ? Thanks

 

[samhocking]

I think had Froomes bike not been broken, the times would have stood. The fact neutral service bike was almost unrideable and team car blocked, because there was no barriers to hold the fans back, which incidentally caused the issue in the first place. I think taking times at 1km is good. Arguably Quintana 'might' have not lost as much time had Froome crashed, so Froome not advantaged, others on the attack like Porte & Mollema, obviously disadvantaged along with anyone who might have been attacking out of the Quintana group at the end. You can't please everybody. At least you know things are as least unfair as they can make it with the final decision. No team's going to appeal, it could be any GC rider, not Froome.