Tour de France Tour de France 2021, Stage 3: Lorient - Pontivy, 183.9 km

[HelloDolly]

Sagan’s bike handling is amazing. The donkey falls in front of him but he still manages to protect himself without serious injuries.

Dont talk to me about Sagan ...the way he rides...saw him totally push Cees Bol and nearing caused him to crash so Bol practically sat up

The Secret Pro was right about Sagan

 

[Broccolidwarf]

absolutely no discussion of the solution:

6 man teams.

120-132 riders at the start.

Ok

Bye

 

[Big Doopie]

it cannot be said enough what an absolute tool wiggins is.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

lol here we go. Default CN response anytime something like this happens to the riders. Time to slurp some ASO boot.

This is always your take, yet many people on here, myself included, have criticized the riders in certain situations (like the Giro stage shortening) and race organisers on others (like today). It really isn't that black and white.

 

[Tim Cahill]

I haven't seen a stage that brutal since I first started watching in 1999, Passage Du Gois. Unfortunately, and wishing them well, whilst the Thomas, Roglic and Ewan crashes can be put down to rider error, that downhill narrow corner around 4k to go is a pretty ludicrous situation for such a huge peloton to be put in.

 

[Ricco']

Bahrain can't get any luck this year with their GT captains.

Time for Bilbao and Poels to channel their inner Caruso.

 

[movingtarget]

Hope Rog is ok, otherwise I guess WVA is in 4th as plan B?

He will have to be affected going into the TT.

 

[titan31]

On the other hand, the more warrying terrain, of warrying quality, you use, the more dangerous the race becomes, but also the more exiting to watch.

You need riders to have an exciting race though. Not going to be very fun when everyone is out or banged up so they can't perform at their best.

 

[Breezy1985]

lol Roglic just got body checked off the road by Colbrelli, had nothing to do with rust

Its the UCIs fault Colbrelli hit him. Only riders care about safety

 

[mavmav]

People claiming it’s the riders fault sound like F1 organizers in the 60s who didn’t want to build barriers around the track despite several deaths during a season because it would eat into their revenue. Drivers should simply drive less fast if they can’t keep their car on the road was their argument…

ASO and the likes still act like it’s 1980. Because it’s in their benefit financially. Appalling that many on this forum agree with them…

The riders race to win. As hard as possible. That is literally their job. in that situation accidents will happen. But it’s the organizers and governing body’s responsibility to take every safety measure in their control to minimize the possibility for accidents and their consequences.

 

[woodburn]

lol Roglic just got body checked off the road by Colbrelli, had nothing to do with rust

Yeah. Fail to see how Roglic is to blame. He's near the front and guy next to him bumps him down unexpectedly and sends him off the road.

 

[wheresmybrakes]

Why? Seems like the riders had predicted what would happen with this course design of downhill finish with sharp turns on first sprint stage. Tour didn't listen to them and now some guys have serious injuries.

It might seem like nothing to you but these wipe out months and years of work and are painful and difficult to recover from. They're not robots out there. It's not a video game. Riders have to advocate for their safety or nobody else will.

So the riders knew about the design on the first sprint stage and still decided to race full gas into it. Couldn't the riders not get together and decide for the GC guys to ease up on the approach to the dangerous part and let the sprint teams go for the stage win. If the authorities are not gonna listen, then maybe the riders themselves have to make a decision and let the powers that be know they are not putting up with it.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

How were Rog, Thomas and Sagan predictable

Thomas was not in the finale. The road furniture made it more likely but ASO can hardly avoid it three weeks straight.

Roglic, and other crashes prior to 4k, were predictable because there's much less room for error on a narrow road with sloping sides, so smaller mistakes than usual cause crashes.

Sagan/Ewan was predictable because a S-curve in full sprint is dangerous, especially after a false flat downhill, although Ewan did make a very bad manoeuvre there.

 

[Volderke]

All the crashes hurt to the eyes.

After some thoughts, I still feel riders are mostly to blame:

1. Roglic touched wheels (with Colbrelli). Avoidable.
2. Haig crashed in a tight turn, BECAUSE his team mate Mohoric strung out the field at a very high pace going through those curves. Avoidable, but also the oraniser to blame for putting in these kind of chicanes in the last 10K.
3. Ewan touched wheels with Merlier. Avoidable.

 

[Brumdog66]

it cannot be said enough what an absolute tool wiggins is.

Looks like he's auditioning for the role of Blofeld

 

[King Of The Wolds]

I haven't seen a stage that brutal since I first started watching in 1999, Passage Du Gois. Unfortunately, and wishing them well, whilst the Thomas, Roglic and Ewan crashes can be put down to rider error, that downhill narrow corner around 4k to go is a pretty ludicrous situation for such a huge peloton to be put in.

Agree with every word of that.

 

[IndianCyclist]

In these cases personal bias clouds judgement. If someone crashes & loses the GC, people who don't like that guy tend to cheer.



Case in point. What sort of projecting fantastical stuff is this? From the camera view we all saw, he was seemingly jettisoned out to the left for xyz reasons.

You don't know so your 'theory' is not worth much.

Yes i know. That is why it is called not 'theory' but hypothesis/opinion. Yet u thought it was worth replying

 

[Nick2413]

I think it’s important to make a distinction in which crashes are caused by course design versus rider error or natural bike racing. A steep winding downhill at the end of a sprint stage is probably fair to blame, but most of the crashes so far this tour seem to not be due to course design. I also second the person who said field size is part of the problem. Having 184 riders wheel to wheel creates a lot more congestion than 120 or 140. It’s really unfortunate that almost all the big hitters and teams have been uprooted so far, but if you look into the details a lot of it has nothing to do with course design.

 

[Rollthedice]

All the crashes hurt to the eyes.

After some thoughts, I still feel riders are mostly to blame:

1. Roglic touched wheels (with Colbrelli). Avoidable.
2. Haig crashed in a tight turn, BECAUSE his team mate Mohoric strung out the field at a very high pace going through those curves. Avoidable, but also the oraniser to blame for putting in these kind of chicanes in the last 10K.
3. Ewan touched wheels with Merlier. Avoidable.

Thomas touched wheels with a speed bump, avoidable.

 

[spalco]

Dont talk to me about Sagan ...the way he rides...saw him totally push Cees Bol and nearing caused him to crash so Bol practically sat up

The Secret Pro was right about Sagan

***, I just rewatched, if you mean the "incident" at about 400m to go, that was a gentle, totally normal nudge, can't even say Sagan initiated it, that wasn't dangerous at all.

 

[Eclipse]

All I can say is that if G had gone down where Roglic did nobody would be talking about the route.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

The only thing that's really needed is a gentlemen's agreement to form a favourites' gruppetto on flat stages.

The fat guys work together on the climbs, the small guys could too on potentially dangerous sprint finishes.

How does that work if someone like Van Aert were to go for both GC and sprints? Regardless, the curve at 4k would also have caused a crash in a smaller peloton.

 

[Salvarani]

They have rethought it. It went like this

Tricky stage > Riders try to stay safe, > caught behind crash > lose time > rethink > go to frontline with entire team > everyone fights for position > more crashes > more people lose time.

It's a 0 sum game. Nothing is gained from taking it safely.

That’s fine.

But then this ”it is not safe enough”. ”Roads are dangerous”. Conversation is something they can stop with.

Then it is just part of the racing and if everyone keep racing this way, they can suffer the consequences. I think they lose and us as fans lose. That’s my opinion

Dont want to see any change in any rulebook. Take the time earlier and so on.

If they keep causing this hysteria then whatever happens, happens.

 

[saganftw]

so if you advocate for safer roads, anyone with knowledge of local roads? could the finish in the town be made a lot safer if some other roads were used?

 

[Broccolidwarf]

The only thing that's really needed is a gentlemen's agreement to form a favourites' gruppetto on flat stages.

The fat guys work together on the climbs, the small guys could too on potentially dangerous sprint finishes.

It shouldn't be a gentleman's agreement, it should be a rule.

If you - for instance - on selected stages (bunch sprints) make a cut off point at 5 or even 10K, where all the GC riders can back off and slow roll, without losing time on GC, the run in to the finish becomes a much reduced peloton.

Crashes often happen, because all the GC riders want to stay at the front, all the way until 3K, which IMO is too close to the finish, with all the fight for position going on amongst the sprinter trains.