What would you do to make the Tour more interesting?

[SetonHallPirate]

One thing I would like to see, but we'll never see it (due to UCI rules), is a Team Time Trial on the Champs-Elysses. Would completely magnify the importance in keeping all nine of your riders in the race all the way to Paris if possible.

 

[auscyclefan94]

One thing I would like to see, but we'll never see it (due to UCI rules), is a Team Time Trial on the Champs-Elysses. Would completely magnify the importance in keeping all nine of your riders in the race all the way to Paris if possible.

That is crazy and unfair.

Anyway, I think we should have 8 man teams. Less riders and probably less crashes. Teams will not be able to control the race so easily.

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

-Fewer teams
-smaller teams
-less sprint stages (why so many stages for just a few select riders to win?)
-more stages that can make small time gaps for GC in the first week, without risking sprinters to finish out of time
-stages with 3k rule only for flat finishes, let riders not competing for the stagewin (non-sprinters, GC riders...) take a detour, free up roadspace for kamikaze sprinters, keep GC riders away from crashes. (never gonna happen, lol)
-ban TTT from GC, let it count for TGC only!
-make up their minds whether the green jersey is the sprint jersey or the points jersey. If it's the points jersey (best rider based on points instead of time cfr F1), give points in every stage at the finish line (also mountain). Also, any points classification/tournament in any sport i know of, lets you keep the points even if you crash out or quit prematurely. If you don't finish the last race in F1, you keep the points you have saved up in the other races. In tennis, you don't lose all your ATP/WTA points if forfaiting a major tournament due to injury etc...

 

[Franklin]

More but smaller teams.
More variety in stage profiles
Bring back bonusses on intermediates and all finishes.
At least a few shorter mountain stages.
25 KM rule on major crashes during flat stages. yes, keeping upright is important, but now people are being shredded where they absolutely couldn't avoid it. Worse, it kills the competition.


Controversial ideas (not sure if they would be good ideas):
Time differences are decided on the ten km flag during flat stages. Escapees with the last ten km do get the time bonus, but it gives the GC riders a chance to bow out.
No time differences during the last 25 km of a flat stage, but give time bonusses for the first ten finishers.
Variations on this them.
Shredded riders can be brought paced by car, tour-doctors decision. Only used in clearly disastrous cases. The motivation is that we pause most sports to allow for injury treatment. Neutralizing is not practical, so let's pace riders who truly are grated cheese. This also allows decent wound treatment and new clothes. It's a disgrace that we see riders riding around bleeding with completely disfunctional clothing. And no, I'm not puritanical.

Things I (strongly) disagree with the others:
Keep the yellow helmets (you guys have no sense of history!)
Vary Mountainuous and TT oriented TdF's. There's nothing worng with (long) TT's. Why play favouritism on the climbers?
Don't focus on those so called super-climbs. Why play favouritism on the climbers?

Related: This TdF might become extremely exciting due to the fact that the mountain stages aren't crazy. During the Lance years one less mountain stage and one more longish TT might have made the LA-JU contest a lot more Interesting. More mountains doesn't mean more excitement

 

[Kwibus]

7 man teams for starters. Shorter stages to compensate, but the queen stages would still be 200km+.

Flat stages would be not longer than 150km. I'd either ditch the silly prologue or put bonus seconds back in the race. I don't want to spend another week looking at Cancellara in yellow, it happens every freaking year. And one serious mountain stage in the first week. Preferably on a Sunday. 3km rule would not count on stages with an uphill finish longer than a km.

Bonus seconds would be on offer on mountains/hills in the same way KoM points are distributed. 20 seconds if you cross a HC/1st category mountain first, 18 for second, 16 for third, etc

Time bonus would be halved for second category mountains and again for third category. No time bonus on fourth category hills unless it's the finish.

This, allthough I might go as far as saying that there should be a last 50km rule in those flat stages. The flat stages cause the biggest gaps, becuase of crashes. Ofcourse there has to be a timelimit.

 

[Franklin]

I'm a bit hesistant on shortening flat stages, they might get even more dangerous. On the other hand, shorter means less km's for misshap.

There is another caveat: you would have more transition by bus, that might be an issue as well (less sleep)

 

[rghysens]

*)No race radios operated by team directors. I can imagine race radios come in handy to warn riders for dangerous road furniture, to warn team directors if one of their riders has fallen or has a flate tire,... But it may be possible to operate the radios by a jury who doesn't influence the tactics or gives orders.
*)Smaller teams: 7 or 8 riders per team
*)More variation in stages, certainly the first week. I have no problem with prologues, but please don't let it be followed by 6 flat stages (or even worse: 5 flat stages and a team time trial). An ideal tour start would be (in my opinion): prologue, ardennes-like stage, cobbled (or "strade bianche" like) stage. Or prologue-cobbles-hills. Throw in a medium mountain stage in the first week as well.
*)I have no problem with 6-8 pancake flat stages, but why not put most of them between the Alps and Pyrenees. Sprinter teams will be more tired then (and lost some men), so the inevitable mass sprint may be less likely.
*) Medium mountains before the first high mountain range. Now they are mainly used for transition stages, which make them useless.
*) Bonus seconds for the fastest ascent of certain climbs. Let's say, only for the last 1st category or HC climb of the day, if its summit is within 30 or 40 km of the finish, but it's not the finish itself. Maybe that's a way to induce long range attacks in mountainous stages.
*) Better use of the terrain. France has so much to offer, make use of it. But that probably could give some problems for the publicity caravan in front of the race, which is probably the most important thing of the tour for ASO (money, money, money,...)

 

[LaFleur]

I would agree with some of those rules like detour for the GC men and less teams and so on. But giving the same time to all crashers in the 25km? That's a bit much aint it? Next time the crash could very well happen 30km from the finish and people would want to move it again.. 50km? Why not give the same time to every finisher in every stage then? No matter what happens.

I think the rules are just fine as they are right now, the riders make the race, not the rules.

 

[rghysens]

Bonus seconds would be on offer on mountains/hills in the same way KoM points are distributed. 20 seconds if you cross a HC/1st category mountain first, 18 for second, 16 for third, etc

That would reduce whole climbs to a sprint to the summit

 

[Franklin]

I would agree with some of those rules like detour for the GC men and less teams and so on. But giving the same time to all crashers in the 25km? That's a bit much aint it? Next time the crash could very well happen 30km from the finish and people would want to move it again.. 50km? Why not give the same time to every finisher in every stage then? No matter what happens.

I think the rules are just fine as they are right now, the riders make the race, not the rules.

Actually there is a point in extending the range. The problems usually start when the pace goes up due to the sprinttrains closing the gap on the escapees. Normally the pace goes up in the last 25ish KM (closing the gap earlier is silly as there will be new escapees).

There is a "fairness" issue here... do we want to keep on punishing riders for crashing? Is this punishment making the peloton even more nervous and causing more crashes?

What sport just goes on when people are lying bleeding at the game-court? Even boxing stops for wound treatment.

 

[LaFleur]

Actually there is a point in extending the range. The problems usually start when the pace goes up due to the sprinttrains closing the gap on the escapees. Normally the pace goes up in the last 25ish KM (closing the gap earlier is silly as there will be new escapees).

There is a "fairness" issue here... do we want to keep on punishing riders for crashing? Is this punishment making the peloton even more nervous and causing more crashes?

What sport just goes on when people are lying bleeding at the game-court? Even boxing stops for wound treatment.

The main objective would be to stop those massive crashes tho. I don't really think that there are any teams where 1 rider thinks: "oh damn, I lost 2 minutes today". Preventing the crashes happening in the first place should be the priority and even when the GC men wouldn't worry about it so much anymore, the sprinter teams will keep jostling for positions and it could still make mass crashes.

 

[Dutchsmurf]

I see lots of insane ideas in this thread. Makes me wonder if people are watching the same race as I am. Cobbles or Amstel Gold like stages in the first week? They tried cobbles a couple years ago and I can't say it was a success. The peleton is even more nervous now than it was back then. Cobbles or small roads over lots of hills is just asking for crashes all over the place.

Personally I would remove the 3km rule. It is a rule made to avoid crashes and it obviously isn't working. Making it the last 10km instead might be an option. But then you might as well make it so the flat stages don't count for the GC. If you want to avoid crashes, you are better of designing a better last 3km.

The flat stages in the first week have always been there, I see no reason to suddenly change those. I would just make them more boring than they are now. Go for wider roads and get a straight line to the finish for the last 3km. Although straight wide roads are no guarantee for less crashes (all crashes happen on straight roads lately after all), it might calm down people. The stages are boring anyway and we only watch the last km, so why bother with better views in the first 180km of the stage? Just take the highway from city to city. Finish on things like airports and circuits. Build your own seats at the finish if needed and charge people for it. It is the Tour, people will pay.

I would save the uphill finishes and hilly parcours for the second week. Put 2 major mountain stages on the first weekend. Put the long flat ITT on the first Wednesday. An ITT is a far more saver way to get time gaps than uphill finishes. And you need to do that ITT at some point anyway, better to get it out of the way fast. That would make the first week boring to watch, but I prefer that over crashes.

Radio's have nothing to do with crashes or how boring the race is. Flat stages have always been boring and will always be boring. Radio's or no radio's. Small teams or big teams. It makes no difference.

Smaller teams won't do anything to limit the crashes. There will still be 100+ people wanting to be in the first 20 positions.

Shorter stages make no difference for crashes or anything either. They are trained profs, they are more than capable of doing 200km every day. I don't see why this is even suggested by some.

 

[LaFlorecita]

let contador ride .

..........

 

[the asian]

Kick out Prudhomme and appoint Zomegnan as race director

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

Like i said, just put in less sprint stages and teams will not be banking their entire fortune on winning one of two or three sprint stages. Sprinters will be less supported by their team. TDF becoming less appealing for sprinters, less sprinters/sprinterteams, less nervous peleton.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

I see lots of insane ideas in this thread. Makes me wonder if people are watching the same race as I am. Cobbles or Amstel Gold like stages in the first week? They tried cobbles a couple years ago and I can't say it was a success. The peleton is even more nervous now than it was back then. Cobbles or small roads over lots of hills is just asking for crashes all over the place.

However, what the cobbles and hills do, is ensure the bunch isn't 180 strong at the time. There are people who have been tailed off, meaning there is more room at the front for everybody who's still protecting their interests, which makes crashing LESS likely.

The problem at the moment is that the péloton is a nervous place. But one of the big reasons for that is that nobody has lost anything (save for crashing) yet. Everybody still thinks their #1 goal is attainable, so everybody still wants to be in the position they need to be for that. Every GC man wants to be up in the first 30-40 guys in the group, and they need to have a man or two with them for security. That's fine in the main body of the stage, while you still have 15-20 people who want to preserve their spot. But then you have the sprinters' trains wanting to come up to the front and they're fighting for space, while the GC teams are trying to allow the sprinters to do their thing whilst also not losing their spot in the péloton lest there be a split or a crash that they're caught behind.

By making stages more selective, there is more space at the front because fewer people are there; and it also has the knock-on effect of meaning in other stages, fewer people need to be up at the front, because people who've already lost time thanks to the selective hill/cobble stage no longer have their position to protect, so they're changing their goals, which means the sprinters have more room and freedom to do their thing as they're not being crowded by GC teams too, and crashes on the scale of the one we saw yesterday are less likely.

 

[pugdog]

Have amusing commentators.

 

[Franklin]

Smaller teams won't do anything to limit the crashes. There will still be 100+ people wanting to be in the first 20 positions.

The argument was to make it more exciting, not to limit crashes. It would be less easy to control a stage. On a side note, peloton size does have a significant influence on crashes. I'll see if i can find a link.

Shorter stages make no difference for crashes or anything either. They are trained profs, they are more than capable of doing 200km every day. I don't see why this is even suggested by some.

Quite frankly this is nonsense. Nobody can concentrate for 5 hours, not even the best chess players. Yet concentration is a big part of crashes. Cutting the amount of time on the bike cuts down this problem to manageable size. Considering that everything above the last 50 KM is usually trash-km's anyways cutting the time on the road is a realistic idea. It certainly has disadvantages, as it would take away some of the heroics, but for the spectator nothing would change.

 

[cineteq]

Agree
- No team radios
- Smaller teams: 6-7 riders
- Less flat stages or consecutive flat stages
- Medium mountain stages on the 1st week
- Bonus seconds at all finishes, less weight for mountains, 10 sec. for 1st and on flat 20 sec. for 1st.
- Bonus secs intermediate Cat1 and HC, perhaps 20 sec. on HC for 1st to pass.
- Champs Elisees stage should be an ITT or a hard mountain stage on last day
- Better and fairer rules for mass accidents where there was no reason to lose time
- Keep 3km rule but give everybody the same time as the enter the last 3km, so that GC riders stay in the back and let the sprinters do their thing
- Keep ITTs, 2 like this year are fine. Also a short TTT or prologue should be included.

Disagree
- Cobbles stages since not all riders do this kind of racing = time bomb
- Short stages since a Tour winners must have endurance

Irrelevant
- Yellow helmets

 

[Libertine Seguros]

In the event of mass crashes, not the usual three or four guys go down but the 'massive roadblock' ones, the péloton should be neutralised until those who are able to continue who were involved come back together as a bunch. The break up the road can continue.

The péloton decided this themselves back in 2010, right?

 

[Dutchsmurf]

However, what the cobbles and hills do, is ensure the bunch isn't 180 strong at the time.

Exactly, because half of those will have crashed somewhere already. The last time the Tour used cobbles, there wouldn't have been any selection at all if Frank Schleck (or someone else later) hadn't crashed. That crash caused the selection, not the cobbles.
You get 10+ teams all trying to get their GC man at front with every cobble section or hill. That makes each of those sections a crash waiting to happen. Even more because unlike Paris-Roubaix or Amstel Gold there will be riders who aren't as skilled on those sections and therefor will be more likely to fall. It will be exciting, but it won't do anything to make crashes happen less often. Mountains work for that, cobbles and hills don't.

 

[taiwan]

More MTFs evenly distributed through the race, as well as a decent amount of ITT kms.

 

[WindLessBreeze]

Ban Race radios!!!!!!!!!!

& let the road captains direct their troops....Like in the old times....Not by Generals sitting inside A/C vehicles, munching chips, watching TV, not feeling the Pain! (Which reminds me of NATO Generals directing forces in Irak from Tampa, Fla.....Swell 4 them!)

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

What would you do to make the tour more interesting..hmm, a fall by Wiggins, Evans and other not-fallen contenders would make the race interesting again

 

[WindLessBreeze]

Nerd Talk

What would you do to make the tour more interesting..hmm, a fall by Wiggins, Evans and other not-fallen contenders would make the race interesting again

$%#*&@~~~~~