Velominati Super Prestige: Paris-Tours 2016
One doesn’t appreciate how many touring companies there are in Paris until you do a search for “Paris-Tours”. Refine the search to “Cycling Paris-Tours” and the results are not noticeably reduced. I imagine that adding the year to the search will do little to improve the situation.
The fact is, as popular as Cycling is, it remains a fringe sport, at least as far as Paris and Tours is concerned.
My internal clock is all fucked up. And so is the 2016 VSP calendar, because we don’t have the Men’s World Road Race Championships on there at the moment (we will put that little nugget on there, worry not). But when it comes to Paris-Tours, we should not be talking last major trade team road race of the season for the blokes. But we are, because up is down and down is up. Just wait for the green flash.
Paris-Tours is supposed to be a sprinters classic, but it is remarkably lumpy towards the end and you never know what might happen. Richard Virenque won the thing once; for fucks sake, anything can happen if Tricky Dickie can win the “flattest” classic of the season.
In any case, the season is winding down, but we have some serious racing to come. With the Worlds being a Sprinters’ course, this could be a final warm-up; either that or all the sprinters head off to the Middle East last-minute to acclimate to the heat to leave a load of twiggy climbers to fight it out, dismally.
Time to put your chips down, and stop fooling around. If you’re going to make a play for these VSP prizes, you’re going to have to show up with some game. Good luck!
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The late climbs have been ironed out this year, which produces this startlist. I think it’s in the “easier to list who isn’t there” territorry for sprinters- no Kittel, surprisingly, and Tinkoff are entirely absent so no Sagan. No Groenewegen is a surprise.
Probably a better race than the overheated crit that is replacing the Worlds this year. 106km? FFS
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I’m not feeling good about this one but I would like to climb in the standings. Just for pride.
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A sprint royale as the speed-merchants tune up for Qatar.
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I really like Matteo Trentin. Something about a guy who is almost always just a work horse, but can also pull off stage and 1-day wins. If I were a pro racer…I’d love to be that kinda rider.
Very well-timed and strong win for Demare yesterday. Didn’t think he’d hold of Zdenek.
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Frank, for an IT guy or whatever you are, you’re pretty shit at the internet.
https://youtu.be/qdjRwpYM-Kw
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Aussie, Aussie, Aussie.
As long as he doesn’t strip down to his jocks with a french flag on them and drink champagne from his shoe he’ll be right !
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@Al__S
>>> Probably a better race than the overheated crit that is replacing the Worlds this year. <<<
I’m just not getting excited (at least not yet anyways) about road worlds this year for some reason. And you might have nailed it with that description.
Bouhanni is due.
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@Barracuda
He’ll use wooden shoes filled with oranjebitter instead, for an ad-schundum
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I ain’t winning anything this year, but it’s the taking part that counts, isn’t it?
On another topic, I haven’t received my Olympic rings yet, Frank – any news on the ETA?
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Cavendish suffers illness setback ahead of World Championships
Oops, apologies for the font, poor copy and paste job on my part.
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@Rick
Bugger!
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Updated after Cav illness.
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Picks 5 sprinters…hopes
at least one of them finishes in the top 5.
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Didn’t see that article about Cav until after I posted. Updated.
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Take 2. Cav’s been no well.
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I thought Cav would do well, but not if he’s ill.
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Cav is playing a pre-World’s game. He’s fine.
Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes…
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@RobSandy
Hence my pick of him at No 4 and my chosen name for him originally !
post-Cav illness disclosure.
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@Randy C
Don’t get me wrong, I do like a good sprint and I like that the Worlds cycles through course types to give most riders a chance every few years.
But especially if the heat forces it shortened to just the final circuits, round streets devoid of fans in a country that doesn’t, and will never, care about cycling any more than it cares about human rights or good taste
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