Tour de France 2011

That's the very thing that ruined it for me, you know: I simply cannot admire their achievements anymore.

Everytime I see someone climb up that hill in front of all others, I cannot help but think "Yeah, right... surely he's full of drugs to be able to do that".
I think sport, as in sport is pretty much dead. None of those competitions are about athletic performance anymore, the sport has been turned into a business and as with any such venture the important thing is the bottom line. Oh sure, sponsors might get on their high moral ground every now and again, but that's only when the cat's out of the bag. Otherwise, they prefer to ignore it because all they care about is the end result. I hardly even blame the riders, the pressure to perform is beyond enormous, I'm sure.

That said, I don't really care. I'm rarely following these things to admire achievements, I do so for the spectacle and excitement of a fight. Professional athletes at the top are not heroes, they're employees. If one wants/can race "clean" more power to him, but it make no difference to me. When I want to watch actual sports, I go see the amateurs who do it just because.
 
Armstrong quits cycling - Americans don't care about cycling any more? :lol:
 
Ummm some of still follow cycling...hell there is what 3 American teams in the top ten of the team competition?
 
i don't see Andy Shleck winning a single tour de france. he's the button of cycling. can keep up with the best, but isn't aggressive enough to be a winner...
 
i don't see Andy Shleck winning a single tour de france. he's the button of cycling. can keep up with the best, but isn't aggressive enough to be a winner...

If he is the Button of cycling then surely he will win a Tour?
 
Saw the last 35km live today, exciting finish. Rain, wind and the climbs made that a tough stage. I didn't hear of any crashes today.

:smile:
 
Hushovd is fantastic. Certainly looks like the green will be won by one of the all-rounder type sprinter, i.e. Gilbert, Hagen or Hushovd.
 
What the hell is Contador doing. He's crashing all over the place. He just did a solo crash.

And it doesn't seem like any of his team mates are helping him out..
 
What the hell is Contador doing. He's crashing all over the place. He just did a solo crash.

And it doesn't seem like any of his team mates are helping him out..

Supposedly someone knocked him over to the side.
 
Well, he has gotten kicked out of the tour at least.

That was a horrific crash. The driver was/is a complete jackass.

What's funny about it, Danish television kept showing the incident over and over, you know how many times it was shown on French television? Once.

And just in clarification, the car belongs to the TV station.
 
How did Cowboy get to drive in Tour de France? :lol:
 
Interesting stage today. Right now the Schleck brothers are alone for the final climb, they've used up their team basically. Meanwhile, Contador has still got a few SaxoBank riders with him.
 
Fantastic performance by Voeckler, keeping the yellow jersey.
 
Contador certainly wasn't impressive. They're saying his knee is giving him trouble. I wouldn't count him out yet, but he has to improve a lot. Andy Schleck didn't look fantastic either. Frank Schleck did :)

We'll see over the next few days.
 
Voeckler's been fantastic so far. He well deserves the yellow getting it by actually racing and on his own merits. I am getting seriously tired of this team mentality. Even the sprinters fail to impress me these days with all those stupid lead out trains. Meh.

Neither Contador nor A.Schleck impressed today, and I honestly hope they both go home empty-handed from this one.
 
Andy was playing the team game to setup Frank, he finished right on the wheel of Cadel and Ivan Basso, where as Contador couldn't take the pressure from Cadal and Basso.
 
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