Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => Freewheeling => Racing => Topic started by: quixoticgeek on 11 July, 2021, 07:20:18 pm
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Can those of you who understand these things, help a newbie understand pro racing a bit more?
If I understand it right, the person who has the fastest accumulated time for the whole event, gets a fancy jumper (yellow for France, Red for Spain, Pink for Italy?). The first person past the most of certain signs on top of mountains gets to wear the spotty jumper, some of these climbs are marked on the stage drawings with a number, which seems to go from 4 to H. So my first questions.
1) Is the magic jumper for being top of the most hills always spotty? Does it vary based on which country the race is in?
2) How are the 4 to H classifications calculated?
3) Is the H cos they realised that they wanted to go up harder climbs than the 4 to 1 range they started with?
4) Why do some climbs get a number, not but all of them?
5) How are the points per climb calculated?
Next up there is the snotty jumper, that goes to the rider who is first past the most of certain signs that are not on tops of hills. These signs seem to be at least one in the middle of every stage, and one at the end, if the end is not on the top of a mountain?
6) Is this magic jumper always snotty? Does it change based on country of racing?
7) What defines how many points there are for any given special non hilly sign?
Then there is a white jumper for the youngest rider that's doing the best?
8.0) How do they define young?
9) How do they define best?
Finally a jumper for the most aggressive rider?
10) how is this calculated? Elbows furthest out on the sprints?
11) what colour is it?
11 a) Next up, if the person who makes it to the end of the race in the fastest time, is also the first to the top of the hills, the first past the special signs on the flat, the youngest, and the one with their elbows out the furthest (or what ever that criteria is). Do they get to take 5 jumpers home with them?
11 b) In the middle of a race, if the person with the magic jumper is also leading all the other things too, do the 2nd places get to wear the special jumper for that classification?
On any given stage, if you're too slow. You're OTL, which I think is Out something beginning with T of Luck, and then you're not allowed to ride again the next day?
12) how is the time for being too slow calculated? Is it a different sum depending on the type of stage?
People talk of a broom wagon? Is this a vehicle with a big broom on the front that sweeps up drivers that are so slow that not only are they OTL, they are annoying someone, and thus have to get in the broom wagon?
13) What is the broom wagon, and how does it work?
There are lots of vehicles around the pelican. Some of these belong to the teams, and have bikes on top, and inside a shouty man, and a mechanic. Then there are Yellow or Blue cars that belong to either Shimano or Mavic, which have bikes on top and a mechanic? There are red Skoda's that seem to follow the riders, and sometime have an old white guy standing out the top of them. Near the end of each stage there is a man who stands next to the barrier and waves some vehicles through a gap in the barrier.
14) What's with the red skodas? Are these race officials, or just VIP's that want a good view of some riders butt?
15) Why do they sometimes have a white bloke standing up out the top of them?
16) At the end, most of the vehicles are waved the barrier, but there's usually one or two red skodas that pull over the finish line, then stop, so some old white bloke can get out. Why?
There's lots of mopeds, they seem to be full of people with cameras, and function to provide an extra hazard for the riders to
17) Do these have any other purpose?
Having crossed the line, the bloke who did it first is usually surrounded by people, including 4 people dressed in branding of a water company who surround said rider.
18) Do these have a purpose other than getting the water companies branding on the TV while the cameras are pointing at a knackered happy rider?
When a rider is on the podium, there used to be two pretty women who would stand there and clap, now it's a pretty woman and I'm assured a pretty man, who stand there and clap.
19) Why? As much as I enjoy the site of pretty women, it's 2021, what is their purpose?
XX) Why is consistent question numbering hard?
I think that sums up all the things I've not managed to understand while watching this year's ride around France. Can anyone help answering my questions?
J
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Can anyone help answering my questions?
Here you go: www.google.com
Or maybe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
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OK, joking apart...
Q8: Under 26 years.
Q9: Lowest aggregate time, same as the general classification leader.
Q10: "Most aggressive" is the for the rider who's done the most to animate the stage, i.e. put in an attack that lasts all stage/until overwhelmed by the sprinters 200m before the finish line.
Q11: There is no jersey , but the rider thus awarded gets their race numbers in red for the next day.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have dinner to prepare...
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Q6) no. In the Giro it's purpoo (maglia ciclamino). Which, as any fule kno, is the best colour.
Q19) we've only *just* got rid of 2x pretty women. Baby steps, apparently.
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Can those of you who understand these things, help a newbie understand pro racing a bit more?
1) Name tube stations at random.
b) Qibble over fictitious obscure-sounding rules.
iii) Er, that's it.
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Can those of you who understand these things, help a newbie understand pro racing a bit more?
1) Name tube stations at random.
b) Qibble over fictitious obscure-sounding rules.
iii) Er, that's it.
Covent garden...
J
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Can those of you who understand these things, help a newbie understand pro racing a bit more?
1) Name tube stations at random.
b) Qibble over fictitious obscure-sounding rules.
iii) Er, that's it.
Covent garden...
Mont Ventoux.
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Mont Ventoux.
Cote de buttertubs...
J
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The spotty jumper is spotty because it matched the original sponsor’s colours (chocolate, iirc). [ETA: Poulain chocolate, jersey first awarded in 1975]
Similarly, the yellow jumper is yellow because the original sponsor was L’Auto newspaper, which was printed on yellow paper.
The classification of climbs is pretty arbitrary, there is no set formula for calculating their difficulty.
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OTL = over time limit (I think).
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People talk of a broom wagon? Is this a vehicle with a big broom on the front that sweeps up drivers that are so slow that not only are they OTL, they are annoying someone, and thus have to get in the broom wagon?
13) What is the broom wagon, and how does it work?
I know zilch about cycle racing as I don't watch it, but when the Commonwealth Games came near me a few years ago and I therefore bothered to go and have a look, one of the highlights (for me) was that the broom wagon did indeed have an actual broom attached to it. :thumbsup:
This was a race with a few laps of a circuit, IIRC, so the broom wagon swept up those who were about to get lapped. Sadly, they didn't use the broom to do this.
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I believe the numbers on the climbs were originally based on the gear needed to get a car up the hill with the H (hors) category being so steep you needed to go in reverse.
This may well be a myth of course.
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Re mountains, H means Hors which is what you get when you don't feed your quadruped enough ravey davey drugs. Or it could be because these climbs are 'out of category' i.e. too hard to be a 1.
Google assures me that Hors (Fr) is Out (Eng).
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The answer to 11a is that they get to be called Eddy Merckx (except for the elbows bit).
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Q1: White with red spots in France, plain blue in Italy, white with blue spots in Spaign-o.
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Automobiles and motorcycles. Each team has a team car with the course manager and a mechanic. These will normally be liveried in sponsor colours. Typically they follow the pellican which means they can sometimes be a long way from some of their riders. To counter this there are additional sponsored cars for the likes of mavic and the like which have mechanics and spares to suit most bikes. They are often in the gaps between the pelican and the breaks and can offer assistance to any rider. There are also some motorcycles with a limited supply of spares with the same intention and they can be closer to solo breaks and the like. The red cars are the main race commissioners following in amongst the riders to make sure everyone is behaving themselves. That’s are also some commissioners on motorcycles, who can mix it more readily and try to catch out the sneaky cheats. These are I believe most of the three wheeled motorcycles. The other motorcycles tend to be camera bikes and you’ll often see the pillion standing so he can get a clearer view of some rider or others bum.
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Some random replies:
These races are commercial entities (the grand tours even more so), so sponsorship and publicity for sponsors drives decisions. Sponsorship value is measured in total time and logo size on TV and mentions on radio and in race reporting. Skoda provides the official vehicles (and a wodge of dosh) for the race officials. Similarly for the official drink and almost everything else you can think of.
Most stage starts and finishes pay considerable sums to the TdF and provide the overnight accommodation. The race organisation allocates the accommodation to the teams and the race organisation.
The race director and commissaires (referees/ umpires) watch the head of the race from official vehicles. I expect the old bloke you see get out of the car at the finish line is the race director.
Different races use different jerseys for the various classifications and the colours of some have changed over time (Giro and Vuelta particularly). The Tour casts a big shadow, so many smaller races use similar colours for those classifications.
The myth of the polkadot jersey was that it copies a Poulain chocolate wrapper. Almost certainly not true but it sounds good. Nobody has found a polkadot chocolate wrapper made before the jersey was created. Most likely, the race organiser who created the jersey remembered seeing some track racers decades before who wore easily recognisable polkadot jerseys.
The yellow jersey is yellow because the newspaper published by the race organiser was printed on yellow paper. Similarly, the Giro’s organiser printed a newspaper on pink paper, so the jersey was pink. These races and the myths were literally created to sell newspapers.
The myth of mountain categories was that it was the gear needed for a 2CV to get to the top. If it couldn’t get to the top, it was ‘beyond categorisation’. In reality, the category is defined by the race organiser and the same climb can vary its categorisation from year to year, based on whether it is in a long or short stage, early or late in the stage or early or late in the race. Many times, the first week of the Tour goes through flatlands but the King of the Mountains sponsor (back to talking about filthy lucre) wants his publicity every day, so a meaningless pimple gets a Cat 3 or Cat 4 label and a jersey presentation, even if it would be utterly ignored in the second or third week.
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Some random replies:
These races are commercial entities (the grand tours even more so), so sponsorship and publicity for sponsors drives decisions. Sponsorship value is measured in total time and logo size on TV and mentions on radio and in race reporting. Skoda provides the official vehicles (and a wodge of dosh) for the race officials. Similarly for the official drink and almost everything else you can think of.
That kinda makes sense, capitalism and all that.
Most stage starts and finishes pay considerable sums to the TdF and provide the overnight accommodation. The race organisation allocates the accommodation to the teams and the race organisation.
Does that mean that a start/finish town needs to have a couple of thousand hotel rooms to be able to do it?
The race director and commissaires (referees/ umpires) watch the head of the race from official vehicles. I expect the old bloke you see get out of the car at the finish line is the race director.
Can't they can just watch the tv feeds? Wouldn't that give them a better view of all the things going on?
Different races use different jerseys for the various classifications and the colours of some have changed over time (Giro and Vuelta particularly). The Tour casts a big shadow, so many smaller races use similar colours for those classifications.
Makes sense.
The myth of the polkadot jersey was that it copies a Poulain chocolate wrapper. Almost certainly not true but it sounds good. Most likely, the race organiser who created the jersey remembered seeing some track racers decades before who wore easily recognisable polkadot jerseys.
The yellow jersey is yellow because the newspaper published by the race organiser was printed on yellow paper. Similarly, the Giro’s organiser printed a newspaper on pink paper, so the jersey was pink.
Logical...
The myth of mountain categories was that it was the gear needed for a 2CV to get to the top. If it couldn’t get to the top, it was ‘beyond categorisation’. In reality, the category is defined by the race organiser and the same climb can vary from year to year, based on whether it is in a long or short stage, early or late in the stage or early or late in the race. Many times, the first week of the Tour goes through flatlands but the King of the Mountains sponsor (back to talking about filthy lucre) wants his publicity every day, so a meaningless pimple gets a Cat 3 or Cat 4 label and a jersey presentation, even if it would be utterly ignored in the second or third week.
AAAH! that explains a lot.
Thank you for the info.
J
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The myth of the polkadot jersey was that it copies a Poulain chocolate wrapper. Almost certainly not true but it sounds good. Nobody has found a polkadot chocolate wrapper made before the jersey was created. Most likely, the race organiser who created the jersey remembered seeing some track racers decades before who wore easily recognisable polkadot jerseys.
Now you mention it, I remember some time ago searching in vain for evidence that Poulain ever sold its chocolate in polka dot wrappers... you'd think there would be pictures on the internet.
This is quite enlightening - reckons it was Felix Levitan's idea:
https://www.cyclinglegends.co.uk/index.php/races/climbers-jersey
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To add to LWaB's bit on mntns, all mountains were just mountains from 1933 to 1947 when they were split according to severity. 3rd cat dates from 1949, 4th cat was introduced in 1962, dropped a year later and reinstated in 1964, while the class referred to by TV's R Gilmore as “horse category” dates from 1979. The HC route on Mont Ventoux was used for a (motorised) hillclimb before the TdF even existed, and continued until 1976.
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Logistics mean that some phenomenal roads and mountains will never feature in the TdF. Finish lines need to have large areas to park all the team and race vehicles, to set up grandstands for the VIPs, have alternate routes so that team buses aren’t using the race route and so on. Stage towns need all of that plus sufficient accommodation in the surrounding area to accommodate the race and to still sell enough accommodation to the public to justify buying the right to have the TdF or Giro overnight in your region. Part of the reason there are all those photogenic tableaus by the roadside and the reason why the race commentators describe the local attractions and delicacies is because the local government wants tourists to visit the region after the race has gone through. Publicity, again.
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TV only shows what the cameraman and director thinks makes good television. The race director needs to see everything possible about the race, including the stuff that isn’t photogenic. The race director and chief commissaire decides whether a stage needs to be neutralised due to weather or road conditions e.g. mud, ice, etc. A TV screen doesn’t necessarily reflect reality.
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Almost nothing about TdeF reflects reality - which is what makes it consistently the best three weeks of the year!
Good explanations there, LWAB.
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Q11b: Yes.
Q12: The time limit for a stage is a bit of a moving target, because it depends on the difficulty, or "coefficient" of the stage and the average speed of the stage winner, but essentially, the higher the coefficient, the greater the cut-off gets for a given average speed bracket, and the faster the stage has been ridden, the more time is allowed.
https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/how-do-tour-de-france-time-cuts-work
That, or it's worked out by playing Numberwang via the medium of interpretative dance...
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QXX:
Measure Proof-read twice, cut post once. ;)
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Q11b: Yes.
Q12: The time limit for a stage is a bit of a moving target, because it depends on the difficulty, or "coefficient" of the stage and the average speed of the stage winner, but essentially, the higher the coefficient, the greater the cut-off gets for a given average speed bracket, and the faster the stage has been ridden, the more time is allowed.
https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/how-do-tour-de-france-time-cuts-work
That, or it's worked out by playing Numberwang via the medium of interpretative dance...
So if a stage is ridden sufficiently slowly, the cut off becomes very close to the finish time?
J
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Re the "what happens if the leader of the magic jumper is leading another jumper too" question. Yes, second place gets to wear the lesser jumper. For example the current Magic Jumper holder is Pog. Being a youngster he's also leading the young rider (white jersey) competition. Second place at the start of Sunday's stage was Vingegaard, so he was in white.
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In the 1969 Tour, Eddy Merckx managed to win the yellow, green and polkadot jerseys. The white jersey didn’t exist then but he would have won that classification. His team also won that classification. Nobody else has managed to do that. On multiple occasions, he won two of the three classification jerseys in grand tours. Few racers have done that even once. There is a reason Merckx is known as the greatest racing cyclist of all time.
The second placed rider wears the lesser jersey during the race (the sponsor needs their publicity) but the actual winner takes the jersey (and prize money) home at the end of the race.
In previous TdFs, there has been a separate sprint jersey (red) for the intermediate sprints and the green jersey was purely for stage finishes. There was also a combined jersey for the lowest combination of overall, points and climbing classifications. More jerseys means more sponsorship!
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Q11b: Yes.
Q12: The time limit for a stage is a bit of a moving target, because it depends on the difficulty, or "coefficient" of the stage and the average speed of the stage winner, but essentially, the higher the coefficient, the greater the cut-off gets for a given average speed bracket, and the faster the stage has been ridden, the more time is allowed.
https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/how-do-tour-de-france-time-cuts-work
That, or it's worked out by playing Numberwang via the medium of interpretative dance...
So if a stage is ridden sufficiently slowly, the cut off becomes very close to the finish time?
J
For certain values of very close:
Coefficient 1 (no particular difficulty): time cut ranges from 3–11 percent of the stage winner’s time
Coefficient 2 (medium difficulty): 6–18 percent
Coefficient 3 (short stages on hilly terrain): 10–22 percent
Coefficient 4 (very difficult): 7–18 percent
Coefficient 5 (very difficult short stage): 11–22 percent
Coefficient 6 (time trials): 25 percent
https://www.bicycling.com/tour-de-france/a20030938/tour-de-france-time-cut/
Mind you, the odds of a Coefficient 1 stage ridden by the winner at less than 36 km/h, which would set the time cut at 3%, are pretty small.
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The ‘most aggressive’ rider never used to get a jersey (do they get one now?). Sometimes they would get a red number. They were selected each day based on who ‘deserved’ it, usually by the race organisers, sometimes by the journalists. Similarly, the TdF has had a pedaleur d’charme or ‘most elegant rider’ daily award, always chosen by the journalists. These sorts of awards usually went to a deserving rider who may have had bad luck with an unsuccessful attack or who livened up an otherwise boring day and gave the journalists something interesting to write about.
The lanterne rouge was an award for last overall rider in the tour. It was something else for journalists to write about and gave some publicity (and cash) to a rider who had likely crashed hard or overcome sickness to struggle through.
Some of these awards are obsolete now but still referred to in TdF articles.
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The ‘most aggressive’ rider never used to get a jersey (do they get one now?). Sometimes they would get a red number. They were selected each day based on who ‘deserved’ it, usually by the race organisers, sometimes by the journalists.
No jersey, but they do get the red number.
One of the key criteria for 'deserving it' is usually being more French than the other candidates.
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Adding to Spesh's bit about time limits, the Commissaires can, at their discretion, reinstate riders who have finished after the cutoff time. Normally this happens when the autobus consists of so many riders that there wouldn’t be much of a race left if they were all sent home, but occasionally they'll let one back in if he’s been unlucky. Rick Zabel missed the cutoff by 3 seconds one year but they let him back in because he'd had a mechanical on the last climb. Current rules state that reinstated riders lose ALL* their points in the, er, Points and Mountains competitions, so were it to happen to Cav, someone else would win the green jersey this year even if he subsequently made it to Paris.
A pedant notes that while His Eddyness was KotM in 1969 he didn’t win the spottyjumper as the jersey itself was only introduced in 1975.
* Although TV's Matt Rendell was unsure about this the other day – unusually, as he knows everything about the history of bike racing – everyone else seems to think this is the case.
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In the 1969 Tour, Eddy Merckx managed to win the yellow, green and polkadot jerseys. The white jersey didn’t exist then but he would have won that classification. His team also won that classification. Nobody else has managed to do that. On multiple occasions, he won two of the three classification jerseys in grand tours. Few racers have done that even once. There is a reason Merckx is known as the greatest racing cyclist of all time.
The second placed rider wears the lesser jersey during the race (the sponsor needs their publicity) but the actual winner takes the jersey (and prize money) home at the end of the race.
In previous TdFs, there has been a separate sprint jersey (red) for the intermediate sprints and the green jersey was purely for stage finishes. There was also a combined jersey for the lowest combination of overall, points and climbing classifications. More jerseys means more sponsorship!
Hence my reply no. 12 to question 11a above. But your explanation is more informative than my (usually) glib one! ;)
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Pedantry acknowledged re. KoM jersey.
For completeness, the TdF yellow jersey was not always awarded for the lowest cumulative time. For a time before WW2 (correction: WW1), it was awarded for cumulative points alone as the points competition had not been created yet.
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8.0) Young category 26? That's too old to be young. IMO it should be reduced to about, say,
under 24 on 1st Jan of the year a particular tour is being raced.
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The Giro seems to have hunners* of sub-jerseys that don't get much of a mention. Everyone gets a prize!
*Slight eggsageration
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Logistics mean that some phenomenal roads and mountains will never feature in the TdF. Finish lines need to have large areas to park all the team and race vehicles, to set up grandstands for the VIPs, have alternate routes so that team buses aren’t using the race route and so on...
Though they can have finishes in small areas if they put their minds to it. Col du Galibier springs to mind.
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The Galibier is a special case. The Desgrange memorial is just by the summit tunnel. The necessary compromises are too much most of the time.
The Puy de Dome is too much hassle for the modern TdF with no second route down.
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A note on prizes: traditionally the accrued prize money from the individual points competitions was distributed amongst the team. Non-monetary prizes such as cows would occasionally present complications.
Winners of points competitions (and the lantern rouge) would frequently cash in by being paid appearance money for track events over the winter months.
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The Galibier is a special case...
I think that's what I said.
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Bobet in ‘53 was the first to share his prize money with his team, to stop his teammates from competing with him.
http://pelotontales.com/tour-de-france-1953/
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One of the key criteria for 'deserving it' is usually being more French than the other candidates.
Some tours (e.g. the Tour of Britain) are more honest and have a "best home rider" jersey.
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One of the key criteria for 'deserving it' is usually being more French than the other candidates.
Given how often it was French riders (Jacky Durand being the textbook example) who'd get into the break of the day, thus ensuring plenty of exposure for the team sponsors before the sprinters' teams ensured they'd get caught with a few hundred meters or a few km to go...
In the post- Fignon and Hinault era, just think of the prix combatif as the participation prize for the French. :demon:
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Marc Hirschi, a self-confessed Schnibble, won the Super-Combativité last year. Standirds r slippin'.
Vehicular Stuffs: in addition to the divers motorcycles already mentioned there’s (Usually? Always?) one carrying water bottles somewhere up near the stage leaders, to save them the hassle of fetching bottles from their team car. It can probably be assumed that these contain plain water rather than any exotic cocktail of [“fruit” – Ed.].
The bloke standing in a red Škoda with his upper body protruding through the sunroof in a manner almost, but not quite, entirely unlike Botticelli's Venus emerging from the sea is race director Christian Prudhomme, unless he's tested +ve for Coronalurgi and has been supplanted by his deputy François Lemarchand. He normally only does this at the end of the ceremonial roll-out at the start of a road stage, before waving his little fleg to start the stage proper, or waving his arms like the Malmesbury Monk failing to fly, to indicate to the riders that the start has been delayed because some poor sod is trying to catch up after a mechanical in the neutral zone.
Sometimes the red official cars were driven by ex-racing drivers but I think they dropped that idea after Jacky Ickx terrified one car-load of vips and finks utterly to DETH in the Alps.
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The myth of mountain categories was that it was the gear needed for a 2CV to get to the top. If it couldn’t get to the top, it was ‘beyond categorisation’.
That couldn't possibly true. As every former 2CV owner knows, you can get it to the top of anything if you take out the spare seats and have a decent recumbent with a tow rope in front.
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19) They have a pretty bloke too these days, to balance things out. One day they'll have Shane McGowan and Ann Widdecombe dispensing bad breath and hellfire respectively but, for now, they're sticking with pretty.
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I believe the numbers on the climbs were originally based on the gear needed to get a car up the hill with the H (hors) category being so steep you needed to go in reverse.
This may well be a myth of course.
That is generally held to be the case. I believe it was a large and heavy early Citroen.
Now it’s based on a look at overall height gain, steepness and a few other things
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8.0) Young category 26? That's too old to be young. IMO it should be reduced to about, say,
under 24 on 1st Jan of the year a particular tour is being raced.
It has varied, in 1984 it was for the first rider who had not previously ridden the event (Lemond won it)
A friend of mine won the Tour Feminin White Jersey overall in the 1984 race - all 18 stages of it. She still doesn’t know what the criteria were - possibly youngest finisher.
It’s worth noting that the women category winners shared the podium with the male winners in Paris.
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Back to the spotty jumper's spots: It was originally an homa
rdge on the part of Félix Lévitan, who decided to copy the jersey of Henri Lemoine, a well-known track rider in the 1930s, whose colours earned him the nickname "P'tits pois" (little peas).
Il s'agit en fait d'un hommage de Félix Lévitan, alors directeur du Tour, qui décide de reprendre la tenue d’Henri Lemoine, très bon pistard des années 1930, et dont les couleurs lui avaient valu le surnom de « P’tits pois ».
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Prix_de_la_montagne_du_Tour_de_France
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_Lemoine
However, that isn't entirely accurate. Lemoine was half of a track duo, the other half being one Marcel Guimbretière (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Guimbreti%C3%A8re), and they both wore spotty jumpers. They referred to their team as "Les P'tits Pois".
And now you know as much as I didn't 10 minutes ago.
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Logistics mean that some phenomenal roads and mountains will never feature in the TdF. Finish lines need to have large areas to park all the team and race vehicles, to set up grandstands for the VIPs, have alternate routes so that team buses aren’t using the race route and so on. Stage towns need all of that plus sufficient accommodation in the surrounding area to accommodate the race and to still sell enough accommodation to the public to justify buying the right to have the TdF or Giro overnight in your region. Part of the reason there are all those photogenic tableaus by the roadside and the race commentators describe the local attractions and delicacies is because the local government wants tourists to visit the region after the race has gone through. Publicity, again.
Ah, there was a bit of a fracas a year Orr two back when they had a mountain top finish on a hill that only had the one road on it. The lead competitors (and I think some of the vehicles) started back down the mountain before everyone had finished resulting in said fracas.
Or did I dream thwt?
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8.0) Young category 26? That's too old to be young. IMO it should be reduced to about, say,
under 24 on 1st Jan of the year a particular tour is being raced.
The 26 cut-off may have to do with the 26 -32 bracket being considered (by some, and by results perhaps, YMMV) the prime years for pro-cyclists, but the emergence of MVdP, WVA, Evenpoel et al, and most of all Pogecar, make a bit of a mockery of the 26 upper age limit for 'young' riders.
At the other end of the scale, late flowerings (Horner) and extended careers (Valverde) look, at best, dubious, so perhaps better that there's no awards for 'best veteran rider'....
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The bloke standing in a red Škoda with his upper body protruding through the sunroof in a manner almost, but not quite, entirely unlike Botticelli's Venus emerging from the sea
Never mind the jerseys, Mr Larrington has won the thread!
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Note also, Venus is doing an Arrivee - in crosswinds - whereas 'the other bloke' is doing a Depart ...
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The 26 cut-off may have to do with the 26 -32 bracket being considered (by some, and by results perhaps, YMMV) the prime years for pro-cyclists, but the emergence of MVdP, WVA, Evenpoel et al, and most of all Pogecar, make a bit of a mockery of the 26 upper age limit for 'young' riders.
Old fogeys compared to Henri Cornet, who was 19 when he won it in 1904 (albeit largely due to everyone else being disqualified for cheating).
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Ah, there was a bit of a fracas a year Orr two back when they had a mountain top finish on a hill that only had the one road on it. The lead competitors (and I think some of the vehicles) started back down the mountain before everyone had finished resulting in said fracas.
Or did I dream thwt?
About once a decade, the TdF thinks that they can organised a constrained mountaintop finish without issues. About once a decade, they find out that they can’t.
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Pogacar won the yellow, white and polka-dot jerseys this year.
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I have come to this late and ICBA to see if anyone else has got the answer but to my memory the polka dot jumper is red and white because it was sponsored by Champion supermarkets and those were the Champion colours. Indeed at one time it had Champion written across the front. Champion no longer exists (bought up by Géant-Casino i believe).
The early combativity awards were IIRC sponsored by Coeur de Lion cheese (a cambembert) in the days of Richard Virenque. Dunno if they still do!
All fule know Le Tour est là pour les enfants who will pick up all the goodies chucked out by the caravan if the mémé doesn't get there first with her stick to hoik goodies to safety in her sac (or pochon in this part of the world). The racing is of no interest apart from it gives the gendarmes an excuse to stop you getting into your car to drive home. Entertaining the kids in the hour's wait before the pelican flashes by in about 15 seconds (or less if they are all still grouped) is a major logistical headache which is why serious watchers of the racing do it at home with the tele and a few beers and despatch the kids with a hard-suffering maman (who truth be told would actually like to watch those good-looking boys giving their all up or down a mountain - which is why their hubbies are afraid to let them; complexes of inferiority rool, ok)
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The early combativity awards were IIRC sponsored by Coeur de Lion cheese (a cambembert) in the days of Richard Virenque. Dunno if they still do!
Making him Richard Coeur de Lion.
Je vais chercher mon manteau.
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The early combativity awards were IIRC sponsored by Coeur de Lion cheese (a cambembert) in the days of Richard Virenque. Dunno if they still do!
Latest sponsor news I could find was Antargaz signing a three year deal in 2014.
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The early combativity awards were IIRC sponsored by Coeur de Lion cheese (a cambembert) in the days of Richard Virenque. Dunno if they still do!
Making him Richard Coeur de Lion.
Je vais chercher mon manteau.
Well I do remember something with Virenque being linked to the promotion and the phrase Richard Coeur de Lion being put up in the publicity. I can't remember if it was before or after his doping saga or his retirement. Lance must wonder what he has to do sometimes. Virenque is still a prized sporting ambassador for Festina! (Or at least he was just a couple of years ago, he's been a bit more silent recently)
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There are races other than the major tours (as described in this thread).
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I don't think anyone answered this one:
Next up there is the snotty jumper, that goes to the rider who is first past the most of certain signs that are not on tops of hills. These signs seem to be at least one in the middle of every stage, and one at the end, if the end is not on the top of a mountain?
6) Is this magic jumper always snotty? Does it change based on country of racing?
The answer is no, in the Giro d'Italia it is purple ("ciclamino"). Wikipedia says the Vuelta also has a green jumper.
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I don't think anyone answered this one:
Next up there is the snotty jumper, that goes to the rider who is first past the most of certain signs that are not on tops of hills. These signs seem to be at least one in the middle of every stage, and one at the end, if the end is not on the top of a mountain?
6) Is this magic jumper always snotty? Does it change based on country of racing?
The answer is no, in the Giro d'Italia it is purple ("ciclamino"). Wikipedia says the Vuelta also has a green jumper.
Tour de Wallonie, for example:
Maillot orange: GC
Maillot jaune: Points
Maillot rouge: Young Rider
Maillot fuschia: Sprints
Maillot blanc: climber
https://www.trworg.be/les-maillots-2021/
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The polka dot jersey came into being in 1975 when the sponsor of that competition, Chocolat Poulain used the design of the wrapper of their chocolate bars for the jersey.
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The polka dot jersey came into being in 1975 when the sponsor of that competition, Chocolat Poulain used the design of the wrapper of their chocolate bars for the jersey.
Or not (https://yacf.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=119790.msg2640499#msg2640499).
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My favourite leaders jersey is from the Criterium de Dauphiné from a few years back when they used a reverse of the polka dot jersey, ie red jersey with white circles but sadly, ASO weren’t selling replicas of them