Stage 2 of the 2009 Tour de France—in useful video analysis form! Some early-race crashes and good racing over the final kilometers. Watch the picture-perfect leadout by Columbia-Highroad HTC and hope they aren’t this effective for the next three weeks.
I had a fairly clear schedule yesterday, so I figured I’d put another one of these together from online feed footage. Not the highest quality, I’m afraid, and I had to crop the picture to fit widescreen, but all things considered, I think it came out OK.
[right-click for iTunes compatible download]
There’s a video podcast as well, in case you we’re unaware (direct link to iTunes). Doing what I did for the Giro and Romandie is too time consuming, but barring a copyright complaint, I should be able to get a single-stage feature done each weekend.
Fantastic video – hilarious and informative – keep em coming!!!
I tihnk this was your best one yet. Looks like you stepped it up fro the Tour!
Wow, that video rocked.
That was awesome.
I’ve never paid any attention to cycling at all. I moved to the West Coast and I love tennis so I got up to watch Wimbledon at 6 in the morning on Sunday but TdF started a half hour earlier and I was up at 5 so I turned it on and I’m not sure how it happened but I got hooked. If versus hadn’t done reruns I’m not sure I would have watched Federer and Roddick.
It is so cool to have a whole other sport to try to understand. Plus you get to see France (used to live in Paris). These guys are unbelievable. I’m a hockey goalie and love the endurance and attritive component of the Stanley Cup, last guy standing and all that. I can’t believe they burn themselves like this and then start the next day. And the next. Gotta be the most impressive annual sporting event.
Great video by the way (plugged it on twitter at weblogtheworld). Look forward to further posts.
So how tough is it for them to beat the doping tests? There’s just no way they can recover like that every day for three weeks without taking something. Plus all the training. Maybe everyone should do it openly so that it’s an even playing field.
I enjoyed it. Thanks a lot for the effort.
Hi Ray, welcome to cycling.
I would imagine its harder to evade the dope tests in cycling than in any other sport in the world, just based on the sheer amount of testing. People also get caught all the time, and the penalties are steep.
Consider Dutch cyclist Thomas Dekker, who was caught just two weeks ago, when testers re-checked a sample from the 2007 off-season. He had already been fired over mere suspicion of doping in 2008, and will likely be suspended until 2011. For comparison, baseball player Manny Ramirez failed a mid-season dope test earlier this year, and is already back in the lineup.
At any rate, I don’t think it’s impossible that riders would be able to complete a three-week race without drugs. There are rest days, and none of the riders in the race goes 100% every stage. And even then, 15-20% of the guys who start the Tour don’t finish.
Toward the end of the race, it’s not uncommon to see breakaways finishing 10+ minutes ahead of the field because the riders in the break are so far behind in the overall standings leaders, and also because the other 150 riders are too exhausted to chase.
That having been said, you’re not the first to suggest that doping be legalized for the safety of the riders—the increasing abuse of blood-thickening drugs like EPO in the 1990s brought a disturbing rise in the numbers of otherwise fit young cyclists dying of mysterious heart attacks.
Well. I’d totally given up on you a while back. When you stopped posting for 700 years I figured you were done. On a whim I looked and I’m glad that I did.
I don’t get it.
bravo. great analysis of the sprint. thanks.
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