If the event is looking a bit unsettled about its name, may I suggest “Tour of Colorado”?
Sorry it’s a bit late, and afraid I won’t be doing HTRWW for the Vuelta due to some time zone issues and day job time constraints. That said, there’s more going on over the next months than 21 days of riding in Spain, so stay tuned.
Shame you can’t do the Vuelta due to time constraints. maybe years down the road.
Well done. Enjoyable as always.
Is it really weird to anyone else that Froome didn’t win? Can someone explain this to me? As someone pretty new to cycling, it’s like dominating major league baseball, but failing miserably in the AAA league a month later?
@Wes Parsel: It’s not weird that Froome didn’t win. The TdF is a very different race—three weeks long, much bigger mountains, much higher level of competition, with people going all-out to win every day.
The Tour is almost more survived than won—generally, the strategy is try not waste energy 98% of the time, and win the race in the last KM of some mountain or a time trial. Moves like Morton/Frank’s escape or TJ’s decent are very risky, and unlikely to net meaningful time during a race as long as the TdF.
Also, it’s very hard to maintain top shape for a long period of time, especially if you’ve used three weeks of it winning the Tour. Froome’s post TdF schedule involved a ton of media appearances, some faux-races at a bunch of festivals in Europe, and a lot of rest. It’s hard to hop back from that to top form, especially 8,000 ft above sea-level. Froome himself said he was using the race for training/helping a teammate.
I guess the best baseball metaphor would be an all-star coming back from injury and taking a few minor league starts. A few strikeouts aren’t a major cause for concern. That said, were people expecting Froome to not get dropped? Absolutely.
He was just showing his face, homie. And wouldn’t have won even at his best. Welcome to the glorious depth of the worlds only meaningful sport.
Have patience and enjoy the learning process. You only get to enjoy it once.