Tour de France Stage 3 - Vejle to Sønderborg (182km)

mewso

I don't see a thread and we are well underway in the Magnus Cort Classic. Almost certainly a sprint finish today. Not sure of the betting but take your pick - Jacobsen, Ewan, Groenwegen, Philipsen, Van Aert. I'll go for Pedersen since he's on my Velo Games team.

AxleAddict

Hats off to the Danes - yet another superbly supported stage so far - must be some experience for Magnus this early in the tour...

It's like a lap of honour for Magnus there today.

Dodge

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119284031#Comment_119284031

Well deserved too. Always gives everything

Backing Ewan to win today

griffin100

Van Poppel for the win (just to be different)........but I’d like to see Ewan win.

Mefistofelino

"Can I ask a practical question at this point? Are we gonna have a huge bridge today"?

neris

Carltons getting very excited

neris

thought van aert had that looks like gronewegan

neris

Sagan not a happy bunny

Squidgy Black

Wout needs to practice his bike throws, or he’ll be stuck in 2nd place for the rest of his career

Weepsie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119284988#Comment_119284988

He was very happily and warmly giving wout a tap on the back thinking he'd won.

Mefistofelino

Memo to Groenewegen: Don't force your sprint rivals into the barriers, almost killing them and you won't have deal with two years of mental anguish.

The revisionism from the GCN crew on this is disappointing.

Daroxtar

Genuinely happy for Groenewegen. He's had plenty to deal with and doesn't seem like a bad chap.

at1withmyself

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119285058#Comment_119285058

Agreed, he's had an awful time since the incident so glad to see him win again!

retalivity

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119284988#Comment_119284988

Sagan got Sagan'd

Uran, Caruso, Haig all lost 39s

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119284962#Comment_119284962

He's ruining the sprint finishes for me... he gets 'very excited' about 100m out from the finish and then starts screeching! Condition seems to be getting worse...

dahat

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119285393#Comment_119285393

He seems to get a lot wrong these days for me, even Kelly corrected him today.

CramCycle

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119285047#Comment_119285047

They didn't did they, I never listen to the "show" cast as it's a tough listen.

Mefistofelino

Robbie McEwen is Groenewegen's sprint coach and has been working with him to get his mojo back since the incident, so there's some objectivity missing there. Orla made a comment which made it sound as if the incident was like some 50:50 call and both Dylan and Fabio were somehow both the victim.

Squidgy Black

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119285575#Comment_119285575

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119285672#Comment_119285672

Yeah it was very much aimed towards “poor Dylan who’s had such a hard time the past 2 years, what a comeback from such an awful crash”.

Don’t get me wrong, some of the abuse he got to the extent that he had to have armed police outside his house for 2 months was outrageous, but I’ve certainly no sympathy for him in regards to everything else, he created the situation himself with such an awful move

dahat

The discussion after each stage is far too short for me, nothing of note discussed after a brief rundown of the result.

Not a fan of Orla & her screeching either.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119285836#Comment_119285836

I didn't mind her in previous years but they've all become overly pally there from the looks of it and it's irritating at times. I've just been leaving it on the multi audio stream with JHB covering the podium and introducing different bits. Also no sign of Brian Smith this year?

mewso

Yeah too much friendly laughing and slagging each other to the point we can't hear whats been said sometimes. Another annoyance for me was during the race they showed an analysis of yesterdays finish and it was only on the left hand side while the live race continued on the right. They kept switching from a wide shot of Blythe and back to a close up of the finish but with half the screen we don't need to see Blythe just hear him. They need to just leave the close up shot of the sprint full screen for the entire analysis or any analysis like that.

Melodeon

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119286303#Comment_119286303

I fully agree with this!

In this house, we watch the first few minutes of the Breakaway to see what sort of clown outfits Orla and Adam are wearing today, and then it's over to the 'normal' coverage for the entirety of the rest of the day.

My wife summed it up nicely, what's needed is a management boot . It would happen the rest of us at work.

Anyway absolutely gutted for Denmark after a fantastic weekend for them that some nutter had to go shooting up the place in Copenhagen, terrible thing to happen.

MyDarkArts

Haven't seen any of The Breakaway coverage this TDF as I'm abroad at the moment*, so might need to reserve judgement, but generally I enjoy their pre- and post-race analysis, and I don't have any issues with the outfits or "banter", prefer that to something overly dry. Though I suppose there's a happy medium.

*though GCN should probably have an option whereby I can select my preferred language rather than being geo-locked.

Dodge

I defo prefer the loose approach. It’s not like they don’t have good punditry too, particularly with McEwan on sprints now.

I don’t like Wiggins on TV at all but the rest of them are all fine and looks like he won’t be in the studio at all

Macy0161

I really don't mind the coverage, the dress or the "banter". Easy enough to ignore if you don't like it.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119285719#Comment_119285719

It was a sh!t move, but the actual finish set up and the barriers collapsing have kinda been forgotten about, and also contributed massively (maybe more so) to the injuries. Stage 2 of this years Tour had a downhill sprint ffs!

AxleAddict

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119285836#Comment_119285836

I went to school with Orla and happen to know she's fairly handy with the business end of a camogie stick - so choose your next words carefully 😂😂😂

That said, the one thing that does irritate me a bit when watching cycling coverage is the inconsistency between commentators in the pronunciation of cyclists names - I feel like the media should be provided with some sort of guide which provides a phonetic spelling of every rider to help them (and ultimately the viewers) get the pronunciation right - or more consistent at least... Surely its not too much to ask that if your profession is to speak about these people on a regular basis you could learn how to say their names!

Morris Garren

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119288535#Comment_119288535

This is an interesting point; lots of weird and frankly irrational pronunciations going on at times which can be annoying. Speaking of things Danish, the two that really drive me nutty are when Kirby starts warbling.... 'Mikkel MEER-COW' and worst of all 'Yonis VING-YA-NGO...' this is utterly ridiculous and a not -untypical English faux-intellectual attempt at understanding culture. Or that's just my take on it.

AxleAddict

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119289162#Comment_119289162

Yep - those are two which immediately spring to mind. Or Tadej POG-A-CHAR instead of PO-GAT-CHA! (Sorry Sean!)