heywoodu

Is that provisional, or the final entry list in terms of nations?

Those red flags were already raised high and proud when distance records dropped like flies and then they shot up into the stratosphere when the 400m hurdles final in Tokyo finished

Oh well, with the double in two consecutive Olympics in the pocket, one might wonder how much it really hurts to miss a world championships medal here or there I'm still expecting her to be entirely back in Paris.

Curious how we see that in 2040

Oh well, I would somehow have been more sad about it if he wasn't basically just another American (Tokyo was the first time in his life he had even left the US, curious if he's been in Liberia since)

Superman has a problem. Linked to Dr Maynar, a well-known doping doctor who has been banned for 10 years since 2011 and is working happily ever after in sports physiology. Maynar was, among other things, well-known as the doctor of the continental LA-MSS team, which dominated Spanish/Portuguese continental races around 2008, until Bruno Neves got a heart attack during a race, fell and died. Which was followed by a police raid in which they found shitloads of doping and blood transfusion equipment. Always 'fun' to see these doctors pop up somewhere sooner or later.

The motorbikes who caused that crash fairly early in the stage have been kicked out. One of the Tour organizers, one of Belgian channel Sporza. No more live 'interventions' on Sporza for the rest of the Tour, which is excellent, because just like Bradley Wiggins and Alberto Contador on Eurosport, it adds absolutely nothing Rider X rejoins the peloton Motorbike guy: "Rider X has indeed rejoined the peloton!" Those kind of tidbits.

I thought McNulty was funny yesterday, but Van Aert got close as well At least Vingegaard didn't get close to Riis' time, so that's something

By the way, Hautacam as finish today. Historical climb, not in a good way Bjarne Riis had the most 'epic' of his moments there in the 1996 Tour, where on the way to Hautacam he utterly destroyed everyone as if it was children's play. With playing being what he did for a part, until he accelerated like a madman, with the EPO basically bursting out of his ears. Let's just hope that nobody will get anywhere near his time on Hautacam, it's widely seen as arguably one of the most ridiculous performances ever in cycling. Lance Armstrong attacked in terrible weather in 2000 and laid the foundations for this win, putting minutes into his rivals there. We know how he did that. Juan José Cobo won on Hautacam in 2008. And well, we kind of know how he did that. That was, by the way, with 2008 being the ridiculous Tour of mostly Gerolsteiner and Saunier Duval. Riccardo Ricco, Leonardi Piepoli, Stefan Schumacher, Bernard Kohl, those clowns (And Cobo of course) Which all goes to show, there is a show possible on Hautacam, especially those who have gone full retard throughout the years made for interesting watching Luckily we got rid of those people nowadays. These are times we want to stay for away from today: Note how Cobo, who was so full of doping he was glowing in the dark, isn't even on the list.

One might argue athletics is a much bigger sport worldwide though, it's presumably simply harder to get anyone at the top. Plus success breeds success, so you (often) need good athletes to really get something going in terms of depth.

Second to last climb yesterday, times of Pantani, Virenque and Ullrich obliterated by Pogacar, Vingegaard and McNulty (and Thomas and Kuss although they lost time after being dropped by Pogacar/Vingegaard's pace maker). This is....not good

Excellent, I should be able to watch the entire session in roughly an hour then, instead of 1,5 hours, before starting work tomorrow

Lampaert and Senechal yelling Jakobsen towards the finish

Oh my, what a fight for Jakobsen.

Well, that was a waste of time

A common way to use it is as sort of a 'springboard', so to speak. Guy up front lets himself be dropped, team leader acttacks and catches up with his teammate, who can then push for a few minutes to give his team leader a good gap. This isn't a very rare tactic, although it's hard to perform it very well.

And down goes another record from the EPO days

Right, but it's been proven a useful tactic quite often throughout the years

Thomas can't rest though, he still has the 3rd place to defend (which shouldn't be much of a problem, but still)

McNulty drops Thomas

Van Aert has shown that strategy is quite good though, if the rider is strong enough and the timing is done well.

Brandon Beltran is decimating the group with GC guys that are left

And that's the green jersey mathematically decided if Van Aert stays on his bike. Not that it wasn't decided yet, total dominance. Same kind of thing as in most of Sagan's green jerseys: the way stages are set up and such makes it impossible for someone to beat someone with the qualities Sagan had and nowadays the overall qualities Van Aert has

And Majka is out, he got injured when his chain broke yesterday. That is really unfortunate.

When taking away the fines, Astana has already earned a full €40 these past 2,5 weeks, Vino can maybe take one of the riders for a Happy Meal at McDonald's