Quote:

Originally Posted by ZeroGravity 

For all of us number crunching weenies, the SRM live telemetry data for some riders from Saxo, Cofidis, Liquigas, and all of HTC can be found here

 

http://www.srmlive.de/Data/Telemetry.html

 

Google is also providing the same for HTC only http://www.google.com/intl/en/landing/mytrackstour/

 

The SRM site displays all the riders data, where the Google site is one rider at a time.

 

Nice catch.  Love the data…fun stuff

Quote:

Originally Posted by UGASkiDawg 

Nice try by Tyler...too bad he doesn't have a Renshaw to blast him off

Even if the amazing Renshaw was pulling the line Tyler can’t anchor himself to his drops yet…fundamentally necessary to crank with Cav.

great ad spot

Lance involved in two silly/minor crashes today, setting him even further back from Contador.

For some reason monkeys flying out of butts come to mind.

How is shleck in the time trail vs. contador?

I think it is Andy Schlecks tour to lose at this point. His stock went up with me after his performance on the cobbles, and seeing him drop Alberto Contador today was great. I think his brother was holding him back. 

I'm most likely wrong, but I don't see Schleck all the way on top. Top 3 for sure, but winning... I don't see him there. His TT is just way too slow to be there, at least in my opinion. It might be different this year, but until now (last few years) he didn't show some really impressive mountain ride yet. He's good, nothing to say about this, but I just don't see him taking minutes from Contador in mountains, which he could afford to lose later on during TT. 

At the moment, Evans looks really good too, but I have feeling sooner or later there will be one of his days, when he will be losing 10-15mins in one stage.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tromano 

How is shleck in the time trail vs. contador?

Well, in the prologue he lost like 50 seconds in 8 km.  He is the time trial champion on Luuxemboug, but there were only four people competing.
 

I know just a bit about bike racing. But my take after stage 8 is that Astana is very strong team and can protect contador in the climbs even if he is not on his best form. The Astana helpers didn't finish far back of the GC leaders yesterday so even if contador goes off the back he has a chance to be able to stay close enough. 

Shleck looks to be on the best form of everyone, but with out his brother he has little backup on the climbs to protect him and he will have to go it alone much of the time. Any of the top 13 guys on GC right now any in the group could win it if they can get contador off the back. I acutally think liquigas has a good shot to podium given that Roman and Basso are both looking good and can work together.  

Evans is DOA on the last climb today, and AS looked like he could have dropped Contador if he had wanted to put the work in.

Schleck's tour to lose.

   Liquigas weaker than I thought, Cadel much weaker than I thought, Vino stronger than I thought.      Otherwise the pattern is pretty much there (I got the chase group wrong).

(FWIW, I was modeling today on Stage 14 of the 2009 Giro Forli-> Faenza)

*since nobody else called anything, keeps Dogfishhead and quaffs it*

Oiginally Posted by comprex 

So.   Who's got a favorite for Stage 14, Revel -> Ax 3 Domanes, and how is it going to play out?

Quote:

Originally Posted by UGASkiDawg 

Incorrect....it's AC's tour to lose right now.  AS needs at least 2.5 minutes on AC to even have a chance to win this thing going into the final TT.  Contador was never in trouble today...I don't know what you were watching......

"Even should he never drop Schleck in the mountains, a 41 second deficit may be small enough for Contador to overcome in the final 52km time trial, where he is historically a much stronger rider. Schleck lost 1:45 to Contador in the 40.5km time trial of Annecy one year ago."

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/contador-happy-to-stay-on-schlecks-wheel

So Evans broke his elbow in Monday's crash and couldn't pull on the bars at all today.  He was lucky to keep up as long as he did (credit to the BMC gang for pacesetting for as long as they did).

I think that AS and AC basically set up quite the duel.  AS is climbing better than AC right now, but AC is still the superior TT guy.  Menchov is quietly moving up, as well, and Levi can still hit the podium, provided he stays strong and doesn't get dropped too much in the future (and no, he's not changed: the guy still can't launch an attack if he wanted to).

Let's see what he last Alpine day and the days in the southern mountains bring about.  Stage 14 will see fireworks: whose team will launch the most severe attacks.  It could be Astana, with Vino being Vino.  It could be Saxo, with their strong supporting cast.  It could be Rabobank's 1-2 due of Menchov and Gesink.  The Shack could throw Lance, Levi, Klödi and Horner at the lot.  We'll see.

But it's looking increasingly like AC and AS are going to due this out until the final TT.

Quote:

Originally Posted by UGASkiDawg 

 

I thought that was what I just said

It was.  I was agreeing with you and providing some numbers to back up what you said..

We need a poll:  What will the time difference be between Contador and Schleck in the final TT?  Flawed of course, because there is a lot of race to go, but I think it will be Contador by 1:30.
 

Quote:

Originally Posted by ecimmortal 

Evans is DOA on the last climb today, and AS looked like he could have dropped Contador if he had wanted to put the work in.

 

Schleck's tour to lose.

If he could have, why didn't he? He had Contador alone. You don't get that many chances.

Quote:

Originally Posted by epic 

If he could have, why didn't he? He had Contador alone. You don't get that many chances.

Both have been quoted as saying that they decided to work together to put time into the rest of the field.

 

Yeah, I just read that. Seems like a mistake to me. He should be worrying about AC not the rest of the field. Well, this is why we have the race isn't it?

My heros from yesterday - Voigt and Navarro.

Ok, time to start cooking in earnest..  I got a case of Gigondas yesterday (which I managed to bring home one the bike!).  Tomorrow's stage lands right in the Gigondas grapes.  Here's what I'm making:  (Google translation for your convenience)

Râble de lapin rôti au thym et polenta aux trois poivrons

Ingrédients pour 4 personnes :
râble de lapin 2 p
thym pm
crépine pm
Huile d'olive 10 cl
poivrons rouges 100 gr
poivrons verts 100 gr
poivrons jaunes 100 gr
ail 15 gr
polenta 250 gr
lait ½ l
maïzena 100 gr
glace de viande (fond de veau ) 10 cl
miel de lavande 50 gr
sauce soja 5 cl

Préparation :
Désosser les râbles de lapin, mettre un peu de thym puis les rouler dans de la crépine un tour entier. Les cuire dans une poêle avec un peu d'huile d'olive pour bien les faire colorer sur toutes les faces et finir la cuisson au four à 200° pendant 5 minutes.
Tailler en petit dés les poivrons et les faire revenir dans une casserole avec un peu d'huile d'olive. Ajouter l'ail hachée et avant la coloration, déglacer avec le lait et saler.
Lorsque le mélange bout, incorporer la polenta en mélangeant bien au fouet et laisser cuire 5 minutes a feu doux. Ajouter hors du feu le reste d'huile d'olive et mouler dans une plaque avec du papier sulfurisé 1 cm d'épaisseur. Laisser refroidir et tailler en bâtonnets de 6 cm de longueur.
Faire réduire le miel avec la sauce soja jusqu' a l'obtention d'un caramel et déglacer avec la glace de viande (fond de veau très réduit et concentré).

Présentation :
Passer la polenta dans la maïzena et la frire à 180° pour bien la colorer. Disposer les en rond au centre de l'assiette en les faisant chevaucher. Couper le râble en biseau et le mettre au milieu et décorer avec la sauce autour.

Vin conseillé :
Gigondas 2001

Saddle of rabbit roasted with thyme and pepper polenta with three

4

30 minutes

20 minutes

Quote:

Originally Posted by newfydog 

Ok, time to start cooking in earnest.. 

Newfy's cooking theme

Okay, we'll run with it...Mark Renshaw sure served up his last can of headbutting whoopass on Dean making space for Cav’s table today.  Mark, you can sure cook it up on a lead out but you also need to do a much better job of cleaning the table quietly and without notice once it’s time to pick up the dishes [in this case with Tyler Farrar].  Too bad Mark as I liked your cooking…but this is not a Track restaurant…it’s a French Bistro.   

He did not deserve to be booted....

rubbing is racing

He should have just fought afterwards, thats only worth a couple of hundred euros.

And no appeal.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rossi Smash 

He did not deserve to be booted....

 

rubbing is racing

Sure, I agree.  Hell, Dean didn’t give a crap about it.  Certainly a harsh sentence.  But it was not “rubbing” [far from it in fact] in the eyes of tour officials rather it was track style headbutting they don't want broadcasted.  Also, Renshaw did not help his cause as they reviewed the tape with the subsequent wall block of Tyler once he let Cav out of his slip stream. 

This race has been an especially weird one with all the bones breaking and skin rashing of the top seeds. And while I don’t like what happened to Renshaw today I’m not surprised they pushed the nuclear button on him.   

Quote:

Originally Posted by Taxman 

He should have just fought afterwards, thats only worth a couple of hundred euros.

 

And no appeal.

I think you're right

If Cadel was on the receiving end of Renshaw’s headbutting rather than Dean, good lord…broken elbow or not…Evans would have unleashed hell at the finish line.  BUT: technically off racing camera and after the line, Evans would have remained in the race only a few euros short. 

edit re: next post...[ahha...yes; OZ v NZ  ]
 

Deans whinge is a bit of an Oz v NZ thing (big brother/little brother); we beat them at most things except rugby union.....

.... and NZ has much better mountains than Oz.

That was a classy move for sure. Seems like Garmin and HTC really don't like each other.