Sports Poets Society

Il Tour riparte senza Paolini, dalla Normandia si arriva in Bretagna e la Grande Boucle rende omaggio ai luoghi di Bobet e Hinault. E la Francia, con tre giorni di anticipo sul 14 luglio, si gode la prima vittoria francese in questo Tour. Nella duplice arrampicata sul Mur de Bretagne, doppio attacco di Alexis Vuillermoz, ex campione del mondo nella staffetta in mountain bike, che al Giro 2014 chiuse 11esimo. Il 27enne della AG2R ha attaccato a 1,5 km e poi a ottocento metri dal traguardo, vincendo da solo a braccia alzate. Terzo successo in carriera, il secondo quest'anno dopo il Gran Prix di Plumelec, dove trent'anni fa partì l'ultimo Tour vinto da Hinault e da un francese. E dove, soprattutto, arriverà la cronosquadre della nona tappa. Seconda e ultima frazione contro il tempo che assesterà poderosi scossoni alla classifica generale. Classifica già ritoccata anche dall'ottava tappa, che dietro Vuillermoz ha visto piazzati l'irlandese Daniel Martin e lo s...

28 km TTT | Sunday July 12 | Start 15:00 – Finish 17:17 CET STAGE FACT Plumelec hosted a TTT finish in 1982 after the Tour’s initial TTT on stage five was interrupted by striking steel workers. Organisers stuck an impromptu 69km TTT on the morning of stage nine. It’s less than 20 miles long, but today’s stage will be one of the ones that the Tour’s overall favourites fear the most. It is team time trial day: one of the most physically and technically demanding stages of the whole race. At the end of a long first week, riders will be hoping that they don’t slip up and concede crucial seconds going into the first rest day. As if that wasn’t enough TTT’s don’t always suit the best time triallists as they demand constant accelerations and decelerations rather than steady state efforts. They also require exceptional teamwork, with the time taken on the fifth rider to cross the line. As a team, do you choose to use up four riders to save the legs of the remaining five? Or do you rid...

181.5 km | Saturday July 11 | Start 12:40 – Finish 17:19 CET STAGE FACT When he wasn’t commentating, legendary Tour announcer Daniel Mangeas liked nothing more than to go to Rennes to watch his beloved football club Stade Rennais. Mûr-de-Bretagne wasn’t named after the French for ‘wall,’ but with the long straight road into town hitting an average of 8.4% over 1.3 km , it might as well have been. The climb featured regularly in the Tour until in 2011 it was used as a stage finish for the first time . That day Cadel Evans outgunned Alberto Contador to the line (198/1000) and went on to win the Tour outright. Fast and furious It’s basically an uphill sprint finish for the GC riders , and with a flat run-in to the bottom of the climb , the GC teams will be doing full-on lead-outs to position their leaders. While the pure sprinters will be thinking about the rest day and saving their legs for the mountains, the stage will also be high on the list for puncheurs like world cham...