Missile to Launch Control - Cavendish flies

I was going to keep this blog to a weekly roundup of the Tour this year, but when the Manx Missile Mark Cavendish defied illness to take stage 5 from Cagnes-sur-Mer to Marseille, I was pretty inspired.

Launching a missile is obviously a complex process. Omega-Pharma Quickstep could at least get some outside contractors to keep the breakaway in tow in the form of Orica-Greenedge who, with fast-man Matt Goss as well as Maillot Jaune Simon Gerrans on their team, had every reason to be looked to. Fresh from taking OPQS' scalps be a mere 3/4 of a second in the Team Time Trial the day before, they were obviously full of confidence and so did not shirk round their duties.

Energy saved then for the lead-out of Cavendish you would think. Perhaps not though, because the stage wasn't as straightforward as he might have hoped. The rolling terrain made for a difficult catch of the breakaway which meant Peter Velits, Sylvain Chavanel and Tony Martin - a trio who could have run Greenedge that close in the TTT by themselves - had to be deployed into the chase.

After clearing away the embers of rockets past, setting up the launch pad then fell to Matteo Trentin and the ever-present Gert Steegmans, who place Cavendish perfectly before he pressed to big red button and went. That is in past tense because, well, it happened yesterday; but also because when Mark Cavendish kicks out from an idyllic lead-out like that, the sprint may as well already be over.

The Manx Missile flew as André Greipel and Peter Sagan could only watch as the man in red, white and blue soared off towards the sun - taking Edvald Boassen-Hagen with him to mop up some more Green Jersey points. Save a thought for Matt Goss who was comparatively left in the dressing room putting on his space suit and was beyond nowhere to be seen, despite all his team's work earlier in the day. Well three stage wins in a row would have been greedy.

The ball is rolling. Let's see if that Missile gets painted green.

Why the 2012 Tour de France route was a necessity for faith in cycling

It was a route that has been bombarded with abuse, being named boring and predictable, but could it have actually been a clever plan by Prudhomme and co to restore a little faith in the front line of our sport?

Doping, by it's nature, makes cyclists better. And by being better then surely better performances, more impressive performances, are pulled off? Nobody can forget the scenes of Armstrong dancing up Alpe d'Huez, staring Ullrich in the face as he shoots off into the distance, the German being made to look pedestrian whilst still destroying the rest of the peloton himself. But all these scenes, exciting though they may be, are now utterly unconvincing and ultimately fake.

The 2012 route then was one which certainly highlighted strong time trialists, but still needed gritty and dogged performances in the mountains to pull of a victory. Wiggins and Froome did not ride everybody to oblivion. Their climbing 'dominance' was epitomised on stage 17 where they rode everybody else off their wheels - however they finished no more than 15 seconds ahead of third place overall Vincenzo Nibali. And just 3 seconds over youngest rider in the race Thibaut Pinot. What is especially telling is how this appeared to us - the judgmental public - as a complete trouncing of the field. Compare this though, to the likes of Armstrong claiming 2 minutes over Ullrich on a single assent of Alpe d'Huez in 2001. Or passing Basso on the mountain time trial in 2004. These performances were exciting, magnificent, unreal.

As a result, Wiggins was the only person who ever looked likely to win the Tour because of his supreme time trialling skill, and the whole race perhaps seemed monotonous and easily-predictable. But in the age where the form book tells us everything we need to know, and where races are easy enough to predict anyway, shouldn't this be the case?

Take away the fireworks and you don't get burnt. Prudhomme performed a masterstroke to protect cycling from the fire in an oh so significant year. While talking about Lance and the dirty years of cycling, we need to look at this year's races and believe in clean and honest sport. It may not keep you on the edge of your seat, but it might just save professional cycling altogether.

Click to recap the 2012 Tour de France route and to see what's in store for 2013 when hopefully viewers can watch with renewed faith.

2012

This year is set to be massive. That's from pretty much any perspective too! Don't believe me? Here's your proof from the last two months already:

1) Greipel looks AWESOME right now, but so does Cav. This is going to make for a very interesting and exciting Tour de France 1st week, let alone the rest of the year!

2) Wiggins showed his climbing prowess in the Algarve with a monster turn to help Richie Porte take the win. He then beat Tony Martin in the final day's TT and in doing so, moved up to 3rd on the GC. This was done riding for a team mate so imagine what he can do when the teams attention is focussed on him! This is another reason for British fans to be excitedly tuning into Eurosport or ITV4 come July, but it also sets up a tantalizing Olympics Time Trial in London. Wiggins was the only person to come close to Martin in any time trials last year, namely the Dauphiné where he could have won had he not been playing it safe on a wet descent. Oh boy oh boy oh boy!

3) Boonen's back! Wins in San Luis and Qatar as well as a solid performance in the opening classic Omloop show his form is good going into the spring. Cancellara also looked strong in Qatar and with Hushovd, Breschel, Gilbert, Flecha as well as new Vaughters protégé Vanmarcke going well the classics season looks set to be a case of the bit meaty power houses that dwarf the bike beneath them gunning for victory once again. Hopefully they will have learnt not to mark eachother out like last year. Don't get me wrong, I love seeing an underdog like Nuyens or Van Summeren win but when Cancellara did everything he possibly could to escape and deserved to win so much it was sad to see it not happening.

Paris-Nice starts soon and it will be a great test of early-season form for the Grand Tour hopefuls. While there is a lot of climbing compared to the Tour, meaning Wiggins might not be able to reach the top step, he should at least be able to tell further how his fitness is when he's heading in an upward direction.

In terms of favourites I think the Schleck's would have to be ill not to get their seasons off to a storming start with wins here, especially when you consider the parcours only include a mountain Time Trial.

The presence of Levi Leipheimer and Andreas Kloden, the week-long stage race assassins from last year, should cause some heart rates to rise even before the riders hit the pedals!

The likes of Tejay Van Garderen, Janez Brajkovic and the previously discussed Wiggins have had success in these kind of races previously so watch out for them too.

Ivan Basso will be there to test himself before the Giro, while Cunego is looking to start fine-tuning for his main aim this year which is the Ardennes Classics.

This is all without mentioning last year's winner Tony Martin of course, although I don't think think the hillier course will suit him this year so he may just be there to help Leipheimer.

Look out for the French trying to shake things up a bit as well. Voeckler never stopped attacking in this race last year, Sylvain Chavanel will be looking to show off his tricolour in its home country, and Jerome Coppel will be hoping to follow some of the favourites' wheels in the mountains. I wouldn't put it past Belgian De Ghent to go off the front a few times as well after his success with this tactic on stage 1 in 2011.

Let's not forget the French revelation of the Tour in 2011, Pierre Roland. If that race and his early season for are anything to go by, and if he has the right support, then he my well be challenging for the top places as well.

In terms of sprinters, it looks like Boonen could be a good tip considering many of the big name sprinters have headed over to Tirrenno-Adriatico, however he will face competition from Renshaw, Rojas Gil, Haedo and a rider who has been very impressive so far this season, Yauheni Hutarovic of FDJ-Big Mat.

And this is all just for one of the races going on next week. The season is well and truly under way!! 

Did i miss something?

Oh yeah! MANX MISSILE. WORLD CHAMPION. MARK CAVENDISH. BEAUTIFUL. GREAT BRITAIN FOREVER. Right i think that pretty much sums it up.

TTing at the Worlds!

So it's nearly the end of the season. Riders will be looking forward to a nice next few months spent at home with their families, relaxing and doing things they couldn't do during a full summer of work. There is still one obstacle however: The esteemed World Championships!

The women were up first and at one point it looked like there could be a Canadian eclipse with 4 of their riders showing in the top 5. As soon as the big guns rolled out though. things changed a little bit. Emma Pooley was the big British favourite being the reigning champion but the course was too flat and easy for her meaning it would play into the hands of the stronger riders more. She did however, ride to a Broze medal which shows positive signs for the future. Namely the Olympics Time Trial course which is also as flat as a pancake.

Silver went to Linda Villumsen of New Zealand, only 3 seconds ahead of Pooley. A further 20 seconds ahead though Gold was claimed by Judith Arndt who had been chasing the coveted rainbow jersey since 1997. Her well calculated ride made her the dominant winner and, interestingly, she had done it without the use of a radio. Take from that what you will but she seemed focussed on her goal the entire way through and she certainly got the result she wanted oh so much.

 Next was the mens race. Going into it Fabian Cancellara had been the unchallenged Time Trial king with 4 world titles to his name. This season did not go all his own way though. He won time trials in the Tour De Suisse and Tirreno-Adriatico yes, but he had hopelessly lost to heir apparent Tony Martin in the Tour De France and Vuelta á Espana. Couple this Martin's storming form shown from a GC win at Paris-Nice and a Time Trial win at the Daupiné Libre and you could sense a changing in the wind coming.

Sure enough it was Martin who came off the ramp and destroyed the field. He caught and passed acclaimed Time Trialer and last years silver medalist David Millar even before halfway. In the end he won by well over a minute. But who would it be over that was the question...

It was between our very own Bradley Wiggins after posting the best time as he finished, and Sparticus himself Cancellara. Wiggins has been on form all year in Time Trials as well as climbing and as Fabian came round the last corner it was a real nail biter as to whether he would make it to the line before Wiggins' time passed or not. It ended up that it was Great Britain got a second consecutive silver medal and Brad had helped towards a double-dethronment of the Swiss powerhouse.

Martin though, still a young rider, looks set for big things in the coming years. Consider this though: Judith Arndt rides for HTC-Highroad. As does Tony Martin. One of the favourites for the womens road race is Ina Teutenberg of HTC-Highroad and the big favourite for the mens rainbow jersey is Mark Cavendish...you guessed it, of HTC-Highroad. Why then, has no company seen the opportinuty to save this historic and successful team? Who knows how the mind of a businessman works...

British epiphany in Spain and Gilbert shows he's human in Canada

When, just 20 months ago, a new team formed from a little known area in cycling terms called Great Britain did nobody expect two of its recruits to be standing on the final podium in a grand tour.

But here we are today. The Vuelta á Espana is one of the most prestigious races in the world and today Bradley Wiggins and Christopher Froome of Team Sky took the 2nd and 3rd places in the final general classification. It was anticipated that Brad would be the team leader and would earn his place in the time trial while having to hang on through the climbing stages.  Froome began as the main man to martial Wiggins up the climbs and did a stellar job by setting a very high pace for the last few km's and then letting Brad take over. This would be the formula for the rest of the tour.

Then came the time trial where Wiggins was expected to take the lead after performing better than he had hoped on the early mountain stages; but it was Froome who placed 2nd on the stage behind Tony Martin and took the red jersey. Speculation was rife as to wether he would still ride for Wiggins or not and he ended up sacrificing himself and potentially a win for his leader. It turned out that Brad did not have the legs to stay with the eventual winner Juan Jose Cobo on the gruelling 23% Angrilu climb and unfortunately it appeared as though Chris Froome was stronger and if Team Sky had ridden for him after that oh so impressive time trial, then he could have worn the red jersey into Madrid.

A lot of people are saying that Dave Brailsford made a big mistake to stick with Wiggins as theeir guy for the GC but the fact of the matter is that they could not have known how strong Froome was. While Wiggins is a proven 3 week rider, Froome was a revelation in giving this class of performance and what would Sky have done if his fitness level had dropped off towards the end leaving them with no cards to play. Ultimately the critics have to ask themselves, would you rather have two riders on the podium albeit not on the top step, or have one rider in 4th or even lower?

Look at it from a different perspective...British cycling has reached new heights today. Before Team Sky there were only one or two cyclists at a time (E.g. Robert Millar, Chris Boardman, David Millar, Mark Cavendish) that could do anything on the European road scene. Now, much like the Leopard Trek did for Luxembourg in the Tour de France, we have two riders whose names will be spoken of worldwide. Along with the likes of Ben Swift and Geraint Thomas, these riders have out in world class performances on world wide stages and brought Britain to the fore in professional cycling; all in a time scale that other teams and countries could never dreamed of doing!

Now we can look forward to generations of talent flying the flag for us. Bradley Wiggins, David Millar and Mark Cavendish are the current big names but the likes of Froome, Swift, Thomas, Dowsett will all continue to develop and provide the stars of the future.
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In other news, Phillipe Gilbert showed he was human in the second Canadian world tour classic around Montreal as a late breakaway unexpectedly succeded. Gilbert still managed to sprint to 3rd but that by his standards is a big loss. While the Belgian, who regained his place at the top of the world tour rankings the other day with his win in Quebec, had to settle for third it was Movistar's Rui Costa who took his opportunity to sprint to victory ahead of Pierrick Fedrigo of Francaise De Jeux. The question still looms over whether Gilbert thinks he could do anything in the world championships in Copenhagen later this month or if he'd rather concentrate on the final classics of the season.

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The Tour of Britain started today with a sprint stage that was a formality with Mark Cavendish easily winning and taking the first leaders jersey. Such was HTC's dominance that leadout man Mark Renshaw held on for 2nd place. Teams had to work together and fight to chase down the breakaway which, with only 6 riders per team, was more difficult than usual. Team Sky, Rabobank and HTC-Highroad all harboured interests in the final sprint though so together they reeled in the two breakaway riders in time but not before all the KOM and intermediate sprint points which go to Russel Hampton of Sigma Sport-Specialized and Pieter Ghyllebert of An Post-Sean Kelly respectively. Lets hope some of the smaller British teams can continue to show their faces during the week to come.

Thanks for reading!

Public Apology

I almost forgot, I would like to make a public apology to Team Radioshack for bringing on the curse of the commentator or in this case, blogger. I had bigged up their chances in the Tour this year with their four pronged attack on the GC and they had a torrid time with three of the team's leaders (Horner, Brajkovic, Kloden) abandoning due to crashes and Leipheimer losing significant time to the tarmac as well.

Sorry Mr Bruyneel and co!