How to Vault a fallen team mate:

Fast cornering, not for the faint of heart.

Froome vaults over a fallen Moscon.

A hotly contested Tour de France

Brittany northern France. (reuters picture)

Hay bale fires rage in near-by fields. Luckily, favorable winds allowed the race peloton to safely pass.

It’s TEA time with the Tour de France !!!

Saturday July 1st. 2017 …. 06:30am Southern Californian time.

Thé du jour: Pu-erh accompanied by “homemade” Spinach and Walnut muffins:

Chapeau à Mark returning to this year’s TdF. (post race update: Mark was off the pace today, 1:45 behind the winning time)Chapeau à  Team SKY .. Four riders in the top Ten

 Have Tools Will Travel

Some files uploaded to YouTube

Cav takes win #4

Brilliant timing combined with raw power & speed ….

No place for Whiners !!! (Marcel Kittel Etixx-Quick Step, gets 5th. place)Mark Cavendish gets his 30th career Tour de France stage victory.

A nice place to Pedal for a living

Winding through the Pyrenees from: Vielha Val d’Aron to the Andorra ski station in Arcolis.

Nothing Short of: Exciting last 15km, Froome explodes

Stage 8: Chris Froome wins with panache: An audacious attack on descent of Col de Peyresourde.……. Now he is in YELLOW !!!

Three is a Charm .. Cav., 3rd Stage win !!!

 

Stage 6 2016:       The race from Arpajon-sur-Cère to Montauban was destined to be a sprint finish.Cavendish now holds the second-most stage wins in Tour history, behind Eddy Merckx. Mark also snagged the lead in the points classification, to hold the green jersey.

Stage 3 .. another Win for Cav

Just for a Day .. But what a day!!

TdeF 2016 .. Mark Cavendish in YELLOW

Stage 1 winner and Race Leader: .. Well deserved ……

2014 Tour Finale and First Chinese Rider

July 2014, Sunday in Paris, Tour de France winner: Vincenzo Nibali. Bringing up the rear of the pack: the “lanterne rouge” 红灯  Hóng dēng.  Cheng Ji,  first rider from Mainland China to ride the tour, 6 hrs. behind the winner.

PARIS (AFP) — Chinese rider Ji Cheng said he wants to get away from cycling for a while after completing the Tour de France on Sunday. Ji was a visible member of the peloton over the last three weeks, relishing his role as the “breakaway killer” for his Giant-Shimano team.  And although the 27-year-old did not set the world alight with his performances, he did gain cult status over 3,659 kilometers of racing around France.

But he’s had enough for this year.

Asked what he would do now, he said: “I have no idea. I will try to relax because I got married but 20 days later I came back to Europe for a training camp and then racing and it’s been eight months now since I’ve been home. “That’s really long, I will try to relax and not think any more about cycling.”

It’s not been easy for Ji, who was expected to ride at the front of the peloton day after day to control breakaway groups and ensure his Giant team would be able to reel them in later so sprinter Marcel Kittel could finish off his work.

Kittel won four stages in total while another German sprinter, John Degenkolb, finished second in two others in which the lumpy run-ins weren’t suited to Kittel’s raw straight-line power. But Ji’s also had his own challenges to overcome, having suffered from a knee problem.

“The hardest moments were just the first week and the last week,” he said. “The first week had more sprint stages and we had more chances for victories so I was working hard to control the group and working hard on the front. That was a hard week.”  “And the last week because I was injured in the left knee. Already I wasn’t looking forward to the mountains because of my injury which was so painful. “But the second week was nice for me, I had more time to enjoy the race.”

Enjoyment would be a curious word for a race that lasted more than 90 hours. And in Ji’s case, he rode for more than six hours longer than winner Vincenzo Nibali (Astana), in so doing managing the biggest gap between first and last since 1954.

Ji, who was 164th, also finished more than 50 minutes behind the second-to-last finisher and crashed on the final stage on the Champs Elysees, even suffering the ignominy of being lapped by the peloton as it completed eight circuits of the famous avenue. But every day, Ji managed to get inside the time limit. And it’s not the first time he’s completed a grand tour.

He finished 175th (last place) at the 2012 Vuelta a Espana, although sickness prevented him from completing last year’s Giro d’Italia.

While the native of Harbin in the northeast of China may be the Tour’s “lanterne rouge,” the rider who finishes last, he at least finished, which is more than what 34 other starters managed, among them defending champion Chris Froome, Alberto Contador, and Mark Cavendish.

All three crashed out and Ji says that’s one of the risks in cycling.  “In cycling sometimes dangerous things can happen like a crash, or you can get sick or have a fever,” he said. “It’s normal, last year at the Giro the same thing happened to me. I got very sick before stage five and couldn’t start it.

“It’s really sad but it’s like this. Maybe next year I’ll have this situation. I was pretty lucky really, I didn’t crash or get sick or anything.” Having made history as the first Chinese rider to compete in the Tour, Ji said he hopes to be a pioneer for his countrymen, but said it will take more than just him to change things.

“I hope so but a cycling project in the country cannot be one man like me,” he said. “Maybe I can show them something but I cannot change anything.

“I hope they can see it’s possible to build a team or train riders to be top professionals. That’s what I hope.”

Tour de France – Quantum of Solace stands at Zero

With temperatures hovering at 40c (104F) racers try to cool down after crossing the finish line. During the race you seek solace in any form.

Tour de France – Post Rest Day

With the early exit of the “Top” names in Professional Cycling and various others pulling out of the Tour in pursuit of personal goals, we are left with an uninspired peloton.  Despite the efforts of; Tour organizers and various interested factions .. This Tour has lost its Panache ….

A rider questioning where his wages will come from (? your name here) 

Tour de France --- Major Departure

Stage 10 claims Alberto Contador, crashing and sustaining a severe knee injury. Now the top two contenders, Froome and Contador,  for this years Yellow Jersey  have crashed out!  Tomorrow is a “Rest Day”. .. Much speculation and strategy changes will abound .. We now have the potential for a Wide Open race.  Many will endeavor to gain their stripes.  I cannot remember a TdF with so many major contender losses in the first 10 days. 

Can Vincenzo Nibali, 2014 Italian champion and 2013 Giro d’Italia winner,  take the 2014 TdF ? .. Seen here wearing the Magli Rosa in 2013..

Tour de France – Profile of a “Ballbuster”

Stages 9 and10 .. Pictorial definition of a: “Ballbuster” … All in a days’ work for the Pro Rider.  Stage 10 on: La Fête Nationale (Bastille Day, July 14th.)  "The Storming of the Bastille" by Jean-Pierre-Louis-Laurent Houel, the arrest of: Bernard René Jourdan, m de Launay (1740-1789)

Tour de France … What is Road-Rash???? + Update

Last Years winner, Chris Froome lands in France, HARD !  Road-Rash .. When the moving meets the unyielding road Chris took this fall on Stage 4. Next day ,on the wet and treacherous roads of stage 5, Chris would crash two more times and had to abandon the race.

Michel’s 6 hour race .. In France

A very cold day in France

From: Schaal, Michel
Subject: Race on the weekend.

Hello John,  I arrived 6th over 85 runners and ran 61,440km in 6 hours.

It was very cold in the morning (about 0°C) and the two first hours were difficult for my hands, even with two pairs of gloves.

I also had a problem with one of my foot (I don’t know the name in English, it’s like a bubble of water) after about 4 hours of run; but I was able to solve this by myself,  but loose about 10’.

So globally, the result is quite good.

See the attached pictures from my arrival and a few minutes after with another runner from my team who did 55,6km.Regards.

Michel's weekend Marathon

CONGRATULATIONS … Les félicitations, très bon. This morning my friend Michel (lives in Evry on the outskirts of Paris) dropped me a note:

"Hello John, Yesterday, I ran my Marathon and I did it in 3H15’O5 . Regards."

http://ratj.fr/resultats/fiche.php?dossard=2473&saison=2008 In Mid-Sept he ran the: Briare Half-Marathon, as a training run for a Marathon. His time:

"Last Sunday, I did it in 1H35’24s. I arrived 8th in my age category.".... .. and 62nd/227 for the whole categories. I am quite happy, it is on my schedule, I wanted to be at 1h35’ +/-1’. Maybe, this is because of your excellent Chinese tea from last Friday!!"

Saturday - Part iii

The lake near Combreux: ...
It's not just the men who play with their Balls in; Vitry-aux-Loges, on a Saturday morning

Saturday - Part B

Along the road-side, colours are changing:Chateauneuf-sur-Loire
Sully-sur-Loire:...The foot bridge is open ... "the" place to buy baskets: