littletunny

Down to really 2 mountain stages. Nibali would have to take 4 minutes out of wiggins just to tie.

Aint happening.

TeeJay is too busy trying to prop up over the hill wiggins who did none of the work in last years TDF.

Froome is too busy being Bradleys b!tch.

Wheres Contador and Schleck when you need them,,,,

Jed19

You meant to say Evans instead of wiggins re Tejay.

Yes, this Tour does miss Contador and Andy Schleck. No doubt about it.

And Froome went for the money when he signed his present contract with Sky. He should have signed with a team where he could contend for the GC win. He might never win the TdF in the future, and if this is so, he'll always look back to this Tour with regret.

jimc101

Must be, as Wiggins was out early last year with a broken collar bone.

Good for Sky to have Froome as an option up front if anything happens to Wiggens, as we still have distance to go, but it's getting a bit tame with no-one attacking, with Evans efforts yesterday not amounting to anything.

markjenn

There's attacking going on, it just isn't working worth a damn.

- Mark

chasm54

This. Everyone seems to think all these guys have to do to beat Wiggins is ride away from him. What they may be missing is, Wiggins appears to be stronger than any of them. As a certain Mr Armstrong once said "motivation won't take you very far if you don't have the legs".

Seriously, in all the fuss about how well Froome is doing, people are overlooking just what great shape Wiggins seems to be in. In the saddle, high cadence, reels everything back in without fuss, and with speed and energy to spare to give a very fast lead-out to EBH in a sprint finish. In every single mountain stage Evans, Nibali or van den Broeck have attacked - sometimes more than one of them. But they've barely put a dent in him.

YMCA

correct

FriendlyFred

With the lack of mt. top finishes, there haven't been the sustained attacks like in year's past. The course this year doesn't seem as focused on the mts, and when they are in the mts, the finishes 25km down the other side effectively neutralize the attacks. I'm not a fan of this year's course. There's too much emphasis on the individual TT and the flat, sprinter's stages, and they've just sapped the ability of anyone to take back time on the mt stages.

ultraman6970

Any of the favorites that need time will need to perform a vino or a hinault to win. Add that to be lucky enough for sky to let them go. Is not going to happen, nobody has the legs.

Nibali will defend his 3rd place but he will lose it in the TT to evans, Evans as long is close to nibali he will podium for sure. Nibali and evans are racing for 3rd place unless a disaster happens that mess up froom in the TT and he lose like 4 minutes (accident??) In the case of wiggo, same situation and those two will race conservatively, they can't risk the podium and have a lot of time to play with aswell. Sincerely? they won this thing already.

FriendlyFred

They won this thing a week ago with the individual TT. It was over from that point on.

edited to add....with the exception of Tommy V., and he's too far down in time, no one else in the entire peloton has the nerve or courage of a Hinault to go for the win. This is just 2000+ miles of guys pedaling across France together.

littletunny

I meant to say Teejay dragging Evans up the moutain.

Its "looks" like Wiggins is deserving but I would like to see him earn it, not just pulled along. In fact I would like to see him destroy someone on the mountains. Somebody do something.

The year Contador won it, he was right there at the front in the mountain stages with not a lot of help.

Giacomo 1 

Geez, stage 15 and again the breakaway is running away from the Sky controlled peloton.

All the top sprinters left behind because none of the teams will support them. Why would these teams let Sky control the pace like this?

ultraman6970

Because they can't do crap, everybody is tired, two more days of climbs ahead and the TT. Nobody will burn, the sprinters teams screw up anyways w/o putting anybody in those brakes. A lot of guys abandoning today so that can tell you how hard this race is, and today is a flat day were the guys arent even going that fast comparatively speaking.

Kind of Blued

Good point. These guys are just lazy. Everyone with a 7w/kg FTP should just ride off the front on the next mountain stage and drop Team Sky.

CALE262

This.

2012 Really is the most boring TdF in recent memory thanks to the course layout IMHO. More tacks required.

Keith99

But Evans did attack.

And because of it he went from a solid second to 4th.

Most effective way to defend Yellow is to punish failed attacks.

paperbackwriter

I guess they can't do much more- and it's a combination of a route that doesn't give many opportunities in the mountains and the race lacking both elite climbers and decent domestiques to back them up.
Contador and Andy Schleck are probably the only ones that could make the difference on their own, despite the Sky train chasing them (esp if they were working together like in 2010). But even without them, it could've been more exciting with few good climbers ganging up on Sky- and ideally having some support from their teams. However it seems that there are only two guys whose climbing is consistently good- Nibali and Van den Broeck. But even if they went early and worked together, they'd probably have to work against four- Porte, Rogers, Wiggins and Froome. And as much as I'd love to see them putting everything on the line, why should Nibali risk his podium spot? It's a big achievement considering he's basically on his own and many didn't believe he can get there.
It would be very different if he got the support he deserves. If for example Szmyd and Basso were in good shape, of course they are much better climbers than any of Sky domestiques (obviously, except for Froome). Or if Vanendert was as good as last year. Also, it would help if Samuel Sanchez didn't crash (and was fit), if Scarponi and Valverde were closer to their top shape, if Frank was more consistent and so on. Again, if Rogers and Porte are among, I don't know, 7-8 best climbers in the race, you know that either something is very wrong with Team Sky or that the field is really weak.
Because this time it's not really that guys aren't gutsy enough to attack, just nothing comes out of it when they try. The battle with Sky could've been great but they don't have enough tactical options.

MH817

Someone mentioned Wiggins being in the saddle - and it just dawned on me... I haven't seen him stand once. I'm sure he has at some point - but he's literally shutting down all these attacks while staying in the saddle. He looks rather bored through most of the stages - just pedaling away...

Jed19

Wiggins must be in some real good shape/form. It does not even look like he's working hard on this mountain climbs. He is either real good, or, some funny stuff is going on.

We'll see.

eja_ bottecchia

As much as I dislike Wiggo, I have to agree that your analysys of the current situation is spot on. This is turning out to be a very boring Tour. Well, there are always the Olympic games.

Laggard

The guy won Paris Nice, Tour de Romandie and Criterium du Dauphine this year. He's having a phenomenal year and there is no one who can touch him at the moment. Would be interesting to see this Wiggins go up against an in-form Contador.

Keith99

Against this Wiggans with this team I'd ahve to make him a heavy favorite compared to Contador and the best support he has had in the past.

diphthong

hopefully all the big boys can stay out of trouble-injury and otherwise-for next year's tdf so we can have a more exciting show (with contador & a schleck back into the fold). much has been said in the past about the riders making the race vs the course making the race. having a more 'humane' course this year with sky's dominance/the seeming lack of successful protagonists would seem to indicate otherwise. can you imagine how bored we all would really be had there been a ttt this year? both froome & wiggo would be up likely an extra 45+ seconds.

Barese Rider

I agree, this course has made for some boring mountain stages.

daveF

He's stood up a number of times, but not nearly as much as any of his competition. When he does stand, he still has the same smooth efficient pedaling style as when he is seated. Doesn't rock the bike back and forth like Cadel who looks like he is grinding no matter how hard or easy the climb. In fact, his upper body is just as motionless as when he is seated.