grkeller

for all those Danish speakers:
https://ekstrabladet.dk/sport/cykling/article1377539.ece

interview went up. French summary in Le Monde quotes F. Schleck saying ASO "is playing with riders' lives" by including stages like the one he bit it on.

Laggard

He was one of several who stated similar thoughts. Sadly there are a few people here who think that these riders are a bunch of cry babies who should just suck it up and ride their damn bikes because hey, these roads were used for other bike races and bike racing is dangerous anyway.

SunSwingsLow

I thought it was Stage 2 that everybody had a problem with and not the Pave?

grkeller

Jens for one definitely had a problem with the pave': ("You can't imagine how angry and pissed off I am." https://www.velonation.com/News/ID/47...s-cobbles.aspx)
Also, it'd be mighty strange if one of the Schlecks had a problem with a stage across the Ardennes (their backyard).

Keith99

Interesting that he chose to quote the winner from the first time the Tour entered the pyrenes! Now those climbs (and multiple climbs at that ) are an indispensable part of the Tour.

I'm not thrilled with the crapshoot aspect of the cobbles. I am thrilled that it broke a flat stage to pieces.

Urthwhyte

Do you want a translation of the article? It's pretty similar to what is in VeloNews et al. by Jens already, but I can take a look at it this evening if people are interested

Cat4Lifer

I'm interested.

SunSwingsLow

x2 please

DiabloScott

Exactly... what's missing is SELECTION. Every stage is controlled by the GC teams or the sprinter teams. When there is some kind of a selection it's usually the GC teams deciding who is unimportant enough to not chase down. If Stage 2 or 3 were classic races, the natural selections of riders actually trying to WIN would have thinned the field out enough that everyone else could have gone through safely. Instead, there's a small breakaway group and then a huge peloton that can't possibly negotiate those old goat paths as a unit.

Instead of positioning strategy being important for winning races, it's important only for not crashing.

Urthwhyte

After aviolent crash on the tours third stage and surgery on his collarbone, Luxemberger Frank Schleck is able to (lit: come up stairs?; I think it means ride) again.
Little by litle, the pain lessens and in roughly ten days he should be able to begin at pedal again.
Those that planned the tour have again gambled with the welfare of the riders in the hope of a spectacular race (a spectacle), says Frank Schleck.
Inside his head, however, the road to recovery is a long one. Rage still smolders in the normally quiet man when he speaks of the cobblestone loop included in this year's Tour.

"The parents and children and spouses of the riders see the Tour on television; how do you think they fell when they see their son, husband, or father crash? It is frightening for them. Do the men that organized the route have no children? I don't think that the race organizers have sons that are riding in the race." says Frank Schleck

He threw himself towards the cobbles on the third stage, where there was a guarantee of a crash and drama, but men should not organize a route for the sake of creating a dramatic race, says Schleck.

"Flash is part of the sport, but it is not entertainment. There are riders that will not get up again; we have seen crashes that will leave folk in wheelchairs. No one should plan a route that precipitates a crash, and certainly not in the Tour de France; no one would like to have won because Alberto Contador or Andy had crashed" says Frank.

He finds it ironic that the organizers try to enforce safety by making the riders wear helmets, while simultaneously planning a race route with a crash-guarantee. "It's that that I am most angry over. As I lay there on the cobblestones, I was angry and frustrated. I had done everything right, and something something words I don't know

The team was perfect, the mechanics, my form and equipment were all in top shape. I had a great chance to get on the podium, and now my tour is over. It still makes me angry when I think about it."

The rider hopes to make a comeback in late August at the Vuelta a Espana.




There are a few errors here and there, but for the most part it's translated accurately. If I didn't know a word or may have translated incorrectly, I italicized it, since I didn't think to bring my ordboq with me to the US this Summer.

gsteinb

Why is that sad? Isn't everyone entitled to their own opinions?

Keith99

Are there any nasty (need not be very long, jsut steep enough to cause seperation) climbs near the cobbles? Perhaps somethgin like that could create a very interesting selection, and also get things spread out enough to make the cobbles reasonably safe (thought still hell).

I'm guessing not as it would make for an interesting classic.

grkeller

I *almost* know what Franck is talking about - was supposed to be on the tour for my press agency, but broke my collar bone in a bike crash a week before the start. So following from home... :/

DiabloScott

They did put some cobbled climbs in P-R a few years ago... I think it was when the Arenberg was being repaired or something. It wasn't enough to have much of an effect though. But when a majority of the peloton just wants "st" at the end of the day, the motivation to split things up beyond one break group just isn't there.

merlinextraligh

Just exactly what kind of course would Frank Schleck find not life thretening?

For a professional cyclist, he is not the best bike handler.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0O5d94P6JGo

DMF 

Is 'flash' the right word? I'm not sure I understand what it means in this context.

Cat4Lifer

Thank you very much for this.

Urthwhyte

Drama might have been a better translation of that sentence, as in "drama is part of cycling as a sport, but it shouldn't be seen as entertainment"
Glad I could put my Danish skills to use somewhere

Urthwhyte

and out of curiosity, OP, why were you searching through Extra Bladet anyways?

grkeller

hi Urthwhyte - Le Monde newspaper here in Paris mentioned the interview and printed a summary, that's how I heard about it.

eddiepliers 

Google translate is your friend..

https://translate.google.com/translat...cle1377539.ece

Urthwhyte

Look up. Google Translate is terrible with Nordic languages

rat fink

It looks like either he panicked and clipped out to put his foot down (that trick only works on motorbikes...), or he may not have been leaning enough and, rather than countersteering more to tighten up his line, subconsciously compensated for the turn by rotating his feet (in a way similar to those whose wave their controller around when playing Tetris to move their blocks further over on the screen, you know who you are), then his foot inadvertently clipped out. Both of those explanations are noob mistakes, though. So, maybe he was really tired/fatigued and had a lapse of judgement, or maybe he isn't all that confident at bike handling; pro or otherwise. Either way, I'm convinced that his foot coming off of the pedal is what caused the crash. It's amazing how much it affects control.