Winnersaint

As I am winding down towards retirement at the end of term, most of my jobs have been passed over to others who will pick them up in September, so I am left with baby-sitting the naughty kids and having plenty of work time to spend pondering this year's tour. Here is my take on it. Stage 1 is an odd one, longer than a normal prologue, but nothing like a standard ITT, so may not favour Tony Martin or Alex Dowsett. Fancy Tom Demoulin for this one. A Dutch TT specialist in yellow seems rather fitting in Utrecht. Stage 2 looks like a sprint stage on the surface. I think the elevation difference along the route is + or - 6 metres so flatter than flat. Looks essentially like a drag race between the fast men, but there is a fly in the ointment. The last 50K are for the best part parallel to the North Sea coast of Zeeland, and it brings with it the prospect of crosswinds, echelons and splits in the peloton. If it stays together it should be one for Cav or if possibly Kristoff . Stage 3 to the Mur de Huy is a mini Fleche Wallone so Valverde is the obvious choice for this. Its shorter than the spring classic but has the same finale, so looking beyond the obvious, how about Dan Martin or even one of the explosive climber among the GC boys? Stage 4 will be a test of bike handling as it includes pave on the way from Seraing to Cambrai. Like last year's cobbled stage it could be where the tour is lost rather than won. Nibali showed last year the he wasn't averse to them and he could again put time into the other GC contenders. Sky have got Thomas, Rowe and Stannard to help Froome, but he has got to stay upright. If it rains again it could be carnage as the tour peloton consists of far fewer specialists than Paris-Roubaix. Fancy an out and out specialist so, Sepp Vanmarcke. That's all for this post. I'll post again shortly.

RIP Chris Squire. Saw them at the Winter Gardens in 1973. A bit of Stravinsky's Firebird Suite and some Close to the Edge stuff, but mainly Tales from Topographic Oceans. I remember it was a long but brilliant gig. Was always struck by the clarity of Jon Anderson's vocals.

Campbell Forsyth was Saints keeper in the promotion season in 1966 and in the early months in Division 1 (Premier League now) He broke his leg against Liverpool following a collision with I think Ian Callaghan. I was there. The other references are not about him, merely that I was at Wembley for the Cup Final and Charity Shield in 76 and the League Cup Final in 79. BTW it's worth looking into the history!

I think quite of few are able to separate the emotional tug of SFC and see it for what it is with regards for the player. I don't think that anyone in their right mind in whatever field they are employed in would baulk at new challenge along with a substantial pay hike. It's the way of the world. I don't want to patronise but but fair play for coming on here again. Apologies if that's not towing the party line but that's how I feel. If anyone doubts my credentials as a Saints fan I saw my first game against Leeds at the Dell aged 5 in October 1963 sat on my dad's shoulders on Archers Road. I saw Mick Channon make his league debut and Campbell Forsyth break his leg was at Wembley twice in 76 and again in 79. Maybe it's time to stop going on this site!

Yes but don't you know we the supporters think we own him. We're emotionally unequipped to cope with the rejection. He's ours, I tell you, he's ours!

Me too. I thoroughly enjoyed the series. At present I've got A long Walk to Freedom on the go. After 20 odd years of no apartheid and the 'Rainbow Nation' it has a timely reminder of the gross injustice, and immorality of a regime based on racism.

That just doesn't bear thinking about.

Me neither. Mind you Caitlin Stark was supposed to be resurrected by now as Lady Stoneheart. Seems like she was but came back in the wrong programme according to my wife who watches all manner of TV guff such as this. http://variety.com/2014/tv/news/game-of-thrones-actress-michelle-fairley-joins-abcs-resurrection-1201267806/

Planet X Pro Carbon review here. http://www.theguardian.com/technology/bike-blog/2014/jul/06/planet-x-pro-carbon-bike-review Video review here. Hope this helps. Have used Planet X often with no problems, not for bikes, but their service is very good. Ribble much less so.

Well that's three hours plus I'll never get back. Did a mate a favour by getting him round the Three Counties Cycle Ride, but boy was it frustrating at times. Anytime the road pointed even slightly upwards I was having to knock it back and if I didn't I ended up waiting. Don't mind riding at a leisurely pace but this was a pace with no consistency whatsoever.

Nice one. I'm having it on my new bike I'm getting when I get my early retirement at the end of August. Enjoy!

Compelling stuff from Daenerys and Tyrion finally meeting up to the attack on Hardhome. That final twenty minutes was just an awesome piece of TV. The only thing I can remember watching that had quite the same feel to it in a similar epic, chaotic, shocking way was the Omaha Beach landing at the the start of Saving Private Ryan. Whereas that film was crap from that point onwards GoT never disappoints.

Good stuff. I did around 34 miles at a similar pace. I'm not getting over anything but I have ridden over 200K since last Sunday which is high..ish for me. I am aiming to match or beat my time for the 3CCR next weekend which is a sub three hour 50 miler.

Hope it went well.

Like VFTT I tend to support local events near me, two in particular The Three Counties Cycle Ride and Wokingham Bikeathon. That said to improve it is always useful to have a training goal, without one you just get stale. Be it Wiggle or any other organiser it doesn't really matter having an event to train for should help.

x2 for full carbon bike, but even there you have to be careful. With bike frames there is a holy grail and it is a balancing act between weight, stiffness and comfort and that is very much dependent on the geometry, tube shape and using the right carbon fibre lay-ups in the right places to achieve it. For example when aero-bikes became more widely used they were very fast in the right hands with plenty of lateral stiffness but at the expense of weight and vertical compliance (comfort). That is changing with the current generation of such bikes like the Giant Propel and the Cervelo S3 tending towards a more balanced approach to their design. The S3 for example has taken the rear triangle from the Cervelo RCA to achieve a level of comfort which far exceeds that of their previous aero-bikes, bringing that sort of machine within the reach of us mere cycling mortals. As far as shorts are concerned, despite it being a company based along the M27, Wiggle is my friend. I've been buying various DHB bibs for the last four years. Never let me down either on, price sizing quality or on comfort. Best of all they are pretty much always on offer.

Don't have a problem with it but it needs a red collar!

Sounds a really nasty one maybe she has a point. Hope you recover well and take it easy for a while.

Nice to hear the bike is OK. Seriously hope the you damage isn't too painful and that it heals quickly. What actually happened? Personally it's one of the attractions of being a lone wolf not having to worry about someone braking in a group without warning and for no apparent reason. FWIW decided on new steed today. Cervelo S3 with Ultegra Di2. Saw one today in the flesh, built up. Gorgeous looking piece of kit. Chatting to owner who races on it reckoned he taken minutes off Alpe d'Huez ascent. 45 mins?? As and when I get there don't think I'll be going up anyway near that fast S3 or not. Only downside is my effective retirement date is 31st August, to ensure payment for summer holiday and break between full and part time teaching contract. Oh well, can't have everything. BTW take it easy tomorrow

Very sad news. Saw him play many times along with John McGrath, Joe Kirkup, and Denis Hollywood at the back. As many say he was a seriously uncompromising defender and seems to have been very different from his playing image. I remember the bit about the retreat in the monastery being reported at the time. RIP "Docker".

We stayed at a youth hostel in Dolgellau. Unfortunately its not about remembering my geography from those A level days as I have a B.Ed degree in the subject and have been teaching it in secondary schools in Berkshire for a substantial part of the last 35 years. As far as the stay in the youth hostel I don't remember much about the food, but the weather was great. It was 1976 and it didn't rain once in Wales while we were there. In fact returning back south we came through the Elan valley, The reservoirs which were at there lowest levels ever and the inter-connecting streams were dried out.

I missed this one, along with the earlier replay at Villa Park and West Brom away. The WBA game was one where we set out but got as far as Bromsgrove, before the van we were travelling in conked out with a burst radiator. The semi-final coincided with our A Level Geography fieldtrip, and I was on the way down from the top of Cader Idris with just about enough radio signal to hear Rag Trade win the National. We were in some kind of radio black hole. Whoever had the radio by chance switched it on, and the first we heard of it was the commentator saying something along the lines of 'and its over to Stamford Bridge where Southampton are now two up.' We didn't even know we were one up. Sod the roche moutonees, boulder clay, glacial striations and hanging valleys we were going to Wembley! Most of us were Saints fans so feck all fieldwork was done for the rest of that afternoon.The footage of that game I've never seen. Trying to find somewhere in North Wales to watch the Big match the following day was mission impossible.

Bought some Shapwick Monster from brewery shop in Blandford recently. Good stuff!

Sound advice, as is that about making sure the bike is fitted properly. I started five years ago on a Cyclescheme Cube Peloton, still got it though it is resigned to commuting and the turbo these days, I have to be honest I am really hard pushed to notice any real difference in speed between that and my carbon bike which is 1.5 kg lighter. The ride quality is definitely not as good and it doesn't climb as well, but for £850 it was a great re-introduction to road cycling and it is certainly enough bike for my modest standard of riding.

Apologies for giving misleading info, but Rose do indeed do the Carbon X-Lite. The CRS3100 comes with Ultegra Di2 and weighs in at 6.9 kg all for £1990. Ridiculous.