Tour de France Stage 3 For Dummies
Ok, you’re back. Good. You saw what we wrote yesterday, you made a TON of money with your bookie based on our recommendations, and now you want more. Naturally. We’ll, we won’t disappoint. We never do. So let’s get started.
Yesterday, we said Stage 3 would be a major BORE-FEST. In fact, if we underestimated anything - and we’re not saying we did - it was that Versus has gotten (thankfully!) more advertisers than it had last year when we saw Saab commercials, and only Saab commercials, at least four thousand times during the Tour.
Oh, and we didn’t forecast the group of Frenchman who held a protest that got five seconds’ airtime on Versus — but forecasting a work stoppage in France is like claiming brilliance for predicting a baby will eventually soil a diaper.
Frankly, the whole thing seems beneath us.
As to the actual “action” during Stage 3, I’m sorry, but I feel asleep. And I kept falling asleep every time I tried to replay it. Did any of you catch it?
Alright, so it was nice to see freedom-fry eater Will Frischkorn in a breakaway that began before the starting gun had even fired, and then ended with a little duking-out among two Frenchman, Frisch, and an Italian, to see who would win the stage.
You know perhaps better than I (not really), that the breakaway group was allowed to go out on a long leash, at one point up to 15 minutes, because the big guys didn’t consider the two Corfidis riders, Frisch, and the Italian, as worth chasing down.
Another sign of stage-apathy, was that the Stapleton and Vaughters, directors of Team Columbia and Garmin, respectively, made themselves widely available for interviews with Versus DURING THE STAGE.
Vaughters was even asked why he wasn’t even in the teamcar at the moment, and said he was resting up for a big day tomorrow. Then he asked if they would interview him some more.
Anyway, most of what we said yesterday proved at least 100% accurate. Sometimes better. Let’s review.
“Stage 3 will be a bore-fest extraordinaire, ending in a group sprint and possibly a group-crash in Nantes, along France’s northwestern coast.”
– In fact, Stage 3 was so meaningless the coaches were getting in plugs for team sponsors while the riders allowed a breakaway to get up to 15 minutes out, and then they chased them down so the big guns could sprint for like fifth, sixth and seventh places. Oh, and of course we nailed the part about crashes.
“It is unlikely there will be any significant changes in the rankings on Monday,”
– A Frenchman (I won’t bother giving you his name — he’s a one-hit wonder you’ll never hear from again) in the breakaway slipped into the Yellow Jersey, relieving Valverde of the obligation to chase meaningless breakaways in coming days and putting that burden on team Corfidis. Ho hum.
“…as everybody plays nice and rests the legs awaiting Tuesday’s Individual Time Trial,”
It’s like we were looking in a crystal ball, huh?
“(Stage 4s time trial..) will be won almost assuredly by world champion time-trialer and Swiss rider Fabian Cancellaria. “
That’s still the most sure-thing in the history of sports betting. Get your wallet out, max your credit cards, borrow from mom, but don’t whine to me if you miss out on this one.
“…Spanish rider Alejandro Valverde is the current overall leader…this gap won’t stand past Tuesday.
Didn’t even make it through Monday. But will get worse on Tuesday. We said so.
“…there are essentially no time gaps at this point. Said another way, almost everybody is within an eye-blink of donning a Yellow jersey.”
We should have said or any nobody.
“…Soler is 78% likely…to be…heading home. Sure, it’s possible (about 1 in 5 odds) he’ll suffer through the bore-war on Monday, rolling at the back of the peleton and hoping not to lose any more time, and then keep going day-to-day.”
Congrats to Soler for laying it in for one more day. We knew he was tough.
“…If asked who’s doing surprisingly well, in your view, you’re going to toss out the following names: Kim Kirchen, Riccardo Ricco, and Andy Schleck.”
They’re all still lurking within seconds the lead, not counting today’s little breakaway group which will be meaningless to the results over the full length of the Tour.
Okay, sorry for a boring recap of a forgettable stage. Remember, if we said it, you can bet on it. Talk to you tomorrow.
p.s. If you have a question that didn’t get answered here, use the “Comment” function below to leave it, and our high-priced attorneys and sexy summer interns will assemble a quick response, for which I’ll receive the credit, naturally.
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You are a mad genius.