2027 Tour de France doesn’t come past my house thread

Page may contain affiliate links. Please see terms for details.

Ajax Bay

Guru
Location
East Devon
1768640920172.png
 

cyberknight

As long as I breathe, I attack.
Do you plan to come out the closet to watch the race?

depends if i can get the cure to chuck it off a cliff :smile:
 

Gwylan

Guru
Location
All at sea⛵
I've already started camping out on Caerphilly Mountain in the hope that the race will climb this just before Cardiff. All I have to do now is to get my wife to knit me a mankini and I'll be ready to join the crowd of  Nutters fans running up the hill and getting in the riders' way.

Right at the top. There's a field on the right, free camped there as a scout in about 1960. Clearly I was ahead of the game, as usual
They went past my house in 2012 but I didn't line here.....

When they went through Keighley they went to an add break on TV.... Funny that!🤣🤣🤣

I've been to Keighley.
 

scragend

Über Member
As for the TdF, it comes within about 10 miles of my house. On the Saturday so I will probably go and watch.

Would have been interesting if it had come past my house - a long, wide, straight downhill street with a tight hairpin bend at the bottom. Missed an opportunity for carnage there.
 

Alex321

Guru
Location
South Wales
Correct, whilst in the Lake District what's wrong with sending them over Hardknot pass :whistle:.

They don't want climbs in the first few days that might have GC impact.

Looking at the Welsh stage in a bit more detail it feels a bit like some of the Britanny / Normandy coastal stages with lots of short, sharp climbs. I was surprised they didn't take them of The Keepers (Tumble) and a bit disappointed as I always wanted to know when I was younger what the climbs I trained on would be categorised as. I'm assuming this stage will be a mixture of 3rd and 4th category.
None of those look like enough to be 3rd cat, I think they'll all be 4th.

It's likely to see a bit of a battle between those hoping to get the spotty jumper and hold it for a few days before the big mountains. I'm hoping I can watch it on Epynt as, if the weather is good, it will be spectacular up there and then get to Caerphilly or the finish but I suspect that will be a challenge. Not sure what the Cote de Bannau Brycheiniog is (looking forward to Hatch doing that in a faux Welsh accent!) but I assume it's the A470 to Storey Arms which isn't particularly inspiring (I've done it on the big ring in the dim and distant past).

Yep, 6Km at 3.5%, I would probably stay in the big ring too. I've never actually ridden up that (or any others on the route), but have driven it quite often.

Rhigos is a nice climb and quite alpine with the views down into the valley and the hairpins.

That is one I have been meaning to try for a whie. Might well get round to it before then :smile:

Other than Caerphilly Mountain I don't know the other climbs, I'm surprised they've decided to go for those urban Valleys roads as you'd think it would be more disruptive but maybe a deliberate 'celebration' of the industrial past of the area after the rural first part of the stage.

If they want to start in mid Wales and finish in Cardiff, they have to go through some of that.

They could have done Llangynidr Mountain then The Tumble before heading across to the Western, Sirhowy or Rhymney valleys to get down to Caerphilly if they really wanted to stick that over-rated lump in the mix. Still, shouldn't complain as it will be great seeing the race come through localish roads.
They could, though I am happier with what they have chosen, as there is more close enough to me that I can cycle to.
 

katiewlx

Well-Known Member
If it's anything like the Tour of Britain, the council may not yet realise all the implications of what they've signed up for. One council's "cycling champion" cabinet member was under the impression that the Tour of Britain racers would be using one medium-size car park and the 3m-wide riverside cycleway and was quite shocked when told she'd effectively been pushing for closing the market square, half the start town's central streets and a major arterial road for half the day! Not details people, some local government cabinets...

yes it struck me my local council involved in the ToB last year, royally mucked up on the "size" expectations in terms of the amount of space needed for all the vehicles, maybe they thought they were sizing for the women's race which is a bit smaller, but like originally I think theyd expected just to put the sign on stage by the side of the road where the ceremonial start line was, which even I thought was optimistic. But then realised this stage is actually a gigantic truck thesedays, moved it to a swimming pool car park, but clearly hadnt applied to close the car park for the day, so only got a small fraction of it, and there was then no where for the teams to park or setup, and they ended up just parked up on the main road, but even then there wasnt enough space for them all so they were trying to play like some kind of car jenga and get them all sideways, and although the road was given closure notice, I dont think they expected to have to close it for 2hrs, and some of the teams then got stuck in the traffic jam.

it was a right old mess.


so yeah Im not sure councils always sign up to these things with all the knowledge or realisation of what it means, I mean like I assume the TdFF operates the same way the TdF does, so the roads will be closed for most of the day, not just as part of a rolling road block like the ToB, which of course changes things for spectators too, as if you are going up one of the main climbs of the day, youve got to be up there all day its not going to be like oh I can watch the start then go to this place, or this place to watch them past, its going be you go here and thats it, or go somewhere and maybe hop on a train to get to the other place, but its not going to be as easy as people think.
 

CarbonClem

Well-Known Member
Comes within about 60/70 miles of my house which I'm taking as a win. I'll probably take my van and watch each day, but at the very least I can easily go to Caerphilly or Cardiff. Its the Tour De France, to me, well worth a bit of effort to go see.
 

Dogtrousers

Lefty tighty. Get it righty.
Is there any news on what the TdFF London stage is? I looked on the official website but there's no detail other than that it's a Sunday. An ITT? A road stage with central London finish?

Just curious really. I can wait...
 
Top Bottom