How to improve the Tour

[Aravis]

I'd never heard of these. What fun!

As you probably know, GC times DID count at the 50km-to-go mark, so for GC purposes that point was "a flying stage". I think.
Are you suggesting that Sunday should be TWO stages?

(Flying Stages sound bonkers-but-fun. 1 problem could be that if you get far enough ahead, 1 attack could earn you two stage wins! But is this really a problem?? Don't know ... it's a bit like track racing, where laps are gained, but races carry on regardless.
Those races are often bonkers and impossible to follow :P )

Exactly right, it just needs the 50km mark to be designated as such as a stage finish, and for the idea to get accepted.

As you say, two stages in one would be bonkers but fun (you could make a slogan out of that) and just possibly a good fit for Paris at the end of July.

 

[Lanterne Rogue]

It's been done, when riders started seriously contesting the Lanterne Rouge as it was earning them a fortune on the post Tour crit circuit.

And duly halted, because it created some truly perverse outcomes.

It's not the last rider that causes the viewer problems anyway - how many times have we all struggled to find out if the autobus made it, let alone anyone behind? The coverage just ends.

If the motivation is to end slow stages well, that ain't going to work either - there's already a time cut and nobody is going to ride faster because they're worried about somebody now fifteen minutes behind somehow overtaking them. And at the back there's no incentive to work because you'll want to save your legs for the final sprint...

A more meaningful incentive is that any sponsor without riders in the break results in competing companies being given five minutes of air time to explain why the sponsor's product is a load of crap. That ought to stop it.

 

[Aravis]

So who is the KoM supposed to be for? It's the best climber, innit?

When I first started watching the Tour avidly the KoM was nearly always won by a GC contender, but not the overall champion. Breakaway types didn't feature. At least that's what I think I remember. Best to look at a graph:

The red line, fairly obviously, shows the final GC position of the KoM winner. Full disclosure: in recent years when the GC has sometimes been amended post-race after doping revelations, I've tried to show the position as it appeared to be at the end of the race. A few numbers might be out by a place or two.

It's quite apparent that something shifted around the turn of the millennium. The way it used to be felt right to me.

Edit: a little tweak to the graph. Hope no-one noticed...

 

[matticus]

So who is the KoM supposed to be for? It's the best climber, innit?

When I first started watching the Tour avidly the KoM was nearly always won by a GC contender, but not the overall champion. Breakaway types didn't feature. At least that's what I think I remember. Best to look at a graph:

View attachment 781881
The red line, fairly obviously, shows the final GC position of the KoM winner. Full disclosure: in recent years when the GC has sometimes been amended post-race after doping revelations, I've tried to show the position as it appeared to be at the end of the race. A few numbers might be out by a place or two.

It's quite apparent that something shifted around the turn of the millennium. The way it used to be felt right to me.

Interesting. Must admit that I also like the KOM going to someone other than the Yellow Jersey. but I'd note there were lots of "1"s in the races pre-1971. Don't know if that's significant, I certainly didn't watch any of those years ...

If I accept your analysis, might it be because flat TTs used to be more significant? Can you add a line for TT-mileage in each race?? :P

 

[Pblakeney]

How to improve it as a spectator sport?
Force TNT to reduce prices, unlikely.
Pay Pog and Vingegaard not to show up, even more unlikely.

 

[Jameshow]

Have a two win rule like American presidents...

Two wins and your out let others have a go...

Better still two wins and you have a serve two years in the commentary box.

 

[Jameshow]

Ban Slovenians for 5yrs!

 

[mjr]

Ban Slovenians for 5yrs!

What's Matej Mohorič done to upset you?

 

[No Ta Doctor]

So who is the KoM supposed to be for? It's the best climber, innit?

When I first started watching the Tour avidly the KoM was nearly always won by a GC contender, but not the overall champion. Breakaway types didn't feature. At least that's what I think I remember. Best to look at a graph:

View attachment 781882
The red line, fairly obviously, shows the final GC position of the KoM winner. Full disclosure: in recent years when the GC has sometimes been amended post-race after doping revelations, I've tried to show the position as it appeared to be at the end of the race. A few numbers might be out by a place or two.

It's quite apparent that something shifted around the turn of the millennium. The way it used to be felt right to me.

Edit: a little tweak to the graph. Hope no-one noticed...

Superb work! It seems incredible that there's a 45 year gap where the winner wasn't the yellow jersey, I wonder if there's a correlation with length of time trials...

The various points arrangements over the years (the Wikipedia page started to make my brain hurt) make it difficult to really see if there's a single major trend - and it's also tricky to extrapolate without some way of quantifying how ASO have sprinkled the climbs (and adjusted classifications) around a parcours. One of the major changes though has been increasing the gap between Cat 4 and HC - fpr much of the time iHC was worth maybe 10 times a Cat 4 rather than today's 20, and there were more points available on all climbs (as in Cat 4 climbs awarded points to 4 riders, HC to 15 not 10)

I think ASO must have got fed up with late era Virenque, because there's a change in 2004 (his last victory) to favour MTFs over breakaways

 

[KingstonGraham]

Get rid of the shitty new green colour they've used the last two years.

 

[Andy in Germany]

Do away with the stages and make it one long endurance race, all the way around France.

Unsupported.

 

[Andy in Germany]

Allow recumbents.

 

[Aravis]

I must admit to being uneasy at how thin the evidence for the existence of flying stages seems to be. I have a couple of Kennedy Brothers books covering the Tours of 1981 and 1985, both of which allegedly featured flying stages (1985 being the last) but I can't find mention of them at all.

Wikipedia cites Tour de France rules and statistics - Pieter van den Akker, which sounds like something I definitely ought to have. A trip to eBay, wait a few days, and I am the proud owner.

It isn't quite what I expected, being more of an entertaining read than a book of reference. The author only names his sources in general terms, so anyone wishing to use it as a guide to further research may be disappointed. He makes a full and valid explanation for this and makes it clear that he is willing to be consulted regarding any particular detail, but somehow I doubt whether the contributor(s) to Wikpedia did this.

Back to the subject of how to improve the Tour, I'm left in no doubt that some of the ideals on which the event was founded have been lost over the years. Selection of riders for the Tour is not what it was:

In the first years of the Tour de France, every man (women were not allowed) could start, as long as they had a valid cycling licence at the start of the Tour, and paid the entrance fee. Anyone under 21 needed permission from their parents.​

Fairly soon it seems that demand for places outstripped supply.

Personally I enjoy time-trial days, but I've often felt uneasy at the influence that such a particular specialism has often had on the overall result. Since WW2, in 44 of 75 editions (up to 2021), time gained by the overall winner in time trials was crucial to the final result. Naturally Merckx would have won all his anyway, but without time trials Hinault would only have two wins, and Indurain none. Based on a totally invalid assumption, but interesting none the less.

On of the most exciting Tours, in 1987, is remembered as a three-way battle between Stephen Roche, Pedro Delgado and Jean-Francois Bernard. Of those Delgado was the strongest climber and Bernard the best time-triallist. But without time-trials the winner is none of those; it's the original and best Colombian climber (subjective judgment), Luis Herrera. He also comes out top in 1985, Hinault dropping down to 8th

Could we have a five year moratorium on time-trials? Or maybe go time-trial free in alternate years?

 

[Pblakeney]

Back to the subject of how to improve the Tour, I'm left in no doubt that some of the ideals on which the event was founded have been lost over the years.

I'm not sure we want to go back to the original intent.
IIRC, it was hoped to be designed hard enough that only one man would complete.

 

[Dogtrousers]

I kinda like TTs. I think they are important to test the all-round abilities of the rider. But in moderation. It adds an interesting dimension to the overall GC. There's a balance to be struck.