Tour de France 2015 - may contain nuts and SPOILERS

[Pro Tour Punditry]

I am currently watching Eurosport's review of the Tour - classic Kelly moment on stage 13, with Kirby screaming his head off making no sense...Kelly says "van Avermaet"...Kirby keeps screaming, a few seconds later Kelly's almost hushed comment registers with him and he screams "and it is GVA"...Kirby continues to scream about Sagan fighting for the win, there's about 100 metres still to go, and Kirby challenges the viewer "CAN SAGAN TAKE THIS!!!!??????"...almost inaudibly Kelly's voice can just be heard "no, no he can't"

 

[Flying_Monkey]

I am currently watching Eurosport's review of the Tour - classic Kelly moment on stage 13, with Kirby screaming his head off making no sense...Kelly says "van Avermaet"...Kirby keeps screaming, a few seconds later Kelly's almost hushed comment registers with him and he screams "and it is GVA"...Kirby continues to scream about Sagan fighting for the win, there's about 100 metres still to go, and Kirby challenges the viewer "CAN SAGAN TAKE THIS!!!!??????"...almost inaudibly Kelly's voice can just be heard "no, no he can't"

I remember chuckling about that at the time.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

Eritrea welcomes home Daniel Teklehaimanot and Merhawi Kudus

It's great that people are out supporting them, but I have very mixed feelings. I have colleagues who do research on Eritrea and it's one of the world's most repressive regimes, and I have no doubt that the success of these two guys is being used by the regime for propaganda purposes.

 

[coffeejo]

It's great that people are out supporting them, but I have very mixed feelings. I have colleagues who do research on Eritrea and it's one of the world's most repressive regimes, and I have no doubt that the success of these two guys is being used by the regime for propaganda purposes.

Speaking from a position of total ignorance re: Eritrea, it could be argued that no publicity is bad publicity and the team's success and new-found fame means that the western world and its media will take another look at human rights issues.

 

[HF2300]

It's great that people are out supporting them, but I have very mixed feelings. I have colleagues who do research on Eritrea and it's one of the world's most repressive regimes, and I have no doubt that the success of these two guys is being used by the regime for propaganda purposes.

It probably is, but that doesn't mean their success is not a good thing for them personally, for the profile of African cycling, for other Eritrean cyclists, or ultimately for Eritrea as a whole - most news reports have had a proviso about the Eritrean regime which you'd think is likely to increase global awareness and scrutiny.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

Yep, totally agree on increased visibility being a good thing in all cases.

 

[HF2300]

Serious question: are Europcar pulling out of cycling?

INRNG summary of the current Europcar situation:

http://inrng.com/2015/08/europcar-sponsor-hunt/#more-26095

 

[User169]

It's great that people are out supporting them, but I have very mixed feelings. I have colleagues who do research on Eritrea and it's one of the world's most repressive regimes, and I have no doubt that the success of these two guys is being used by the regime for propaganda purposes.

Follow up piece in Graun today. In the print version, it was next to a piece on two emigrants from Eritrea and the general screwed-up ness there.

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2015/aug/17/eritrea-cycling-team-rwanda-tour-de-france

 

[mjr]

http://www.barb.co.uk/whats-new/weekly-top-10 for w/e 26 July suggests that TdF viewing figures on itv4 peaked at 1.192million for the live coverage of the final stage. The Friday and Saturday live shows also attracted about 450,000 viewers, putting them 10th and 7th respectively, with the TdF highlights and a Bond movie completing the top 10.

itv4+1's figures suggest another 25,000-63,000 viewers for highlights each day.

For comparison, 1.2million viewers wouldn't quite make itv1's top 30, but would be a top 20 show for BBC2 or Channel 4 and top 10 if it was on 5. Surely this must be worth quite a bit to itv?

Will the Vuelta and ToB do more than last year's typical 300,000...? Watch their threads

 

[Pro Tour Punditry]

 

[rich p]

Where was that printed?

 

[jarlrmai]

I wondered what was in those Sky branded drinks...

 

[Pro Tour Punditry]

Where was that printed?

This month's Pro Cycling magazine - I spotted it linked on twitter