The 100th Tour de France (2013)

nitrogen

Do you think we'll see anything special or unusual for this, or would this tour not be marked with greater importance than the centennial celebration which stayed in France?

kenmc

I think they should go back to the good old days of carrying their spare tubes wrapped around their shoulders, wine for breakfast and fixing mechanicals themselves. Should be some good whines from the usual suspects then!

sxt

I think they will have a stage around the isle of man in honour of Cav.

Hermy

Remove all the electronic gizmos for the 100th Tour.
Or at least limit the technology in some fashion.

CramCycle

No team cars, no spare bikes, no spare wheels, no support, just man and machine, show who truly deserves it.

denlaw

at least the joker won it


batman must be seething ...:rolleyes:

Hermy

Maybe a single speed special stage.

velopeloton

The 100th Tour de France will start in Corsica in 2013. It will be the first time the Tour has been to the island. Rumour is that the tour will not visit any other countries that year and that after 3 days in Corsica it will visit every region of the mainland.

Barcelona is the favorite to host the Grand Depart in 2014 but don't rule out Quatar who are throwing tons of money at French sport. When transferring the riders from Grenoble to Paris on Sunday morning the ASO used Qatar Airways rather than the usual Air France.

on_the_nickel

To make it fair, they really should remove all descents and time trials.

Captain Havoc

velopeloton wrote: »

Barcelona is the favorite to host the Grand Depart in 2014 but don't rule out Quatar who are throwing tons of money at French sport. When transferring the riders from Grenoble to Paris on Sunday morning the ASO used Qatar Airways rather than the usual Air France.

I think Berlin was told they'll get either 2014 or 2015.

Junior

velopeloton wrote: »

The 100th Tour de France will start in Corsica in 2013. It will be the first time the Tour has been to the island. Rumour is that the tour will not visit any other countries that year and that after 3 days in Corsica it will visit every region of the mainland.

Barcelona is the favorite to host the Grand Depart in 2014 but don't rule out Quatar who are throwing tons of money at French sport. When transferring the riders from Grenoble to Paris on Sunday morning the ASO used Qatar Airways rather than the usual Air France.

Qatar Airways are an ASO Partner these days.

Lumen

velopeloton wrote: »

Barcelona is the favorite to host the Grand Depart in 2014 but don't rule out Quatar who are throwing tons of money at French sport. When transferring the riders from Grenoble to Paris on Sunday morning the ASO used Qatar Airways rather than the usual Air France.

Quatar should built a full-size replica of the Alps. Then Dubai can build a replica of the Pyrenees, and Kuwait can do the Massif Central.

Then we can move the whole thing over to the Middle East for a couple of years before the oil runs out.

In thousands of years time, our post-WW3 descendents will gaze in awe at these concrete mountain ranges and theorize that Stargate-equipped aliens must have built them.

velopeloton

Captain Havoc wrote: »

I think Berlin was told they'll get either 2014 or 2015.

Applications are reported from Qatar, Venice, Florence, Barcelona, Berlin, Scotland and Yorkshire.

In 2015 Le Tour will start in France. ASO has stated that Grand Depart will alternate between France and abroad. Odd numbers France, even numbers abroad.

ROK ON

Not applicable to 2013, but in an interview Prudomme was very happy with this years race. He pointed that Evans races all season long, and that it is worthy of a chmpion to race competitively for a full season. He indicated that the TT was put into the Dauphne for a reason. They may well do it again as they want riders to prefer ASO events.
Finally he hinted that the course director may get his wish for 2012 with a lot of mid mountain stages and very few High Mountains. They believe it is important to keep the race open for as long as possible (and presumably help a few French riders to achieve high placings).

CramCycle

Hermy wrote: »

Maybe a single speed special stage.

Fixed gear for one of the mountain stages, they would be allowed a second cog on the other side so they can flip their wheel for descents.

ednwireland

CramCycle wrote: »

Fixed gear for one of the mountain stages, they would be allowed a second cog on the other side so they can flip their wheel for descents.

naaaah why bother

Beasty

Doesn't time fly ...

... it seems like only yesterday we were talking about the 2011 Tour:)

aquanaut

I think that for the 100th anniversary, Lance might come out of retirement to avenge all cancer lovers and the UCI testing teams!

irishpeloton

nitrogen wrote: »

Do you think we'll see anything special or unusual for this, or would this tour not be marked with greater importance than the centennial celebration which stayed in France?

The 2003 Tour actually nipped into Italy for a short while.

aquanaut

It normally dips in and out of other countries - it was in England in 2007 (???) I think

el tel

Up and down the Ventoux plus a nightime time trail down the channel tunnel with tunnel lights all switched off. The Schlecks will be bricking it as they are afraid of the dark. To compensate there will be a tandem mountain stage. For other stages Trek will be providing bikes with mirrors so Andy and frank dont waste time looking backwards. I've heard that leopard trek have struggled this year for team hotels that could cater for Andy and Franks bunk bed.

gman2k

CramCycle wrote: »

No team cars, no spare bikes, no spare wheels, no support, just man and machine, show who truly deserves it.

And no motorbikes, helicopters or TV crews.....


Wait a second.:p

Hermy

For the 100th Tour maybe Eurosport will bring back David Duffield.

Seve OB

Am i missing something here or what? I was convinced that I seen them talking about 100 years in the Alps during the week

http://www.letour.fr/HISTO/fr/TDF/index.html

the tour has already seen it's 100th Anniversary surely?

Beasty

stevieob wrote: »

the tour has already seen it's 100th Anniversary surely?

There's a difference between the 100th Anniversary (2003) and the 100th Tour (2013) - it wasn't held during the war years

Seve OB

Beasty wrote: »

There's a difference between the 100th Anniversary (2003) and the 100th Tour (2013) - it wasn't held during the war years

fair enough, thought I was loosing the plot or something!!!

nitrogen

I reckon the last stage should be:

Nantes–Paris 471km, just like the last stage of the first tour.

Hermy

What about just the one stage incorporating the route of the first Tour and the riders take it at their own pace a la the RAAM.

CramCycle

Hermy wrote: »

What about just the one stage incorporating the route of the first Tour and the riders take it at their own pace a la the RAAM.

Maybe as a warm up, they do some sort of Randonnée or Audax style event based on a race that was so popular they decided to expand upon it and in essence create the Tour de France. Maybe a simple back and forth from Paris to Brest and back again. Something like this:

Morrisseeee

nitrogen wrote: »

I reckon the last stage should be:

Nantes–Paris 471km, just like the last stage of the first tour.

.........on a fixie :pac:

There was such a stage, ie. 400+km on a fixie, not sure if it was the one you mention, and the winner took 16 hours to complete it. It would be very interesting to see a hilly stage done on a fixie, or a mountainous stage done on a 5 speed bike. Maybe introduce a 'fun' stage, on a rest day, but with some seriousness, ie. a Prologue stage, 10km on a single geared bike, on a tight circuit, where the top 10 get a time bonus.

Captain Havoc

I was just reading there that Le Coq Sportif are to make all ASO cycling event jerseys from next season (leaders jerseys, not teams).

CramCycle

Morrisseeee wrote: »

There was such a stage, ie. 400+km on a fixie, not sure if it was the one you mention, and the winner took 16 hours to complete it. .

They were all fixed gear in the beginning AFAIK, just double sided so they could flip the wheel for long descents but I could be wrong.