Giro D'Italia Stage 10

Porte's penalty was disproportionate and unnecessary. He gained no meaningful advantage and if the rules must be rigorously applied, Contador took off his helmet during the stage before which is an infringement punishable by elimination.

It is also an elimination offence to continue through a level crossing once the barriers are down. See Paris-Roubaix.

I still dont understand this - did the commissaires stop the convoy after Porte got a puncture or after the wheel change ?

Regardless of which way it was it's blatantly obvious it was done deliberately to hinder Porte hence why they have not come out with a reason for it.

Giro organizers seem quite a bit schizo... they post this https://twitter.com/giroditalia/status/600704582205997056
and then they penalize Porte and Clarke for making cycling the most beautiful sport there is...

theres another sky rider in the picture of the wheel swap, presumably he didn't give Porte a wheel as he was required to pace him back. So the lesson here is get a wheel from a team mate and the team mate then gets the wheel from a.n. other....

Question is, if Aru had obtained similar help (to what Porte had), would the Italian race organisers have applied the 2 minute penalty? And how much would Mr T have paid to get an extra 2 mins for Contador.
I expect the British and Australian ambassadors will be recalled from Rome over this international incident.

Boem has won me the stage in the purist comp. Pretty pleased

That being said, I'm not a fan of his, but I find it harsh on Porte...

The UCI rule suggests that Matthews rather than Porte should be penalized:

UCI rule 12.1.040 [8.1]
Non-regulation assistance to a rider of another
team:
The text says "to" another rider; nothing about accepting assistance FROM another rider.
But then under the penalty column, it says "each rider involved";
Pretty unclear for a regulations text.

Oh dear only got him self to blame for this
Quote from cycling news:-

Porte’s illegal wheel change was not captured by television cameras but it appears that the Tasmanian inadvertently provided the commissaires with the evidence they needed to punish infraction by tweeting his thanks to Simon Clarke immediately after the stage, and later retweeting a photograph of his fellow countryman in the act of giving him his front wheel.

“If that's not Aussie mate ship them what is? Punctured and clarkey gave me his front wheel…” Porte wrote.

Vegni dismissed the idea that other teams had alerted the commissaires to the infraction, pointing out that images of the wheel change were circulating on the internet almost as soon as the stage had finished.

“Ragazzi, you know better than me – with the photos that are flying around on the internet these days, you’d struggle to get out of any situation,” Vegni said. “Within three minutes there were pictures circulating on the internet of the rider Clarke giving him a wheel.”

Now down to 12th on GC.

Porte docked two minutes for accepting help!

Ha, I had Boem for the whole of the first week but not any more.

Still, he's in my purist and 5 Italians I guess. Chuffed for him, he gets in the break so often without getting anything.

Porte with a mechanical with just under 4kms to go!

Matthews helping pace Porte back to the peloton with some Sky team mates