Stage 9 - ITT, Arc-et-Senans to Besançon

I think I can get 7 out of the top 20 with any luck:

Wiggins
Rogers
Taaramae
VanGarderen
Pinot
Westra
Boeckmans
Grabsch(in for Morkov)
Zabriskie(in for Cantwell)

Hope the early deadline caught a few out!!!

I wonder how many picked Cancellara and Martin, personally I figured Wiggins, Froome and Evans could well outscore them with their guaranteed GC/KoM standings points.

That's just plain mean

I went for these, not ideal but best I could do considering what a mess my team was in yesterday!
Wiggins
Cancellara
Brajkovic
Peter Velits (bad choice for last 2 days but is an improving TTer)
Zabriskie
Grivko
Jeandesbosz, Bouet, Simon
Hopefully at least four of the top six can pick up good points, then I'll recalibrate on the rest day with the four free transfers and have another go...

Almost as mean as the BBC 'gloating' over Sammy Sanchez' injuries and the so-called 'boost' to Cav's Olympic chances.

Personally,if Sanchez was even a contender then Cav has no chance.....as it is it made no difference to the Olymic Road Race favourites(Greipel/Cav/Gerrans/Goss/Gilbert/Sagan).And if France get their track sprinter Bourgain over the undulations then I think he'll blow Cav away!!

Taken a penalty today had a mare last 2 days so hoping for a better showing today. Couldn't get Evans in either(being biased towards Wiggo was a factor)

Menchov
Wiggo
Rogers
Cancellara

Vichot
Izagirre
Lancaster
Engoulvent
Morkov

Didn't think martin was worth it today!

took my penalty yesterday bringing in rogers a day early

Evans
Van Garderen
Rogers
Wiggins

Lancaster
Roux
Zabriskie
Boeckmans
Bernaudeau

for me. 5 or six in the top 20 would do

Everyone seems to be talking up Cancellara and Wiggins as top two, then Evans and Martin as 3 & 4 in any order. Does anyone think there are any other riders capable of breaking into the top 4? Froome, Millar, anyone?

Also probably more importantly, how will Nibali, Van den Broeck and Menchov do in relation to Wiggins/Evans?

Zabriskie,Grabsch and Grivko from the DS' perhaps.....Kessiakoff,Taaramae,Rogers from the stars but probably not good enough to top 4 if Martin's on form.

Larsson,LuLuSanchez,Westra look to be the early 1/2/3.

Current top 5

1. Westra
2. Larsson
3. LL Sanchez
4. Millar
5. Gretsch

Zabriskie 1 minute down at the first check, Lancaster same at first check, 2 minutes down at the second.

Tony Martin 13 seconds better than Westra at first time check

Excellent, I have neither but I reckon more people will have Westra than Martin so the more people quicker than Westra the better

I'm hoping for points from LL Sanchez today

Zabriskie only 7th with probably at least 5 or 6 faster guys to finish, looks like bringing him in was not worth 20 penalty points after all

Always unlikely to finish top 5(minimum requirement for 20 penalty points)and nowhere in any of the GC/pts/KOM comps!!

Martin goes fastest by half a minute!!

first 3 of mine to finish are sitting 2nd,9th and 12th with some major guns to come-really anticipating top50 on the stage

Never trust Gustav Larsson's twitter.

EDIT - Although thinking about it, I brought in Westra for Larsson so I should be happy.

Currently i've no riders in the top 20
But i do have the current slowest rider Engoulvent

He should stay there unless one of the big guns goes round in under 50 minutes, at which point he's outside of the cut-off and DQ'd

Hat's off to The Jensie......2nd at the first chrono

Shit the bed he's flying
shouldn't be suprised really, he did put in a stormer in California

Martin had puncture again in an time trial! so Canc will prob come in nearer 50min mark!

He's such a star! I don't think he'll retire quietly and voluntarily - it'll take several big blokes to drag him away in a strait jacket

I'm calling it now, without Canc even finished, he's going to win it, Over a minute up at the second split......He's found his TT legs today

Sorry, Cancellara is storming it but I still reckon Wiggins is in with a good shout. The climb in particular should help him more than Cancellara, plus, if he's doing his Discovery Channel thing he may even out pace his support car today...

With you on this one drh.....Wiggins comfortably....

I hope Wiggo can put in a good time, but I don't see him doing a 52. As it stands I have 3 in the top 10, so I'm hoping only Wiggo can go under 54.33

TJvG currently leading at the first check!

Have to go for Wiggo now, he should destroy the course and hopefully put 30+ seconds into Evans. If Evans limits him to less than that then he's put in a superhuman ride.

Can't really judge anything on the first split though, because the timing is just at the top of the small climb, So Canc was never going to be fastest through split one

TJvG fastest at second check by 2 seconds, all but Evans and Wiggins on the road.

Forget the Panzerwagon, hear comes the Froome-wagon... (sorry, bad pun)

And they're also reporting at the 10km mark Wiggins is already 20 seconds up on Evans.

Aye, Froome is nailing it, but again, only the first split, uphill.

Yes Teej was still fastest at second split by 2 seconds, then was the best part of 10 seconds down at the line.....

So we'll see, Is Froome leaving it all on the start of the stage or can he continue that pace?

30 seconds now being tracked by GPS, he'll catch him half way at this rate

Not great for me....

my team

Wiggins
Chavanel
Rogers
Roy

Casar
Grivko
Lancaster
Zabriske
Izagirre

I have to just say now, my favourite part of this stage today has been that MASSIVE display of the TT guy in the field with the stopwatch rear wheel.

Anyone got a contact out there in the helicopter with a camera?

I want an aerial shot of that to blow up into a poster

Y'know what they say, there's always Froome at the top...

Better day for me (37pts yesterday so that wasn't hard) but should have Brad, Cancellara, Velits, Brajkovic and Grivko in the top 20 today.

Awesome from Wiggins so far!

Wow, Evans is dying on his arse out there. Wiggo showing almost a minute up coming to split one.....

GC could be Wiggo from Froome after today

Oh well, LL is going to score me 0 again today he's 17th just now with 8 riders to come in, more that 3 of them will be faster. Grivko at 15th.....might struggle to get points from him aswell.

Was that Froome just showing why its himself and Wiggo who are going for Olympic TT and not Millar?

Another fail from me.

Impressive showing, not just from Froome and Wiggins but from quite a few GC guys, Nibali, Menchov and Kloden have all done well and you could argue that by only losing 4 minutes Schleck could have done worse

Wiggo leading GC by nearly 2 minutes

1,3,7,15 so not too bad. Tried to hedge my bets too much, and went for Brajkovic and Zabriskie instead of Chavanel and AN Other cheap DS. Now it gets interesting - so many good climbers will be looking to attack in the Alps, do you play it safe with Wiggins or go all out for KOM points and stage-winners?

All I want to see is a HUGE green arrow on the purist's TdF, Sitting 9th, think I might go up

:edit: Down 2 to 11th.....time to see its unlimited

Wiggo, Evans and TVG for me plus 5 points for Rogers. enough to be going up rather than down, now sharing 96th place with alan tullett...

I could be wrong but I'd ask Dave before you change anything.

Swapped out Froome for Evans - Doh !!!!!

Still not to bad i suppose. Now to sit down and look at my team for the next 3 / 4 stages.

Thats it. Nibali is getting transferred out.

Thats it. Nibali is getting transferred out.

Bouhanni might stand a remote chance of winning but if Bourgain wins his first road race in the Olympics that would be a miracle. I would have thought if the sprinters get dropped then Boonen and the Belgium team in general has the best chance. Sagan has a good chance but he hasn't outsprinted Boonen yet.

Penalties are an excellent idea if you want a stage victory. In fact they make it a bit easy. Take a big pen one day for glory the next. Useless for the overall though.

That was a penalty in the sense of having him in my team, as opposed to actually spending points

Taking a big pen one day for a big score the next only works if you actually pick the winners. If you're good enough to do that you can probably do it without getting hit for masses of points...

I didn't see this before my previous comment. Is this a boast, that you're as high as me!! I really fucked up stage 7. I thought it was going to be one of those boring first mountain stages, but, thankfully in some ways, it wasn't. Then, I went for the breaks and I got Pinot, who was down in my team long before Eurosport was on about him every 5 seconds, but Moncoutie doesn't have the legs anymore and De Gregorio did nothing. Chavanal was still too dangerous to let go, unfortunately, although I'm sure he'll win a stage eventually. I thought I needed 2 or 3 big scores to be in contention but I only got 1. Thought about Kessiakoff as well.

Today was much better than I expected as my team was not oriented towards the TT at all. At the last minute I picked out Velits as a good pick at that price range and he produced the goods so I'm pleased at that. Don't tell me how far behind the leader I am as I daren't look. I only look at the overall table to make sure I'm above Teratcliffe26

I'm playing overall for another week, then I'll go for stages. Should have won last year when I had a good chance. This year I think I'm out of it but I'll pray for a couple more Pinot's and some good choices on the stars. I couldn't watch either stage live as I had my daughter's concert one day and I did over 200k for the first time the next!! I hope I can watch next weekend live, even though stage 11 is probably the key one now. If Wiggins doesn't crash surely he has it in the bag. The only one who can beat him is Froome, who is probably under orders not too!!

Guess who's going stage hunting

That was a penalty in the sense of having him in my team, as opposed to actually spending points

Taking a big pen one day for a big score the next only works if you actually pick the winners. If you're good enough to do that you can probably do it without getting hit for masses of points...

Well, I'm glad you didn't spend points on him. The only person I thought of spending a penalty on was Cancellara, but you still need the points, which I didn't really have. It's true you need to get the winners, but now you can have a try every other day, which wasn't possible before. I'm sure quite a few people must be trying this already if they've sussed out the system. I'm still keen on keeping my overall position and I don't desperately need any of the stage prizes. Personally, I think the old system of 2 a day, no rollovers and no penalties was more intellectually challenging, but perhaps less interesting to more casual players.

Not me!! I still want the overall even if it's going to take a couple of very, very good stages to do it now! But I believe I can still do it. Just got to think a bit harder about all the tactics.

Well that's my second account, its going stage hunting now I have time and this one is staying purist

Stage Winner for Stage 9....................well chuffed