Stage 7 TdS

Swirly wrote:

Should British websites use US English then? I quite like it being in Swiss French but then I spent a few months living in a village in the Valais. All you need is the results pdf and the parcours surely?

Only if it can be shown that the English language originated in the United States. Which, whatever my wife claims, it didn't

As for the TdS site, if for example you want to follow the race ticker - to find out about Soler's crash yesterday, for example - if you didn't know French or German, you were out of luck.

BMC Racing is based in the US but Swiss-sponsored, and DS Max Sciandri said earlier this year that the first thing they looked for in a rider was whether they spoke English, which for better or worse he saw as becoming the lingua franca of the sport.

I'd say that if you're the organiser of a top-level race, commercial factors alone mean you shouldn't ignore a huge part of the sport's fan base.

Just my two Swiss Francs' worth.

Simon_MacMichael wrote:

I'd say that if you're the organiser of a top-level race, commercial factors alone mean you shouldn't ignore a huge part of the sport's fan base.

I see your point although I'd hazard a guess Spanish and Italian would be the languages of choice after French in this case. It would be interesting to know visitor figures to the TDS homepage, I can't imagine UK, US and Aus account for enough browsing for translation costs to be viable. Especially as most info gets re-reported elsewhere pdq. When all is said and done this is a fairly minor sporting event and even the Giro website wasn't full translated. It's also worth bearing in mind the Swiss are (massive stereotyping here) pretty jingoistic in nature.

Also, it's exotic and could be worse it could be only available in Romansche!

Surely 'if you build it, they will come'. Cyclingnews has a full run-down of every intermediate sprint, every mountain top, the finish and all the classifications available by 5.30, and their ticker is great. If the official website was translated (or even translatable!), easily navigable and had the results up quickly, it would get a good deal more traffic, I think.

stewieatb wrote:

If the official website was translated (or even translatable!)

I think you've hit the nail on the head, its not that there is no English version thats the problem as some websites dont have them, but google can always sort that, its the mix of languages that has google stumped and the ticker, google wont even touch

I think the site would have enough traffic for it to be a viable option, but then we are talking about the Swiss, if its not their way then tough luck

As for the comments about it not being a major sporting event, you just have to look at the start list to nullify that argument, if it wasn't major, the start list would be a list of, wannabe, could have been and has been riders, not a list of who's who when it comes to the tours

cyclingfans has a link that uses google to translate the ticker, but it's pretty bad - as you say, it's the mashup of languages that's the problem.

Gkam84 wrote:

As for the comments about it not being a major sporting event, you just have to look at the start list to nullify that argument, if it wasn't major, the start list would be a list of, wannabe, could have been and has been riders, not a list of who's who when it comes to the tours

It has the startlist it does because of the terrain covered and it's position in time relative to the tour. However, regardless of that it would still attract a decent line up. What it doesn't attract is a large audience, you've been watching it so you'll know there's a semi decent crowd at the finish and a sprinkling of people at the top of the other climbs. It may be a big event in terms of pro cycling but in terms of sporting events it's very low profile. Compare the viewing of the mountain stages in the TdS to stage 1 of last years Tour, a flat stage that had spectators a few people deep for its entire length. I'd put money on the TdS not even being the most watched sporting event in Switzerland.

I'm surprised google is struggling to translate the ticker, at least more so than using it to translate conventional French. In terms of French, at least, I found the main difference to be the Swiss spoke slow enough for me to understand. The only vocab incident being the fairly important issue of buying beer. (FYI they don't use the words pression or demi a small beer is biere and a large is choppe). Mind I'm off to the Alps soon so I'll find out if I'm now unintelligible, many would say I always was.

thefatcyclist wrote:

Told you a breakaway would get it today.
Nobody in the top 10 for me, and 11-20 probably, so all my points will come from the GC.
Crap

Even better for me then

I think Gasparotto came home in around 11/12th