“About time cyclists started to take responsibility for their actions again”: “Ridiculous” cycle lane shortened leaving cyclists stranded; “I am now 10g lighter”: Pro loses part of thumb in crash; Mountain ambush at the Tour? + more on the live blog
SUMMARY
Cycle lane shortened by Council, leaving cyclists stranded
Our thanks to road.cc reader Paul for getting in touch, bringing our attention to this latest bit of strange cycle lane removal.
In Inverness, campaigners have criticised the Highland Council for removing a segregated cycle lane running past the town’s big shopping centre. Google Maps from last year shows the lane being separated by green paint and segregated by orca kerbs.
The Inverness Courier have been to the site and photographed the road showing it restored to three lanes for cars.
> Inverness e-bike scheme restarts with smaller baskets to stop them being used to carry passengers
The decision appears to run counter to the council’s Net Zero strategy, which seeks to “developing infrastructure to enable and encourage staff to choose active travel” and to “promote active travel infrastructure across Highland.” But it seems the council think they can do these things without things that make active travel safer. Many people are unhappy…
Emily Williams, convenor of the Highland Cycling Campaign, told the ‘paper, “We weren’t consulted and I’m genuinely not sure what anyone is meant to safely do now.
“It especially disadvantages anybody not on a standard bike because the only access now is to cross over onto the pavement, on the wrong side of the road, or swing across two lanes of traffic with no lights or markings to help you.
“It completely undermines [Highland Council’s] own strategy of connecting all the really great infrastructure they have invested in. It is really daft, and really dangerous.”
Paul tells us Inverness “is also the city that doesn’t grit several cycle paths that are part of the Sustrans active travel route, and when I enquired about it a local councillor suggested I did it myself.”
Unfortunately, the Facebook comments on this story carry a similar attitude…
“Where have these “cyclists” suddenly materialised from? You certainly never see them using cycle lanes”
“You can tell them it’s very dangerous cycling on pavements, cycling down one way streets the wrong way. And cycling through red lights when pedestrian lights are at green.”
“About time cyclists started to take responsibility for their actions again. Far too many (not all) don’t think they have to look where they’re going or obey the rules of the road. Someone on the pavement is going to get seriously injured or worse when a cyclist uses it to jump red lights.”
“They cycle on the roads anyway so why complain about cycle lanes when they never use them”
Unfortunately it seems like this is one part of the country that could benefit from some tender loving care, and some two-wheeled fresh air…
Tesla releases $225 balance bike for small children
Nothing says encouraging a child to enjoy life on two wheels than by buying them a balance bike emblazoned with a car logo. And a car company with not the greatest record when it comes to cycling…
> Tesla denies malfunction caused crash that killed cyclist
Not forgetting the company’s prior history of ‘inspiring’ an e-bike (although we think it was more of a moped) and then offering NFTs for the designs that could supposedly be exchanged for the real thing? 5 years later, we’re yet to see those NFT’s be converted into something… fungible.
And then there’s Elon Musk himself, a man whose social media output speaks for itself – though it should be noted road.cc has been wary of him long before he became quite so outwardly bigoted when, in 2016, he urged adoption of driverless vehicles “as soon as possible.”
So, our reaction wasn’t exactly tip-top to the news that Tesla is releasing a balance bike for toddlers…
Costing $225 (£167) it’s notably pricier than other balance bikes, though I suppose cheaper bikes might not have “a lightweight magnesium frame, adjustable seat and futuristic design. Finished with the Tesla wordmark on the side and the Tesla “T” logo on the front.” So that’s something.
It also comes with a toolkit for assembling it yourself because it comes disassembled. Although were I to receive a tool from Mr Musk I might be minded to send it back to its maker. Tesla say the balance bike has already sold out, though based on their production history I’d be tempted to say that was due to a smaller production run than you might expect.
Admittedly company bosses don’t always buy and use their own products. But for a company so synonymous with their CEO I find it difficult to imagine Musk using one of these for his own children. Or maybe he’s already promised one to each of his kids, hence the line selling out already…
Dramatic finish!
Goodness me! Finally with 500m to go Tejada managed to force Schmid to the front, and when the Colombian launched his sprint with 250 metres to go he looked the favourite. But Schmid rallied, and won by less than half a wheel, with the chasing group coming in just a few seconds behind. They left that very tight…
Mauro Schmid wins, becoming the first Swiss stage winner since Marc Hirschi in 2020, whilst Tom Pidcock, unexpectedly, comes home in third. Those bonus seconds could be vital!
Full gas for Mauro Schmid in Belfort! 💨
Pleine vitesse pour Mauro Schmid à Belfort ! 💨#TDF2026 pic.twitter.com/rP0ZTZb91E
— Tour de France™ (@LeTour) July 17, 2026
Update: The peloton clearly took an energy gel (singular) on the run-in and came in just over 7’30” behind Schmid. The result sees Pidcock lie 4th overall, nine seconds off Remco Evenepoel in third. Not bad for a day’s work, and he gets the combativity prize for his troubles…
4km to go and Kevin Vauquelin attacks and gets a gap with Jordan Jegat, surely they can’t close 20 seconds in 4km? The Frenchmen cooperate but a caught a minute later.
2km to go, still Schmid and Tejada hold 20 seconds. Mcnulty is next to launch, meanwhile they’ve stopped working at the front!
1.8km, it’s down to 17 seconds, Schmid is yet to come round for Tejada. They’re looking at each other.
They come under the flamme rouge… and Tim Wellens has stolen a march behind…
Two-up sprint incoming?
10km to go and still they have 10 seconds. Tim Wellens just tried to break free once more but was wheeled in. It skirts up to 12 seconds. With his gains on GC, this will surely be Pidcock’s last chance to get in the break but it’s hard to see what he can do to get the stage win he craves.
8km left, 13 seconds, they can still see Tejada and Schmid but they’re out of reach. 15 seconds now, Luke Plapp is sitting in and disrupting the turns of his rivals, not wanting them to catch his teammate Schmid.
7km, 18 seconds the gap. Unless they stop to look at one another, this is looking very promising for Schmid and Tejada. And for XDS-Astana and Jayco-AlUla a stage win at the Tour de France would be massive.
6km 20 seconds the gap, and Pidcock is about to be pushed off the virtual podium by Remco Evenepoel, the peloton are now eight minutes behind.
5km, 21 seconds, we are closing in on a sprint a deux…
10 seconds is the gap for Tejada and Schmid who are fully committed and rotating through. Behind, they’re attacking one another rather than working together. For context, this is all happening at 60kph, utterly bonkers. 12km to go
Attacks
Tim Wellens has rejoined the front group, whilst Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe have taken over the peloton to lead onto the descent. The roads are wide enough to not encourage any risk-taking however, which is bad news for Tom Pidcock. He’s not renowned for his bunch sprint, and might struggle to best Van Gils in a sprint. But it’s been an intense day, and anything could happen!
Meanwhile the gap to the peloton has dropped below 8’10”, drawing Vingegaard and Pidcock neck-a-neck on GC, albeit in the Dane’s favour.
Now the attacks begin! 17km to go and Tim Wellens went first but was quickly closed down. Next up is Mauro Schmid and he’s got a gap with Harold Tejada. Ooh and they’re looking at each other behind! They ought to get the skates on sharpish if they’re to bring them back…
Cooperation
Pidcock has Mauro Schmid, Jordan Jegat, Luke Plapp, Maxim Van Gils, Kevin Vauquelin, Harold Tejada, and Clement Braz Afonso for company. A smaller group containing Michael Matthews is 30 seconds behind but the front group won’t want to let him back in. So far, they’re co-operating and rotating through. The peloton meanwhile is still led by Lidl-Trek both by Derek Gee-West and Mads Pedersen, freshly dropped from the breakaway. The gap is 8’30”, and Pidcock is still second overall… 24km remain
Summit! 30km to go
Luke Plapp is next to launch and gets another, larger gap but again Pidcock closes, this time with only 5 riders on his wheel.
Through swarming fans on hairpins Van Gils leads and he sits up to zip up his jersey, breifly lulling the peloton to a slower pace. Still the gap is 8’10”.
1.4km from the summit and Plapp goes again, Vauquelin follows this time whilst Pidcock sits in behind. Now the favourites all look at one another.
Here goes Pidcock! 800m from the summit it’s a vicious acceleration, his whole body rocking over the bike he gets a small gap but Luke Plapp claws his way back. 400m of furious riding out of the saddle but it’s not breaking up the group. He’s instead pinned back, though Pidcock goes again! One final punch to lead over the Ballon d’Alscae, 8’27” the gap and now he’ll be hoping to create gaps on the long descent ahead…
Van Gils strong
Halfway up the climb and Jayco seem imperious right up until the next attack. TotalEnergies launch it but Maxim Van Gils is the one to counter and get a gap. Jersey unzipped, gritting teeth, proper bike racing, swerving in and out of shade around the hairpins. He’s still firmly in sight though.
Pidcock accelerates out of the saddle and only a few can stay and hold his wheel. They’re all looking to the Brit to drag them to the front of the race.
In the peloton Lidl-Trek are pacing to preserve the GC of Ayuso and Skjelmose.
3km left of the climb and Pidcock finally catches Van Gils, the group now 8-10 strong.
Pidcock overtakes Vingegaard
Just as Ben Healy is dropped, Hirschi pushes on again, but is reeled in this time by Jayco-AlUla, who have Ben O’Connor, Mauro Schmid, Luke Plapp and still Michael Matthews in the group. 5km left of the climb.
The group’s larger than first thought. 23-strong but showing no signs of slowing, Pidcock’s now 8’15” in front of the peloton and overtaken Jonas Vingegaard on virtual general classification to move into second overall…
36km to go
Here comes Kevin Vauquelin, catching and passing Pluimers and pushing on with a smaller group of around a dozen riders on his wheel, Pidcock and Healy among them. The next attack is from Jordan Jegat, he gets a gap but Pidcock comes to the front of the group behind, working to peg him back. He duly does so before rotating off. Harold Tejada is there, so is Brandon McNulty.
6.5km of the climb and the next attack is from Lars Craps. The Lotto rider burst away with a flurry of an acceleration, Jegat and Marc Hirschi also attack and come close to joining him. This time Pidcock lets other riders work to close the gap. 6km left of the climb
Ballon begins...
45 riders, 8’10” the advantage but the attacks begin immediately at the bottom of the category-1 climb.
Rick Pluimers makes the first move from Tudor, and quickly gets a gap, this is going to be a very reduced group that rejoins. Meanwhile Girmay and Pedersen are dropped, this climb is too hard for the fast men!
Climbing begins
Onto the category-3 Col des Croix and just as we do, Pidcock moves level with Remco Evenepoel on virtual GC. Pinarello-Q36.5, including Fred Wright, are continuing to bury themselves for Tom Pidcock, working to do everything they can for both a stage win and a big move on GC. This climb is short though and not very steep, it’s a useful leg loosener though which starts to rid the breakaway of extra domestiques and larger rouleurs. Wright is among the riders to drop away.
1km from the top and Ben Healy attacks! He’s latched onto by Kevin Vauquelin and tries to wrestle a smaller group away. Quinten Hermans is prepared though and resumes his position at the front of the group
7’42” at the bottom of the climb, 7’44” at the top, Pidcock still perfectly positioned, everything’s looking rather good.
10km now to the bottom of the Ballon d’Alsace…
Road rage driver wanted!
Sadly this story won’t make it into our monthly sentencing round-up, because police can’t find the man they need to sentence!
Philipsen takes the intermediate sprint
Benefiting from multiple teammates leading him out, and not having to chase the front of the race for an hour, Jasper Philipsen came out on top. Mads Pedersen was second to effectively stabilise the green jersey competition with Biniam Girmay third. Now, will Pedersen try and hold on in the hope of picking up points at the finish? Pinarello-Q36.5 are fully working for Pidcock now, jumping him up into the top-5.
💚 Intermediate sprint @WeLoveCyclingFR 💚
🇧🇪 Jasper Philipsen – 25 points
🇩🇰 Mads Pedersen – 20 points
🇪🇷 Biniam Girmay – 16 pointsThe top three in the green jersey classification were able to contest the sprint.
Les 3 premiers au classement du maillot vert ont pu se… pic.twitter.com/T7ICpjUnxy
— Tour de France™ (@LeTour) July 17, 2026
In the peloton, Bahrain-Victorious have started riding at the front to try and protect Lenny Martinez’s GC position from Pidcock and Jordan Jegat. They brought the gap down to 6’50” at one point but it’s back up now to 7’30”, another 15 seconds or so and Yorkshire’s finest leapfrogs Evenepoel onto the podium.
63km remaining.
All together now in no-man's land
Writing about The Farm with the goats gave me the inspiration for that headline.
Anyway, finally the two break aways have reunited, meaning we now have a 57 (Fifty-seven) strong group at the front of the race. Meanwhile the gap to the peloton keeps growing and is now touching seven minutes. That’s enough for Pidcock to overtake Isaac del Toro on GC, and the Brit is bearing down on Florian Lipowitz and Paul Seixas. If he gains another minute he’ll move onto the podium!
One other bit of info from the GC battle is that Jordan Jegat, 10th last year and currently 19th overall, is moving into the top-10 if the timegaps stay as they are.
In the peloton UAE’s Nils Politt is just starting to grimace on the front. Or is just a lovely smile from the Big Friendly German?
86km remaining, less than 20km to the intermediate sprint, and a very very dramatic GC battle is unfolding…
Best rendition of Crazy Frog ever...
Admittedly it’s a low bar.
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TIBOPINO spotted
Oh! Look who is here 🤩👀
Oh! Regardez qui est là 🤩👀#TDF2026 pic.twitter.com/3LuYx1iJUe
— Tour de France™ (@LeTour) July 17, 2026
La la la lala la Lah! THIBAUT PINOT!
Despite never finishing as the best placed Frenchman at the Tour de France – thanks to Cillian Kelly for that immense factoid – Thibaut Pinot won our hearts for years with his style and panache.
Today’s stage visits his home town of Melisey, which is also the destination for today’s intermediate sprint, and where his father is the mayor! It’s any excuse to share this fantastic photo…
As for today’s stage the Girmay-Pedersen group, now 20 strong, is still 40 seconds off the front of the race. The gap has closed slightly but not by much. Josh Tarling, Ben O’Connor, Kasper Asgreen, Magnus Cort, Michael Matthews and the magnificently named Lars Craps are among the names trying to catch the front.
Meanwhile the gap from the front to the peloton is now just over 5’30”, meaning Tom Pidcock is starting to move up on the virtual GC. UAE are leading the peloton but I can’t say they’re riding with any ferocity. 105km remaining
Pidcock in the break!
Blimey, 37 riders have got away, and Tom Pidcock’s snuck in there! He’s got 3 teammates for company, including Fred Wright He started today 10th overall, nearly 12 minutes behind the race leader and around 5 minutes off Lenny Martinez in ninth.
Lidl-Trek weren’t worried about him, but they were worried by Jasper Philipsen slipping up the road. But they couldn’t pull the break back and now we have a series of counter-attackers trying to break free of the peloton and hoping to claw the minute gap to the front of the race.
Among the other riders up the road are Jordan Jegat, Brandon McNulty, Kevin Vauquelin, Ion Izagirre, Maxim Van Gils, Tim Wellens, Romain Gregoire, George Bennett and Julian Alaphilippe.
137km to go, the chasers (containing Pedersen and Girmay) are 45 seconds behind, the peloton 2’50”. One more thing, the average speed of today’s stage is currently 55kph. Utterly bonkers!
E-bike news round-up
OUCH!
We start today, curiously enough, with a postscript.
On Wednesday our fingers were on the pulse as Tom Pidcock labelled the “white shit” sprayed on the road as responsible for him, and several other riders crashing on the descent of the Puy Marie, en route to Tadej Pogacar’s latest stage win.
On Thursday we thumbed through the considered defence of the Tour de France’s head of race operations who defended the white wash as preventing roads melting whilst being ecologically better than water – though I’ll leave it to the scientists to try and explain that one.
André Bancala also suggested that the fact several riders came down individually, rather than as one mass crash, suggested it was down to ‘rider error’ rather than the road surface.
That seems to be a slightly bizarre argument, given the race was completely fragmented and a mass crash often sees riders crashing because the rider in front of them has blocked their way, rather than because they too suffered from the same cause as the person who crashed first.
But after a certain point, we’re getting bogged down in ‘ooh did what to ooh’. The net result is that riders are crashing and injuring themselves and races are repeatedly unwilling to bear responsibility or make considered efforts to reduce risk. Just yesterday, a crash in the sprint finale saw Fernando Gaviria have to abandon the race.
And we now know the unfortunate details of Pidcock’s teammate Chris Harper’s abandon after crashing on Tuesday…
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“Pulling out of any bike race sucks but hurts a bit more to pull out of the biggest one of them all.” Harper, the former Giro d’Italia stage winner and key mountain domestique wrote.
“Thanks to the team for the support and fingers crossed for a quick recovery and back into some racing for the second part of the season. On a positive note think I’m now 10g lighter #marginalgains 🤦♂️”
There’ll be no thumb wars for a while, we reckon
Even Jose Mourinho can't take his eyes off Baptiste Veistroffer
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Rohan Dennis facing jail
There needs to be a degree of caution when covering Rohan Dennis, not least because at the heart of the saga is a grieving family and two young children.
However, these elements of the story only make his latest behaviour all the more indefensible…
Stage 13 preview: Unlucky for who?
I think our Ryan has slightly undersold today’s stage, which I think has more potential than he thinks…
“You know the final week of the Tour is tough when this stage, featuring an actual Category One ascent under 30km from the finish, is labelled by the race organisers as ‘hilly’.
“The climb in question is the Ballon d’Alsace, the first mountain ever climbed by the Tour in 1905, averaging 6.9 per cent for 8.9km. It may not be enough to awaken the GC contenders from their slumber, but its proximity to the finish means that only the breakaway’s strongest climbers will contest the win.”
The way this race has been going, I wouldn’t write off another GC day, particularly considering the type of riders who get up the road on the flat start to the stage probably won’t be best equipped to power up the climb.
A reduced bunch sprint could favour someone like Michael Matthews (though his best years are behind him) and Dorian Godon (though he crashed heavily yesterday and is on concussion watch). Is it steady enough for someone like Mads Pedersen to hang on or rejoin on the descent? If so he could take another massive step towards holding on to the green jersey.
As for the GC favourites, I’d keep an eye on Remco Evenepoel. One steep climb that’s not too long, the time trial world champion is one of the few riders who you would back to hold off a peloton solo for 30km if he gets a gap. He’d also be keen to put a little more distance between himself and German shepherd teammate Florian Lipowitz.
Cyclist sues council over 'invisible' lane dividers
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Latest Comments
comparable blue-sky lunacy, apparently a small keychain pendant is going to save lives. i was going to reply on fb with images of stationary police vehicles that other motorists collided with despite being festooned in hiviz markings, but y'know .. jail time for hurt feelings. https://www.inverness-courier.co.uk/news/be-bright-be-seen-inverness-schools-to-receive-7500-keyrin-448570/
I could wear a giant Las Vegas neon sign on my back and a driver looking at their phone still wouldn't see me.
@kingleo He also drives. I've heard him talking about his car. His family has also been deeply affected by bad drivers. He seems extremely well qualified for the position he's in and I think we're lucky to have him. I'd like to see The Spectator employ better journalists but there's Bob Hope of that.
A cautionary tale for anyone relying on public consultations as an indication of public opinion, given that BH12 apparently had a population of 36,169 at the 2021 census, and only 31 bothered to respond.
I wonder what would happen if some random pleb decided to suplex Sheriff Fergus Thomson randomly for no reason on his way home from work. I have a sneaking suspicion it wouldn't involve them "avoiding jail by the narrowest of margins", no matter how many crocodile tears they might shed in court.
It would also be nicer if it dropped you out more parallel, so that you don't have to make a turn into the path of any oncoming bus - something like this (there are other versions that have a tapered merge after the drop).
Maybe they should make the bike lane a different colour to the road to make it clear that it's not part of the road. Oh, wait, they already did. There is no hope!
@Rendel Harris Yeah, I can see the logic, just seems a bit over-engineered for that purpose! The surfacing in particular seems unnecessary - you can have the dropped kerb and painted markings without the little patch of red asphalt.
I'm not generally a fan of emulating American approaches, but I do think local authorities need to be much more willing to tow and impound illegally parked vehicles, with all costs involved recovered from the owner before they get their vehicle back. (Maybe it's just a TV trope, but in American films and TV shows, improperly parked cars always seem to get towed away pretty quickly, especially when inconvenient for the protagonist!) Most of the time illegally parked cars just get a PCN, which a) is regressive (impacts poor people most; for rich people it's a minor annoyance at most) and b) does nothing to alleviate the harm done by the illegal parking - i.e. the parking restriction exists for a reason; leaving the car there means that reason continues to be undermined.
I'm in no way whatsoever justifying the car being parked in the scooter bay, but as it is a 'classic car' from 1972 it doesn't actually need an MOT. It does need to have current VED, although again due to the age, this is a cost of £0 per year, so there's no excuse for not keeping the VED records up to date.
4 thoughts on ““About time cyclists started to take responsibility for their actions again”: “Ridiculous” cycle lane shortened leaving cyclists stranded; “I am now 10g lighter”: Pro loses part of thumb in crash; Mountain ambush at the Tour? + more on the live blog”
Yeech! I think you should at least give some sort of trigger (or perhaps thumb shifter) warning before sticking that in front of us!
Did I miss something yesterday? As far as I could see (and there were multiple replays, slightly ironic that Rob Hatch is continually saying “This is just what we don’t want to see” whilst we are shown the same crash over and over) Gaviria’s crash and the other riders subsequently coming down was a pure racing incident, nothing for which one could blame the organisers.
there is as yet no commentary about the problem of pedestrians incorrectly using the ness walk cycle path, in inverness. it’s very popular with people pushing pushchairs and local running clubs. all of them seem shocked when a cyclist appears.
as for the millburn road reworking, there’s a sequence of 4 preexisting ‘toucan’ crossings that route one from ‘cinnamon’ over to the morrisons-side shared-path, and then back across to ‘farm&household stores’. but most pedestrians shout at cyclists going past the morrisons bus stop so nobody bothers with it anymore.
Pretty sure sentencing is the court’s purview, not the police’s.