So are we talking about the TdF? Hell of an ITT to start things off.
Very happy for Lampaert, and really great, heartfelt response to his win. āIām just a farmerās son from Belgium.ā
All the feels.
Though kind of strange pitching a ārags to richesā story. The guy was Belgian national champion last year, and a podium finisher at Paris Roubaix. 
I will say the US coverage is painful. No wrap-ups, just full-race coverage, and two feed options - the European feed is fine, but the bloated, painful-to-watch talking heads US feed brought in Phil Liggett and Bob Roll to call the race.
So do I suffer through the US feed and endless commercials in order to listen to Phil again?
VPN to watch UK channel ITV4 for insightful commentary from David Millar.
I have been doing this for years. MUCH better coverage on a lot of cycling, not just TDF. I have to hunt for it sometimes but itās worth it. Thanks for the heads up on the channel.
āHey, letās put Paris Roubaix in the Tour de France! What could go wrong!ā
Feel like the TdF asked GvA for stage advice again this yearā¦hell of a stage 5!
I subscribed to GCN. Is that available in the USA? Commentaries are awesome. Robbie McEwen is now part of the team. Love that guy.
I do as well, unfortunately they donāt hold the US rights to any ASO events. So I get US coverage of their events by NBC sports.
They have a Euro feed, so I donāt have to watch the US coverage, but I wish theyād get their act together. They only did a stage recap for the 2nd stage, for example. So Iāve had to jump through the full race for all the other stages.
People might find this summary interesting:
They also have detailed information about the stages and the races, including gpx files for the stages.
Since Iām in the US, I watch it live on NBC Sports while doing my morning workouts. I love Phil and Bob, but itās painfully obvious that Phil is getting older. And despite both of them being in cycling for 40+ years, neither of them seem to have a lot of very in-depth race analysis.
Even tho they arenāt the best, I usually end up watching them, anyway - listening to Phil is more of a nostalgia thing - and then watching replays and highlights on GCN+ using a VPN.
GCN adding Robbie McEwan was a great add. Even if their analysis isnāt always spot on (Adam Blythe?), nobody is perfect, and itās better and more in-depth than anything on NBC. Listening to Chris Horner and Christian Vande Velde tends to drive me a little nuts.
Then Iāll watch Lantern Rouge and Chris Horner on YouTube. Always nice to get a variety of post-race analyses.
Yeah same, and Iāve really noticed it this year. Truth be told though, my nostalgia was always Phil and Paul Sherwen. Never felt Bob Roll added much.
I have switched to the European feed NBC offers online, with Anthony McCrossen and Simon Gerrans. They do a good job, and no 1000 commercials.
Yeah. The nostalgia is definitely for Phil. I miss Paul. I didnāt like Bob when he was an analyst. Felt like he was more goofy than anything. He definitely improved a lot once they put him in the booth with Phil. So much that I donāt dislike him, anymore. But not enough to feel he adds much other than correcting Phil when he has a senior moment (which he is having more of, and Bob feels more and more comfortable correcting him, like every time Phil calls Mathieu Van Dee Poel āAdriāā¦). Wish Bob had a much better feel for race-craft and analysis so he could actually add more.
I watch on NBC Sportsāand when I get tired of the subpar commentary, I turn on my VPN, connect to a European server, and watch on GCN from my home in the US.
Definitely was very annoyed with the NBC commentary today during Stage 6. They never seem to look to much below the surface of the basic tactics beyond the simple idea of the breakaway trying to stay away and the peloton trying to catch them.
It looked very much like TJV was trying to get Wout in the break today to force UAE to have to ride to catch him while the TJV riders could have some rest and draft in the back after a very hard day playing catch-up, yesterday. And that they knew they were going to lose the Yellow jersey with those tactics and were okay with it. Or, if UAE didnāt want to do the work, then he could potentially increase his lead. But the likelihood was that he was going to lose it while hopefully making UAE work hard the day before a hard Planche de Belles Filles stage when he was going to lose the jersey anyway.
That never occurred to them. They just kept talking about Wout trying to win the stage or add time over everyone else, or EF trying to get Yellow for Powless (so close!). And why were the other teams trying to help UAE with the chase? They never discussed that, either. Why didnāt other teams make UAE and EF tire themselves out doing all the work trying to chase Wout before finally attacking over the last couple hills in the last 15k? Not that I am endorsing whatever strategy TJV was employing. Iām listening to the GCN broadcast right now and there is a LOT more in-depth discussion of strategy.
Sometimes I swear that the NBC team never watches any bike racing except for the Tour de France. Just like most of their American viewers. I know Chris Horner does commentary on a lot of other races on his channel throughout the year, and he does have a least a decent mind for tactics. But I question a lot of what he says, and he seems to lose what knowledge he does have when sitting on the NBC Tdf set.
I only watch the highlights on GCN since I am not subscribed to GCN+.
And now, we have a new leader in the GC and we saw the first crack of Tadej Pogacar.
I was down with COVID that day and watched the whole thing. The highlights of that stage should have been four hours long. It was mental.
I didnāt have the same āfortuneā at yesterdayās stage, but - after seeing the highlights - did rewatch the descents of Tom Pidcock: it was like a computer gameā¦ No fear and unlimited grip. Unbelievable!
I posted one of the descents here:
It was good enough to make the Tourās Twitter feed.
I saw it somewhere that Tom Pidcock was descending at almost 100km/h at one point. That just blew my mind away 
Yeah, but he had to slow down to about 85km/h in order to get a drink of water. 
On our coverage (SBS, Australia) I saw 96km/hr at one point.
So Iām reading all this stuff about the Yellow jersey battle and really feel that Jonas Vingegaard is not being given enough credit. Yes, heās got a super strong team that is working so hard for him (Primoz Roglic a case in point) but what he did on Stage 11 was something extraordinary ā¦ and it wasnāt just Tadej Pogacar that he put massive time into but all his rivals. (My thoughts on Pogacarās performance that day - Team JV took too much out of him with their ferocious and plentiful attacks.) Vingegaard looks pretty calm and in control, frequently just sitting on Pogacarās wheel as he crosses the finish line. Much like Jai Handley in the Giro crossed the finish line on Richard Carapazās wheel on numerous stages, looking super calm and in control.
While the race for the Yellow jersey is far from over Vingegaard looks in such incredible form (and with such a strong team) that I think it will be hard to take it off him. Pogacar needs to take risks to try and do so and thatās where I think we may see some movement in the GC classification. G is riding so controlled and consistent he could well pedal steadily up those climbs, at his own pace, into second spot.
Of course I could be completely wrong - but itās exciting to watch. And with my poor daughter now with Covid (better today) I have an unplanned work off week to immerse myself in the TdF.