tour de france : scandalous

"dennisg"
In an interview, Lance admitted that it was his own mistake. He was
riding too close to the side.

Link?

Post race he said... "I saw it coming but there was nothing I could do about
it...".

A mistake? You *are* kidding. All that effort... and a competitor makes a
mistake by having a spectator's bag hit his handle bars?

eyes rolling

The spectator should be punished.

hth

St Canard wrote in message . com...
In article , Luigi de
Guzman wrote:

I'd be curious to know whether any spectator, in the hundred years of
the Tour de France, has wilfully attacked or injured a competitor with
a view to denying that competitor a stage or overall victory.

The answer is yes. In 1975 a French fan stepped out from the crowd
and punched Eddie Merckx in the kidney during a climb -- he was a fan
of Bernard Thevenet and apparently upset that the trophy was going to
leave France. Merckx had the yellow jersey at the time. The kidney
became infected and forced him to abandon, and Thevenet went on to
win.

The fan was arrested and tried for assault, I hope...?

In typical Merckx fashion, after the stage we went back down
looking for they guy that hit him.

....so *that's* why they call him The Cannibal!

*grin*

-Luigi

....got the fava beans, now where did I leave that Chianti.....?

"Doug Huffman"

wrote:

And for tolerance like this events like the Chimney Rock Hill Climb are no
more. We started cars at two minute intervals while the course was clear
and still the idiot spectators would dance bare assed on the course between
cars.

Do we - volunteers, sponsors, organizers - put events on for the benefit of
(idiot) spectators or for our friends, the competitors?

It's not as simple as either/or. I'm sure that when you were involved with
organizing racing events you did it in part for your friends (the competitors)
but did you also advertise the events to attract spectators?

Regards,
Bob Hunt

St Canard wrote:
The answer is yes. In 1975 a French fan stepped out from the crowd
and punched Eddie Merckx in the kidney during a climb -- he was a fan
of Bernard Thevenet and apparently upset that the trophy was going to
leave France. Merckx had the yellow jersey at the time. The kidney
became infected and forced him to abandon, and Thevenet went on to
win.

According to letour.fr, Merckx finished second in 1975 to Thevenet.
Apparently he went on but was hindered by the injury and apparently
a later crash injury which required his jaw to be wired shut.

Here's another link that says he finished:

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory...ycling/1972099

--Bill Davidson
--
Please remove ".nospam" from my address for email replies.

I'm a 17 year veteran of usenet -- you'd think I'd be over it by now

(Luigi de Guzman) brightened my day with his incisive
wit when in m he
conjectured that:

Walter Mitty wrote in message
...
Am enjoying my first full Tour on the TV : (an evening job helps)

Lance was just knocked off his bike by a ****ing stupid spectator.
What are the "rules" here?? Will Ulrich pull up and let Lance get
back into the race or is it just "rub of the green" as they say in
Golf?

If you stayed around to watch, Ullrich and Hamilton did, in fact, hold
up and let Armstrong rejoin the race--eventually, to win and increase
his margin over ullrich by a minute.


I did : watch the thread.

Incidentally, Lance was being very sporting : the spectator did wave a
bag out and should have more cop on. These guys are mentally drained at
this stage in the race.



That spectator should be hung by his toes. All that effort, training,
determination, cat & mouse ruined by one foolish asshole.

Would you rather the Tour be so unpopular as to have no spectators at
all?

Erm, No. Just not ones who run alongside the bikes slapping the riders
and shoving bags into their brake cables.


There are a lot of people--riders, support vehicles, press vehicles,
race officials, gendarmes, and spectators--crammed onto not a lot of
frontage on very remote roads. These things happen.

Agreed. And Lance handled it very well.

I'd be curious to know whether any spectator, in the hundred years of
the Tour de France, has wilfully attacked or injured a competitor with
a view to denying that competitor a stage or overall victory.

"Ignorance == Wilfull" in my view.

An ignorant man drives while drunk. it's still wilfull.


May the best man win : the fair way.

Today, he did, and the whole peloton demonstrated a kind of class that
is seldom seen in other sporting events--indeed, seldom seen on
Usenet, either.

Indeed. Amazing finish.


as for me: allez Tyler!

-Luigi



--
Walter Mitty.

TbosS brightened my day with his incisive wit when in
he conjectured that:

Having rewatched the incident I concurr that it wasn't malicious. But it
was stupid. Suppose Lance crashed out completely? Tore a ligament ? etc
etc. Then cycling history is changed because a spectator didn't realise the
dangers he was putting atired cyclist in by waving a bag/cap out in front
at this critical stage.

--
Walter Mitty.

Not clear it was the spectator's fault -- he (or she) was just holding a bag
of something standing alongside the route and Lance cut very close to the
edge of the road and caught his brake lever on it. The fan wasn't one of
those jumping out in front and back and the last moment -- he was just
standing there.

Mark

I was struck by the irony of this. There are what seem to be millions
of annoying idiots making genuine hazards of themselves (somehow I
suspect alcohol is involved), and the one crash we see is someone just
standing there who Lance bumps into.

In addition to all the other amazing things about the riders, the fact
that none of them go berserk and murder some of those spectators is
truly impressive.

In article io3Ta.17647$Ne.17267@fed1read03, Bill Davidson wrote:
St Canard wrote:
The answer is yes. In 1975 a French fan stepped out from the crowd
and punched Eddie Merckx in the kidney during a climb -- he was a fan
of Bernard Thevenet and apparently upset that the trophy was going to
leave France. Merckx had the yellow jersey at the time. The kidney
became infected and forced him to abandon, and Thevenet went on to
win.

According to letour.fr, Merckx finished second in 1975 to Thevenet.
Apparently he went on but was hindered by the injury and apparently
a later crash injury which required his jaw to be wired shut.

Here's another link that says he finished:

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory...ycling/1972099

Thanks, I had trouble finding links in my search (which surprised me),
and had to piece it together from a couple of places, since I was
fuzzy on the finer details.

It doesn't surprise if I accidentally combined two stories :-)


--
"Divide by cucumber error, please reinstall Universe and reboot"
-- Terry Pratchett, _Hogfather_

In article ,
says...
On Mon, 21 Jul 2003 11:12:09 +0000, archer wrote:

According to the report I just read, Ullrich did slow down rather than
attacking, and then Lance ended up taking the stage and put a minute or so
into Ullrich, with Ullrich taking 4th.

Ullrich was third.

Oops. I mis-read the report.

--
David Kerber
An optimist says "Good morning, Lord." While a pessimist says "Good
Lord, it's morning".

Remove the ns_ from the address before e-mailing.

On 22 Jul 2003 07:53:07 -0700, (salmoneous) wrote:

In addition to all the other amazing things about the riders, the fact
that none of them go berserk and murder some of those spectators is
truly impressive.

Remember a couple of Giros ago when some guy on a mountain stage
smacked some heckler right in the jaw and got disqualified?

That was a great "highlight video" as they got video of it from the
helicopter and one of the motorscooters.