OV9

Just watched today's highlights, Team UAE were all wearing yellow helmets, when they're usually white. Wondering if that was a subtle trolling and statement of intent regarding their aims for the GC at the end of the day?

Jobbo wrote: Mon Jul 06, 2026 8:48 pm

I only own white socks

Gavster wrote: Mon Jul 06, 2026 9:20 pm Just watched today's highlights, Team UAE were all wearing yellow helmets, when they're usually white. Wondering if that was a subtle trolling and statement of intent regarding their aims for the GC at the end of the day?

It must be, surely. Pog does go all yellow when in yellow so it looks like a dig at Ving. They can’t have planned quite that close a time difference though.

All yellow helmets are often worn by teams leading the team classification.

8Ball wrote: Tue Jul 07, 2026 7:32 am All yellow helmets are often worn by teams leading the team classification.

Ahhhh cool I never knew that! They were leading the team classification after stage 2

I didn't know that either. I guess UAE Team Emirates or Jumbo Visma have been wearing them so much over the years when Pog or Ving have been in yellow that I hadn't realised it was for a different reason.

A few things which I haven't been sure about after a few days watching the Ch5 highlights:
- The footage comes from the TdF organisers and the captions are I assume part of that, so where you see the time gap that's on the image already. Ch4/ITV4 commentary used to refer to who was in each group but yesterday the caption showed polka dot jersey was consisently 20+ minutes back; because the Ch5 highlights show seems to just show the finish, cut back to Rebecca Charlton in the studio then end abruptly I didn't have any idea who was in the polka dots but I was aware Pog had been in it on the second day. When the highlights just launch in part way through showing one of the jerseys in a group so far back, when you last saw Pog wearing that jersey, it gives you a momentary pause

- There's s softly spoken Irish commentator who says the most banal things about needing to be good at bike handling to ride, stuff like that - what the fuck is he paid for.

- There have been plenty of rubbish images where the motorbike cameraman has been pointing his camera at the ground or it's showing just team cars as the bike accelerates from one bunch to the next... This is supposed to be a highlights show FFS, don't include those bits. Also where there's a bike camera pointing backwards towards a group the image is quite poor this year, really shaky; does TNT have its own bike feeding their images perhaps? I don't remember it being as bad on ITV4.

Still haven't watched a highlights show yet but need to watch the Stage 3 one as my parents used to live in that part of Catalunya

Looks like the tour is decided then he looked quite fresh over the finish line too.

Best thing about the Tour is my Insta has filled up with pretty girls cycling up French mountains.. merci!

Vingegaard smahed the previous fastest time up the Tourmalet yesterday, by any standards he is in incredible form. No wonder he looked so dismayed in the post race interviews. Unfortunately, he's racing an alien.

Goddamn it, nobody can touch Pogi this year. He’s totally
In a league of his own. It gets boring when no one can even challenge him

The speed with which he erased Carapaz's 45 second advantage was amazing. Looking at the footage of him and Vingegaard at the same finish 2 years ago compared to last night, it seems Vingegaard simply doesn't have his old form back - nobody else was in the mix with the pair of them in 2024 yet yesterday Vingegaard lost time to 5th place. Pog has got better and it makes his superiority very stark when he's on his own.

That was insanely impressive, the gap was dropping a second every few seconds, he passed Carapaz like he was going backwards. I feel like Vingegaard is on decent form this year, but Pogi does seem to have got quicker and quicker. I also wonder if yesterday was a bad day for Jonas, also he dragged everyone else up the last couple of climbs once Pogi launched, I didn't see anyone else taking a turn on the front.

The whole thing is more or less done and dusted now, barring crashes or mechanicals. It's just the race for 2nd and 3rd on the podium.

What's even more crazy is that Pogacar is still a year younger than Froome was when he won his first tour, so his potential to dominate could last for many more years. I can't see Cavendish's record for Tour stage wins lasting much past 2028 either. Pogacar is already on 24 and could easily pick up another 3 or more this year, based on his current form.

I found some data from Pog's ride up the Tourmalet this year:

He completed 16.89 kilometers in 43:08, with 1,346 meters of positive elevation and an average gradient of 8%. His average speed was 23.5 km/h.

That equates to 1,875 meters of elevation per hour.

Power estimates place the total effort around 410 watts or 6.4 W/kg. (These are external calculations and not data from Pogacar's power meter, so they should be interpreted as an approximation.)

Estimates place those final 5 kilometers, completed in approximately 13:12, around 465 watts and 7.2 W/kg.

He averaged 72.2 km/h on the descent (about 50mph)

With sections over 100 km/h (60mph)

Aside from anything else, that takes enormous skill and bravery

Also....

'm trying to work out what watch he's wearing while riding each stage

It's definitely a Richard Mille

I'm not sure if it's a 67-02 (£400,000) or a 64-01 (which I think is about £1m)

Over 13 mins at 465W is pretty bonkers. The speed downhill is mad too; I remember seeing 85km/h before but 100 with no suspension on a bike is fucking fast.

ETA: seeing 85km/h downhill on the TdF, not myself. I’ve seen nearly 40mph on my full suspension eMTB down a steep hill in the Cotswolds and that was a lot more composed than 30 on a non-suspension bike.

Jobbo wrote: Wed Jul 15, 2026 9:36 pm Over 13 mins at 465W is pretty bonkers. The speed downhill is mad too; I remember seeing 85km/h before but 100 with no suspension on a bike is fucking fast.

ETA: seeing 85km/h downhill on the TdF, not myself. I’ve seen nearly 40mph on my full suspension eMTB down a steep hill in the Cotswolds and that was a lot more composed than 30 on a non-suspension bike.

And the Col du Tourmalet is 2100m, so he's doing that at altitude too

DaveE wrote: Wed Jul 15, 2026 6:44 pm
'm trying to work out what watch he's wearing while riding each stage

It's definitely a Richard Mille

I'm not sure if it's a 67-02 (£400,000) or a 64-01 (which I think is about £1m)

I think Matthieu van der Poel is sponsored by Richard Mille too, I wondered if they purposely only sponsor world champs