"Tour’s tarnished reputation" - what Sam has to say

"Hey mate

I have just seen my diatribe about the TdF on your blog. Hell, I have to be careful what I say in future.

I watched the final day of the Tour today to Paris and I sense that everybody is putting on a brave face (except Contador of course who is as happy as Larry) to salvage something positive from the Tour’s tarnished reputation. For me, there are still some significant and positive highlights from the Tour. Here are some of them

1. All the Brits survived the full course (Except Wiggins whose team pulled out due to their team leader being caught for doping, very sad for him) and all of them gave a good account of themselves

2. Barlowworld, an also-ran team full of enthusiasm and youth showed what can be done by a team of virtual non-mega stars (except Hunter perhaps who has always done well in the Tour de Langkawi)

3. Contador did fantastically well and especially in the Pyrenees. Let’s hope he does not do a Landis and is found positive after the event.

4. Cadel Evans gave a really gusty and inspirational performance. If only he had a stronger team around him, things could have been different.

5. Even without “the master” Lance Armstrong, the Discovery team still showed an awesome strength in depth

6. Leipheimer’s time trial on Saturday was out of this world, averaging around 50kph. Since you have the same bike…….so, how about it?

7. Soler’s polka dot jersey was an inspirational performance. What a climber! I wonder what time he would do up KK hill? Probably 15mins!

8. Some of the domestiques and teams did a fantastic job in supporting their main man. Rabobank come to mind as a team that worked so hard only to have their main man evicted. How sad is that?

Anyway, I have loved being here in France during the Tour. There is unquestionably a buzz in France when the Tour is on and with it being shown live on Eurosport every day, my afternoons for the past three weeks has been sorted. Sadly, there is no TdF next week so its time to head back to KL.

Before watching the final stages of today’s stage, I went for a 110k ride to Courmayeur in Italy. That was a climb of 1200m to the border from my house and then a drop down the other side of 1400m. So I did a climbing total of around 2600m. It was a lovely ride and while the coffee shop I stopped at in Courmayeur did not have Milo panas, they did a great cappuccino.






I arrive back in KL late on the 7th Aug so see you for a ride the following weekend.

How did your Singapore Tri go? Were you feeling any better or was your chest infection still causing you trouble? Race report please!

See you soon……..

Sam"

[SIMON] For the record Singapore Tri (my target race for the year) was a wash out. I was still struggling through my second course of antibiotics and not only that but was progressively getting sicker by the day so I cancelled.

Singapore next year - watch out.