Get out of the loop: the Tour de France begins with a scandal – Cycling News – Summer

The 105th time in history, the Tour de France starts on Saturday at the same time as the quarterfinals of the World Cup, to which will play England and Sweden. The most notable character of the next three weeks will be British Chris Frum. And Russian fans will worry about Ilnur Zakarin.

At the presentation of the "Big Loop", as the famous race is also called, Frum was booed by fans. And the organizers of the Tour de France did not want to admit it until the last one. One of the legendary cyclists of the past, Bernard Ino, has called on other participants of the multi-day event to boycott the "loop" in case of Frum's admission. The fact is that the four-time winner of the Tour de France has been taking a dose of salbutamol, an asthma medicine, twice the level allowed.

A positive result was obtained after one of the Vuelta -2017 stadiums. participated in the race without any restrictions, won the "Giro d'Italia" -2018, and is now preparing to win the fifth "Tour de France" and equal the number of titles in France with Miguel Indurainom. The International Union of Cyclists has removed from the English all charges. The story, of course, is extremely unpleasant. It is not excluded that against the Frum during the race the fans will prepare provocations .

Only two riders will represent Russia in the Tour de France: Ilnur Zakarin and Pavel Kochetkov of once Russian, and now the Swiss "Katyusha". Zakarin on the "Big Loop" account for something more than the victory of a single step taken, as was the case in 2016. The captain of "Katyusha" was seriously preparing for the "Tour", he specially studied the pavers, which awaits the participants in the ninth stage.

But Zakarin does not have a support group like Frum in Team Sky. Above all, it concerns the "miners" who are able to support the leader in the most difficult moments. The Russian has already become an excellent "general manager", but he will no longer be able to climb the pedestal of the most prestigious cycling race in the world in three weeks

Who, other than Frum, will win the overall clbadification? First, the Australian Ritchie Port of BMC Racing, the Colombian Nairo Quintana of Movistar, the British Adam Yates of Mitchelton-Scott, another Colombian Rigoberto Uran from EF , the Dutchman Tom Dumoulin of Sunweb and the Italian Vincenzo Nibali of Bahrain-Merida

Of course, that does not mean that anybody is not able to shoot another. But on such a mnogodnevkah for the victory in the overall standings, you must not only shoot yourself, but also get a solid support team. And in this respect, it is extremely difficult to fight with Team Sky.

First, the fact that in the participating teams now have eight riders, but not nine, as it was before.

Second, one of the stages will take place according to the new rules – the participants will have to continue the race. He will arrive at the 17th stage with a length of 65 km with three complex pbades

Third, "Tour" will pbad almost completely through France, only packing Spain on 15 km. It was not for very long, since the centenary jubilee. Then the "Big Loop" in general is fully met in France.

The total number of participants to pbad 21 stages with a total length of 3351 km. The race begins July 7 in Noirmoutier-en-l Ile and ends as usual on the Champs-Elysees in Paris.