by It seems like I’m always taking one step forward and two steps back. My calf muscles are still aching and despite constantly stretching them it doesn’t seem to be getting any better. I’m going to start using a tennis ball to do some deep massage, I had a go last night and it was pretty sore afterwards! Hopefully it will have a positive effect.
The calf muscles don’t affect my cycling too much but it would be nice to feel physically healthy for once, I think the last time I felt really fit was in 2014. I was off the bike for all of June, but I’ve managed a few rides since. The first ride was pretty horrible, it has to be said! But my ride yesterday was a bit better and had a decent average speed.
Tour de France
The Tour started off well but has been a bit anti-climactic recently. Stage 4 was obviously full of drama and my initial reaction was that Sagan should be thrown out but probably wouldn’t – at first glance, this image is pretty damning:
But obviously he then did get thrown out! Having seen the replays again I think getting disqualified from the stage would probably have been enough, the elbow didn’t seem deliberate and Demare’s move at the front was probably far worse, it’s just that Cav crashed pretty spectacularly (along with Degenkolb and Swift). I was pretty gutted at Cav having to abandon after he made such an effort just to be there, and he looked reasonably competitive. Unfortunately without Cav and Sagan (and Demare has now gone home too) the sprints are too easy for Kittel and not interesting to watch.
The GC is also not as interesting thanks to Porte’s crash. Thankfully he is OK because that too looked very nasty, but it means that Froome only has to really worry about Aru. Whilst my opinion on Froome has changed over the years, I’d still like to see him actually have to work for the win! Hopefully something spectacular will happen in the next mountain stage.