Roubaix 2021 - Men & Women

[MichaelB]

Yay, it's finally here again, and there will be a Womens Roubaix for the 1st time

The first edition of the Paris-Roubaix Femmes will include 17 sectors of cobbles, starting in the town of Denian and covering the final 85km of the men’s route in northern France and finishing in the iconic Roubaix velodrome.

https://www.cyclingnews.com/races/paris ... 1/preview/

And then comes the traditional Men's race, and it looks like rain for both events !

https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/rain-f ... e-weekend/

And even better, it's a holiday Monday !!!

Paris Roubaix Women's
Saturday October 2
SBS VICELAND and live streaming to SBS On Demand
2230 - 0100 (AEST)

Paris Roubaix Men's
Sunday October 3
20:00 - 02:45 (AEDT)
Live streaming to SBS On Demand before SBS VICELAND LIVE at 21:00

[Warnesy]

This one goes pretty late. Might be a watch the replay in the morning option…but I’ll probably end up staying up!

[fat and old]

Looking forward to this.

[AndrewCowley]

Hopefully GCN is showing the whole thing. If there’s any race you need to watch from the start to finish, it’s this one. Not sure whether SBS will be showing all of it.

[MichaelB]

More links & previews

Femmes Roubaix - https://www.cyclingnews.com/races/paris ... 1/preview/

Mens Roubaix - https://www.cyclingnews.com/races/paris ... 1/preview/

[Warnesy]

Hopefully GCN is showing the whole thing. If there’s any race you need to watch from the start to finish, it’s this one. Not sure whether SBS will be showing all of it.

SBS is starting from 8pm on demand and 9pm on a Viceland.

[fat and old]

Hopefully GCN is showing the whole thing. If there’s any race you need to watch from the start to finish, it’s this one. Not sure whether SBS will be showing all of it.

SBS is starting from 8pm on demand and 9pm on a Viceland.

That'd be almost 7hrs telecast. Start to finish yeah?

[AUbicycles]

The weather is still the big topic and while is may not be rain, it may be muddy so riding up the side could be tricky and the cobbles slippery.

Was booked to go though has to change plans and wont be part of this pretty big two weeks of cycling.

[DavidS]

Yeah, looks very slippery.

They should make the women's race longer and go through the Ardennes.

DS

[find_bruce]

Slippery indeed. An unusual race where the winner seemed to fall off the front rather than being a deliberate attack

[stevenaaus]

Group race on muddy cobbles - bit of a circus.

[MichaelB]

It is wet as !!!

[DavidS]

Wow, these conditions are stunning, I barely know how they stay upright at all on wet muddy cobble stones. Treacherous barely does it justice.

DS

[warthog1]

Yeah crap conditions.
Love this photo.

[AUbicycles]

Wow, these conditions are stunning, I barely know how they stay upright at all on wet muddy cobble stones. Treacherous barely does it justice.

Powering through is a good strategy, you may have spotted some of the sections where riders slow and the slipping gets worse. I think it is in the same fashion as having the right speed to skip over the cobbles, with the right speed to can also get that forward motion that (kind of) self corrects.

Beyond the pave, with the muddy wheels you could also see riders getting tripped-up on cornering as well. But in addition to the fatigue - the extra tension / strain on the body to control and main control in the slippery conditions is a level-up from the managing the cobbles.

[find_bruce]

Yeah crap conditions.
Love this photo.

I’d accuse you of spoiling, but even knowing the podium finishers it’s hard to tell. Sometimes it was hard to see the cobbles for the mud

[Mr Purple]

I fell off 18 times watching the highlights reel.

[fat and old]

Yeah crap conditions.
Love this photo.

I watched last night, looked at replays, checked every pic I could. How in hell did VDP keep those shoe covers so white all the way to the line???

[warthog1]

Yeah crap conditions.
Love this photo.

I watched last night, looked at replays, checked every pic I could. How in hell did VDP keep those shoe covers so white all the way to the line???

Good point
Just a cyclingtips photo I think it was.

[Warnesy]

Crazy race. Good spectacle but you sure need a lot of good luck to win when it is like that.

[MichaelB]

Brilliant race, and whilst the podium was well deserved.
Many suffered bad luck or fell foul of the treacherous conditions. There were many that deserved to be on the podium.

I was more than amazed !!

[Thoglette]

Many suffered bad luck or fell foul of the treacherous conditions. There were many that deserved to be on the podium.

Gianni Moscon will be cranky with whichever mechanic set up the spare bike - even before his crash the bike was jumping around all over the place and he was noticeably slower.

[Mububban]

What an absolutely bonkers event PR is - and I loved it! I thought the women had tough conditions on Saturday but the men's race was horrific. Only saving grace is maybe riders could slide when they hit the ground rather than stop suddenly. There'd surely be some concussions from some of those crashes, I saw plenty of heads hitting the ground

[Mububban]

I fell off 18 times watching the highlights reel.

The number of crashes across both races was horrendous

[MichaelB]

Many suffered bad luck or fell foul of the treacherous conditions. There were many that deserved to be on the podium.

Gianni Moscon will be cranky with whichever mechanic set up the spare bike - even before his crash the bike was jumping around all over the place and he was noticeably slower.

Meh. I actually went to bed at 1am, as I was both tired and not liking the prospect at Moscon winning. Little did I know that less than 3km later, he would have punctured and then crash a bit later, and then get dropped.

He certainly had the capability to win, and Roubaix is also about luck, and in those conditions, it was certainly needed. Vermeesh (?) who got 2nd, almost had a fairy-tale 1st event (and youngest in the race too ?). Bouvin deserved to get a podium spot as well, as he was also doing a sterling job.

Many stacks, and some of them nasty, saw one where someone slid over the kerb on their backside (ouch) and the Rowe/Pedersen stack as well.

It was a brilliant race, and one you'd almost buy the DVD of !!