Wednesday, 5 July 2017

Should Peter Sagan have been disqualified from the Tour de France? Hell, no…

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Online opinion can't save him now: Peter Sagan was disqualified from the Tour de France on Tuesday, which means that the race will have to continue without one of its greatest ambassadors.

Sagan – arguably the greatest thing to have happened to professional cycling since quick-release wheels -- will no longer pedal the roads of France this July. And that's a massive shame.

Really, whether you're a fan of the zany Slovakian or not, his expulsion leaves a gaping hole in this year's race – a gap that even Mark Cavendish could fit through.

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But personality can be no gauge of who does or doesn't get disqualified. Neither should whether a rider crashes or not. Yes, Cavendish was the unlucky recipient of Sagan's shoulder – or was it his elbow? – but the fact that the British sprinter hit the deck shouldn't really come into it.

Elbows out, shoulders bumping, even heads colliding, are all part and parcel of the joys of sprinting – actions that often go unpunished if they're deemed not to have overtly changed the outcome of the run to the line. Most top-level sprinters will do whatever they think they can get away with, but none of them want to take down any of their colleagues, who, more often than not, are also friends. They simply want to beat them.

Deviating too much from your line, on the other hand, often risks the wrath of the race judges, with the punishment usually being relegation to last place in the group and a time penalty. Which was the initial punishment meted out to Sagan in this case.

You can read more at Cyclingnews.com



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