Well, it seems that Mark Cavendish has got back on his bike again this morning, which is good to hear. i did wonder if he would manage it.
They’re riding from Cesanatico to Bologna, described as a ‘hilly stage’. I should think so too with 6 climbs in the almost 200 kilometres the riders will cover today.
Here are some action reports:
11.12 British time
Mark Cavendish seems chipper at the depart, saying he’s thankful for the blinds in the hotel and for the “incredible group of people around him”. He says “every metre you do is one less metre you have to do” and that Le Tour is about suffering. “If you have my body type, don’t start climbing now…I’m just hanging on by a thread as a sprinter and that’s by experience, really”.
11.46 British time
190km to go: It’s baking hot out there, and a series of attacks in the first 10 clicks has resulted in an 11-man breakaway. The main bunch, Bardet in yellow is dropping 20 seconds behind.
11.52 British time
185km to go: It’s a hilly stage, nothing too daft but tough enough in the heat. The peloton is dropped back close to 1’ 30” at this point.
12.02 British time
The peloton sitting back after Saturday’s shakeup, the cruelty of such a long chase over such tough terrain. Cavendish is off the back of the group but smiling.
Fingers crossed he makes it to the end of the ride!
Today’s stage is dedicated to the Italian cycling hero Marco Pantani, nicknamed “Il Pirata” because of his shaven head and the bandana and earrings he wore.
He was born and grew up in or very near to Cesanatico. Despite his having been tested many times for doping, he never tested positive and is very much the hero of his home town where they have a statue of him. On February 14th 2004 he was found dead in a hotel room in Rimini, possibly from a drugs overdose. A sad end for a great cyclist but twenty thousand people attended his funeral in his hometown
I confess to getting a little obsessed each year with the Tour de France. So there will undoubtedly be more of this over the next few weeks.
Now for some more serious stuff. I read this morning about a primary school in Hartlepool where classrooms now have spaces in which children can sleep. “We see little ones coming in worn out,” said Dave Turner, the school’s headteacher. “Sometimes they are sharing a bed with siblings. Sometimes they share with different families.” The cash-strapped school gives all its children free breakfasts, PE kits and stationery.
Another Hartlepool headteacher has launched a charitable project which aims to deliver 10,000 new beds to children in the Tees Valley in the next three years. We’ve seen a huge growth in food banks. And here’s an article about a “baby bank”, where young mothers in need can get help finding the equipment needed for a new, or not so new, baby. As the article tells us, it is having trouble staying open!
The beds issue is another aspect of the problem. Barnardo’s estimate that almost 900,000 children jn England had to share a bed or sleep on the floor. Good grief! Here we are in the 21st century with children who don’t have a bed of their own to sleep in. I remember reading about families in the past where children slept two to a bed, head to toe, with a pillow at each end of the bed. (And to think that I considered myself unfortunate because didn’t have a bedroom of my own but shared it with two sisters. At least we each had our own bed!) But that was, as I said, in the past! We should be doing better than that now!
And elsewhere there is this:
“A UN spokesperson said she had just returned to central Gaza after four weeks outside the territory and “it’s really unbearable”. Louise Wateridge said by video link that the situation had “significantly deteriorated”. “There’s no water there, there’s no sanitation, there’s no food,” and people were returning to live in “empty shells” of buildings. In the absence of toilets they were “relieving themselves anywhere they can”.”
It’s a good job I have the Tour de France to take my mind off things!
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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