Grand Depart of TdF 2014

Frannybobs

Rob and I are looking at doing the Yorkshire Festival of Cycling to see the Grand Depart of the TdF - it's camping at Harewood House but looks pretty good and loads of activities. It passes through there 7 miles into Stage 1, but then they take you on led rides to other vantage points on both the Saturday and Sunday, and it's not overly pricey I don't think.

http://www.festivalofcycling.org/

Are any other UK based people planning on watching the UK stages of the TdF? What are your plans?

TheBigYin

I'm looking forward to it, having seen a couple of stages already when it came over here last time in 1994, though perhaps it's because I sort of know the roads that they're going over, but I'm pretty much undecided where would be the best place to go see them pass through - bearing in mind, all the classic places to view them are going to be impassable for anything up to a couple of days before if I'm not sorely mistaken.

I'm sort of dreading it in a way, a bit like I was when the Olympics came over here - I just don't want us to make a **** of it and go down in history as "that bunch of tools that made a bollocks of the greatest show on earth"... (something not entirely unlikely, especially with the track record of the Yorkshire Police Force for making a disaster out of cycle races! - Hopefully the "Garde Republicaine" will just shoot any of the Yorkshire Plod who get out of line :laugh:)

Frannybobs

I'm looking forward to it, having seen a couple of stages already when it came over here last time in 1994, though perhaps it's because I sort of know the roads that they're going over, but I'm pretty much undecided where would be the best place to go see them pass through - bearing in mind, all the classic places to view them are going to be impassable for anything up to a couple of days before if I'm not sorely mistaken.

Yeah....that's why I'm glad they're doing these led rides to vantage points - they say they're working closely with Yorkshire Police regarding roads which are open and closed etc...I'm getting excited to see it now, although I read the other day there'll be no Quintana as he's concentrating on the Giro, and I really enjoyed watching him last year. There'll be plenty of other great cyclists to see and cheer on!