Stats and Sensibility: Rethinking the King of the Mountains

Every year, the Tour de France draws even casual sports fans to pay at least a passing glance at the sport of cycling. People who wouldn’t know their peloton from their pedal are bombarded on sports pages with at least a passing glance at the day’s events for three weeks every July. Here in the United States the phenomenon is largely thanks to the twin titans of American cycling, Greg LeMond and Lance Armstrong, who over a twenty-year... Read More

2011 Tour de France: Pre-Race Reconnaissance

Cycling is unique in that the climax of its season comes not at the end of the season but dead center in the heart of the calendar. It isn’t the Tour Down Under in January or the Giro di Lombardia in October that the top riders of the road dream about. No, it is the sunflowers dotting French countryside in July that captivates the imagination, the high Alpine and Pyrenean passes that separate the contenders from the pretenders. It is a rite... Read More

2011 Tour de France: Nagging Pre-Race Questions

Cycling is unique in that the climax of its season comes not at the end of the season but dead center in the heart of the calendar. It isn’t the Tour Down Under in January or the Giro di Lombardia in October that the top riders of the road dream about. No, it is the sunflowers dotting French countryside in July that captivates the imagination, the high Alpine and Pyrenean passes that separate the contenders from the pretenders. Read More  Read More

NTSF 098: FIFA sanctions, tectonic shifts in cycling, new F1 leader and more…

The calendar turns yet again into August, a month stacked with events galore for sports fans around the globe. We’re gearing up for the start of club seasons throughout European soccer, with teams already vying for spots in the UEFA Champions League main draw with just one qualifying round left now to decide the field. Tennis gears up for the last Grand Slam of the 2010 season, the hard courts of the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center... Read More

NTSF 097: Tour de France, F1 shenanigans, Euro track and field and more…

In just the past decade we have witnessed an explosion in the range and depth of sports-viewing opportunities for fans here in the United States. The growth of multimedia technology coupled with the increase and variety of its availability and subsequent decrease in price has democratized the options available; no longer is the American sports fan shackled to whatever the networks and a limited range of sports networks are willing to broadcast. Read... Read More

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