Friday 24 July.
We went for a walk again this morning before breakfast. It was a nice cool morning and lovely for walking. We made our way down the hill via Abingdon and at the supermarket turned along Link Rd that runs parallel to the main Durban Rd. When we reached the end at the junction with the P68 we turned left and made our way up the hill to the turning with Ibis and home. Although the P68 was a busy road I don't think it's as dangerous as some of the narrow quieter minor roads where even though you are going on the left hand side into the traffic, the cars coming from behind can get very close. But on the P68 it is wide and there is a small hard shoulder that keeps you safely away from the oncoming traffic. Moira was managing a lot better today and she had no problem keeping up with me on some of the long steep hills.
When we got back I made the breakfast then washed up the dishes. Next it was into my working togs and more painting. The job today was the surrounds at the front of the garage. There was a lot of high areas, about 3 metres, and I had to get up the ladder to reach them. This meant Moira was tied up holding the ladder. I went on to some even higher bits, the ridges running down the sides of the ends of the roof, that were badly marked and stained. For these Moira fitted the handle of the roller into a broom shaft. This enabled me to get to some of the awkward places with the paint. At the end I used up any paint that was left in the tray by brushing it into some patchy places along the bottom of the gable facing the drive. When finished and after cleaning up I was very pleased with the effect and it is looking very nice. It was then time to shower, change and relax with a cup of tea before lunch.
Moira found another fault with the work that was done yesterday. It wasn't the gate but the drop bars that they fitted to the back door. The bracket at one side was snagging on the door and she couldn't get it open. As I predicted there was no sign of him this morning and Moira phoned or texted him every hour until she eventual got a reply. The same as yesterday they arrived as I was settled down watching the 'Tour'. The noise wasn't too bad this time as he just had to remove the bracket and grind off the oversize that was obstructing the door. Next he put epoxy cement over the bolt heads. When the cycling was finished I had a look and the epoxy was just dolloped on. We set to work on it and spread it more evenly with a knife and wiped the excess away with a damp cloth. It look a lot better but still a bit shabby. Hopefully it will do the job it's intend for, to keep out burglars.
Back at the cycling Nibali showed how he won last year by soloing to victory on top of La Toussuire on stage 19, while Quintana kept himself in contention in the battle for the yellow jersey by snatching back 30 seconds from Froome when he danced clear on the final ascent to the line.
The third of four successive stages in the Alps was to prove Froome’s most trying day of the Tour to date, and he was under pressure from the start. An early onslaught from Movistar, Tinkoff-Saxo and Astana on the opening climb, the Col du Chaussy, left Froome largely isolated, and though his Sky guard regrouped in the valley that followed, it was a sign of things to come.
Froome’s teammate Thomas, fourth in the GC as the day began, struggled on the Col de la Croix de Fer and ended up losing more than 22 minutes to slip to 15th overall. Six kilometres from the summit, Froome himself was placed on the back foot when he had to stop after a stone lodged in his rear brake, prompting Nibali – who turned twice to look at Froome – to take advantage and shoot off with some 62 kilometres still to race, after his Astana team had laid the groundwork on the lower slopes. Nibali denied that he had attacked expressly because Froome was in difficulty, though the yellow jersey saw the incident differently.
"He did see what he was doing, I’m pretty sure he looked around, saw I was in trouble and attacked. In my opinion you don’t do that to the race leader, it’s not sportsmanlike," Froome complained afterwards.
Nibali closed to within a minute of earlier escapee Rolland by the summit of the Croix de Fer and had more than 50 seconds in hand on the yellow jersey group, and he continued to gain time on the long, sinuous descent that followed. He eventually caught Rolland just over the top of the penultimate ascent, the Col de Mollard, where they had an advantage of 1:47 on the Froome-Quintana group. Despite a scare on a tight right-hand bend midway down the descent, Nibali and Rolland reached the base of La Toussuire with that buffer largely intact. With 16 kilometres of climbing remaining, last year’s Tour winner lifted himself from the saddle and eased clear of Rolland, never to be seen again.
With a shade under six kilometres remaining, Quintana finally sensed his opportunity and jumped clear of the yellow jersey group. Froome was quick to marshal a response, first attempting to close the gap with Contador and Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) on his wheel, before then proceeding to give chase alone. Initially, at least, Froome succeeded in limiting his losses well, keeping Quintana’s lead pegged at around the 15-second mark, but the relentlessness of the Colombian’s rhythm began to tell in the final three kilometres, as he nudged his advantage out towards the 30-second mark.
Quintana crossed the line in second place, 44 seconds down, while Froome came home in third, 1:14 behind. The Briton had the consolation of putting more than a minute into Contador and Valverde, who finished together, 2:26 down, and he declared himself pleased to have limited the damage.
After dinner tonight we listened to the Country Music Channel on the radio until 8 pm when the courtroom drama 'Silk' came on TV. It was coming to a climax in the story when the picture started to break up before it was lost all together. It came back for a couple of minutes before disappearing again. We gave up when it was due to finish and returned to the radio, the reception there was normal. It was disappointing as we don't know what the outcome was. Maybe when we return to Scotland the series will be repeated and we can find out what happened.
Posted with Blogsy
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