HeyItsSara

I have only seen little online clips of it in years past, and read about the stages in daily emails; this was my first year recording it from cable and then watching it after work.
It took a lot of time every single day!!! My DVR didn't have enough space to record the whole thing to watch at my leisure - and oh, the commercials !!!

Anyone? Did you watch everything, every day?

Iride01 

I think this is the first year I was able to watch every day and stay current, week days I'd have to fast forward through some. Used to be that I'd get as much as four or five days behind watching. I'd have to shun the cycling news sites to keep from getting spoilers. I've been watching the TdF since before Y2k. Though not regularly back then. And certainly not with any context from my own experience since I'd only claim to be a leisure rider till I reached my 50's. Except of course for teen years when we didn't know we didn't know things.

If you enjoyed this, then watch for the Vuelta a Espaņa. Sometimes those Spanish police and officials get little rough with fans that are in the way. Hope the weather is decent like it was for most of the TdF.

MinnMan

I don't have enough time to watch the whole tour. If it's a choice between watching a full stage and going out for a bike ride, I'll choose the latter every time. So during the tour, I'll just watch clips.

But in the winter, when I'm on my trainer, I'll watch full stages of the Tour and other races. I'll have Zwift on one screen, and a stage on the other. It will take me several trainer sessions to get through a stage.

Maybe when I retire I can watch full stages, but at present, it's hard enough to justify the time I spend riding, which competes for work and family and housework time.

diphthong

yah....watching full stages....i'd rather sleep or ride but i'll make an exception for 2-3 stages in every grand tour. they are always big mountain stages.

Caretaker

If you recorded it then you should be able to fast forwards at the commercials.

Generally I watch live and also record each stage then delete the stage if nothing worth keeping happened. I've still got stages 20 & 21.

On Eurosport they kept pushing a pay-per-view commercial free service but I can watch on their regular service and then when a commercial segment starts switch over to our local Irish language TV channel who cover it live every year and the chances are that their commercials aren't showing at the same time as Eurosport's.

No I didn't watch everything every day but I watched a lot of it most days and some of it all the other days.

slcbob

HeyItsSara don't miss out on all the fun here. https://www.bikeforums.net/professio...iscussion.html

Register by Friday night. Then mix it up in the thread.

As for watching it "all" -- heck no. But I'm a desk jockey now and have taken to putting the NBC ad-free feed on my tablet so it's just going along live while I work in the mornings. With more extended coverage and my access to it that way, the part that's new-ish to me that I like the most is seeing all the action at the front before the break of the day forms and sticks. Some of the stages in the last Tour were particularly combative for that.

I used to tease my British wife listening to Test Match Special on the radio about the silliness of a 5 day match that often ends in a draw. I'm less of a hypocrite now.

Pemetic2006

Watched the whole thing and I’m ready for the Giro to start tomorrow (10/03). Just re-upped my Fubo subscription and I’m currently watching this year’s Tirreno Adriatico.

Watching 4 hours of a grand tour each day for 42 days a year seems like a lot to most people, and it is, but I enjoy it.

squarenoise 

I started watching full days in 2009, I think, then discovered the ITV Highlights in 2010 or 11. The ITV Highlights are perfect IMO. 45mins, all the important action, and fun historical segments.

Flip Flop Rider

record. watch the beginning to get the analysis from Christian, Horner, Phil, and Bob Roll. fast forward but watch as I ff. If I have an hour, watch the last hour. If more time watch more. Have watched a handful of stages start to finish all of it

Prodigy4299

I bought the Eurosport / GCN Race Pass, so am theoretically able to watch every stage start to finish, but I very rarely do. I am currently living in GMT+1, so spending 13:30-18:00 just glued to the TV doesn't really appeal. Especially for sprint stages, where all the action happens in the last 15 km anyway.

What's nice about the race pass is being able to cast at home and watch on mobile when out of the house.

But I do subscribe to a mix of TdF podcasts: The Cycling Podcast, ITV TdF podcast, Bradley Wiggins Show, Cyclingtips, etc.

JT Burkard

I have been watching every stage every year for at least 6-7 years now. Before that it was catch a couple stages through out the week or highlights for the last 10-12 years. I used to watch it on the computer at work but then started to DVR the Tour several years ago and it was much easier to watch the whole race at night and fast forward through the commercials. I wish the Giro and Vuelta were televised in the US as well.

vane171

I used to watch last several years in Toronto, Canada. For some reason this year, the sports channel that I used to watch TDF on didn't carry it and I didn't want to pay some extra subscription to watch on my PC - which I wouldn't mind, just don't want to spend money that way, especially because then I'd feel pressured to watch it and as people noted, most can't watch it all anyway or some stages turn up to be boring... (which probably was not the case this year).

But even in those past years, the tv channel would give the start of the stage plus some ten fifteen minutes into it, then there was a cut and it continued someplace from around 100+ km and the reporter would catch up on what happened in that first part of the race, maybe even showing some key events of it if there were any, depending on the stage length and how interesting it was. It was broadcasted in the evening here, so not live and they cut it most days, which I felt was reasonable.

At least I can watch Paris Open tennis which is similar marathon. Also need to record and I fast forward through it and watch only the interesting matches and dump what I watched right away. Knowing myself, if I don't delete it now, it would likely remain indefinitely and tie up sizable chunk of the recording space.

HeyItsSara

OK, thanks for responding!