I suppose if it becomes intolerable and something has to be done then there are some solutions

The problems only really arise on climbs where the riders are going at 10-12 mph and people can run alongside or step out without much chance of being knocked over.........obviously they tend not to step out on the flat or descents where the riders can be going 25 to 40/50 mph (tho' when fans get killed or seriously injured it's usually on the flat)

So the problem is the climbs

They could only use climbs that have roads wide enough to allow for motorbike escorts on both side of the road

They could have climbing days where they use the same climb and go round a circuit 3 times.......that might allow for barriers if they're only using one climb

Both of those would alter the historic nature of the race and some of the monument climbs would have to be taken out..........but it would be possible to do

We are seeing increasing use of bike cams (currently limited by battery life that prevents live transmission). When drone battery life improves there will be a dedicated yellow jersey cam. There is no problem at present putting cams on the service vehicles and bikes. Like CCTV, the video is only reviewed by when necessary. The chances of identifying offenders will improve dramatically.

In the Vuelta 14, there was an example of a spectator's smartphone footage identifying an offender. A stick was 'thrown' at Froome but the smartphone recording showed a less aggressive cause. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d29rJjbmewg

Rider safety should be number one in the Tour's thinking, anything less and that would not be on.

Having spectators so close to the action should not happen, they need to sit down and really think hard about the future of how they try and adapt rules so that having incidents like Frooms yesterday doesn't happen again.

I am by no means an expert on this, but surely ways can be found in order to have a race that is free from spectators crowding the roads, and draping big flags over a racer, so they cannot see where they are going, etc etc.

I just want to see the racers do their thing to the best of their abilities, without wondering which idiot is going to do what to which rider this time.

It was Sean Yates who threw the bottle at the motorbike camera after it got between Sagan and the team car. One day ban from the race as a result: https://youtu.be/QTWPttvKLFA?t=18s

https://twitter.com/Cyclingnewsfeed/...24141205426176

His retirement didn't last long
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cycling/20113671

When he left Sky he coached the racing team in my local club for a while. I've done some Sunday rides with the club and the general consensus from members was that he was a self important, monosyllabic ****. And an Armstrong apologist:
http://www.cyclingnews.com/http://ww...al-of-team-sky

Jeez, the first hour of today's stage was ridden at 53.6km/h!!

Two groups of 12 (including Sagan, again) at the head of the race; it looks like another stage for the breakaway...and maybe another near miss for the Slovakian. If nothing else, he'll probably win his fourth consecutive TdF points classification.

We won't see the British champ's jersey in Paris as Kennaugh abandons, so Sky no longer have a full complement of riders (same goes for all the other major GC teams as van Avermaet is off to join his wife, who is due to give birth shortly).

No, it wasn't Sean Yates. It was a mechanic who got out of a car that Sean Yates was driving.

19km to go - gap between the leaders and the peloton is 20 minutes!!

Unless Plaza crashes another stage win is slipping through Sagan's fingers.

And the running joke of Sagan being today's Poulidor goes on. Having said that, Sagan rode an awesome descent - I don't know know how he does it.

GC battle is still on...and Barguil has bashed Thomas off the descent!!

Christ, I hope Geraint Thomas is OK. That looked bloody nasty.

Big crash for Thomas on the descent........over the fence (barbed wire?) and disappeared off the edge. Looks like he might have clattered a telegraph pole on the way

hope he's OK.........haven't heard any news yet

Thomas back on the bike.........

Thomas finishes less than a minute behind the GC men! Impressive.

He even has time for a concussion joke in a quick interview...thank God it's a rest day tomorrow.

In the 'battle' for the lanterne rouge, Irish sprinter Sam Bennett is currently the slowest rider by around 16 minutes.

Here's a clip of Sagan riding the last 6km of today's stage.

Those two arrows attached to that telegraph pole didn't do much good, did they?

Spectacular crash and glad that Thomas is okay.

Taking a look at Sagan's girlfriend I don't think he'll get much of a rest on the rest day.

I can watch the rest live as I'm off work from Wednesday.

Tejay Van Garderen abandoned

not feeling well

14km from the end and Quintana attacks Froome. Yet again, we see that he attacks but lacks anything really explosive. He doesn't seem to be able to do any real damage. We've seen this on a few occasions during this Tour.

Others abandonments today include Sam Bennett (laterne rouge passes on to Sébastien Chavanel) and Kwiatkowski, so no more rainbow stripes in this Tour.

Looks like Germany may claim the most stage wins of all nations once again - Geschke claimed their fifth.

Well done Geschke, that's got to be worth a German-language shampoo advert at least. And the Sky conspiracy theories get ever more convoluted. As usual, not at all convinced by this whole "send a couple of riders up the road to help the leader later" idea.

Astana's Michael Landa is reported to have signed for Sky after his podium place in this years Giro.

If this guy had known how to point a camera at a race he would have had an exclusive splashed across social media. In the ITV highlights, he could be seen up in the rocks: http://nos.nl/tour/video/2048387-nos...krabbelen.html

For one of the former core cycling nations, Italy is having a bad Tour. Only 13 of 16 riders left with Nibali the only one in the top 50.

Surprisingly, MTN Qhubeka are riding high with second place in the Team table.

Blimey, the indoor track season will be starting early this year, with lots of familiar name looking to build up qualification points for the Olympics in Rio. First event will be a meeting in Derby, 14-16 August. Never even knew there was a track there, seemingly this will be the opening event. Amazing to think that Britain now has four international class velodromes!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cycling/33635771

Jakob Fuglsang is today's unlucky man.

In the lead group but then is involved in an accident with a motorbike.

Thankfully ok.