Tour de France (Yorkshire edition)

[nineveh_uk]

Let’s get the most important thing out of the way first: the Earl of Harewood* can pronounce his title how he likes (Har-wood), but the village and the house are pronounced as spelt, Hare-wood. Thanks to the twitter commentariat for getting that one corrected by later in the broadcast.

I had an excellent couple of days watching the Tour de France. On Saturday we stationed ourselves in Otley, staking out a prime spot on a corner and a mini hill before 8 o’clock, with the sole disadvantage of some bongo players opposite. The police were swiftly trained by the crowds: drive past without acknowledgement, and you get nothing. Entertain us in some way and you’ll get a cheer. After the racers themselves, by far the largest cheer went to the lorry distributing small packets of Taylor’s tea. Scaffolders have clearly done well out of the weekend, with lots of people putting up small platforms in their gardens to raise themselves above the crowds or a wall. Sunday was a dash to a roundabout on the A59, five minutes before the peloton came through. Here it is on Saturday - well it is if you're on LJ.

There were a lot of helicopters about. I rather liked the man shouting ‘It’s an invasion!’

All in all, full marks to the team who brought the race to Yorkshire and delivered splendidly, nul points to UK Sport who recommended that no government funding for it at all should be provided (in the end they got £10 million), even after it beat DCMS-backed Scottish bid, and VisitEngland who tried to take over the marketing. No doubt Gary Verity has been thoroughly enjoying offering them large servings of humble pie. Getting multiple farmers to dye their livestock has got to be a strong indicator of success even before you start counting the crowds, and there were a lot of crowds. I'm going to be watching the full broadcasts while doing the ironing over the next couple of weeks.

Back to work tomorrow afternoon – well, tomorrow morning, when I am going to be working on the train. But first I am off to Beryl at the West Yorkshire Playhouse for more cycling-themed entertainment.
*Surnamed Lascelles, pronounced to rhyme with tassels.

Comments

[biascut.livejournal.com]

We managed to miss it going past five minutes from our house, by virtue of being foolish and disorganised (and also having just moved house two weeks ago, which is some mitigation of the disorganised part), at which point we realised that although we'd both been being super casual about it, we actually REALLY REALLY WANTED to see it as part of our We're Back In Yorkshire Now enculturation, so we got in the car and drove to Harrogate and stood about 200m down from the finish line. Couldn't actually see any actual bicycles, but we watched it on the giant screen and were about 200 yards away from Cavendish's awful crash.

(...and in true British fashion, I've managed to do that in both imperial and metric. Welcome to Le Tour Yorkshire!)

[biascut.livejournal.com]

Also, I keep meaning to ask social media this - what do you think of the spelling 'EY UP? That's how I've spelled it in my head since I was a kid, but I've usually seen it written by other people as Eh up (or Eh oop, I suppose.) Not convinced by 'Ey up.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I would go for Ey up without the ', which seems unnecessary - it isn't omitting anything, ey is a word in itself. Eh up looks weird to me, so that probably isn't how I've seen it written most. I shall have to see what James Herriott does!

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Moving house is a very good excuse, but glad you got to Harrogate. The atmosphere was half of the fun, and the pictures of Harrogate looked great. The roads over the weekend seem to have been surprisingly manageable (unlike Friday, when I had no problems on the afternoon train, but other people due for dinner were variously trapped on motorways).

All references to the Tour de Yorkshire should include references to both imperial and metric, and possibly hundredweight of sheep.

[elmey.livejournal.com]

We've been watching it on TV here, it looked fantastic, opening ceremony and all.

[stevie-carroll.livejournal.com]

I have photos of some of the dyed sheep, although most hide (embarrassed?) any day when I'm passing with time to stop.