Minor childish infractions at the 2019 Tour de France are costing riders and team directors big bucks every day.
The race officials seem to enjoy ferreting out trivial rule violations and imposing non-trivial fines – all in Swiss francs, which teams keep in duffel bags stuffed full so fines can be paid every day.
Around the GFDN office our bet is Tour de France officials use the Swiss francs to buy beer…
Here’s a list of childish behavior fines so far (1 Swiss franc = 1.00 USD):
STAGE 3
Teams Jumbo-Visma and CCC
– Littering team water bottles on the roadside, 200 Swiss francs each team.
Jonathan Castroviejo (Team Ineos)
– Peeing in public (when you gotta got, you gotta go), 200 Swiss francs.
STAGE 4
Iván García (Bahrain-Merida)
– Peeing in public, 200 Swiss francs.
Carlos Verona (Movistar)
– Littering, 200 Swiss francs
STAGE 5
Anthony Perez and team sports director Alain Deloeuil (Cofidis)
– Cheating with “sticky bottle” (when team car personnel and rider both hold a water bottle while the car accelerates to sling-shot the rider forward), 200 Swiss francs each
Yoann Offredo and team sports director Hilaire Van der Schueren (Wanty-Gobert)
– Sticky bottle, 200 Swiss francs each
STAGE 6
Geraint Thomas and Gianni Moscon (Team Ineos)
– Littering, 200 Swiss francs each
Tom Steels (Deceuninck – Quick-Step sports director)
– Not following instructions, 300 Swiss francs
Gorka Izaguirre (Astana), Steven Kruijswijk (Jumbo-Visma) and Pierre-Luc Périchon (Cofidis)
– Peeing in public (not all together), 200 Swiss francs each
STAGE 8
Rui Costa (UAE Team Emirates)
– Littering, 200 Swiss francs
Marc Soler (Movistar)
– Peeing in public, 200 Swiss francs
Dmitriy Fofonov team sports director (Astana)
– Not following instructions, 200 Swiss francs
Team sports directors Dmitriy Fofonov (Astana) and Julien Jurdie (Ag2r La Mondiale)
– Getting out of line (in follow caravan), 500 Swiss francs each
STAGE 9
Simon Clarke (EF Education First)
– Peeing in public, 200 Swiss francs
Lukas Pöstlberger (Bora-Hansgrohe)
– Peeing in public, 200 Swiss francs
– Sticky bottle, 200 Swiss francs
Enrico Poitschke team sports director (Bora-Hansgrohe)
– Sticky bottle, 200 Swiss francs
Tiesj Benoot and Herman Frison team sports director (Lotto-Soudal)
– Sticky bottle, 200 Swiss francs each
STAGE 10
George Bennett (Jumbo-Visma) and Yves Lampaert (Deceuninck-Quick-Step)
– Not playing nice with one another, 550 Swiss francs each
Alexey Lutsenko (Astana) and Benoit Cosnefroy (Ag2r La Mondiale)
– Peeing in public, 200 Swiss francs each
STAGE 11
Kasper Asgreen (Deceuninck-Quick-Step)
– Not playing nice, 550 Swiss francs
Julien Jurdie team director (Ag2r La Mondiale)
– Getting out of line (follow caravan), 500 Swiss francs
David McPartland (Mitchelton-Scott DS)
– Talking without permission, warning.
STAGE 14
Sergio Henao (UAE Team Emirates)
– Littering, 200 Swiss francs
STAGE 15
Marc Soler (Movistar), Jan Tratnik (Bahrain-Merida), David Gaudu (Groupama-FDJ), Mike Teunissen (Jumbo-Visma), Geraint Thomas (Ineos)
– Littering, 200 Swiss francs each
Michael Schär (CCC Team), Patrick Konrad (Bora-Hansgrohe)
– Peeing in public, 200 Swiss francs
Simone Pedrazzini (UAE Team Emirates), Dirk Demol (Katusha-Alpecin)
– Not playing nice, 200 Swiss francs
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