Tour de France Rider Gets Fined For Smooching In The Middle Of The Race
France -- French rider Julien Bernard was fined 200 Swiss francs ($223) by the International Cycling Union after he stopped to kiss his wife during the time-trial seventh stage of the Tour de France.
Fifteen minutes into Friday's time trial, held in Bernard's home region of Burgundy, the rider paused to kiss his wife and young son who were standing in the road among a group of family and friends.
The UCI said in a statement that Bernard's behavior had been inappropriate and damaged the image of the sport.
Does the Tour de France hate love? Does the Tour de France have something about loving husbands and fathers? This Julien Bernard cat can't even lay a big, fat smooch on his wife in the crowd without having to fork over some cold hard cash to the International Cycling Union?
I thought the French were all a bunch of sexual deviants, anyway. No offense or anything. But that wasn't even a French kiss. It's not like he even slipped any tongue in there. It was just a wholesome little peck on the lips. If you're going to get fined for kissing your wife in the middle of the race anyway, you might as well just go all the way. Really get down and dirty out there. If that was Lance Armstrong, he would have been banging his old lady out there. Guy was just built different.
Now I understand there's probably a precedent that needs to be set here. You can't give cyclists carte blanche to just go out there and start sucking face with any spectator they want. You give a cyclist an inch, they take a mile. I get that. And where do you draw the line? Wife? Girlfriend? Some random chick you just met at the bar last night? It's not the easiest predicament the UCI found itself in here. But really what it all comes down to is just using your brain. Did everybody enjoy the smooch, or was everybody grossed out by it? Just judge the fine based on that.
Sidenote: Speaking of rad moments during the Tour de France this week...how about this dude catching some sick air to avoid running over some jabroni who crashed in front of him?
These guys might have to start throwing some pegs on their bikes and rip a few sick grinds throughout the race.