The professional cycling thread

[Sway]

Chris Stott said:

Sway said:

HurryUpAndWait said:

Chris Stott said:

Pretty sure Froome is the most tested athlete on the planet - he'll be pissing in another cup very shortly.

Ah, the ‘Armstrong defence’

The best bit about that oft mooted position from Lance was that he wasn't even the most tested American athlete with the surname Armstrong...

My point wasn't that he's clean (if you read my other posts you'll see I'm not naive enough to think they are 100% clean), only that he gets tested a lot

Yeah, I knew where you were coming from. Just like a criminal trial, the testing doesn't prove innocence, merely the absence of provable guilt.

[Mr E]

Matt_N said:

You have to feel for him, 13 days in the maglia rosa and a sterling effort until yesterday.

He was grinding away at the foot of the Finestre and looked like he just couldn't summon the energy to get ontop of the gear then as soon as Sky hit the front and upped the pace it was like he was pedalling backwards.

It must be a massive kick in the balls for the bloke. Turned himself inside out and then this.

I presume he’s sick or otherwise broken. I’m not sure that will make it any easier to stomach.

[anonymous-user]

Ryan Mullen tweets to sum up the stage well

https://twitter.com/ryanmullen9/status/10000538337...

300W for him must be at least 3.8W/kg

[fuzzyyo]

I don’t understand how people can get so excited about something so unbelievable by someone riding under such a large cloud?

[Vocal Minority]

Mr E said:

Turned himself inside out and then this.

I fear the two halves of the sentence are cause and effect....he’ll use it to get stronger

But you may be right about illness

You never find out until after

[addey]

JPJPJP said:

Ryan Mullen tweets to sum up the stage well

https://twitter.com/ryanmullen9/status/10000538337...

300W for him must be at least 3.8W/kg

He is 84kg according to his tweets (he mentions it a lot as I guess he is the heaviest guy in the race?) so ~3.6W/kg

Bloody impressive getting 84kg over all those mountains......

[NRS]

Road cycling must be one of the most stupid sports to do in a way. Either you're "just" one of the pack, or if you get to the top then everyone will just assume it is cheating no matter what. There is no top to the sport.

[Matt_N]

Some of the time gaps from the stage:

Froome's ascent up the Finestre, even with full Sky lead out was the slowest there has been. (2005, 2011, 2015 were all faster)

Richard Carapaz ascended the Jafferau fastest, but was almost 3 minutes slower than Santambrogio/Nibali in 2014, in appalling conditions.

Dumoulin and Froome both 20 odd seconds slower than Carapaz.

How Froome made time over Dumoulin:

Finestre climb 37s
Finestre descent 1 min 15
Sestriere climb 49s
Sestriere descent 25s
Valley 14s
Final climb 3s

So 1:40 gained descending and 1:43 ascending.

Edited by Matt_N on Saturday 26th May 07:11

Edited by Matt_N on Saturday 26th May 08:07

[JuniorD]

fuzzyyo said:

I don’t understand how people can get so excited about something so unbelievable by someone riding under such a large cloud?

I’m sorry you don’t believe in miracles

[anonymous-user]

4000m of ups and downs in the last 90km today...

[HurryUpAndWait]

Matt_N said:

Some of the time gaps from the stage:

Froome's ascent up the Finestre, even with full Sky lead out was the slowest there has been. (2005, 2011, 2015 were all faster)

Richard Carapaz ascended the Jafferau fastest, but was almost 3 minutes slower than Santambrogio/Nibali in 2014, in appalling conditions.

Dumoulin and Froome both 20 odd seconds slower than Carapaz.

How Froome made time over Dumoulin:

Finestere climb 37s
Finistere descent 1 min 15
Sestriere climb 49s
Sestriere descent 25s
Valley 14s
Final climb 3s

So 1:40 gained descending and 1:43 ascending.

Interesting thanks.

[Mr E]

HurryUpAndWait said:

Interesting thanks.

Very. I was under the (mistaken) impression that Froome couldn’t descend. Clearly he’s not pretty, but committed and very quick.

[DeltonaS]

Matt_N said:

Some of the time gaps from the stage:

Froome's ascent up the Finestre, even with full Sky lead out was the slowest there has been. (2005, 2011, 2015 were all faster)

Richard Carapaz ascended the Jafferau fastest, but was almost 3 minutes slower than Santambrogio/Nibali in 2014, in appalling conditions.

Dumoulin and Froome both 20 odd seconds slower than Carapaz.

How Froome made time over Dumoulin:

Finestre climb 37s
Finestre descent 1 min 15
Sestriere climb 49s
Sestriere descent 25s
Valley 14s
Final climb 3s

So 1:40 gained descending and 1:43 ascending.

Dumoulin said he probably made a mistake yesterday by waiting for Reichenbach twice (in both descents). Reichenbag was the only one willing to ride.

Shame, probably cost him the Giro.

Great Giro nonetheless.

[ferrisbueller]

Assuming the valley floor is flattish, then that 14s is the surprise.

[llewop]

Matt_N said:

Froome's ascent up the Finestre, even with full Sky lead out was the slowest there has been. (2005, 2011, 2015 were all faster)

Which almost suggests his climb wasn't remarkable...just everyone else was rather unremarkable. Of course it is more of a case of 'on the day'. I was surprised to see quite so much snow around the top of the climbs and it was interesting that the climb was a very poor road and the decent a very fast one; that suited a lone breakaway rather than even a small group.

Shame for Yates he dropped off so far; not even close to top ten let alone podium, which seems harsh after 3 stage wins.

[Chris Stott]

DeltonaS said:

Dumoulin said he probably made a mistake yesterday by waiting for Reichenbach twice (in both descents). Reichenbag was the only one willing to ride.

This.

Froome’s ride was amazing, but the chasers tactics played right in to his hands. To drop that much time on the descents was ridiculous.

[ferrisbueller]

llewop said:

Which almost suggests his climb wasn't remarkable...just everyone else was rather unremarkable. Of course it is more of a case of 'on the day'. I was surprised to see quite so much snow around the top of the climbs and it was interesting that the climb was a very poor road and the decent a very fast one; that suited a lone breakaway rather than even a small group.

Shame for Yates he dropped off so far; not even close to top ten let alone podium, which seems harsh after 3 stage wins.

I think they did it the right way. Imagine descending on dirt, gravel and broken asphalt.

[llewop]

ferrisbueller said:

llewop said:

Which almost suggests his climb wasn't remarkable...just everyone else was rather unremarkable. Of course it is more of a case of 'on the day'. I was surprised to see quite so much snow around the top of the climbs and it was interesting that the climb was a very poor road and the decent a very fast one; that suited a lone breakaway rather than even a small group.

Shame for Yates he dropped off so far; not even close to top ten let alone podium, which seems harsh after 3 stage wins.

I think they did it the right way. Imagine descending on dirt, gravel and broken asphalt.

that was what I was getting at - I vaguely recall Froome has dirt track experience from his early days and despite some earlier criticism of his descending, particularly when on his own, he can clearly get a move on downhill when the mood takes him. I suspect that is why Sky targeted the stage as both sides of the hill played into his hands.

[ferrisbueller]

llewop said:

ferrisbueller said:

llewop said:

Which almost suggests his climb wasn't remarkable...just everyone else was rather unremarkable. Of course it is more of a case of 'on the day'. I was surprised to see quite so much snow around the top of the climbs and it was interesting that the climb was a very poor road and the decent a very fast one; that suited a lone breakaway rather than even a small group.

Shame for Yates he dropped off so far; not even close to top ten let alone podium, which seems harsh after 3 stage wins.

I think they did it the right way. Imagine descending on dirt, gravel and broken asphalt.

that was what I was getting at - I vaguely recall Froome has dirt track experience from his early days and despite some earlier criticism of his descending, particularly when on his own, he can clearly get a move on downhill when the mood takes him. I suspect that is why Sky targeted the stage as both sides of the hill played into his hands.

Brailsford was talking about the team meeting where they looked at the stage layout and spoke about whether they were going to play safe for a podium or go big for the win. They went for the latter and aimed to blow it apart in the hairpins of the first climb and then keep the pace up to stretch things out before launching Froome a long way out so he had enough stage to make the time. They got it spot on to be fair.

Big Tom always ends up fighting on his own. His loss to Aru the other year was hard to watch.

[_dobbo_]

JPJPJP said:

Ryan Mullen tweets to sum up the stage well

https://twitter.com/ryanmullen9/status/10000538337...

300W for him must be at least 3.8W/kg

I can't figure out if the suggestion here is the leaders are cheating. Because he finished 42 minutes behind 2nd, 4th, 5th, etc so singling out the leader is disingenuous at best.

Then we find the key climbs were ridden slower than before, by a significant amount.