What's new

The Cycling Thread

nightgoat

Well-Known Member
Sep 12, 2005
24,604
21,898
@aussiespursguy who are you lumping on tomorrow now that Gilbert's withdrawn? Hard to look past Valverde and Kwiatkowski on current form, but Dan Martin has to be in with a shout, and Orica have got a very strong squad for the race.
 

aussiespursguy

Well-Known Member
Mar 21, 2015
3,437
6,677
@aussiespursguy who are you lumping on tomorrow now that Gilbert's withdrawn? Hard to look past Valverde and Kwiatkowski on current form, but Dan Martin has to be in with a shout, and Orica have got a very strong squad for the race.
Your right with Valverde and Kwiatkowski. Both in great form and to be fair must be the two favourites going into the race. Dan Martin can never be counted out as well.
Orica have indeed named a very strong squad. I was actually surprised how strong! My heart would love to see Gerro get his second, but with Albasini, Kreuziger and the Yates twins I'm guessing they have multiple options depending how the race pans out.
I wouldn't count Matthews out either IF he is there at the end.
I know he has had a busy season already but surprised Sagan isn't racing. I would have thought this tailor made for him?
 

aussiespursguy

Well-Known Member
Mar 21, 2015
3,437
6,677
As a longshot (and I'm not sure of his form, however his team has NO form) maybe
Tom-Jelte Slagter. The sort of journey that suits him, and has finished top 10 before.
 

nightgoat

Well-Known Member
Sep 12, 2005
24,604
21,898
Your right with Valverde and Kwiatkowski. Both in great form and to be fair must be the two favourites going into the race. Dan Martin can never be counted out as well.
Orica have indeed named a very strong squad. I was actually surprised how strong! My heart would love to see Gerro get his second, but with Albasini, Kreuziger and the Yates twins I'm guessing they have multiple options depending how the race pans out.
I wouldn't count Matthews out either IF he is there at the end.
I know he has had a busy season already but surprised Sagan isn't racing. I would have thought this tailor made for him?

You'd think, but Sagan always finishes his Classics season with Paris-Roubaix now to prepare for the Tour of California.
 

aussiespursguy

Well-Known Member
Mar 21, 2015
3,437
6,677
Well isn't he in some form! Valverde rode away from Dan Martin like he was standing still!
Must say very impressed to hear Alejandro Valverde is going to donate all prizes from the race to the family of Michele Scarponi.
A very worthy winner.
 

nightgoat

Well-Known Member
Sep 12, 2005
24,604
21,898
Bit of a slow start to the Giro but it finally kicked into life in the last 20km today, Quickstep doing what they do in crosswinds. The organisers have made a habit of chucking in a summit finish in the first week so things should start to get interesting with a bit of a shake-up on Tuesday.
 

nightgoat

Well-Known Member
Sep 12, 2005
24,604
21,898
For the first time in years we are not getting it free to air. So disappointed. Hope you can keep things updated @nightgoat

What a shitter! If it's any consolation, free to air coverage of cycling in the UK is basically restricted to the Tour, the Worlds and the three main UK events - Tour of Britain, Tour de Yorkshire and RideLondon. Pretty much everything else is only on Eurosport.

I think they post streams on /r/peloton/ on Reddit and there's usually a bunch of highlight videos on here http://www.steephill.tv/giro-d-italia/ (although the layout of that site would make it tricky to find without inadvertently finding out the results...)
 

aussiespursguy

Well-Known Member
Mar 21, 2015
3,437
6,677
What a shitter! If it's any consolation, free to air coverage of cycling in the UK is basically restricted to the Tour, the Worlds and the three main UK events - Tour of Britain, Tour de Yorkshire and RideLondon. Pretty much everything else is only on Eurosport.

I think they post streams on /r/peloton/ on Reddit and there's usually a bunch of highlight videos on here http://www.steephill.tv/giro-d-italia/ (although the layout of that site would make it tricky to find without inadvertently finding out the results...)
Thanks for that. We have been very fortunate over here that SBS has been so committed to cycling over the years. All the spring classics, all 3 grand tours, California, the Dauphiné, world and Aussie champs. I'm guessing this year the rights for the Giro were to hard. Pity. One of my favourites because its always so hard!
 

nightgoat

Well-Known Member
Sep 12, 2005
24,604
21,898
Fantastic ride from Polanc today, and with Thomas and Yates 2nd and 3rd on GC a pretty good result all round. Ridiculous that they can have a turn just before the start of the final climb so badly marked out that several riders go the wrong way and a few more crash because they couldn't slow down in time. Surely they can do more than just have a couple of blokes waving their arms about...
 

nightgoat

Well-Known Member
Sep 12, 2005
24,604
21,898
Apparently Javi Moreno has been disqualified after being caught pushing Diego Rosa, causing him to crash. Peloton seems to be a bit angsty this season, what with Grivko being DQ'd for punching Kittel a couple of months ago...

This is tomorrow's stage. That's about 50km or so along the coast so it's not going to be just a straight forward sprinters' day off for the GC, could be some big damage caused by crosswinds. It'll be interesting to see if Quickstep try and cause more splits like on Sunday and whether or not any of the other teams will be wise to it this time.

giro-ditalia-2017-stage-5-1493202031.jpg
 

aussiespursguy

Well-Known Member
Mar 21, 2015
3,437
6,677
Your right. Crosswind city coming up! GC contenders will have to have their wits about them.
 

nightgoat

Well-Known Member
Sep 12, 2005
24,604
21,898
Sparkled into life a bit today, still no GC changes since Tuesday though. Tomorrow should be interesting with the second mountain finish of the race. Gonna wait for the highlights as there's the small matter of a certain football match tomorrow afternoon...
 

nightgoat

Well-Known Member
Sep 12, 2005
24,604
21,898
http://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/r...dam-yates-ahead-blockhaus-finale-video-330556

Well today was completely overshadowed by some total fucking idiot police motorbike rider who for some unknown reason just decided to stop and park his motorbike in front of the oncoming peloton just before the start of the final climb. There's been far too many incidents involving vehicles in the last few years - Jesse Sergent and Sebastien Chavanel at Flanders two years ago, thankfully this was nowhere near as serious as the incident which killed Antoine Demoitié last year.

You just have to wonder how braindead this guy is to do something like that. As a result Kelderman is out of the race, broken finger apparently, and Sky and Orica have had their GC hopes ended. Landa lost 26 minutes, Thomas and Yates about 5 minutes each.

And it's a shame because it's totally taken away from what was a really good day's racing. Quintana rode like an absolute boss. I was very impressed with Pinot as well, and Dumoulin rode very well too. Nibali cracked pretty early, but only lost a minute and he's made early losses in Grand Tours before and made up time.

Gutted for Thomas, though. He seems to keep getting shit luck. He was flying at the Tour in 2015 until Barguil smashed him off the road, now this is his first chance as team leader in a Grand Tour and his chances are pretty much over after a week through a non-racing incident.
 

nightgoat

Well-Known Member
Sep 12, 2005
24,604
21,898

It was really disappointing to see that from Quintana and Movistar (as well as Nibali, and it was Zakarin who attacked as well, but he was four and a half minutes down so not really a threat to Dumoulin) but unfortunately I can't say it's surprising. Orica's DS was furious that Movistar attacked when the police motorbike took out the whole Sky team, plus Yates and Kelderman. Quintana attacked on the descent of the Stelvio three years ago when race officials had put out a message that racing had been neutralised due to the dangerous weather conditions (they later claimed not to have done so, but I suspect they were just trying to save face).

But it was only on Sunday that Dumoulin showed the type of spirit and sportsmanship that most of us expect in cycling, and Quintana openly praised him for it, but is clearly incapable of reciprocating. I was already rooting for Dumoulin after Thomas' race was ended, and also having come so close in the 2015 Vuetla, but I want him to win even more so now. I suspect he'll have gained a lot more supporters in the last few days.

Quintana's going to have to gain at least two minutes on Dumoulin over the next two days as Dumoulin will destroy him in a 30k flat TT on the final day.
 
Top