Cervelo team manager - Sunstroke?

[Columbus]

What do we know about him? IQ etc...

In todays stage 15 (Giro d Italia) Pauwels obviously got orders to sit up and wait to support Sastre. Carlos was already in a fast group of 10-15 riders that was catching Basso easily.

Was the initial team order changed? Suddenly Pauwels was in the group between the leader and the GC-leader group (where Sastre was). Now again trying to catch the leadere of the stage that he initially let go.
He easily won the sprint for 2nd place. Was the initial team order changed?

Who is the brains behind this disaster?
Pauwels, please leave the Cervelo crap team asap.

[jmnikricket]

While watching the stage, I was sure a deal had been made since Cervelo had taken yesterdays stage. Thinking about it a little more, it's possible Pauwels was ordered just to sit up, not necessarily to help Sastre today, but to conserve energy to help tomorrow. It's no secret that Cervelo is riding for Sastre and Sastre is targeting mondays stage to gain time.

Pauwels, obviously frustrated, rebelled by keeping with the chase group and contesting the sprint for second in a kind of "I told you so" move. Pauwels has my sympathy if this is the case, but based on that, I'm not so sure Sastre can count on Pauwels as a team player in tomorrows important stage.

btw I'm a Sastre fan, and I realize opportunities don't come up often like this for domestiques, but if it helps Sastre get on the podium, then I think it's justified.

[Jasper]

From the stage 15 thread:

It seems it was Sastre who asked his DS to tell Pauwels to wait for him at the top of the last mountain, because Sastre was isolated (Gustov crashed apparentely) and had to close the gap on Basso. Van Poppel has no television in his car, so he could not properly read the current race situation and made his unfortunate decision.

This comes from an interview that the belgian tv had with Van Poppel, during the race. After the race they also interviewed Pauwels, who was shockingly cool about the whole thing, like the perfect domestique. He said that the initial team orders - after Basso's breakaway - were for him to sit in Bertagnolli's wheel without doing any work. Then they told him to wait for Sastre at the top (when the gap with Basso kept on increasing), but he somewhat refused to do so (that part was a bit blurry). In the descent they finally convinced him to wait for Sastre, so he let other breakaway riders pass him. By then Basso and Garzelli had been caught again by the Sastre group, so Pauwels got clearance to ride again for the victory - which was already far gone by then.

[Jasper]

While watching the stage, I was sure a deal had been made since Cervelo had taken yesterdays stage. Thinking about it a little more, it's possible Pauwels was ordered just to sit up, not necessarily to help Sastre today, but to conserve energy to help tomorrow. It's no secret that Cervelo is riding for Sastre and Sastre is targeting mondays stage to gain time.

Pauwels, obviously frustrated, rebelled by keeping with the chase group and contesting the sprint for second in a kind of "I told you so" move. Pauwels has my sympathy if this is the case, but based on that, I'm not so sure Sastre can count on Pauwels as a team player in tomorrows important stage.

btw I'm a Sastre fan, and I realize opportunities don't come up often like this for domestiques, but if it helps Sastre get on the podium, then I think it's justified.

Honestly, you can't say Pauwels was a bad team player in all this. He was strong today, and said he was rather surprised to find out he and Bertagnolli ended up alone on the climb. He just found himself in that difficult position, and let Bertagnolli do all the work, just as the DS ordered him to do. Eventually he did fall back, just as they asked him to do. While I think that in this case, there are many riders who would have said "Screw it, I'm not passing on this unique opportunity" and stay ahead, regardless of what the DS yells at at you through the headset. Afterwards Pauwels was very cool and relaxed about the whole thing, putting it into perspective and wholeheartedly conforming that the whole team has only one goal: helping Sastre win the Giro. Every other personal goal is irrelevant, even when it comes to winning a stage. Of course he sounded disappointed, but he never did anything to discredit his team, his captain or his DS. Heck, he even thanked them for getting the opportunity to ride this Giro, being the young an insignificant rider he is. Which is pretty remarkable, 'cause he had every reason to badmouth his team.

[Cobblestones]

He could've ripped his earpiece out and claimed it wasn't working.

[Jasper]

I guess he doesn't have the balls - yet - to do such a thing

[Buffalo Soldier]

He could've ripped his earpiece out and claimed it wasn't working.

There was still a team car, with his sport director, next to him, couldn't claim that wasn't working

[BroDeal]

There was still a team car, with his sport director, next to him, couldn't claim that wasn't working

He could claim he went deaf.

[Cobblestones]

I guess he doesn't have the balls - yet - to do such a thing

Team car? So what. He could've ripped his earpiece out in disgust and never looking back.

Ah well, no balls no glory.

[Aguirre]

well, i think it was a disaster,something you don't see in professionals very often. I saw on basque Tv and commentators were like "should someone explain this tactique"?
really crap, poor guy. In a situation like this you don't drop never unless your boss is in real danger, and the boss being the maglia.
but being sastre 6 in general, having denis, di luca, levi and the rest in the group having the help of quick step and caisse and basso and garzeli only 30 seconds ahead, YOU NEVER STOP a rider that can win a stage.

van poppel should apologize publicly. By the way we saw a very poor tactic for whole cycling, menchov must be happy the rest are riding for him (specially LPR)

[ElChingon]

From the way it looked to me, the DS's paid to not have the Cervelo rider tag along. I'm not saying which one but I think its obvious. Anyother explaination is just so impossible it must be true.

Yea, I know weird logic but what happened can't be sanely explained anyother way.

[Aguirre]

here the explaination of the tactic, pretty weird, is carlos acting as a truly leader after the complains of last year of non support at CSC?
anyway we had a very awful day of tactics

http://www.cervelo.com/news.aspx?t=TestTeam&i=TeamNews&a=1575

[180mmCrank]

Cervelo have had a pretty amazing year really - not sure if Van P has been calling all the shots but if he has he's done a great job.

Today looked like a miscalculaltion for sure - and the way it played out looked really silly. May not have looked so bad if Pauwels had actually been needed at some point!

Maybe Sastre was concerned about being left - say if Pellizotti had a go as Basso was pulled back...don't know ... but I am thinking they are pretty confident that Sastre can do something in the GC and I think that's where there attention was drawn.

It's going to be fun tomorrow

[yetanothergreenworld]

One of the weirder cycling episodes I've seen lately. Pity Pauwels' poor parents and/or spouse watching at home!

[180mmCrank]

http://www.cervelo.com/news.aspx?t=T...eamNews&a=1575

Really helpful. And it made sense to me - they made a call when they felt Sastre needed help - and then he didn't need the help after all. And yes it ended up looking pretty silly - but it could have played out differently and made a whole lot more sense.

Onwards and upwards - at least for the next two days!

[adam__]

Team car? So what. He could've ripped his earpiece out in disgust and never looking back.

Ah well, no balls no glory.

Yeah, that's a smart comment. How about "all balls, no job next year"?

[Escarabajo]

well, i think it was a disaster,something you don't see in professionals very often. I saw on basque Tv and commentators were like "should someone explain this tactique"?
really crap, poor guy. In a situation like this you don't drop never unless your boss is in real danger, and the boss being the maglia.
but being sastre 6 in general, having denis, di luca, levi and the rest in the group having the help of quick step and caisse and basso and garzeli only 30 seconds ahead, YOU NEVER STOP a rider that can win a stage.

van poppel should apologize publicly. By the way we saw a very poor tactic for whole cycling, menchov must be happy the rest are riding for him (specially LPR)

Totally disagree. If you are 6th in the GC does not mean you still can not win the Giro d'Italia. Besides had Sastre had a mechanical or needed some help to pull any attacker the strategy would not had been so stupid after all.

[hulkgogan]

Totally disagree. If you are 6th in the GC does not mean you still can not win the Giro d'Italia. Besides had Sastre had a mechanical or needed some help to pull any attacker the strategy would not had been so stupid after all.

Saying you can still win the Giro is not the same as saying it is highly probable.

I guess it comes down to how you calculate the risk/reward. Looks like Cervelo is taking an absolute approach, Sastre finishing on the podium is orders of magnitude more valuable than anything else.

Others might take a more expected value approach:

What is the probability Sastre is going to finish on the podium? How does Pauwels dropping back improve those odds? What are the odds of Pauwels winning the stage? What are the expected values of the various decision trees?

Personally I think a high probability stage win has an expected value quite a bit higher than the incremental increase of dropping back, but then I doubt they're making these calculations on the road.

[Rosedale]

The business with Pauwels yesterday only goes to show that cycling would benefit greatly if radios were banned

[kjetilraknerud]

That wouldn't stop the manager from driving up to Pauwels in his car