Recent content by Devil's Elbow

He was the only thing remotely resembling a GC rider for whom it was the first GT of the year, and had the riders who finished ahead of him cared about him whatsoever (or the riders behind him had anything in the way of domestiques) he would have lost 5+ minutes on the final mountain stage...

The only reason why he will take it as a slap in the face is that he seemingly still lives in the fantasy world where he's a budding GT GC prodigy. For the things Skjelmose is actually good at, Lipowitz won't get in the way much, at most they will share leadership in one or two shorter stage...

The real question is why CQ are not using the same season cutoff as the UCI, otherwise Kudus would be in profit for the 2026 season now. (yes, I know they've always gone by calendar year, but afaik the UCI used to do so too so it's not like they've always done things differently)

Posted without comment.

Sounds like this has the potential for spectacularly imploding within the next WT cycle. Still, if I was riding for the team I would have happily accepted that risk it if it's in exchange for the Adams/Israeli involvement being gone completely, as seems to be the case. A clean break was...

The Catalunya stage hosts were announced today, profiles pending but this looks like it could be the best route in the race's history. Vallter 2000: Coll de Pal: And then Queralt hopefully on something like the route they had planned for this year (or the one they did race the year before...

Lots of injuries and other health issues popping up on the women's side of my team with Van Empel, Casasola, Franck... but the strength in depth is holding up well enough for everyone but Samu to be basically out of sight.

It depends. If he was focusing more on monuments, would he have been better about managing his weight during the off-season? If not, his opportunities would have been limited to only Lombardia, and considering that his best one-day results were the Olympic title on a not particularly climby...

I'm sorry, I don't think completely burying yourself to survive Cipressa and Poggio and then having zero left after it counts as having a shot. Ganna was about as likely to win from that situation as Masnada was to win from the situation where he finished second in Lombardia, and not even...

Ganna has never been in a race situation where he had even an outside shot of winning a monument and also hasn't been at the pointy end of one very often at all. Hirschi got screwed out of a 50/50 shot at winning Liège 2020 by Alaphilippe, and Moscon was odds on to win Roubaix 2021 prior to his...

Dumbest rebranding since the HBO Max -> Max -> HBO Max debacle. I also imagine the municipality of Wevelgem will be pretty peeved.

Lol. There are 100+ riders who also didn't win/are yet to win a monument who should be considered before him. And even among currently active riders you have Pedersen, Ciccone and Matthews who are all clearly ahead of him, as well as Moscon and Hirschi who got screwed out of ≥50% chances of...

Only in part. Of all the GT greats who never won a monument, he has clearly the best trackrecord in the classics. And for Lemond and Maertens too, their stage race results are a part of what sets them apart from everyone else you might consider. I also just realised I completely forgot about...

But neither has any classics pedigree. Armstrong won a world title and finished second in Liège twice, Lemond won three world titles, and Maertens won two world titles and finished second in four monuments.

Armstrong LeMond Maertens Not sure if anyone else belongs in the discussion with those three.