2016 TdF, Stage 8: Pau → Bagnères-de-Luchon (184km)

[Hayabusa]

Has Sagan come in yet? I believe at one point he was in the same group as Cavendish.

 

[kenk09]

Re: Re:

Henao did very well as Froome's last man. Proves that he is not only an attacker.

He proved long time ago he's GC caliber, but Sky thinks any British rider is better than him

Froome is better than him.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Re: Re:

Disagree, if he had reacted quickly then he'd have stopped the flow of a few seconds and eventually Valverde would have caught up and been able to lead from the front.

Froome is more explosive, heavier and a better descender. The more Quintana "takes responsibility" the more time he loses. Letting Valverde lead was exactly the right thing to do. Your "taking responsibility" point is complete nonsense.

We can disagree, no need to get heated.

If Quintana loses this tour then he only has himself to blame (just like last year).

There's nothing "heated" in my comment. You have decided, somewhere in your head, that Quintana's problem is that he doesn't take responsibility and looks to others. You have then projected this idea onto his behaviour in a portion of a stage where taking responsibility himself would have been a very stupid idea, given that he had a teammate who is a much better descender with him. I'm not irate about that, just entertained.

There were riders in that group who actually did fail to take responsibility that they should have taken, most notably the BMC two, Bardet and, in particular, Yates. Yates has the excuse of inexperience though. Those riders are ones who actually could have contributed to pulling Froome back if they hadn't let Valverde lead the chase at a pace designed for Quintana. In so far as Quintana made a tactical error it was in not attacking on the climb. Once they were on the descent, having Valverde hold his hand was the obvious and sensible thing to do.

 

[RattaKuningas]

Good move by Froome but I expect Quintana to strike back tomorrow. After 4 mountains and crazy descent Froome probably spent more energy than Quintana today and it would be logical to expect Quintana to attack tomorrow before 1st restday.

 

[SeriousSam]

Re:

Quintana's real mistake was not trying to take advantage of the part of the stage that really suited him and choosing to go into the descent with everybody together. It was a surprise that Froome himself went, but really, that some GC contender or another would get a gap was almost inevitable.

As always, his attitude is his undoing. "There's still many mountain stages to come". "I'm still young, there'll be other Tours". "Oh my, I'm retiring at the end of the season and never won the Tour, how did this happen?".

He'd have lost even more to Froome if they'd been alone at the summit

 

[Tonton]

Masterful: chapeau Froome.

If I were Contador, I would never wear the Tinkov kit ever again...

 

[saunaking]

Re: Re:

Stop playing stupid. The race is not over. Quintana looked really strong uphill but .

All these "wahhhh frooome has won now wahhhh tour over" posts are pure AIDS and everyone making them should feel bad.

lol. This is the best post today!

But Froome schooling everyone reminded me of the time LLS did it to Sagan years ago

I don't like the guy but damn Froom is a racer

 

[Guybrush]

Kudos to Meintjes. Also Buchmann, this could be a breakthrough performance at gc level

 

[RattaKuningas]

Re: Re:

Disagree, if he had reacted quickly then he'd have stopped the flow of a few seconds and eventually Valverde would have caught up and been able to lead from the front.

Froome is more explosive, heavier and a better descender. The more Quintana "takes responsibility" the more time he loses. Letting Valverde lead was exactly the right thing to do. Your "taking responsibility" point is complete nonsense.

We can disagree, no need to get heated.

If Quintana loses this tour then he only has himself to blame (just like last year).

There's nothing "heated" in my comment. You have decided, somewhere in your head, that Quintana's problem is that he doesn't take responsibility and looks to others. You have then projected this idea onto his behaviour in a portion of a stage where taking responsibility himself would have been a very stupid idea, given that he had a teammate who is a much better descender with him. I'm not irate about that, just entertained.

There were riders in that group who actually did fail to take responsibility that they should have taken, most notably the BMC two, Bardet and, in particular, Yates. Yates has the excuse of inexperience though. Those riders are ones who actually could have contributed to pulling Froome back if they hadn't let Valverde lead the chase at a pace designed for Quintana. In so far as Quintana made a tactical error it was in not attacking on the climb. Once they were on the descent, having Valverde hold his hand was the obvious and sensible thing to do.

Had BMC worked on descent from start on then they would've reached Froome but they didn't. As you pointed out correctly other GC conteders failed to take responsibility not Quintana. It seemed like no riders besides Movistar had any GC hopes.

 

[hrotha]

Re: Re:

He'd have lost even more to Froome if they'd been alone at the summit

Froome would probably not attacked in that scenario, and Quintana was a lot more likely to have stayed on his wheel at any rate, since he would have known he couldn't relax when the race was so obviously on.

 

[Lance Armstrong]

Re: Re:

All four jerseys are apparently held by British riders.

Are you sure? Has Cav even finished yet? He must be very close to the time limit.

The time limit should be almost 45 minutes by my very quick count

Should be 44 min but I am not sure. It will be close for Cavendish & Eisel.

 

[DFA123]

Re:

Any word from Tinkov? One has to hope Contador does the honourable thing and fully commits to working for Roman going forward.

Wonder if his fans will also acknowledge that those 2 points Majka got on stage 5 have actually been decisive in putting him in the KOM jersey now.

If he had waited, Contador perhaps would have saved a couple of seconds and now been only 3'20 down instead of 3'22 or whatever he is.

Looks like Majka and Tinkoff made the correct call.

 

[Irondan]

Masterful: chapeau Froome.

If I were Contador, I would never wear the Tinkov kit ever again...

No doubt, he got dropped like a hot potato by Krueziger. They're all looking after their own interests on that team and have been since stage 2.

 

[movingtarget]

Re: Re:

If Quintana had "taken responsibility" and led the chase himself, Froome would have taken another twenty seconds on him.

Disagree, if he had reacted quickly then he'd have stopped the flow of a few seconds and eventually Valverde would have caught up and been able to lead from the front.

BMC are equally just as bad as Quintana, their refusal to help was beyond stupid.

At least BMC made it to the front. Aru tries to break away instead of working. The group was disorganized and with a short descent that was the race over.

 

[PremierAndrew]

Re: Re:

He'd have lost even more to Froome if they'd been alone at the summit

Froome would probably not attacked in that scenario, and Quintana was a lot more likely to have stayed on his wheel at any rate, since he would have known he couldn't relax when the race was so obviously on.

Huh? Froome attacked knowing that Quintana had Valverde, one of the best descenders in the peloton to help. Why would he not have attacked with just Quintana?

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Re:

Kudos to Meintjes. Also Buchmann, this could be a breakthrough performance at gc level

Why kudos to Buchmann? Seriously, I like the kid, but nobody should get kudos for burying himself to move from 30th to 25th on GC. That's just total insanity. Has someone told him that there's an opening in the sport for a new Francis De Greef?

These are not GC positions anyone should be fighting for, ever.

 

[Hayabusa]

Re: Re:

If Quintana had "taken responsibility" and led the chase himself, Froome would have taken another twenty seconds on him.

Disagree, if he had reacted quickly then he'd have stopped the flow of a few seconds and eventually Valverde would have caught up and been able to lead from the front.

BMC are equally just as bad as Quintana, their refusal to help was beyond stupid.

At least BMC made it to the front. Aru tries to break away instead of working. The group was disorganized and with a short descent that was the race over.

You could make that argument for a number of riders in the group but it's a fair point. It is always quite amusing to see a lot of riders do nothing for KM after KM and then suddenly come alive in the finish.

 

[Punkan]

Cavendish was 33 minutes behind at the foot of the last climb. Believe he will make it.

 

[hrotha]

Re: Re:

Huh? Froome attacked knowing that Quintana had Valverde, one of the best descenders in the peloton to help. Why would he not have attacked with just Quintana?

Because it would have been a completely different situation? And because it's much harder to catch a single presumably concentrated rider by surprise than a whole group? I think it's likely that he'd have thought putting time on everybody else would be enough booty for this stage.

 

[Velolover2]

https://twitter.com/CyclingHubTV/status/751803200404131840

Is there anything Froome can't do? He even throws better punches than Contador.

 

[cipurian]

Re:

Any word from Tinkov? One has to hope Contador does the honourable thing and fully commits to working for Roman going forward.

Tinkoff DS said that after not feeling very well at some point during the stage Contador told Kreuziger to go for his own GC chances.

 

[El_ojo_del_Tigre]

Re:

Cavendish was 33 minutes behind at the foot of the last climb. Believe he will make it.

The NOS twitter account has just tweeted that Cav & Groenewegen were the two last riders to cross the finish line, 39'30" after Froome.

 

[Lance Armstrong]

Re:

Cavendish was 33 minutes behind at the foot of the last climb. Believe he will make it.

If he does it will only be by 1-2 minutes.

 

[movingtarget]

Re:

It looked like Quintana may have panicked and dropped his bottle when Froome attacked, perhaps he was looking for a teammate as he didn't want to go solo without water? Definitely saw a bottle fall but maybe that was his empty. Of course he would want Bala for support as well.

I think that was the bottle he took, he had one sip and then saw Froome go and threw the bottle away.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Re:

https://twitter.com/CyclingHubTV/status/751803200404131840

Is there anything Froome can't do? He even throws better punches than Contador.

Some spectators are extremely annoying, but sooner or later a weedy cyclist punching a civilian is going to get his teeth knocked out in response.