2016 Tour de Suisse, 11-19 June

[Valv.Piti]

Re:

Barguil in the same time. Hilarious. Yesterday the gap between Latour and Kelderman was smaller and that was 2s. But it's better. Kelderman didn't deserve extra time anyway

Gosh can you give it a rest? Holy.... The strongest rider will win anyways.

 

[carton]

Re: Re:

Barguil in the same time. Hilarious. Yesterday the gap between Latour and Kelderman was smaller and that was 2s. But it's better. Kelderman didn't deserve extra time anyway

It's cause Talansky was in between

Sure, but there always a few funny quirks with how they time those gaps. In 2014 when Bardet was a second away from fifth how there seemed to be a couple more splits than usual in the Champs Elysees. And how they got to 53 seconds from Nibali to Chaves in stage 19 of the Giro is beyond me.

 

[Krokro]

Re: Re:

That feeling when both mountain stages were boring af. Fed up by this defensive mentality.

Blame the race organizers, 3 consecutive MTF (with the hardest on the 3rd day) followed by an ITT and another mountain stage, that's just too much, people are trying to save some energy for the next day.
At least Spilak showed some guts and Dombrowski still has his Giro legs, if he could actually manage to hang on on the descents he could become more than just a climbing superdomestique.

Agreed. This race design is terrible. Why ? Probably to impress people and make the show appealing. "Wow what a crazy course in Suisse, let's add a 90° turn 100m before a sprint and we might get a few more sponsors/partnerships". Bunch of idiots for sure. Also having "second tier" riders doesn't help.

 

[Red Rick]

Everyone will wait on the Rettenbackferner, at least the first half up the climb. It wasn't exactly a great stage last year.

 

[Laplaz]

Hopefully somebody puts on a real attack tomorrow. Guys who need time for the TT like Lopez...

 

[StryderHells]

Re: Re:

That feeling when both mountain stages were boring af. Fed up by this defensive mentality.

Blame the race organizers, 3 consecutive MTF (with the hardest on the 3rd day) followed by an ITT and another mountain stage, that's just too much, people are trying to save some energy for the next day.
At least Spilak showed some guts and Dombrowski still has his Giro legs, if he could actually manage to hang on on the descents he could become more than just a climbing superdomestique.

Agreed. This race design is terrible. Why ? Probably to impress people and make the show appealing. "Wow what a crazy course in Suisse, let's add a 90° turn 100m before a sprint and we might get a few more sponsors/partnerships". Bunch of idiots for sure. Also having "second tier" riders doesn't help.

Agree with all of this other than the last part, having top tier riders doesn't mean we will have good racing

 

[Valv.Piti]

Suisse often has pretty poor racing compared to Dauphine, imagine Contador, Froome, Bardet, Porte etc. duking it out on these gradients. So yes, most of the times it definitely means better racing IMO.

 

[Alexandre B.]

Re: Re:

Barguil in the same time. Hilarious. Yesterday the gap between Latour and Kelderman was smaller and that was 2s. But it's better. Kelderman didn't deserve extra time anyway

It's cause Talansky was in between

Sure, but there always a few funny quirks with how they time those gaps. In 2014 when Bardet was a second away from fifth how there seemed to be a couple more splits than usual in the Champs Elysees. And how they got to 53 seconds from Nibali to Chaves in stage 19 of the Giro is beyond me.

Bardet "attacked" but TVG followed and they finished together on that day, I remember well.

 

[May0maniac]

Tomorrow the weather should be ok, it should only rain around Sölden before noon, the afternoon should be fine.
The conditions should be similar to last year, about 14°C down in Sölden and no rain.

 

[carton]

Re:

Hopefully somebody puts on a real attack tomorrow. Guys who need time for the TT like Lopez...

Yep, the young'uns (Barguil, Lopez and Latour) are the best bets to shake this up. The two seemingly strongest guys so far, Kelderman and Talansky, will want to leave something for the time trial.

Tomorrow the weather should be ok, it should only rain around Sölden before noon, the afternoon should be fine.
The conditions should be similar to last year, about 14°C down in Sölden and no rain.

Nice update.

 

[Geraint Too Fast]

An Etixx rider is going to end Sagan's long points classification winning streak, one month early.

 

[Hugo Koblet]

Re:

An Etixx rider is going to end Sagan's long points classification winning streak, one month early.

What does this mean?

 

[lenric]

Re: Re:

An Etixx rider is going to end Sagan's long points classification winning streak, one month early.

What does this mean?

Nostradamus prediction.

 

[May0maniac]

Re: Re:

Hopefully somebody puts on a real attack tomorrow. Guys who need time for the TT like Lopez...

Yep, the young'uns (Barguil, Lopez and Latour) are the best bets to shake this up. The two seemingly strongest guys so far, Kelderman and Talansky, will want to leave something for the time trial.

Tomorrow the weather should be ok, it should only rain around Sölden before noon, the afternoon should be fine.
The conditions should be similar to last year, about 14°C down in Sölden and no rain.

Nice update.

Thanks.
Talansky and Wilco are probably on a similar level if it comes down to the ITT, but Talansky is a great descender and could still try something on the final stage.
I didn't expect Scarponi to implode like that, I thought that he could fight for a top 10 on gc.

 

[Maaaaaaaarten]

Re: Re:

Lol it's funny that most of the Kelderman hate, or at least the fiercest criticism, comes from Dutch people. Being a Dutch professional athlete really is a thankless job. For some reason Dutch people only appreciate their athletes when they win in a very dominant fashion with aggressive tactics, but unfortunately the only place where that happens nowadays is ice skating

I rather have him lose by being aggresive then riding like frickin Leipheimer.

The worst TdSuisse was when Leipheimer won. This looks like a repeat.

Yes this attitude is exactly what I'm talking about. You bring it out much more authentically than I ever could!

Johan Cruyff and Sven Kramer are the only athletes we can love

Better to lose 3 to 0 than to park the bus. Who wants to be a Levi Leipheimer? Honour is more important than winning.

 

[johnymax]

Re:

Everyone will wait on the Rettenbackferner, at least the first half up the climb. It wasn't exactly a great stage last year.

Last year Spilak attacked more than 8km to go and went solo for 4km. Even in this year's edition he is the only one who has the guts to attack. Tomorrow he'll try again. Too bad his form is worse than last year. It would be a perfect race for him with the field, the weather and the parcours.

Great victory for Weening today. He was by far the best climber of the break. Also hats off to Richeze. Amazing performance for a leadout man/sprinter. Nice result also for Koren. He doesn't very often get this kind of results.

I'm very surprised Tejay, Thomas and Costa lost so much time. I guess the weather took its toll. But I think this race is far from over. The unpredictability of the weather and the sequence of hard stages can make some other riders crack big time in the following days. But Kelderman has to be the favourite for the win right now.

 

[BigMac]

Re:

Suisse often has pretty poor racing compared to Dauphine, imagine Contador, Froome, Bardet, Porte etc. duking it out on these gradients. So yes, most of the times it definitely means better racing IMO.

Not true. There's a reason those smaller races with few to no big guns are often much more entertaining and attacked. The reason this race is looking dreadful is because of the parcours. 2014 was pretty entertaining and, even though there were still 3 GC stages back to back, it had no real big names innnit. The big guns also missed the move which made the 2014 Dauphiné so good. This race parcours has nothing redeemable, not even all the Contadors of this world could turn it into a nice race. You'd still have a group of favourites strolling together to the line. A smaller one, but a group regardless. Those names you mention are not immune to stage backloading. The smartest thing for a rider to do here is to attack the least possible

 

[PremierAndrew]

Dombrowski looked super strong today

 

[carton]

Re: Re:

Talansky and Wilco are probably on a similar level if it comes down to the ITT, but Talansky is a great descender and could still try something on the final stage.
I didn't expect Scarponi to implode like that, I thought that he could fight for a top 10 on gc.

Yep, good point on Talansky. He's nowhere near as defensive as Kelderman, but coming of a strong ToC TT I'd expect him to save his bullets until after the TT.
I thought I caught Scarponi pacing Lopez back yesterday. I think he's just a bit cooked after the Giro, he might go for stages and help out when he can. On the flip side they're either auditioning Lopez for a Tour spot or just giving him Suisse leadership instead.

 

[Samamba]

Tiesj Benoot was 12th of the GC guys. Impressive. Let's hope for him that it rains in Flanders & Roubaix next year.

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re: Re:

Suisse often has pretty poor racing compared to Dauphine, imagine Contador, Froome, Bardet, Porte etc. duking it out on these gradients. So yes, most of the times it definitely means better racing IMO.

Not true. There's a reason those smaller races with few to no big guns are often much more entertaining and attacked. The reason this race is looking dreadful is because of the parcours. 2014 was pretty entertaining and, even though there were still 3 GC stages back to back, it had no real big names innnit. The big guns also missed the move which made the 2014 Dauphiné so good. This race parcours has nothing redeemable, not even all the Contadors of this world could turn it into a nice race. You'd still have a group of favourites strolling together to the line. A smaller one, but a group regardless. Those names you mention are not immune to stage backloading. The smartest thing for a rider to do here is to attack the least possible

2014 and 2015 Dauphine were classes above Suisse in those same years. Simply put. The Contador v Froome duel in 2014 was epic and is brought up almost on a daily basis, pretty big testament to the racing.
Froome was behind in 2015 and the went after it the last 2 stages. Someone probably founds it boring, but I really enjoy the Sky-trains when Froome is up to it instead of the soft-pedalling, pointless weak attacks etc. we often otherwise gets to see on MTFs. Not mentioning the extremely good stage to Vercors including Nibali, Costa, Valverde etc.

Ill take big names above everything else. Not necessarily because the racing is super much better if at all, it can be argued, but its always much more fun (to me) to see the big guns. Now, I know that you are somewhat of a cycling hipster (is it ok to call you that?) based on the many posts I've read of yours in the last year, so obviously you would disagree with me here.

 

[StryderHells]

Re:

Suisse often has pretty poor racing compared to Dauphine, imagine Contador, Froome, Bardet, Porte etc. duking it out on these gradients. So yes, most of the times it definitely means better racing IMO.

It really doesn't mean better racing, what makes you think those guys would of made this race more entertaining? They would of all still waited until the final couple of K's to do anything and something like Gorka almost stealing the GC today just wouldn't of happened with the stronger teams those riders would of brought.
It's not the riders who are to blame for less than top shelf racing in this race

 

[May0maniac]

Re:

Dombrowski looked super strong today

Not a surprise after his performance in the Giro on the Giau and in the MTT on the next day, he's a pure climber, but suffers on the flat and often looses time on the descents.
Tomorrow he could be stronger than Talansky, it wouldn't be a huge surprise, but the team will probably use him as a superdomestique to help him (with Talansky still having a decent shot at the overall win that's probably the smartest thing to do).

 

[StryderHells]

Re: Re:

Suisse often has pretty poor racing compared to Dauphine, imagine Contador, Froome, Bardet, Porte etc. duking it out on these gradients. So yes, most of the times it definitely means better racing IMO.

Not true. There's a reason those smaller races with few to no big guns are often much more entertaining and attacked. The reason this race is looking dreadful is because of the parcours. 2014 was pretty entertaining and, even though there were still 3 GC stages back to back, it had no real big names innnit. The big guns also missed the move which made the 2014 Dauphiné so good. This race parcours has nothing redeemable, not even all the Contadors of this world could turn it into a nice race. You'd still have a group of favourites strolling together to the line. A smaller one, but a group regardless. Those names you mention are not immune to stage backloading. The smartest thing for a rider to do here is to attack the least possible

2014 and 2015 Dauphine were classes above Suisse in those same years. Simply put. The Contador v Froome duel in 2014 was epic and is brought up almost on a daily basis, pretty big testament to the racing.
Froome was behind in 2015 and the went after it the last 2 stages. Someone probably founds it boring, but I really enjoy the Sky-trains when Froome is up to it instead of the soft-pedalling, pointless weak attacks etc. we often otherwise gets to see on MTFs. Not mentioning the extremely good stage to Vercors including Nibali, Costa, Valverde etc.

Ill take big names above everything else. Not necessarily because the racing is super much better if at all, it can be argued, but its always much more fun (to me) to see the big guns. Now, I know that you are somewhat of a cycling hipster (is it ok to call you that?) based on the many posts I've read of yours in the last year, so obviously you would disagree with me here.

Well I prefer to watch good unpredictable racing, not fussed if the big guys turn up or not

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re: Re:

Suisse often has pretty poor racing compared to Dauphine, imagine Contador, Froome, Bardet, Porte etc. duking it out on these gradients. So yes, most of the times it definitely means better racing IMO.

It really doesn't mean better racing, what makes you think those guys would of made this race more entertaining? They would of all still waited until the final couple of K's to do anything and something like Gorka almost stealing the GC today just wouldn't of happened with the stronger teams those riders would of brought.
It's not the riders who are to blame for less than top shelf racing in this race

I addressed that some point in one of my earlier posts, probably a few pages down by now and I agree. Its definitely not the riders fault, but its obvious that when you have a field where everyone is close to each other, people get cautious (even more with Rettenbachferner).

Anyways, its highly subjective. I'll take the Tour over any race any day unless its a 2012 debacle again.