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2016 Vuelta a España, stage 10: Lugones > Lagos de Covadonga

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DFA123 said:
Lexman said:
1. Quintana (MOV) 2. Valverde (MOV) +57" 3. @chrisfroome +58"


#LV2016 @albertocontador jumps to 5th in the GC after his late push on today's stage. Stellar ride from the Spanish Tinkoff leader @lavuelta
Great to see the big three from the last couple of seasons battling it out.

It's difficult to see anyone coming between them now. I don't think their level isn't going to drop enough for someone like Chaves or Scarponi to sneak in there, and the rest are too far behind or too off form.
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Bolder said:
Merckx index said:
thehog said:
Its not yo yo at all. He is riding to a set power limit to time he run into the line.

I'm pretty sure you're right. And if he's doing that on a single stage, he may also be doing it for the whole GT. I.e., trying to pace himself so that he remains strong in the third week. He's not really racing the others, he's trying to minimize his total time.

But at some point, Quintana's lead may reach the point where Froome feels he has to try to follow him on a stage, even at the risk of not conserving as much energy for following stages as planned. How much more time can he give him and make it up in the ITT? One minute?

I think Froome is below his TdF level, and knows it; whereas Quintana may or may not be -- it's just that Froome is weaker. If CF had the legs he would have ridden away on any one of the MTFs, especially ahead of a rest day. I suspect he feeling pretty good to be just a minute behind Nairo with the ITT ahead. I'm guessing he's going to test him on Wednesday, and then there's the Aubisque...

I suspect you are right but the 3rd week will tell. Still many questions unanswered, including Froome's ability to peak twice in one season but Nairo looking good so far. One thing in Froome's favor is I don't think he was as strong in the Tour this year compared to say 2013. So maybe he and Sky planned to leave a little more gas in the tank for an assault on this Vuelta? Lets see what the 3rd week reveals.
 
A lot of praise for Froome's pacing today, but I'm not sure he didn't misjudge it. He was going so strongly at the top - notably the accelerations to drop Contador and Valverde, that I wonder if he actually went with too little power at the start of the climb, because he felt bad or underestimated his shape. It didn't look like such an even paced effort.
 
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DFA123 said:
A lot of praise for Froome's pacing today, but I'm not sure he didn't misjudge it. He was going so strongly at the top - notably the accelerations to drop Contador and Valverde, that I wonder if he actually went with too little power at the start of the climb, because he felt bad or underestimated his shape. It didn't look like such an even paced effort.

Not sure about that but I wonder is he sat behinf Yates/Chaves for to long.
 
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DFA123 said:
A lot of praise for Froome's pacing today, but I'm not sure he didn't misjudge it. He was going so strongly at the top - notably the accelerations to drop Contador and Valverde, that I wonder if he actually went with too little power at the start of the climb, because he felt bad or underestimated his shape. It didn't look like such an even paced effort.

Did Froome regain much time on Quintana in the final Kms? If not that's still advantage Quintana in terms of who is strongest. This is the quote from the CN story ...

By the finish the gap opened slightly between Quintana and Froome, to 25 seconds between the stage winner and the Briton as Froome reached Gesink.
 
Best stage of the Vuelta so far. Great action...

Wish Quintana had turned the screw slightly more though. Loved it that after Froome was helped back by Lopez and Kennaugh he just blew straight by Konig. Leopold clearly not fitted with his domestique chip.

Great rides from Valverde, Fraile, Gesink.. Shame to see Bertie just doesn't have the legs but at least he gave it the beans.
 
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LaFlorecita said:
Of course he is. He is quite clearly having a dig at Alberto. Really sad.
Come on Fleur, the proper way to write that is "Sad!".

There really must be no love lost between them. But then again Contador seems to have had a strained relationship with Lance, Valverde, Andy, Sastre, Purito, and even Nairo according to sources today (wonder what that's about). Maybe he's the Lizzie Armitstead of the men's peloton, and everyone is simply jealous of their success. Surely that must be it. He's such a charming guy when he wants to be. No one can be that charming and then be a different person behind the scenes.
 
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Cookster15 said:
DFA123 said:
A lot of praise for Froome's pacing today, but I'm not sure he didn't misjudge it. He was going so strongly at the top - notably the accelerations to drop Contador and Valverde, that I wonder if he actually went with too little power at the start of the climb, because he felt bad or underestimated his shape. It didn't look like such an even paced effort.

Did Froome regain much time on Quintana in the final Kms? If not that's still advantage Quintana in terms of who is strongest. This is the quote from the CN story ...

By the finish the gap opened slightly between Quintana and Froome, to 25 seconds between the stage winner and the Briton as Froome reached Gesink.
Not sure to be honest; I think Quintana is strongest as well. Just not convinced that Froome's dropping off the back thing is necessarily always a great tactic, even though it looks impressive when he zooms past loads of riders late on. Ultimately, he still lost 30 seconds to his main rival. Also, this didn't look like such a steady paced effort.
 
Quintana is looking very strong in the Vuelta - The hillier profile of the Vuelta is right up Quintana's ally, especially seeing Froome was solid in the mountains at the TDF, instead of being dominant - Expect Quintana to lead Froome by over 2 minutes by the TT.

And S.Yates yet again towed Chavez up the mountain.
 
Quintana's attack was a great show, Valverde's dead weight forced Froome to do some speed changes, and that's why Gesink outsprinted him in the last 50m, so everybody wasted energy today, Contador, Froome and Quintana gave everything they have today, that was pretty nice

I predict a great show in the last 3k at Peña Cabarga, a breakaway with 2-3 mins at the start of the hill may be enough to get the win, Contador/Chaves must do the waste, Froome will yo-yo as usual, Valverde will stick on Froome's wheel in order to add him some weight and Quintana will attack with 2k to go.
 
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DFA123 said:
A lot of praise for Froome's pacing today, but I'm not sure he didn't misjudge it. He was going so strongly at the top - notably the accelerations to drop Contador and Valverde, that I wonder if he actually went with too little power at the start of the climb, because he felt bad or underestimated his shape. It didn't look like such an even paced effort.
I said this before about the climb to Ventoux when the data was leaked, when you could see Froome basically held around 435W the entire way bar a few accelerations. I think the way the big climbs are being raced today is different than the way it looks. The guys who were eating wind at the bottom of the climb (and this is Ventoux, the conditions are on the tin) were doing massive, massive watts. Riders aren't really upping the pace but maintaining it. Look at Gesink today, his first 4km were about 425W, his second 4km were about 432W. He didn't up the pace, he put in a little dig and maintained it, as the other riders began to slow down. When Quintana passed him it wasn't that he upped the pace, it was the Gesink did slow to about 400W those las 4km (excluding the downhill, including the sprint). I really think we describing all these races the wrong way.

What is happening, from the data, is that it seems that riders need to really go above threshold for a fair bit to hold the wheels, which since they're going so fast that matters even uphill. I think what Froome calculated is that it's better to hold an even tempo, since the steeps of Covadonga are so steep that drafting really stops to matter more than pacing (they were going at 15km/h for a fair bit in the middle). This is the main reason why team dynamics start to matter more than ever. It's not about just how good your superdomestique is, it's about having multiple guys who can burn themselves one at a time against the wind at almost 7W/kg while their lead riders can maintain an even tempo. So everyone is basically slowing down, relative to the gradient, as time goes on, bar maybe one or two guys. I would bet that Froome basically held the same power output that entire climb.
 
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carton said:
DFA123 said:
A lot of praise for Froome's pacing today, but I'm not sure he didn't misjudge it. He was going so strongly at the top - notably the accelerations to drop Contador and Valverde, that I wonder if he actually went with too little power at the start of the climb, because he felt bad or underestimated his shape. It didn't look like such an even paced effort.
I said this before about the climb to Ventoux when the data was leaked, when you could see Froome basically held around 435W the entire way bar a few accelerations. I think the way the big climbs are being raced today is different than the way it looks. The guys who were eating wind at the bottom of the climb (and this is Ventoux, the conditions are on the tin) were doing massive, massive watts. Riders aren't really upping the pace but maintaining it. Look at Gesink today, his first 4km were about 425W, his second 4km were about 432W. He didn't up the pace, he put in a little dig and maintained it, as the other riders began to slow down. When Quintana passed him it wasn't that he upped the pace, it was the Gesink did slow to about 400W those las 4km (excluding the downhill, including the sprint). I really think we describing all these races the wrong way.

What is happening, from the data, is that it seems that riders need to really go above threshold for a fair bit to hold the wheels, which since they're going so fast that matters even uphill. I think what Froome calculated is that it's better to hold an even tempo, since the steeps of Covadonga are so steep that drafting really stops to matter more than pacing (they were going at 15km/h for a fair bit in the middle). This is the main reason why team dynamics start to matter more than ever. It's not about just how good your superdomestique is, it's about having multiple guys who can burn themselves one at a time against the wind at almost 7W/kg while their lead riders can maintain an even tempo. So everyone is basically slowing down, relative to the gradient, as time goes on, bar maybe one or two guys. I would bet that Froome basically held the same power output that entire climb.
But surely holding the same power output is not the quickest way to climb something like Lagos. I think optimal pacing would be to go slightly over threshold on the steepest bits and recover on the flatter or downhill sections. He also did two big accelerations to drop Contador and Valverde towards the end, so was wasting more energy there.

I think he tried to be too clever and actually ended up going too slowly too early, which left himself having to go into alien mod and take the wind in the entire 5km after La Huesera, towing Valverde at the same time.
 
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Libertine Seguros said:
ontheroad said:
Froome is the most peculiar race rider I've ever seen with yis yo-yo-ing on mountains. How would he cope without his power meter?
How much do you remember of Carlos Sastre? He's pretty much the poster boy for letting go early on and reappearing near the front at the end ahead of loads of people who'd been dropped long after him.
I was going to post the same, he was known for that, just look at the 2010 Zoncolan stage.
Monster performance by Quintana and Yoyo Froome is always fun to watch.
Gutted for Gesink, but really happy for Scarponi.
Felline is a pretty good climber with great recovery, Vegard Stake Laengen on the other hand did really well, the guy's 80kg heavy, but after all the guy finished 4th overall in the 2011 Tour De L'avenir, for such a big guy he has always been a great climber.
 
Re: 2016 Vuelta a España, stage 10: Lugones > Lagos de Covad

Lookiing sweet for Froome, he appears stronger than Quintana. If Nario has ambitions for a red tunic at the end in Madrid, he needs to devestate Froome 2 or three times, Froome is simply waiting.
 
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Valv.Piti said:
Was Sastre ever that extreme? Something tells me it was on Verbier in 2009, but I really don't remember enough.
Just watch the 2010 Zoncolan stage, he got dropped right at the start of the real climb and still finished 6th.
 
Re: 2016 Vuelta a España, stage 10: Lugones > Lagos de Covad

This Charming Man said:
Lookiing sweet for Froome, he appears stronger than Quintana. If Nario has ambitions for a red tunic at the end in Madrid, he needs to devestate Froome 2 or three times, Froome is simply waiting.

Froome has one huge shot at Calp, but Nairo has a huge shot the day after, so that is something hard to tell at this moment, third week is massive, so it doesn't matter how much time you have today, but how you are peaking on third week, if Nairo wants a shot, I believe he will need about 2 mins before Calp.

But Movistar has two shots, and Valverde is still a dark horse, he can also outperform Froome at Calp.

Froome can't wait, he must attack if he wants to win.
 
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DFA123 said:
But surely holding the same power output is not the quickest way to climb something like Lagos. I think optimal pacing would be to go slightly over threshold on the steepest bits and recover on the flatter or downhill sections. He also did two big accelerations to drop Contador and Valverde towards the end, so was wasting more energy there.

I think he tried to be too clever and actually ended up going too slowly too early, which left himself having to go into alien mod and take the wind in the entire 5km after La Huesera, towing Valverde at the same time.
Probably. But Lagos is a fairly even climb after the Santuario, in a way. It's all basically around 9% bar the downhill, the flat bit at Mirador de la Reina and the steep ramps before and after that. He let go much earlier than those ramps, and had teammates for much of those "less steep" bits.

I really doubt he cared that much about towing Bala, I think he just dropped him so as not to be pipped at the line. I think the two riders that he was minding were Quintana and Contador, and he definitely seems to have paced himself than Contador. Being one of the the bigger GC contenders here he might actually benefited from going hard at the Mirador de la Reina flat, where Quintana was doing most of the pulling up front. Bottom line, I doubt he ended up spending much more time in the wind than Quintana. And he only made two real accelerations, Quintana must've made half a dozen, besides the more taxing lead in.

Assuming they ended up spending a similar amount against the wind, and yet he lost a few seconds, would he have eventually blown under Quintana's attacks, like Contador did today and like he did on Saturday ? It's hard to say. I think he would've, but YMMV.
 
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Mayomaniac said:
Valv.Piti said:
Was Sastre ever that extreme? Something tells me it was on Verbier in 2009, but I really don't remember enough.
Just watch the 2010 Zoncolan stage, he got dropped right at the start of the real climb and still finished 6th.

Man, I have to now, don't I? I'd honestly much rather watch Verbier now, I guess some nostalgic Contador fans would prefer the same today. ;)
 
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Re: Re:

Valv.Piti said:
Mayomaniac said:
Valv.Piti said:
Was Sastre ever that extreme? Something tells me it was on Verbier in 2009, but I really don't remember enough.
Just watch the 2010 Zoncolan stage, he got dropped right at the start of the real climb and still finished 6th.

Man, I have to now, don't I? I'd honestly much rather watch Verbier now, I guess some nostalgic Contador fans would prefer the same today. ;)
Nope, watching Basso on the Zoncolan is way better. :p
 
Re: Re:

Valv.Piti said:
Mayomaniac said:
Valv.Piti said:
Was Sastre ever that extreme? Something tells me it was on Verbier in 2009, but I really don't remember enough.
Just watch the 2010 Zoncolan stage, he got dropped right at the start of the real climb and still finished 6th.

Man, I have to now, don't I? I'd honestly much rather watch Verbier now, I guess some nostalgic Contador fans would prefer the same today. ;)

What?! Come on, nothing is better than watching Basso go into beast mode and destroy the rest on the mighty sloped :p
 

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