2020 Giro d'Italia, Stage 1: Monreale – Palermo 15 km ITT

[Volderke]

Almeida 57,46 km/h.
Unless the kid has become one of the strongest TTers in the world overnight, I'm pretty confident the record will fall.

I hope so. I bet on the TT being >58K/hr.
But I don't think the record will be broken (if I'm not mistaken, it was close to 59 K/hr).

For 58 K/hr, someone should go 9 seconds faster than Almeida. I think Almeida is a good TT (I won't be surprised if he is top 5 today), and the first part is as much about bike handling (the hairpins), so he probably won't lose too much in that part. The second part has some curves: 6x90-degree and 1x 180 degree. They inevitably loose speed, especially because it is downtown Palermo so not the best surface probably.

Rik Verbrugghe's record TT was only a bit over 7K, tail wind and I think only 1 curve.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Brian Smith pointing out nobody complained the course was dangerous yesterday, so it's entirely the addition of the wind that has changed people's minds. Although that contradicts Campenaerts who said that everything was fine up to those hairpins, and there is oil on the road, which would explain the trepidation more and suggest there's more to it than "the riders don't want to do descent TTs and so will portray them as dangerous" which is an attitude which could easily develop otherwise. Smith then counterpunches that by pointing out Campenaerts is the only one to crash there yet, and that is then counterpunched by Yates having to make corrections while taking the corner super carefully.

 

[Volderke]

You confuse making a factual statement (the disc breaks are a help) with bragging.
The hairpin is very oily in places, apparently. He didn't crash because he braked too late, he crashed because he hit a greasy patch.

Not at all. His angle/speed in the corner was way too much, unless he thought he was riding motoGP.

And from what I have seen (in all kinds of races), Campenaerts isn't the best bike handler.
If we see more riders crash on that corner, it could be blamed on oil. If we don't, it's clearly Campenaert's fault, and I feel he is making up excuses, mentioning oil and complaining about the course.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Yates not blitzing the uphill

 

[Red Rick]

Yates committed to do 16km in a 15km ITT

 

[SafeBet]

He's always been an excellent TT'er as a youth, it is a short ITT, he's been flying all year (Burgos & Algarve)... He won't win it, but he won't be far from the top contenders.

Define far. He was almost a minute slower than Dennis over 20 km in the Algarve TT (when he was "flying").

If that's still his level, Ganna can go under 15 minutes.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Brian Smith pointing out nobody complained the course was dangerous yesterday, so it's entirely the addition of the wind that has changed people's minds. Although that contradicts Campenaerts who said that everything was fine up to those hairpins, and there is oil on the road, which would explain the trepidation more and suggest there's more to it than "the riders don't want to do descent TTs and so will portray them as dangerous" which is an attitude which could easily develop otherwise. Smith then counterpunches that by pointing out Campenaerts is the only one to crash there yet.

Riders generally don’t want to do descent TTs because in almost all circumstances they are a stupid idea. This one has going for it that the descent part is basically a straight line on a wide highway so it wasn’t perceived as dangerous in the same way at least until the wind got up.

 

[LaFlorecita]

I hope the gusts of wind aren't becoming too dangerous (riding a disc with sidewind on a 100K/hr downhill isn't really comforting!).
Campenaerts' crash however was purely about braking enough before the corner.
He bragged before the TT that his bike had disc wheels and thus he could brake faster than Ganna on rim brakes (and thus would gain some seconds in the hairpins).
That backfired quickly.

Not to mention his ridiculous claim that Ganna weighing 90 kg vs his 68 kg was somehow an advantage. Of course Ganna weighs much less than 90 kg and anyway, how is weighing less an advantage on a descent?

 

[Netserk]

Tour de Suisse should bring back the Lugano prologue. Descents in ITTs are great.

 

[Red Rick]

Not to mention his ridiculous claim that Ganna weighing 90 kg vs his 68 kg was somehow an advantage. Of course Ganna weighs much less than 90 kg and anyway, how is weighing less an advantage on a descent?

Before we judge, we must make a trip to the specific fantasyland where his low V cut looks cool

 

[Sestriere]

I have a feeling there are gonna be some weird results today..

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Tour de Suisse should bring back the Lugano prologue. Descents in ITTs are great.

they are like descent finales on sprint stages, a completely gratuitous way to make standard crashes much worse.

 

[Red Rick]

Dennis starting in 2 minutes.

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

Define far. He was almost a minute slower than Dennis over 20 km in the Algarve TT (when he was "flying").

If that's still his level, Ganna can go under 15 minutes.

Completely different ITT, and this time he is actually going for a GC i think. Not only is the ITT shorter, it is mostly downhill. Other than Ganna/Dennis, i don't think anybody will go over 20 sec faster.

 

[Eshnar]

Pretty good time by Yates

 

[spalco]

Not too bad for Yates.

 

[SafeBet]

16'13" for Yates.
Definitely not bad considering the circumstances.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

How much will he lose to Thomas? 45 seconds? 40?

 

[Red Rick]

Not too bad for Yates.

It's okay. Nothing crazy like commentators are saying.

I guess this ITT will have really small gaps for a 15km ITT between the different GC contenders.

 

[Jan the Man]

Decent time by Yates

 

[Volderke]

Not to mention his ridiculous claim that Ganna weighing 90 kg vs his 68 kg was somehow an advantage. Of course Ganna weighs much less than 90 kg and anyway, how is weighing less an advantage on a descent?

To be honest and correct, weighing more (or better: more weight for the same aerodynamics) will make you faster on a downhill.

 

[tobydawq]

Bad time from Yates (just to shake things up here in the comments).

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

It's okay. Nothing crazy like commentators are saying.

I guess this ITT will have really small gaps for a 15km ITT between the different GC contenders.

I think Thomas will want to take a meaningful chunk of time and if he doesn’t it’s not a great sign for him

 

[gatete]

I have no way of watching this race, any feed available?

 

[LaFlorecita]

To be honest and correct, weighing more (or better: more weight for the same aerodynamics) will make you faster on a downhill.

Exactly, but not in Campenaerts' world