Teams & Riders Alberto Contador Discussion Thread

[Red Rick]

Re:

It's either GT 7 or GT 8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVC_g68nUpo

Sorry, but I couldn't resist, in both senses of the word

 

[damian13ster]

Re: Re:

Great day for Contador with Porte having that mechanical. Bert's chances to keep the maglia rosa after the TT are now much better. If so, the Giro is pretty much won and he won't have to go nuclear in the mountains and can just follow Aru and Porte, out-sprinting them in last 800m like he did with Froome last year. Meaning he can save energy for the Tour.

The double is ON

I hope you are right, but its still long way off


VAM9S

So what you are hoping for is worst win in GT history?
That would be in way worse style than Wiggins in Tour de France 2012 and Contador in Vuelta 2014.
At least in those mentioned cases time was gained in individual time trial, and then there was wheelsucking until the end.
In this case it would be time gained through Team Time Trial, opponent mechanical on pancake- flat stage and then wheelsucking until the end.

Don't get your thinking at all

 

[The_Cheech]

Re: Re:

Great day for Contador with Porte having that mechanical. Bert's chances to keep the maglia rosa after the TT are now much better. If so, the Giro is pretty much won and he won't have to go nuclear in the mountains and can just follow Aru and Porte, out-sprinting them in last 800m like he did with Froome last year. Meaning he can save energy for the Tour.

The double is ON

I hope you are right, but its still long way off


VAM9S

So what you are hoping for is worst win in GT history?
That would be in way worse style than Wiggins in Tour de France 2012 and Contador in Vuelta 2014.
At least in those mentioned cases time was gained in individual time trial, and then there was wheelsucking until the end.
In this case it would be time gained through Team Time Trial, opponent mechanical on pancake- flat stage and then wheelsucking until the end.

Don't get your thinking at all

Technically, if you wheelsuck "until the end" you do not win, it's a universal truth.

Froome rode his race and lost. Simple as that.

Cycling is easy: If you're in front, you can take a passive role and let others make the race entertaining. Froome tried and lost.

Let it go.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Haters gonna hate

 

[Publicus]

Lots of angry/irritable folks around the forum today after Porte lost time.

 

[SeriousSam]

Re: Re:

So what you are hoping for is worst win in GT history?
That would be in way worse style than Wiggins in Tour de France 2012 and Contador in Vuelta 2014.
At least in those mentioned cases time was gained in individual time trial, and then there was wheelsucking until the end.
In this case it would be time gained through Team Time Trial, opponent mechanical on pancake- flat stage and then wheelsucking until the end.

Don't get your thinking at all

My thinking is that I want him to arrive at the Tour in the best possible shape. I welcome anything that makes that more likely, such as Porte's mechanical today.

As long as there is no evidence Porte would have won the Giro without the one minute he admittedly lost through no fault of his own, I'll have no complaints.

If there is evidence Porte would have won otherwise, it would be quite an undeserved win indeed.

 

[damian13ster]

Re: Re:

Great day for Contador with Porte having that mechanical. Bert's chances to keep the maglia rosa after the TT are now much better. If so, the Giro is pretty much won and he won't have to go nuclear in the mountains and can just follow Aru and Porte, out-sprinting them in last 800m like he did with Froome last year. Meaning he can save energy for the Tour.

The double is ON

I hope you are right, but its still long way off


VAM9S

So what you are hoping for is worst win in GT history?
That would be in way worse style than Wiggins in Tour de France 2012 and Contador in Vuelta 2014.
At least in those mentioned cases time was gained in individual time trial, and then there was wheelsucking until the end.
In this case it would be time gained through Team Time Trial, opponent mechanical on pancake- flat stage and then wheelsucking until the end.

Don't get your thinking at all

Technically, if you wheelsuck "until the end" you do not win, it's a universal truth.

Froom rode his race and lost. Simple as that.

Cycling is easy: If you're in front, you can take a passive role and let others make the race entertaining. Froome tried and lost.

I agree with you, that's why I don't understand the hate for Wiggins and his Tour victory. That wouldn't make him an undeserving winner.
It would make it really boring though and as a neutral cycling spectator I don't want to see that. I want to see attacks all over the place and not race being decided by TTT and mechanical (if it really comes down to that)

 

[murali]

Porte lost time, not due to a mechanical, but due to a bad support by his team. there were two people in the rear while porte was going back. i have no idea why one of them didnt give their bike to him. in such a big team, if they cant help team leader by lending bike, i dont know wht sort of DS sky has.

having said that, this is also a big lesson for the team. AC has been mostly alone towards the end. i think the others have to realy step up and be close to AC when aru+landa attack next.

1' 09" is not a huge lead before ITT. i still feel that we will see real fireworks on stage 15.

 

[Publicus]

Re: Re:

Great day for Contador with Porte having that mechanical. Bert's chances to keep the maglia rosa after the TT are now much better. If so, the Giro is pretty much won and he won't have to go nuclear in the mountains and can just follow Aru and Porte, out-sprinting them in last 800m like he did with Froome last year. Meaning he can save energy for the Tour.

The double is ON

I hope you are right, but its still long way off


VAM9S

So what you are hoping for is worst win in GT history?
That would be in way worse style than Wiggins in Tour de France 2012 and Contador in Vuelta 2014.
At least in those mentioned cases time was gained in individual time trial, and then there was wheelsucking until the end.
In this case it would be time gained through Team Time Trial, opponent mechanical on pancake- flat stage and then wheelsucking until the end.

Don't get your thinking at all

Technically, if you wheelsuck "until the end" you do not win, it's a universal truth.

Froom rode his race and lost. Simple as that.

Cycling is easy: If you're in front, you can take a passive role and let others make the race entertaining. Froome tried and lost.

I agree with you, that's why I don't understand the hate for Wiggins and his Tour victory. That wouldn't make him an undeserving winner.
It would make it really boring though and as a neutral cycling spectator I don't want to see that. I want to see attacks all over the place and not race being decided by TTT and mechanical (if it really comes down to that)

well now that Porte is down 1'+ to Contador, the likelihood that there will be lots of attacks pre-Stage 14 (Porte) and after (Aru and possibly Contador), I would say you have nothing to complain about.

 

[Electress]

Does anyone think there may be an Astana /Tinkoff alliance formed to distance Porte before the ITT? They've done so to get rid of Rigo, and I can see it would benefit both to remove another contender if possible.

It will be interesting to see how Porte responds - if he's got the mental toughness of Contador (well, no, that is probably asking too much, but at least can not panic / over-react or crack up etc.)

 

[LeindersGains]

Re: Re:

Great day for Contador with Porte having that mechanical. Bert's chances to keep the maglia rosa after the TT are now much better. If so, the Giro is pretty much won and he won't have to go nuclear in the mountains and can just follow Aru and Porte, out-sprinting them in last 800m like he did with Froome last year. Meaning he can save energy for the Tour.

The double is ON

I hope you are right, but its still long way off


VAM9S

So what you are hoping for is worst win in GT history?
That would be in way worse style than Wiggins in Tour de France 2012 and Contador in Vuelta 2014.
At least in those mentioned cases time was gained in individual time trial, and then there was wheelsucking until the end.
In this case it would be time gained through Team Time Trial, opponent mechanical on pancake- flat stage and then wheelsucking until the end.

Don't get your thinking at all

Yeah because Contador didn't attack before the two mountain stages where they battled against each other? Skybots like you with delusional disorder try to pretend stage 9, 11 and 15 didn't exist. Contador attacked all the time.

Your boy Porte has wheelsucked himself through the entire Giro and now you are crying because he is losing "unfair" time. At the same time, you were happy when Contador was hurting his shoulder, because that's a part of the "game".

 

[murali]

2' min on Uran is not a safe gap for a 59km flat+hilly TT. Uran wil probably win this long TT with over a min on other TT specialists and over 2 min on other GC contenders.

If aru and bertie distanced porte in an mountain stage, they will work together as long as contador is sure that aru wont get too much time bonuses.

 

[Miburo]

Contador is gonna destroy Porte anyways, let the skyboys talk.

What happened today won't make the difference, besides didn't contador fall in a stage? Yea i prefer that than losing a bit of time...

Pathetic skyboys.

 

[Miburo]

Re:

2' min on Uran is not a safe gap for a 59km flat+hilly TT. Uran wil probably win this long TT with over a min on other TT specialists and over 2 min on other GC contenders.

If aru and bertie distanced porte in an mountain stage, they will work together as long as contador is sure that aru wont get too much time bonuses.

LMAO First of all there's no TT spec in this race. None of the greats are here.

And you make it out that Uran is a ITT god. He performed really well in 1 ITT!

1! The vuelta one was really good too but not as crazy as the giro one.

I'm not convinced Uran is a froome in that 60km ITT. And Contador isn't a scrub either at it.

If Uran performs more 'normal' compared to last year and Contador rides a really good one, the gap won't be big at all.

 

[Fernandez]

What about Porte winning Volta Catalunya because Valverde was cut in the crash of that descent? Isnt it the same? The Volta had Valverdes name as the winner, he was the stronger. So dont complain too much, this is racing.

 

[Fernandez]

Crashes and mechanicals are part of the game. Even Pedro Delgado uses to remember that in his time they used to attack in the food zone. Cycling of today seems a little bit of a princess game.

 

[LeindersGains]

Re:

What about Porte winning Volta Catalunya because Valverde was cut in the crash of that descent? Isnt it the same? The Volta had Valverdes name as the winner, he was the stronger. So dont complain too much, this is racing.

Yep. Fat Contador was stronger than skinny Porte in that race too. But Porte counter-attacked him in the finish just like Contador did with Froome.

 

[Miburo]

Re:

What about Porte winning Volta Catalunya because Valverde was cut in the crash of that descent? Isnt it the same? The Volta had Valverdes name as the winner, he was the stronger. So dont complain too much, this is racing.

Contador could have won the double in 2011 without bad luck.

He could have won the tour in 2014 without bad luck.

That's the sport, i don't hear porte whining? Cause maybe he knows that's cycling.

That's life, grow up skyboys.

 

[No_Balls]

Re:

2' min on Uran is not a safe gap for a 59km flat+hilly TT. Uran wil probably win this long TT with over a min on other TT specialists and over 2 min on other GC contenders.

If aru and bertie distanced porte in an mountain stage, they will work together as long as contador is sure that aru wont get too much time bonuses.

Lol. And suddenly from nowhere we hear Uran. Where do you get everything from?

“It was a day of ‘active rest’, with a lot of tension in the finale, I’m pleased I got through it without any problems.” This compared sharply to his activity on the rest day where he revealed he had spent the bulk of the day sleeping “like a [hibernating] bear in winter.”

 

[Miburo]

I remember people saying the ITT comes after 2 easy weeks so recuperation won't be important so uran has the edge.

Well not true, the giro was until now really hard. That's a big advantage for Contador.

Btw we've 2 hard days now.

Tomorrow it's prob gonna be crazy again in the beginning with those 5 climbs.

 

[Fernandez]

Still remember all that Schleck chaingate. What a piece of crap. He attacked Contador and dropped his chain for his own fault. So what it supposed to do Contador? Stop and wait for Schleck. Like Carlos Sastre said at that time, that was a crying boys thing.

 

[murali]

I am still worried about worst case scenarios.

only plus point today: AC can wear a raincoat if it rains later on.

 

[Publicus]

Re:

Does anyone think there may be an Astana /Tinkoff alliance formed to distance Porte before the ITT? They've done so to get rid of Rigo, and I can see it would benefit both to remove another contender if possible.

It will be interesting to see how Porte responds - if he's got the mental toughness of Contador (well, no, that is probably asking too much, but at least can not panic / over-react or crack up etc.)

With Porte now being hit with a 2' penalty, Contador basically only has to defend his small margin over Aru, crush Aru in the ITT and then defend his lead the rest of the way. In fact, it is more likely that you see Tinkoff collude with Sky against Astana. Porte is a much bigger threat to Aru than he is to Contador.

 

[ray j willings]

Bertie on top form would be way to good. But I do not want him to win against his best rivals in a race by means of bad luck.

The only plus is if Bertie really is in tip top form then he can ease off a bit now.

Still a long way to go

 

[patrick24]

Re: Re:

I hope he chokes (for reasons I can't say on this forum).

Well aren't you nice.

Does anyone remember that time airstream said Contador should be shot in the head

I meant chokes as doesn't finish, not actually George Bush choking on a pretzel-type of choking.