Teams & Riders Alberto Contador Discussion Thread

[May0maniac]

Re: Re:

I think he'll stretch his legs on Chalet-Reynard already

At this point I expect them to go around Ventoux, honestly

The weather should be nice durning the rest of Paris-Nice, around 14°C and sunshine in Bedoin on Friday, so that shouldn't be a problem.

 

[cellardoor]

Ok, rest day out of the way - now for a 100km attack on stage 5?

 

[Hugo Koblet]

Stupid Majka getting the stage cancelled. I still hope for a show Saturday.

 

[Taxus4a]

There is a long and quite hard mountain finishm and other difficult tages and Contador fans say this is over jut for 20 seconds with his main rivals?

Yes, you really rely on him.

Uran has lost today 2 minutes in Tirreno by a crash and I stiil dont think is over, but of course, I think is almost over.. but it is not the same.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re:

Stupid Majka getting the stage cancelled. I still hope for a show Saturday.

 

[Matteo.]

Re:

There is a long and quite hard mountain finishm and other difficult tages and Contador fans say this is over jut for 20 seconds with his main rivals?

Yes, you really rely on him.

Uran has lost today 2 minutes in Tirreno by a crash and I stiil dont think is over, but of course, I think is almost over.. but it is not the same.

We also be must realistic , not just fanatical fans in here. Objectively ,next stages doesn't favor too much him. 30s on MTF are many to gain on so gentle slopes. And in the final stage ,he needs an exploit of high level.
i have faith in him, as always , but it will be a tough job win P-N.
then i'm interested in a stage win, i always said that.

 

[Red Rick]

Winning Paris Nice matters for like a couple of weeks. at the end of the year, nobody's gonna care. He'd either have won or lost the Tour (only Olympic gold would be some salvation really). This is only an indication of form, so if he shows up on Saturday, it doesn't matter whether he wins PN or not.

 

[Matteo.]

Exactly red rick

 

[hrotha]

Re:

Winning Paris Nice matters for like a couple of weeks. at the end of the year, nobody's gonna care. He'd either have won or lost the Tour (only Olympic gold would be some salvation really). This is only an indication of form, so if he shows up on Saturday, it doesn't matter whether he wins PN or not.

What.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Of course wins in one-week stage races matter too.

 

[BlurryVII]

Re:

Winning Paris Nice matters for like a couple of weeks. at the end of the year, nobody's gonna care. He'd either have won or lost the Tour (only Olympic gold would be some salvation really). This is only an indication of form, so if he shows up on Saturday, it doesn't matter whether he wins PN or not.

Surely a Tour win is overwhelming but a PN win matters too. It'd show he did a great season overall not just Tour.

Even though, he still hasn't had the opportunity to show anything until now apart from Malhao.

 

[Matteo.]

Yeah , it's always important. But now at the end of career , i don't think winning 2 or 3 P-N it will be essential for him
But winning another Tour at 33 y.o. against people like Quintana or Froome in their best ages...meh , it' s a little bit different

 

[BlurryVII]

Tinkoff is gonna make the race super hard on the steeper climbs before madonne d'utelle, then he can attack on the first half of the climb. If he is in great shape, there's no way anyone will follow him on such long climb especially if the stage is ridden hard beforehand.
I don't really understand why is this so underrated.

 

[LaFlorecita]

I just don't think he is already in good enough shape to pull something like that off.. he needs more stamina

 

[BlurryVII]

Re:

I just don't think he is already in good enough shape to pull something like that off.. he needs more stamina

He had enough stamina in Tirreno 14' to pull off that amazing attack, don't see why he couldn't now. Unless he is in worse 'March' form which would be bad news.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re: Re:

I just don't think he is already in good enough shape to pull something like that off.. he needs more stamina

He had enough stamina in Tirreno 14' to pull off that amazing attack, don't see why he couldn't now. Unless he is in worse 'March' form which would be bad news.

True, but it was a different stage and a different race against different opponents.. I guess we will see.

 

[Taxus4a]

Re:

Yeah , it's always important. But now at the end of career , i don't think winning 2 or 3 P-N it will be essential for him
But winning another Tour at 33 y.o. against people like Quintana or Froome in their best ages...meh , it' s a little bit different

Contador is in a better age than Quintana to win le Tour.

 

[Taxus4a]

Re: Re:

There is a long and quite hard mountain finishm and other difficult tages and Contador fans say this is over jut for 20 seconds with his main rivals?

Yes, you really rely on him.

Uran has lost today 2 minutes in Tirreno by a crash and I stiil dont think is over, but of course, I think is almost over.. but it is not the same.

. Objectively ,next stages doesn't favor too much him.t.

Bahamontes must laugh a lot...with just one mountain finish like that in every Tour he rode he would have won all of them.

Today people as Thomas or Dumoulin maybe had more options.

30 second with Mathews, not with the favourites, and there are bonus if I am not wrong.

There was a time where the hardest stage was the last one in Nice.

This kind of mountains finish are news in Paris Nice.

He is the climber, and he has a stage with 5 second cat. climbs and 2 first cat, with a final for climbers. if he cant drop people there, he doesnt deserve to win this race.

I think Dumoulin can do it very well, and Thomas as well, but Thomas was very well in Swiss in an HC finish similar to Mortirolo and Dumoulin very well in Andorra and Asturias.

 

[Taxus4a]

Thiss climb has that km at almost 10 % were you have no excuse to drop people and later you have km enough to put a bug difference. Even in the last Km Contador could put some time, with bonus enough to get the yellow.

One of the stage contador put more time to the rest (except Rujano) was in the Giro, in Etna, 50 seconds with Nibali,...

See the slopes, even you dont have that Km at more than 9.

 

[BlurryVII]

What are the bonus seconds on the finish line?

 

[sacrifice&hardwork]

What are the bonus seconds on the finish line?

They're 10-6-4 at the finish line.

 

[MortiroloForever]

I think that Contador is, alongside with Fabian Cancellara, the most unpredictable rider in the bunch. You never can say a race is over if Contador is in the bussiness. The experience and the facts say that he can blown up every single race where he takes part when nobody expects. For instance, the Paris-Nice he lost against Luis León: he attacked in the last stage and put in serious troubles the leader's team.

I think he is going to try something different next days (if he needs to take time on his rivals), but it's truth that the parcours doesn't perfectly fits him.

 

[MortiroloForever]

Re: Re:

Yeah , it's always important. But now at the end of career , i don't think winning 2 or 3 P-N it will be essential for him
But winning another Tour at 33 y.o. against people like Quintana or Froome in their best ages...meh , it' s a little bit different

Contador is in a better age than Quintana to win le Tour.

Are you sure?

For example, Indurain was retired from cycling at Contador's current age.

Gilberto Simoni, a long-lived cyclist won his last Giro d'Italia at the age of 32. He still was a big contender next 2 years (2004 & 2005, that close race against Savoldelli), but his performances were drowning down little by litlle.

I think riders mature earlier these days. Miguel Indurain won his first Tour when he was 27-28 years old. Quintana has won the Giro and he has been podium twice in Paris and he actually is 26 y.o.

 

[Taxus4a]

Re: Re:

Yeah , it's always important. But now at the end of career , i don't think winning 2 or 3 P-N it will be essential for him
But winning another Tour at 33 y.o. against people like Quintana or Froome in their best ages...meh , it' s a little bit different

Contador is in a better age than Quintana to win le Tour.

Are you sure?

For example, Indurain was retired from cycling at Contador's current age.

Gilberto Simoni, a long-lived cyclist won his last Giro d'Italia at the age of 32. He still was a big contender next 2 years (2004 & 2005, that close race against Savoldelli), but his performances were drowning down little by litlle.

I think riders mature earlier these days. Miguel Indurain won his first Tour when he was 27-28 years old. Quintana has won the Giro and he has been podium twice in Paris and he actually is 26 y.o.

You put examples of another era. I am not going to talk more about that here, if you want I can explain you in private.

Amyway you talk about Simoni and in the ame era you can find Garzelli till 40 years old, and he did his best year with 36 http://www.cqranking.com/men/asp/gen/rider.asp?riderid=37

Zulle in the era of Induran performed his best year with 34.

But Goss has retired in fact of top level cycling, he has money...what you want to say with the age of some people retirement. there are very different examples long time ago and now.

26 years old is a very good age to face le Tour, but 33 as well, and with the advantage of the experience. 30 is the best IMO, but every rider has a different story.

Evans has won le Tour with 35 (but that is not a question of his best age, he did better performes previoulsly), Valverde has done his best result in le Tour with 34.

You can performe very well above 40 as lot of riders as Horner, Voigt, Rebellin,... has showed.

 

[cellardoor]

Aside from the prestige of P-N itself I think getting a GC win against Porte and Thomas would be an important confidence booster. Still, if he wins a stage and shows good form then I'll be pretty happy even if he doesn't win the GC.