airstream said:
In addition he had a chunk of team work on the Arcalis as well, that made him lose even more.
I have done a little more pondering about the Kloden, could he have finished higher at the '09 TDF debate.
If being 'rightfully' put higher in the team pecking order than Armstrong?!
I've decided that yes, Andreas was stronger than Lance in that Tour. He was stronger against the clock, and he was able to go with the three best climbers in the race on arguably the Tours toughest climb, the Col de Romme; whereas Armstrong, despite preferential team treatment, could certainly not go with the Schleck brothers. This means that no matter what tactics Bruyneel employed, Lance could not finish ahead of Andy in that Tour.
But could Astana still have enjoyed a 1-2?
Or even a 1-2-3 if Levi had not crashed out (It could be argued that Leipheimer was about as strong as Kloden in the race)?
What this boils down to is could Kloden have stayed with the Schlecks on stage 17 if he hadn't done earlier domestique work in the race? And how close could have he kept to Andy on Venteoux? There is no doubt that time would have been put into Kloden there, though he may have been a little stronger than he was, again given the removal of domestique duties.
On stage 1 Andreas put a handy 38 seconds into Andy. Another 40 seconds were picked up on the stage 4 TTT. But then on stage 7 Klodi lost 23 seconds to Andy. I will say that if he didn't have to do that little bit of work at the front (into the wind) that he loses 13 seconds instead.
The next differential comes on stage 15, where Kloden (doing a lot of work for Armstrong) lost 46 seconds. Without doing so much work I will say that Klodi finishers with Cadel Evans, which is only 3 seconds further up the road, but the argument is that he has more energy to hang on for the duration of stage 17.
On stage 18 Andreas picked up 51 seconds in the long ITT, not a particularly great result (one of many results that highlights that Andy Schleck is not
too bad in ITT's at the end of a TDF, so may still be able to push for another podium in 2012). But anyway, all of these hypothetical outcomes would lead to him having a 1:13 advantage going onto Mont Venteoux.
I guess that he just loses more than that (Andy was far stronger and would ride hard all the way up, but they rode into the wind and that may have taken some toll on him), but it would have been interesting.
This is the ultimate Klodi fanboy thread, where anything Andreas can be discussed, particularly during the off season
