Andrew and Fränk: The Official Schleck Brothers thread.

[The Hitch]

Andrew and Fränk: The Official Schleck Brothers thread.

We know their target is July. Andrew is the favourite, Frank a co favourite.

How is it looking.

Have to say Chapeau to Frank for that performance in Corsica. A great mountain performance and a very good tt to boot.

Andys tt was poor and some are saying "oh his tt is too poor, hell lose the Tour", but then his mountain form wasnt much either.

We know his climbing will improve big time in July. I say, why not his tting too?

 

[roundabout]

It's a good win in a not particularly deep field.

Andy looked pretty bad IMO on his TT bike today even compared to his brother. Strangely it used to be the other way around until last year

 

[BroDeal]

Without Riis cracking the whip, I don't expect Andy to do as well as Frank. Being with a group of friends who will be loathe to push him can only hurt someone with the mentality of Andy.

 

[RedheadDane]

Come July and we'll know.
Yeah. In case you haven't noticed I plainly refuse to play the predicting game!

And where did Andrew come from?

 

[Waterloo Sunrise]

Aoba

.

 

[theswordsman]

They said last summer that Frank had spent a lot of time earlier in the year working on his time trialing. I'm not sure how to read Andy losing 1:10 on a mountain stage to his brother. Andy is a Tour favorite mostly because in the off-season he made that claim at every opportunity.

It's tough for him to do that since racing has actually started. When he finished 41st at Tirenno-Adriatico, 14:34 behind Evans, he claim wouldn't be believable. But he said it in November, December, and January, and will some how come from no where in July, I guess. But Basso, the Giro winner, 24 seconds back on Evans at T-A, is more believable.

I hope Frank stays upright and has a healthy year.

 

[Sophistic]

I'm actually surprised how good Andys shape "already" is, he didnt perform that much better in June last year. He might suffer from an Anti-Ullrich syndrome, barely eats during the winter and early season and then at the of june goes on an eating orgy and bang is in great shape.

 

[roundabout]

Andy Schleck is a Tour favourite because of how he rides in July, not because of what he says.

 

[Christian]

And where did Andrew come from?

It comes - as many rider nicknames on the forum - from Wonderlance. I think the original line was "Andrew giving his bike a service"

They are both in pretty good shape, and their preparation has gone pretty much exactly according to plan so far, except maybe for Fränk's crash and DNF at Paris-Nice but it appears that didn't do any harm. As someone mentioned earlier they do not have 1 gram of fat too much right now. I therefore have humble hopes that their spring campain will be better than last year (which was a bit of a disaster).

The last couple of years Fränk always had a better early-season form than Andy: he had a nice win in California in front of Nibali and strong P-N performances. It appears he reaches his top-form faster than Andy, or else can keep it longer.

As for their TT'ing - Fränk has shown recently that he can limit his losses, one might even say hold his own, in TT's between 10 and 20 km, at least if we judge from TdS/Criterium. Nonetheless I was surprised to see him do so well today, as he usually does horribly in prologues, and had some problems with his new TT position in Paris-Nice. However once it gets longer than that he is pretty bad - as in the Vuelta last year for example.

Andy on the other hand sucks at TT's all year long, except at the ones in the end of GT's, where he does OK. I attribute this to the extra motivation he gets from the prospect of a podium finish or even a win (Giro 07 and Tour 10, also known as the "Sastre 2008 effect"), as well as the fact that one of his biggest strengths is his recovery. Because of his good recovery, he makes up a bit against others, who are smashed at the end of a GT.

Today I thought his position looked quite good for his standarts. His bad time might be due, among other factors, to bad legs, or the fact that he hit a gutter and almost crashed, or got distracted by a random car that got out of the way just in time in a roundabout

 

[The Hitch]

It comes - as many rider nicknames on the forum - from Wonderlance. I think the original line was "Andrew giving his bike a service"

Might as well put that in context. I think it was that Bertie (Contador) broke the rules of the sport, which date back to 1999 by attacking while Andrew (Schleck) was giving his bike a service".

Or words to that effect

Today I thought his position looked quite good for his standarts. His bad time might be due, among other factors, to bad legs, or the fact that he hit a gutter and almost crashed, or got distracted by a random car that got out of the way just in time in a roundabout

Wow. You saw all that. And it was only a 9 minute effort.Does Andy have some sort of hidden cam from which you watch his entire tt?

 

[The Hitch]

Today I thought his position looked quite good for his standarts. His bad time might be due, among other factors, to bad legs, or the fact that he hit a gutter and almost crashed, or got distracted by a random car that got out of the way just in time in a roundabout

Wow. You saw all that. And it was only a 9 minute effort.Does Andy have some sort of hidden cam from which you watch his entire tt?

 

[Christian]

Wow. You saw all that. And it was only a 9 minute effort.Does Andy have some sort of hidden cam from which you watch his entire tt?

I was watching it on TV and they were following him with a motorcycle ... the gutter incident was clearly visible, Laurent Jalabert said he got scared for a minute that he would crash. The car was in the next roundabout and was moving, although it was clearly not an official one. It stopped on the side after the exit that Andy took but I think the guy must have gotten pretty scared since he did not seem to know which way Andy would go

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Fränk looks to be a reasonable TTer these days and is a good climber, but I wouldn't call him a co-favourite for the Tour. He's not good enough.

Fränk is a very good rider in his own right, and can form a formidable double act with his brother because he's too dangerous to let up the road, but he is in the same position as other sporting 'older brothers' like Asier Olaizola and Simon Fourcade; he has to put in more effort to be 'almost as good as' his upstart brother, but also he is hyped and his abilities slightly exaggerated by association with their more successful brothers. Fränk may get on the podium if things go his way. If he couldn't win last year's Vuelta, I'll be shocked if he ever wins a Grand Tour. He isn't good enough.

He's a very, very good rider in his own right... but it would need to be a really weak field before he's a favourite at the Tour now.

 

[Christian]

Fränk looks to be a reasonable TTer these days and is a good climber, but I wouldn't call him a co-favourite for the Tour. He's not good enough.

Fränk is a very good rider in his own right, and can form a formidable double act with his brother because he's too dangerous to let up the road, but he is in the same position as other sporting 'older brothers' like Asier Olaizola and Simon Fourcade; he has to put in more effort to be 'almost as good as' his upstart brother, but also he is hyped and his abilities slightly exaggerated by association with their more successful brothers. Fränk may get on the podium if things go his way. If he couldn't win last year's Vuelta, I'll be shocked if he ever wins a Grand Tour. He isn't good enough.

He's a very, very good rider in his own right... but it would need to be a really weak field before he's a favourite at the Tour now.

By now he has collected a nice palmarès, and if he goes on for at least 5 more years by the end it should be pretty good. I hope he will collect some more smaller stage-race wins, so far he has Tour du Luxembourg, Tour de Suisse and Critérium.

Last year after TdS he was argueably in the form of his life, some said even above Andy, and he was nowhere near that at the Vuelta. He got 5th in two GT's, once with a screwed-up knee and once with a metal plate in his shoulder and after not racing for 1 month. A GT win is rather unlikely but a podium, especially at this year's TdF, is within his reach if he is in top form.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Fränk looks like he tries harder than Andy, no getting thrown off races for drinking for him, and his TT improvement has been clear and palpable. And he's capable of such good results when he applies himself, such as his Tour de Suisse victory (Lux is harder to rate because few people target it but it would be important to the Schlecks, and is early in the Tour preparation cycle, while CritInt is a similar level win at .HC) and his Ardennes palmarès. He has a pretty good palmarès which I consider to be in line with his talent. It isn't like Evans, who has only recently started compiling a palmarès that his enormous talent justifies. And then Andy comes along, laughs and jokes, looks like he isn't trying most of the year, but proves himself to be clearly more talented, and swans along to better results than Fränk can get.

They remind me so much of the Fourcade brothers that it hurts. Except obviously that Martin Fourcade tries hard in just as many races as Simon.

 

[Havetts]

I doubt that especially this year he'll be one of the podium contenders. There are better climbers than him, which have this years route written on their foreheads, if it werent this mountainous the better TT'rs of the top GC contenders can end above schleck, for example Menchov, once he gets invited, and Cadel .

 

[The Hitch]

Fränk looks to be a reasonable TTer these days and is a good climber, but I wouldn't call him a co-favourite for the Tour. He's not good enough.

Fränk is a very good rider in his own right, and can form a formidable double act with his brother because he's too dangerous to let up the road, but he is in the same position as other sporting 'older brothers' like Asier Olaizola and Simon Fourcade; he has to put in more effort to be 'almost as good as' his upstart brother, but also he is hyped and his abilities slightly exaggerated by association with their more successful brothers. Fränk may get on the podium if things go his way. If he couldn't win last year's Vuelta, I'll be shocked if he ever wins a Grand Tour. He isn't good enough.

He's a very, very good rider in his own right... but it would need to be a really weak field before he's a favourite at the Tour now.

Im not saying hes as good as Andy, but he is a favourite. If you were to put down 6 or 7 names who could win the Tour then hed be in there.

 

[El Pistolero]

That's not hard if some of the best climers aren't going to be there this Tour.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Meh. He won, good for him, but with the top 10 of that Col de l’Ospedale stage in view I think he was kinda obliged to win. Fränk.

You wouldn't expect Kiryenka, David Lopez, Geniez, Lagutin, Nordhaug, Rolland or Fedrigo to beat him, would you?
Only Taaramae is a noteworthy opponent in my opinion.

It only tells me that Fränk Schleck is in good shape, but this race tells me nothing, completely nothing, about the Tour or how Fränk would do against some actual competition.
I bet he is racing Pais Vasco. That will tell us more.

As for Andy, he is doing better than ever in preparation races, still nowhere near as good as he is in july. But he shows some effort he usually doesn't. Maybe he has trained a bit more this winter than usual.

 

[horizon27]

The Schleck's are boring,can't time trial very well can't sprint not great descenders.Very good climbers especially Andy,shouldn't a tour de France winner be a more complete cyclist than that.

I bet Contador will be in France in July and easily wins the tour by at least 5 mins.Last year was Andy's best ever chance of winning the TDF,the man can't even change gears properly.Oh thats why he is useing shimano Di2 gearing this year ,it still won't make any difference if Contador is there.

 

[pedaling squares]

Without Riis cracking the whip, I don't expect Andy to do as well as Frank. Being with a group of friends who will be loathe to push him can only hurt someone with the mentality of Andy.

Agreed. I'm interested to see how Andy will perform without what I saw as a paternal presence keeping him focused and prepared

They said last summer that Frank had spent a lot of time earlier in the year working on his time trialing. I'm not sure how to read Andy losing 1:10 on a mountain stage to his brother. Andy is a Tour favorite mostly because in the off-season he made that claim at every opportunity.

It's tough for him to do that since racing has actually started. When he finished 41st at Tirenno-Adriatico, 14:34 behind Evans, he claim wouldn't be believable. But he said it in November, December, and January, and will some how come from no where in July, I guess. But Basso, the Giro winner, 24 seconds back on Evans at T-A, is more believable.

I hope Frank stays upright and has a healthy year.

Andy's July results make the claim more than his statements. We saw him roll around Europe and California like a bored tourist last spring and he turned up in great shape for the tour. He gave Contador everything he could handle, and I don't care about 42 seconds here or 39 seconds there. Nobody else was a credible threat, but Andy kept up to him in the mountains. Considering that this tour has nearly no ITT km's it's hard not to think of Andy as the number one challenger. Assuming Contador even makes the sign-in.

 

[hrotha]

I like Fränk, he's a nice guy and takes racing more seriously than Andrew. Unfortunately he insists on giving joint interviews with his brother and the fans inevitably lump them together, so everyone assumes they're both idiots.

 

[The Hitch]

Meh. He won, good for him, but with the top 10 of that Col de l’Ospedale stage in view I think he was kinda obliged to win. Fränk.

You wouldn't expect Kiryenka, David Lopez, Geniez, Lagutin, Nordhaug, Rolland or Fedrigo to beat him, would you?
Only Taaramae is a noteworthy opponent in my opinion.
.

On the other hand, a big chapeau to Gesink for beatingt he likes of Edvald Boasson Hagen, Dries Devenyns, Visconti, Vandevelde, Van Avermaet TGBMM Albasini, Flecha and Sinkiewitz in the Oman mtf.

Its moments like those that you know whose going to be podiuming the Tour de France.

I like Fränk, he's a nice guy and takes racing more seriously than Andrew. Unfortunately he insists on giving joint interviews with his brother and the fans inevitably lump them together, so everyone assumes they're both idiots.

With your relatively consistant clinic opinions, isnt there a shadow that should be clouding your opinion of Frank?

 

[The Hitch]

I like Fränk, he's a nice guy and takes racing more seriously than Andrew. Unfortunately he insists on giving joint interviews with his brother and the fans inevitably lump them together, so everyone assumes they're both idiots.

With your relatively consistant clinic opinions, isnt there a shadow that should be clouding your opinion of Frank?

 

[Christian]

You wouldn't expect Kiryenka, David Lopez, Geniez, Lagutin, Nordhaug, Rolland or Fedrigo to beat him, would you?
Only Taaramae is a noteworthy opponent in my opinion.

Well if Sanchez, Klöden, Vinokourov and Wiggins can't deliver it's their own problem - doesn't necessarily diminish Fränk's win though IMO

It only tells me that Fränk Schleck is in good shape, but this race tells me nothing, completely nothing, about the Tour or how Fränk would do against some actual competition.
I bet he is racing Pais Vasco. That will tell us more.

Yes next races are GP Miggy and Pais Vasco