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Question Best male rider of the year 2020

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And van der Poel didn't obliterate the cross scene in January (if we're gonna bring other disciplines into this)?

I'll admit I hadn't thought of Ganna but no way is van der Poel's spot undeserved, are you kidding me?
No, i'm completely serious. Ganna's road season had already started before his WCC on the track, but even if you don't care about that, then he was still much more dominant over a longer period. Mathieu had 2 great wins, in two weeks time, and other than that his road season was mostly underwhelming. Not enough to be considered rider of the year, in my book.
 
1 - Roglic => Amazing regularity, and high number of stages win on top of it.
2 - WVA => Could be first with Ronde/WCC win. Amazing year all around, surprised me on Mountains.

3 - Pogacar => Winning TDF without team, impressive.
4 - Alaphilippe => Great where he was excepted. Sad about the pre celebrations, and the Ronde incident.

And for 5th, I'd say Ganna because he was an absolute monster in every ITT.

But it's really 1 and 2, there is a clear gap between them and 3-10.
 
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No, i'm completely serious. Ganna's road season had already started before his WCC on the track, but even if you don't care about that, then he was still much more dominant over a longer period. Mathieu had 2 great wins, in two weeks time, and other than that his road season was mostly underwhelming. Not enough to be considered rider of the year, in my book.

I'm not saying that van der Poel was the rider of the year.

You began bringing other disciplines in, and when I do you just dismiss it.

So what if Ganna's road season had started before his win on the track, he didn't do anything on the road before the corona break. What kind of an argument is that?

Van der Poel also destroyed the opposition at his nationals.
 
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World champion.

I really don't think you can just dismiss it with a lol.

He was strongest in Liège, MSR and on par in Flanders. What more do you want? Of course his level in the Tour was disappointing.
To me it's about results, and there's basically no way Alaphilippes results are the best unless the criteria are super specific and cherry picked to benefit Alaphilippe.

Like a 2nd place in Sanremo is more than the difference between a Worlds and a Tour win, but then the difference between Worlds and a monument is bigger than Strade, and 2nd place in De Ronde, Worlds ITT and Worlds RR in the case of Van Aert, or flatout Worlds >> Vuelta + Monument in the case of Roglic, both of which are preposterous IMO.
 
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If we say "best male rider" I would actually vote Pogacar, because he was so on top of Roglic during the Tour. We will remember the time trial, but that was not the only occasion that he was better. He won three (!) stages. Had he not lost time due to crosswinds, had he had a team as strong as Roglic's... he would have dominated the race.
Also Roglic won LBL due to Alaphilippe's behaviour, he was not the best rider in that group that arrived together, and Pogacar might also have been stronger at the WC, but maybe felt the need to give something to Roglic because he had already won the Tour and Roglic was very much a friend to him during the Tour.
Of course Roglic's ability to keep it up this whole time is extremely impressive, and he was a fighter, but since Pogacar was clearly better than him for weeks and won the most prestigious race with a lesser team I could not vote anyone else but Pogacar here.

Van Aert has simply blown my mind. He was the best all-rounder this year, but in terms of peak results and peak performance he's behind Pogacar for me.

Alaphilippe has impressed, reached his major career goal so far and has the ability to just ride away from everyone on the steepest gradients. He's the world champ and wasn't far from winning three monuments - however he did not win them and that was not just because of bad luck. He just wasn't the best rider in this year of amazing performances.

Fuglsang - no. Hirschi - no. van der Poel - no. Evenepoel - his whole season was an incredible promise, but still more a promise compared to the others who faced the hardest competition in the hardest races. Hart - lol. I would also have included them in the top10, I would also include Ganna, but there are four 10star-riders of this year and among those Pogacar was the outstanding bang boom rider for me.
 
To me it's about results, and there's basically no way Alaphilippes results are the best unless the criteria are super specific and cherry picked to benefit Alaphilippe.

Like a 2nd place in Sanremo is more than the difference between a Worlds and a Tour win, but then the difference between Worlds and a monument is bigger than Strade, and 2nd place in De Ronde, Worlds ITT and Worlds RR in the case of Van Aert, or flatout Worlds >> Vuelta + Monument in the case of Roglic, both of which are preposterous IMO.

Oh, to me it's not just about results, at all.

Which is why Van Aert takes it for me.
 
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I'm not saying that van der Poel was the rider of the year.

You began bringing other disciplines in, and when I do you just dismiss it.

So what if Ganna's road season had started before his win on the track, he didn't do anything on the road before the corona break. What kind of an argument is that?

Van der Poel also destroyed the opposition at his nationals.
No, you argued Ganna's WCC track win was not valid, so then disregard it and his season was still much more impressive over a significant longer period.

Not sure what the drama is for. I simply think that if you are to make a list of 5 to 10 riders to be considered rider of the year, that van der Poel and Fuglsang shouldn't be on it. They both got one big win, and were mostly invisible the rest of the year.
 
No, you argued Ganna's WCC track win was not valid, so then disregard it and his season was still much more impressive over a significant longer period.

Not sure what the drama is for. I simply think that if you are to make a list of 5 to 10 riders to be considered rider of the year, that van der Poel and Fuglsang shouldn't be on it. They both got one big won, and were mostly invisible the rest of the year.

There's just no way van der Poel was invisible for the rest of the year.

It's only because you pay so much attention to him and was disappointed throughout August and September that you say that. For any neutral observer he would absolutely deserve a spot on this list (I genuinely believe that to be the case, and it's not just because I made the list; I'm actually shocked to be so challenged regarding him, I had expected people to be more critical towards my picks of Remco, Tao, Hirschi and Fuglsang).

And him being ridiculously dominant in January (and the nationals in August) also shows that it wasn't only in the span of three weeks that he performed. And even if it was, his results alone would still put him in the top 10 of best riders with wins in a monument and a one-week WT race (of which there were only quite few this year).
 
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Alaphillipe is the best rider in the world. World champion and should have won 3 monuments.
Roglic gets it this year results wise, even though it's hard to swallow.

This is not a vote about results, though, it's about ability/performance level.

That's why I chose the word best, not most successful, then obviously there's no doubt it's Roglic.
 
There are really only two contenders for this, the two guys who each won two of the biggest nine races. I don’t see how anyone else can be in the conversation, unless you just rate the Tour so highly that the winner is always the rider of the year, but then it seems a bit pointless to have a rider of the year.
He should have won Liege imo and the Vuelta is by far the least prestigious GT
 
There's just no way van der Poel was invisible for the rest of the year.

It's only because you pay so much attention to him and was disappointed throughout August and September that you say that. For any neutral observer he would absolutely deserve a spot on this list (I genuinely believe that to be the case, and it's not just because I made the list; I'm actually shocked to be so challenged regarding him, I had expected people to be more critical towards my picks of Remco, Tao, Hirschi and Fuglsang).

And him being ridiculously dominant in January (and the nationals in August) also shows that it wasn't only in the span of three weeks that he performed. And even if it was, his results alone would still put him in the top 10 of best riders with wins in a monument and a one-week WT race (of which there were only quite few this year).
If Alaphilippe doesn't boycot the LBL finish, Hirschi wins it and you would not even say something like that. Hirschi was great in the TDF, won a stage, won FW as well. He basically got robbed. Does that make him a lesser rider this year? So i don't agree with that. Like i said, i wouldn't have included Fuglsang either. I could understand if Remco weren't on the list, due to him getting injured before the big races came around, but he was ultimately dominating over many months in many races, so for me he "could" be on the list (though i wouldn't vote for him). Anyway, this is a pointless discussion. You think he needs to be on the list, i don't agree. Moving on.
 
Throwing it out there as we're apparently looking for a 10th, but if (big if) Sam Bennett wins tomorrow in Madrid, does he deserve a spot? It's certainly between him and Demarre for the top sprinter of the year, and I would think 2 GT final stage wins would clinch it (I know Demarre really didn't have a chance for even 1).



(Frantically checks PCS to verify that Bennett did, in fact, finish 2nd last today, and will start tomorrow)
 
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Originally I thought, yeah it's Roglic and any other answer is just wrong, but I like the point @BlueRoads made. Pogacar beat Roglic in the Vuelta and is arguably more likely to win LBL if Alaphilippe doesn't pull of his sprinting shenanigans. So if he was better in the Tour and better in LBL, is Roglic really the right choice? Roglic was certainly the most succesful rider of the season but I'm not sure he was the strongest.

That aside, I think Alaphilippe might also be in the discussion for this if things had gone a bit differently. The WC RR completely saved his season, but he also only lost MSR in a photo finish, crashed out while being in a great position in the Ronde and did whatever he did in the LBL sprint. If things go slightly differently Alaphilippe wins not just the WC RR but also 3/4 monuments of the season, with the 4th taking place during the Tour. That would have been completely unprecedented in modern cycling.
Of course we all know, it didn't happen like that, but I'm just saying, if a few coin tosses had gone the other way this discussion would be a very different one.

Also shout out to Evenepoel. You can't really vote for him if his biggest win was the Tour de Pologne, but the way he was looking up to his crash was nothing short of scary. I'm pretty confident he would have won the Giro he was looking like the favorite for the worlds too. I'm super excited to see what he can do next season.
 
Originally I thought, yeah it's Roglic and any other answer is just wrong, but I like the point @BlueRoads made. Pogacar beat Roglic in the Vuelta and is arguably more likely to win LBL if Alaphilippe doesn't pull of his sprinting shenanigans. So if he was better in the Tour and better in LBL, is Roglic really the right choice? Roglic was certainly the most succesful rider of the season but I'm not sure he was the strongest.

That aside, I think Alaphilippe might also be in the discussion for this if things had gone a bit differently. The WC RR completely saved his season, but he also only lost MSR in a photo finish, crashed out while being in a great position in the Ronde and did whatever he did in the LBL sprint. If things go slightly differently Alaphilippe wins not just the WC RR but also 3/4 monuments of the season, with the 4th taking place during the Tour. That would have been completely unprecedented in modern cycling.
Of course we all know, it didn't happen like that, but I'm just saying, if a few coin tosses had gone the other way this discussion would be a very different one.

Also shout out to Evenepoel. You can't really vote for him if his biggest win was the Tour de Pologne, but the way he was looking up to his crash was nothing short of scary. I'm pretty confident he would have won the Giro he was looking like the favorite for the worlds too. I'm super excited to see what he can do next season.

Pedant note; 4 of the top 10 at Lombardia also rode and finished the Tour.

I have a problem with Evenepoel being on the list. Yes he looked unplayable before his crash, but he did crash, and ruled himself out of all the big races on which the best rider of the year is normally judged. You wouldn't name someone the best player of the World Cup just because he scored 10 goals in qualifying and then missed the tournament.
 
Pedant note; 4 of the top 10 at Lombardia also rode and finished the Tour.

I have a problem with Evenepoel being on the list. Yes he looked unplayable before his crash, but he did crash, and ruled himself out of all the big races on which the best rider of the year is normally judged. You wouldn't name someone the best player of the World Cup just because he scored 10 goals in qualifying and then missed the tournament.
Again; it's about the best rider, not the most successful.
 
Again; it's about the best rider, not the most successful.
Well then we need to include someone Remi Cavagna for all his solo breakaways. Even if he wasn't a GC threat, no way the likes of Roglic holds a 20s lead over a peloton for the last 30km of a stage.


Also, disagree with me if you will, but I still see "not falling off a bridge and smashing your leg into tiny pieces" as a relevant criterion when judging the best rider.
 

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