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Better Win: Nibali 2014 TdF or Gilbert 2017 RVV

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Better Win?

  • Gilbert 2017 RVV where Sagan and GVA crashed

    Votes: 19 50.0%
  • Nibali 2014 TdF where Froome and Contador crashed

    Votes: 19 50.0%

  • Total voters
    38
Re:

DFA123 said:
That quote is all over the place. Makes no sense at all.

The only take away i see from it is that people were still fooled that Contador actually had a serious injury and wasn't training really hard for the month before the Vuelta. He was in best condition in the Vuelta, and was behind Quintana until the latter crashed out.

That was only because Tinkoff lost 19 seconds to Movistar in the team time trial, though. Contador had regained most of that time by the time trial (and Quintana hadn't been looking particularly good on the two summit finishes).
 
I love that the main evidence why Contador surely would have crushed Nibali, in a Tour where he had climbing times as impressive as Froome in 2013, is that on one climb he gained not one, not two but three (!!!) seconds on Nibali. And if these three (!!!) seconds aren't prove enough I don't know what could.
 
Re:

DFA123 said:
That quote is all over the place. Makes no sense at all.

The only take away i see from it is that people were still fooled that Contador actually had a serious injury and wasn't training really hard for the month before the Vuelta. He was in best condition in the Vuelta, and was behind Quintana until the latter crashed out.
No he wasn't. He had lost his GC lead at the first intermediate in the ITT, before he crashed himself.
 
Re: Re:

tobydawq said:
DFA123 said:
That quote is all over the place. Makes no sense at all.

The only take away i see from it is that people were still fooled that Contador actually had a serious injury and wasn't training really hard for the month before the Vuelta. He was in best condition in the Vuelta, and was behind Quintana until the latter crashed out.

That was only because Tinkoff lost 19 seconds to Movistar in the team time trial, though. Contador had regained most of that time by the time trial (and Quintana hadn't been looking particularly good on the two summit finishes).
He was still the favourite with the bookies though. When probably the best climber in world cycling, who traditionally peaks in the third weak of GTs, crashes out in the leader's jersey on stage 10, just before a load of tough mountain stages, I think the 'what if's are pretty credible.

Certainly more credible than 'what ifs' about a rider who has done nothing of note in the Tour de France in six years; and who was already 2'30" down to a rider that went on to comfortably win three of the remaining mountain stages.
 
Re: Re:

Netserk said:
DFA123 said:
That quote is all over the place. Makes no sense at all.

The only take away i see from it is that people were still fooled that Contador actually had a serious injury and wasn't training really hard for the month before the Vuelta. He was in best condition in the Vuelta, and was behind Quintana until the latter crashed out.
No he wasn't. He had lost his GC lead at the first intermediate in the ITT, before he crashed himself.
Given Contador's pacing in TTs, I'm not sure that means too much.

As was astutely pointed out in the analysis of his PV effort this year:

http://forum.cyclingnews.com/viewtopic.php?p=2091879#p2091879
 
It means you were wrong, that's what it means. Quintana was behind in GC when he crashed.



You're almost as bad as Pickle when it comes to this (no one is at his level):
D8sxR1.gif
 
Re:

Rollthedice said:
What about GVA olympic gold on a climbers parcours where Nibali and Henao crashed with 11.5 k to go? Which is better?

Pointless. Each of these wins were impressive, crashes and drama are part of this sport, deal with it.
This.

The "what if world" is silly TBH.

If that was true we would have never seen coming the Nibali come back from last year!!

Some events are just unpredictable.
 
Re:

Netserk said:
It means you were wrong, that's what it means. Quintana was behind in GC when he crashed.



You're almost as bad as Pickle when it comes to this (no one is at his level):
D8sxR1.gif
I'm not moving any goalposts. Simply pointing out that for me, the bigger 'what if' of 2014, is the Vuelta not the Tour. Quintana has easily outclimbed Contador in high mountains over the past few years, so it's difficult to think he would not at least have had a very, very strong opportunity in the Vuelta without his crash.

Nibali's form in the Tour was incredible. He won three of the remaining mountain stages after Contador crashed. It's a leap of faith to be believe that Contador could even have stayed with him, let alone gained the best part of three minutes.
 
Re: Re:

Red Rick said:
DFA123 said:
Red Rick said:
I doubt Contador and Froome were even as good as in the Dauphine in that year.
Quite possibly that was their peak form of the year. And, in that case, perhaps it was actually Talansky's crash in the Tour that robbed us of the most likely challenger to Nibali.

DFA123 said:
That quote is all over the place. Makes no sense at all.
It's pretty straightforward. :eek: Talansky won the Dauphine - he beat Froome and Contador at their peak that season. But for some reason his crash in the Tour isn't bought up time and time again to diminsh the achievements of Nibali.
 
Re:

Rollthedice said:
What about GVA olympic gold on a climbers parcours where Nibali and Henao crashed with 11.5 k to go? Which is better?

Pointless. Each of these wins were impressive, crashes and drama are part of this sport, deal with it.

Nibali and Henao are not the top two favorites going into the race. It was actually Nibali, Alaphilippe and Valverde. Henao is not even in the Top 10 in the odds.

In 2014 TdF and 2017 RVV, the top two favorites crashed so it is pretty comparable. A lot of what-ifs.
 
Re: Re:

DFA123 said:
Netserk said:
DFA123 said:
That quote is all over the place. Makes no sense at all.

The only take away i see from it is that people were still fooled that Contador actually had a serious injury and wasn't training really hard for the month before the Vuelta. He was in best condition in the Vuelta, and was behind Quintana until the latter crashed out.
No he wasn't. He had lost his GC lead at the first intermediate in the ITT, before he crashed himself.
Given Contador's pacing in TTs, I'm not sure that means too much.

As was astutely pointed out in the analysis of his PV effort this year:

http://forum.cyclingnews.com/viewtopic.php?p=2091879#p2091879
There's probably little doubt that Quintana would have lost close to a minute on Alberto that day if he'd not crashed. I fail to see how Contador's recent TT performances are useful as indicators of how he'd have fared almost 3 year ago. It is also doubtful if Quintana could have taken back a minute on Contador if we consider the circumstances.

Anyway, I think Nibali's win was better. In my view it is more likely that he'd have won without the 'what-if'-condition than is the case for Gilbert.
 
Re:

42x16ss said:
Nibali's form in 2014 was nuts. The numbers he was putting out would have guaranteed that he'd have gone toe to toe with Contador and Froome.

Over 7 minutes into Peraud and Pinot without truly exerting himself says everything. Quintana would have struggled to beat him as well.

Froome would have been about 2 minutes down after the cobbled stage, if that (look at the way Thomas dragged the lighter Porte up the field over the cobbles). He'd make most of that up, if not all, on the 54k TT alone. And then comes the fact that since 2011, Nibali has literally never been capable of staying with Froome and Contador uphill
 
Re: Re:

PremierAndrew said:
42x16ss said:
Nibali's form in 2014 was nuts. The numbers he was putting out would have guaranteed that he'd have gone toe to toe with Contador and Froome.

Over 7 minutes into Peraud and Pinot without truly exerting himself says everything. Quintana would have struggled to beat him as well.

Froome would have been about 2 minutes down after the cobbled stage, if that (look at the way Thomas dragged the lighter Porte up the field over the cobbles). He'd make most of that up, if not all, on the 54k TT alone. And then comes the fact that since 2011, Nibali has literally never been capable of staying with Froome and Contador uphill

Martin didn't manage to put two minutes on Nibali in that TT and Nibali didn't even go all out. Froome would've finished, best case scenario, where Porte was and worst case scenario far behind Contador.

Perhaps because in 2013 and 2014, his peak years, he never actually raced them head to head properly. His time on Risoul was 5 minutes faster than Froome the previous year in the Dauphine. I know it was only the Dauphine, but 5 minutes is a fair chunk. His Planches des Belles Filles was very slightly slower, depsite it being a much harder day and that it was solo, with nobody to push him or anything. Hautacam beat Piepoli. Full *** Piepoli. He finished over 11 minutes ahead of a guy who was only 6 seconds behind Contador in Catalunya. That Nibali was beyond anything we have ever seen, and he won it breathing through his nose.

But anyway, this is an old discussion.
 
It's always gonna be hard to compare riders if they face a lack of resistance. Nibali wrecked a *** field, as all of the greats would and should've done.

That cobbles performance was truly something special. That's where Vincenzo Nibali showed he ain't no regular *** GT rider. As for the climbs, he was great, but as to how great we'll probably never know. Better than all 2nd places I can remember, except maybe for Froome 2012, that's for sure. A level that would've made every single one of the last 10 TdF's more exciting, and I don't like to discredit that by by making it something different than what it was.
 
My contribution to the discussion of Nibali's performance in the 2014 TdF is to look at Valverde's time gap to him, as opposed to the time gaps the winner had on Valverde in 2015 and 2016. Not a perfect basis for comparison, but somewhat indicative, I would say.
 
Re:

Summoned said:
My contribution to the discussion of Nibali's performance in the 2014 TdF is to look at Valverde's time gap to him, as opposed to the time gaps the winner had on Valverde in 2015 and 2016. Not a perfect basis for comparison, but somewhat indicative, I would say.
Not really considering Valverde actually was pretty bad in that Tour. He really didn't got much going for him (despite being sole leader) and was much better in 2013 and 2015 (as a co-leader/super-dom), even 2016 when he rode the Giro beforehand.
 
Re:

Summoned said:
My contribution to the discussion of Nibali's performance in the 2014 TdF is to look at Valverde's time gap to him, as opposed to the time gaps the winner had on Valverde in 2015 and 2016. Not a perfect basis for comparison, but somewhat indicative, I would say.

You could equally say Peraud's performances in the 2014 and 2015 Tours are indicative of the level of racing in the two editions ;)
 
Re: Re:

PremierAndrew said:
Summoned said:
My contribution to the discussion of Nibali's performance in the 2014 TdF is to look at Valverde's time gap to him, as opposed to the time gaps the winner had on Valverde in 2015 and 2016. Not a perfect basis for comparison, but somewhat indicative, I would say.

You could equally say Peraud's performances in the 2014 and 2015 Tours are indicative of the level of racing in the two editions ;)

I can see your point, certainly, but the reason why I used Valverde as a basis of comparison was that he is probably the most consistent rider for the Tours 2014-2016.
 
Re: Re:

Summoned said:
PremierAndrew said:
Summoned said:
My contribution to the discussion of Nibali's performance in the 2014 TdF is to look at Valverde's time gap to him, as opposed to the time gaps the winner had on Valverde in 2015 and 2016. Not a perfect basis for comparison, but somewhat indicative, I would say.

You could equally say Peraud's performances in the 2014 and 2015 Tours are indicative of the level of racing in the two editions ;)

I can see your point, certainly, but the reason why I used Valverde as a basis of comparison was that he is probably the most consistent rider for the Tours 2014-2016.

Valverde himself said that TdF 2016 was where he hit a new level. So no, his performances have improved significantly across those 3 year.