BMC 2012 - Dream Team

[Timmy-loves-Rabo]

Gilbert. Hushovd & Evans will have a massive season. I dont believe Contador will have a serious go at Ardennes, he will train to peak at the TDF & Vuelta. Velverde wont be as good as he used to as he will be lacking in certain artificial enhancments.

Without the giro it is a lot easier to have the ardennes in your program without harming your tour / vuelta prep. I'm not sure he will take it seriously regardless tho.

And I like your certainly of success from evans and hushovd. Any argument why.

Valverde is a talented rider regardless of substances, if you mention doping, then we might as well put a question mark on gilbert incredible season.

 

[greenedge]

I wonder if at the start of the year anyone considered Garmin-Cervelo as a super team???
Their results don't back up the idea but they had a good season still. P-R, 4 stages at the TDF, Millar, in the Pink jersey and winning the Milan ITT and now Dan Martin going well at the Vuelta.

BMC will have a nice team at the TDF for next year. I think if the domestiques are in a good team, they get the same aura of being good.

BMC did not go around proclaiming to have a super cobbles team, they just had good classic riders. Having 7 men near the end of Tour of Flanders is quite good. Also T_L_R Evans would be able to keep Contador and Valverde in check before Gilbert wins at the Ardennes. GVA can also help ( much like Vanendert ) but is not going to win a mountain stage.

Who is better than TJVG in his age group??? Uran, Henao. Duarte. They all are better climbers but he podiums more races. ( Tour of colarado/ Pro Cycling Challenge beating Henao ) Matthews, Kittel, Sagan and Degenkolb are all sprinters. Phinney is similar potential wise but not shown as much.
TJVG as well this year has been thoroughly impressive and he does not suffer as many injuries ( fingers crossed ). So far I think the only people who could claim to be better are EBH, Uran? and Sagan.

Kelderman and Quintana have yet to come through to Pro ranks

 

[Swede1]

this.

bmc are hardly a dreamteam.

Gilbert yes is dominant in the classics.
Evans, yes he won the tour, but it will be difficult winning another GT, certainly unbeatable at 2 GTs is a joke.
TVJG.. yeah, that hardly tops of a dreamteam. There are equally and more talented riders in his age group. A nice signing but nothing too special.
And thor, i like him, but he hasn't won flanders or p-r. These guys arguably still need a winner in these races. There apparently super-cobble team this year were pretty average.

So apart from gilbert. this team doesn't screw domination in any other areas.

I'm pretty sure it was BMC's pretty average classics team that was able to chase back Cancellara with no one else's help.

For the ardennes classics I think that Contador will be in similar shape as 2010. Good enough to top 3 in Fleche, which suits him, and to be competitive but not win in the others.

BTW I dont think Cadel going to start sucking at GT's like Sastre has these past few seasons. He is competitive all year, and seems to be getting better every year. I think he will win a few stage races and then podium in the Tour.

 

[auscyclefan94]

ACF will be delighted he doesn't have to cheer only for Matthias Frank any more.

Mathias is a quality rider. I'll keep cheering for him. TGAk on the other hand is dead to me.

+1.

I expect Evans to go the way of Sastre. He will podium one more GC and probably get a couple GC top 10s apart from that but I doubt that he will go on and dominate GTs just because he finally managed to win one.

No way. Evans is way different than sastre Lelangue has said that Evans is trianing the house down more than he evever has supposedly. To have sucha season as he did this year will be hard but I wouldn't bet against him not winning some big races next year. I wouldn't mind him going to the Giro and looking to win that.

 

[Eric8-A]

No way. Evans is way different than sastre Lelangue has said that Evans is trianing the house down more than he evever has supposedly. To have sucha season as he did this year will be hard but I wouldn't bet against him not winning some big races next year. I wouldn't mind him going to the Giro and looking to win that.

With Thor on the team, he might just do that

 

[auscyclefan94]

Don't stir that non-story up again

 

[Sasquatch]

All these signings now mean that these riders are competant and BMC won't be getting lost in Holland anytime soon.

 

[Midnightfright]

+1

And Fabian was apparently unbeatable coming into this years classics too...how'd that work out.

If Contador races next year, there's no such thing as a GT super team

I dont see how u can have a GC super team without Contador tbh.

 

[auscyclefan94]

All these signings now mean that these riders are competant and BMC won't be getting lost in Holland anytime soon.

STFU Cadel picked them up just before his tour around france to victory.

 

[greenedge]

Mathias is a quality rider. I'll keep cheering for him. TGAk on the other hand is dead to me.
I wouldn't mind him going to the Giro and looking to win that.

He won't race the Giro next year as he is defending champion of the TDF. Also to be fair BMC kicked off TGAK.

 

[auscyclefan94]

He won't race the Giro next year as he is defending champion of the TDF. Also to be fair BMC kicked off TGAK.

I wouldn't mind him doing riding the giro. I know he's doing the tour but I would like to see him go off win the vuelta and giro. You really are a great stage racer when you win all 3.

I know TGAK was virtually kicked off as I was be facetious with that comment.

 

[buster1]

I cant see how you can claim that BMC is a super team they will be far more competitive than the past two years where its been Cadel or bust.

The main area for improvement is that they will be pushing to be far more competitive in in PR and RVV with Thor and Gilbert. Gilbert will obviously add to the ardennes team but only slightly given it was already a very solid team with Evans and GVA.

To whoever said that BMC will dominate 2 GTs a year is absolutley dillusional. Yes they will be far better than this year and have a lot more quality support for Cadel but all it will do is even up the support Cadel gets with the teams of the Schlecks and Contador.

Cadel has had an inferior GT squad to all the faviourites for his whole career and it will be good to see what he can do now with more adequate support. But win 2 GT's in a year no. Be highly competitive and win another one? well thats certainly not beyond the realms of possiblity. However I hardly think the Schlecks and Contador will be quivering in their boots at BMC's GT squad.

 

[WillemS]

They'll have super team, but they'll not dominate. So far, the only times I've seen real domination by anyone anywhere this year were by Contador in the Giro and Gilbert in about any classic with hills. So far, BMC only has Gilbert. (Okay, maybe someone dominated the Tour of Oman......)

Gilbert has been extremely lucky to have almost no bad luck this year, he could get sick, crash, break his chains on the deciding climb (like Cancellara did few years back in Vlaanderen). I think he will win one next year, but dominate like this? The whole year? He would be lucky man. That, and the fact that this year he focused mainly on the classics season and is now fading a bit, a thing he would not want to do next year, because of the Valkenburg/Gold Race-like WC.

 

[Mellow Velo]

TGAK no longer worthy of uber-hype?
I guess reality automatically kicks in when riders get kicked out of the fanzone.
My guess is Ballan will be next for the cold shoulder.

TJVG is on the brink. He could go either way, next year. In reality, he has made little progress this season. Even with the 2 extra US stage races, he is still not up to his CQ points tally of last season. (and yes I did pick him)
Hopefully, he will take a step forward, to captain a GT team and add some genuine mountain support for Le Tour.
Pinotti is a class act and his worth to the team is without question.

Gilbert will bring home the bacon, but not in the same quantity as this year.

 

[c&cfan]

TGAK no longer worthy of uber-hype?
I guess reality automatically kicks in when riders get kicked out of the fanzone.
My guess is Ballan will be next for the cold shoulder.

TJVG is on the brink. He could go either way, next year. In reality, he has made little progress this season. Even with the 2 extra US stage races, he is still not up to his CQ points tally of last season. (and yes I did pick him)
Hopefully, he will take a step forward, to captain a GT team and add some genuine mountain support for Le Tour.
Pinotti is a class act and his worth to the team is without question.

Gilbert will bring home the bacon, but not in the same quantity as this year.

how can you have the best GT team if you don't have the best five GT contenders?
also, even if you have one of them, how can you have the best GT team without a real good (great!) mountain domestique? also even if you have one of them, is that enough to have the best GT team?

 

[theyoungest]

Who is better than TJVG in his age group??? Uran, Henao. Duarte. They all are better climbers but he podiums more races. ( Tour of colarado/ Pro Cycling Challenge beating Henao ) Matthews, Kittel, Sagan and Degenkolb are all sprinters. Phinney is similar potential wise but not shown as much.
TJVG as well this year has been thoroughly impressive and he does not suffer as many injuries ( fingers crossed ). So far I think the only people who could claim to be better are EBH, Uran? and Sagan.

Kruijswijk, Taaramae, Poels... just some other names in the same age group who's season is at least as impressive as Van Garderen's. Not to mention Pinot, who is younger and already climbing with the best in the Dauphiné.

 

[Mellow Velo]

how can you have the best GT team if you don't have the best five GT contenders?
also, even if you have one of them, how can you have the best GT team without a real good (great!) mountain domestique? also even if you have one of them, is that enough to have the best GT team?

I wasn't aware that I was advocating BMC as the world's strongest/best GT team.
Imo, the best GT team is the one who sends a genuine/contender/s/star rider to each of the 3 events.
BMC are likely to follow other, unpopular teams who put all their eggs into the July Tour basket.

 

[bicing]

i don't.

I like the saying "it's not the years, honey, it's the mileage" **. ...............


**said by probably the most famous archaeologist of the 1930s.

indiana jones????????

 

[Woody22]

Going to take an early stab at predicting the BMC 2012 TDF line up. Here goes:
Evans
Hincapie
Gilbert
Hushovd
TJVG
Bookwalter,
Burghart
Pinoti
Morabito

Toss up between Morabito and Frank. Also, Pinoti may well ride Giro, especially if there is no TTT in next years tour.

Feel free to pick my team apart.

 

[c&cfan]

I wasn't aware that I was advocating BMC as the world's strongest/best GT team.
Imo, the best GT team is the one who sends a genuine/contender/s/star rider to each of the 3 events.
BMC are likely to follow other, unpopular teams who put all their eggs into the July Tour basket.

i was trying to say "one of the best five GT contenders".

i know that you weren't saying that, i picked a random post. sorry

 

[Swabian Lass]

They're not going to dominate two GTs. They'll send a good team to the Tour, although imo they could still do with more in the mountains department. I think that it's possible that Cadel's got one or two more GTs in him, but he's not going to dominate.

Gilbert will win some, but he's not going to repeat this year's performance. For a start the other riders will be expecting him this year and they'll be figuring out how to close him down. Frankly, if he does repeat this year's performance I'll be a little suspicious.

Thor? Dunno. I hope the he wins PR, but I really wouldn't like to call that one.

 

[Mambo95]

indiana jones????????

Of course!

 

[Dutchsmurf]

Good team, yes. Dream team, not even close. It is a team build around 3 stars. Evans isn't getting any younger and the competition in this Tour by the time they reached the mountains wasn't that strong. Gilbert is unlikely to do as well as this year for a second time in a row. Hushovd has yet to win a big classic. The main thing that changed with BMC is that the rest of the team is closer to the level of the leaders now.
Actually it wouldn't surprise me if they only win 1 classic max and don't even top 3 in a single GT.

 

[c&cfan]

They're not going to dominate two GTs. They'll send a good team to the Tour, although imo they could still do with more in the mountains department. I think that it's possible that Cadel's got one or two more GTs in him, but he's not going to dominate.

Gilbert will win some, but he's not going to repeat this year's performance. For a start the other riders will be expecting him this year and they'll be figuring out how to close him down. Frankly, if he does repeat this year's performance I'll be a little suspicious.

Thor? Dunno. I hope the he wins PR, but I really wouldn't like to call that one.

oh my god...

 

[greenedge]

Most people are pessimistic about this. I believe that Gilbert will go well. Classic campaigns of greatness usually run for at least 2 years. I forgot about Rolland, Pinot and Taaramae thx. I would say that Poels is not better. Kruijswijk might be just as good.