Teams & Riders Brothers in (crank) arms - Yates Discussion Thread

[yaco]

Adam is going to the Vuelta which is unlikely to change - I am more interested to see how he performs in the Ardennes - Can do a good LBL, while i'd like to see him have a crack at Fleche.

 

[BlueRoads]

Does anybody else wonder what Simon thinks now?

 

[Pinot's goat]

Adam really isn't going to the Tour? They will leave someone with this results out of the team?

He has had these results before and then he goes to the TDF and struggles/ fades in the final week, Thomas and Carapaz are much better options.

 

[Pinot's goat]

Does anybody else wonder what Simon thinks now?

Thank god I didn't move to Ineos and not get to lead at the Tour or Giro because they have so many GC contenders?

 

[yaco]

Adam's TT has definitely improved at Ineos, whereas at Bike Exchange their ITT has gone to water, and yet they got the Guru in Pinotti working for the team - Adam's biggest issue at the Vuelta will be the hot weather in which he can be vulnerable.

 

[pink_jersey]

Adam's TT has definitely improved at Ineos, whereas at Bike Exchange their ITT has gone to water, and yet they got the Guru in Pinotti working for the team - Adam's biggest issue at the Vuelta will be the hot weather in which he can be vulnerable.

Mneah
Consistency over three weeks will always be his biggest downfall.
The guy is always superb in spring and then fades in TdF. In his only participation in the Giro he faded as well. I don't think he's made for Grand Tours.

 

[Oliver]

What is the next race for Adam? Fleche Wallone & Liege?

 

[BigCoward]

Mneah
Consistency over three weeks will always be his biggest downfall.
The guy is always superb in spring and then fades in TdF. In his only participation in the Giro he faded as well. I don't think he's made for Grand Tours.

Its weird that after his 4th in 2016 he never progressed in that regard.

 

[Forever The Best]

All aboard the Simon Yates Giro hype train!

 

[tobydawq]

All aboard the Simon Yates Giro hype train!

I think it left the station a day and a half ago but judging by this thread, nobody boarded it.

I'm sure Remco, Landa and Bernal have been defecating in their pants, though.

 

[jmdirt]

So, what are his odds for the GdI?

 

[Pantani_lives]

Simon has won the pre-Giro poll by a margin, but the attention still goes to Remco and Egan. I wonder if he will ride more defensively in the first two weeks after what happened three years ago. Those middle mountains in the first week suit him very well, but there's the danger of running out of steam in the third week, and the Italian mountains are higher than those in Spain.

 

[Gigs_98]

Never trust a Yates to deliver yet I did it again god damnit. He's the big loser of today. Remco was expected to improve throughout the race. Yates was supposedly the most ready gc contender after dominating the main preparation race, yet on the first important stage he looked like anything but. Also I don't buy into the "it's the weather" narrative. That sounds so much like the kind of excuse we always have for gc contenders early in gt's before we realize they are just bad.

 

[Hugo Koblet]

Yeah, I expected him to blow up in the third week, but at the same time be the best - or at least among the best - in the first two weeks, so today was disappointing and worrisome.

 

[yaco]

Yates is always a worry in cold and rainy conditions - Even as recently at TA in similar conditions he struggled in the stage won by MVP.

 

[Luthor]

Yates is always a worry in cold and rainy conditions - Even as recently at TA in similar conditions he struggled in the stage won by MVP.

I thought the same today. At that stage in TA he lost 4:50 minutes on Pogacar and 3 minutes on Bernal but he was the second best climber on Tivo.
Too early to tell, I think the gap is not that big in Giro.

 

[Pinot's goat]

He only lost 11 seconds and it's only stage 4, maybe he took it easy after TotA, if he had attacked and looked strong, people would say he will blow up in week 3.

 

[Red Rick]

Never trust a Yates to deliver yet I did it again god damnit. He's the big loser of today. Remco was expected to improve throughout the race. Yates was supposedly the most ready gc contender after dominating the main preparation race, yet on the first important stage he looked like anything but. Also I don't buy into the "it's the weather" narrative. That sounds so much like the kind of excuse we always have for gc contenders early in gt's before we realize they are just bad.

Yates works in mysterious ways.

He's inconsistent and I don't think this stage suited him that well. Seems best at ~30min climbs these days.

 

[SafeBet]

Yates works in mysterious ways.

He's inconsistent and I don't think this stage suited him that well. Seems best at ~30min climbs these days.

I don't think shorter climbs are an issue. Inconsistency definitely is.

 

[Red Rick]

I don't think shorter climbs are an issue. Inconsistency definitely is.

No but his best efforts definitely seem to be the purest one climb W/kg drag races out there.

 

[Blanco]

It's the weather, he'll be fine...

 

[Gigs_98]

Okay, so I suppose he was bad in bad weather in Tirreno. Alright, but that's one case outside of today where he performed bad in the rain. Is there any other example? As a counterexample from the top of my head, wasn't the 2nd tour stage he won in 2019 pretty rainy? I just don't see it.

And the same is the case about him being better on longer climbs. Wasn't Yates actually considered to be more of a specialist for short punchy climbs not too long ago? Remember that murito finish he won in the 2018 giro? And now suddenly we aren't supposed to question his shape because a climb was only 4 km long?

I just don't buy any of that. 2018 was an outlier and he'll just never have that sort of shape again. And now that I've written it I really hope this post won't become another laughing stock very soon.

 

[johnymax]

Lol...he lost 10s and is suddenly the big loser of the day. Riders have better and worse days. Losing 10s is hardly a problem. If he loses 30s on the next MTF on Thursday, I'd start to worry. Until then, he is still in a position where he needs to be at this time.

 

[Gigs_98]

Yeah and last year Nibali losing 15 seconds in Roccaraso wasn't supposed to be a big deal. It's always the same thing. People read 10 seconds, think "that's not a lot" and forget that the issue isn't the time lost, but that you don't just go from losing 10 seconds today to gaining 10 seconds tomorrow.

Also another thing, the whole "Yates is inconsistent in gt's" is really just a myth people started to believe in because of his giro 2018 explosion. Prior to completely blowing up he was extremely consistent in that race, he won the 2018 Vuelta not with any one great climbing performance but by being the only consistent gc rider and outside of those two races the story of the gc rider Yates has just been consistent mediocrity. I might be forgetting something, but outside of 2018 has Yates had any gt climbing performance, even if just on one day, that would make you think of him as someone who should fight for gt wins?

 

[Pinot's goat]

Yeah and last year Nibali losing 15 seconds in Roccaraso wasn't supposed to be a big deal. It's always the same thing. People read 10 seconds, think "that's not a lot" and forget that the issue isn't the time lost, but that you don't just go from losing 10 seconds today to gaining 10 seconds tomorrow.

Also another thing, the whole "Yates is inconsistent in gt's" is really just a myth people started to believe in because of his giro 2018 explosion. Prior to completely blowing up he was extremely consistent in that race, he won the 2018 Vuelta not with any one great climbing performance but by being the only consistent gc rider and outside of those two races the story of the gc rider Yates has just been consistent mediocrity. I might be forgetting something, but outside of 2018 has Yates had any gt climbing performance, even if just on one day, that would make you think of him as someone who should fight for gt wins?

Yates said he felt lost condition in 2019 due to the really flat first half of the race and then in 2020 he got covid, so this is his first GC attempt since 2018 that should truly show how good he really is. Basically, he has not been able to show his true grand tour ability in nearly 3 years.