When he was DS of Armstrong's teams and won all those Tours de France he was hailed as a tactical genius. One wonders however whether almost anyone would look like a tactical genius if they were managing the (by some margin) greatest stage racer of his generation. I know he also won the tour with Contador, but let us be honest about that one: the whole result was messed up by Rasmussen (who worked with Contador to distance Evans); effectively Contador inherited the win and in my view the moral victor was really Evans. Tactically the best stage race win by one of his teams was Savoldelli's Giro (where, interestingly, Bruyneel was not actually on the race). Why? Because Savoldelli was not demonstrably head and shoulders above the rest of the field and the team therefore had to use his strength carefully and calulate things much more than with Lance's tours.
On paper Astana had a very strong squad in this year's Giro and yet their main man finished in anonymity and they didn't even win a single stage as compensation. I would guess that when it came down to it Menchov and Di Luca were some distance better than their rivals, but the way Astana rode it didn't look like they ever really had faith in Leipheimer. What, one wonders was the point of, for example, Popovych's attacks, when he would have been better looking after Leipheimer? One might also suggest that Bruyneel is all sweetness and light when he and Lance are winning, but something of a bad loser when things don't go his way. Its all very well complaining about the course, but surely the famous and much vaunted Bruyneel/Armstrong preparation meant they knew the course intimately before hand? Certainly one would expect that if one believes the publicity that was put about regarding the no stone unturned approach he and Armstrong devised in their heyday.
One wonders now whether other teams will be quite so frightened of Astana as they might have been come July. Armstrong I would suggest won't be strong enough to win, but he might be strong enough to mess up the support that Contador needs. Add to this the likely non-particpation of Kloden whose past it seems is finally catching up with him. Did Bruyneel not have his suspicions about Kloden? The man who moved from T-Mobile when the internal anti doping regime arrived and went with that famously clean rider Vinokourov to Astana instead, despite the leader status he would have had at T-Mobile. Another piece of tactical brliiance on the part of Bruynel was his taking on Basso when he was under-suspicion.
Like Armstrong, Bruyneel has been a great self-publicist, but I think recent events are sugesting that one of his talents has been to propogate myths about his brilliance.
On paper Astana had a very strong squad in this year's Giro and yet their main man finished in anonymity and they didn't even win a single stage as compensation. I would guess that when it came down to it Menchov and Di Luca were some distance better than their rivals, but the way Astana rode it didn't look like they ever really had faith in Leipheimer. What, one wonders was the point of, for example, Popovych's attacks, when he would have been better looking after Leipheimer? One might also suggest that Bruyneel is all sweetness and light when he and Lance are winning, but something of a bad loser when things don't go his way. Its all very well complaining about the course, but surely the famous and much vaunted Bruyneel/Armstrong preparation meant they knew the course intimately before hand? Certainly one would expect that if one believes the publicity that was put about regarding the no stone unturned approach he and Armstrong devised in their heyday.
One wonders now whether other teams will be quite so frightened of Astana as they might have been come July. Armstrong I would suggest won't be strong enough to win, but he might be strong enough to mess up the support that Contador needs. Add to this the likely non-particpation of Kloden whose past it seems is finally catching up with him. Did Bruyneel not have his suspicions about Kloden? The man who moved from T-Mobile when the internal anti doping regime arrived and went with that famously clean rider Vinokourov to Astana instead, despite the leader status he would have had at T-Mobile. Another piece of tactical brliiance on the part of Bruynel was his taking on Basso when he was under-suspicion.
Like Armstrong, Bruyneel has been a great self-publicist, but I think recent events are sugesting that one of his talents has been to propogate myths about his brilliance.
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