Can Froome dominate Le Tour?

[airstream]

Competition is about individual riders. If in a race Froome's main competitor is a rider that has a very strong team behind them, but the leader of that team is of the same level of say a guy like Mollema. Then the simple fact of having a strong team doesn't make that competition good. Froome would always come out ahead anyways.

Team Sky were the strongest team of the 2012 Tour, but how strong were the teams of Wiggins rivals? Cannondale and Lotto were focused largely on their sprinters and I can't remember them doing anything that great. BMC weren't that great and made the mistake of supporting Evans in the beginning instead of Tejay. Most of the GC contenders were the kinds that just try to hang on as long as possible in fact. So does the presence of one really strong team (Sky) make Wiggins competition strong?

Competition is about riders and their teams and exactly team factor makes the Tour win the hardest despite on softer parcours. As we discussed above a certain Giro edition can gather a comparable (to the TdF) squad of big guns, but the race will anyways have a lower general level. Ascents are got over at a crazy rhythm in the Tour. It was said by many outstanding riders: Basso, Armstrong, Contador. Captains provide crazy tempo only on last kms, all the rest is done by their teammates. Yes, naturally it can't be always expressed in higher wattages on MTF's, but it occurs only for one reason — penultimate and earlier climbs are ridden waaay faster in the Tour as well.

 

[airstream]

airstream is right, much as we wish it would, the peloton isn't going to unite to stop a rider winning. Nor will a team/rider sacrifice a podium place and take some huge risks in order to win, especially when the leader is so strong.

Absolutely.

The thing that amuses me to the full is people came to this thought only when Froome was in a lead. When other riders were riding in a leader jersey, it was ok. As soon as Froome started wearing it, the forums became full of rallying cries 'cmon, destroy him!' 'what the hell are you doing??! You should all attack Froome!!!", "what losers. They don't want to win the Tour' and so on. Honestly I cried with laughter while I was reading this stuff.

 

[Pricey_sky]

If Movistar had some sense they could have taken the Tour to Froome with any of 3 riders on stage 9. Instead they chose to domestique for him. Still that was an example of where a stronger team can challenger a much stronger rider.

Having the mental capacity of a 5 year old however is also neccesary and it seems not a single member of the Movistar staff met that qualification.

Very true, however at that stage of the Tour they still had their eyes on Contador believing he would be a force in week 3. They rode for the podium instead of taking a risk. I'm sure they look back now thinking of the time Quintana could have made up on that stage.

 

[The Hitch]

Lol how? Could you provide any realistic scenario?

Dear Hitch do you realize that riders and teams have their racing goals and these goals is NOT 'not to let Froome win by any means'?

So for you the following are not goals a team would aspire too?

Try to win the Tour de France
Get as many riders as possible into the top 10
Try to get more get more than 1 rider onto the podium

For airstream its ok to aspire to win the Tour de France but not at the expense of another rider. Its not fair for example for Valverde to aspire to win the Vuelta this year if that means not letting Nibali win it.

Cos then the goal would be to 'not let Nibali win' and that isn't something any team should ever do.

 

[The Hitch]

airstream is right, much as we wish it would, the peloton isn't going to unite to stop a rider winning. .

Cos Rui Costa, Nairo Quintana and Alejandro Valverde all ride for different teams, right?

And under no circumstances would riders like Jonathan Castroviejo, Emanuelle Ervitti, Andrey Amador, who were in the lead group at the time, do anythingt to help those above riders try to get an advantage on their rivals.

Right?

Why on earth would those above 6 riders work towards a common cause

 

[airstream]

So for you tGTs happened 10 years ago lol. And you seriously expected he could go from 60-70 to go just because he wants to win the Tour (Valverde's goal was podium)? Are you realist? To expect such a move from Quintana, a neophyte of the Tour, is even more weird. Double attack? Too risky. Early attack is a big risk of self-dropping. And it is only one side of medal. The second one is no one would ride against Froome purposefully in this situation. And even if Valverde and Quintana had made a move and gained, let's assume, 1-2 minutes, Saxobank, Belkin and Katusha would've started working on the front because they valued their spots back then. To think that Froome would've needed to make an infinite 60 km pull all alone on the climbs and then would've cracked is a bit funny.

 

[airstream]

So for you the following are not goals a team would aspire too?

Win the Tour de France
Get as many riders as possible into the top 10
Try to get more get more than 1 rider onto the podium

All that breaks the wall of usual racing logics. Froome is not a fool. He would have easily let say Rui Costa go even if would've required to lose e 3-4 mins. So we have 2 cards: Valverde and Quintana. Valverde is a guy whose best attacks in the GTs happened 10 years ago lol. And you seriously expected he could go from 60-70 to go just because he wants to win the Tour (Valverde's goal was podium)? Are you realist? To expect such a move from Quintana, a neophyte of the Tour, is even more weird. Double attack? Too risky. Early attack is a big risk of self-dropping. And it is only one side of medal. The second one is no one would ride against Froome purposefully in this situation. And even if Valverde and Quintana had made a move and gained, let's assume, 1-2 minutes, Saxobank, Belkin and Katusha would've had to start working on the front because their valued their spots back then and stay 3-4-5th is better than become 5-6-7th. To think that Froome would've needed to make an eternal 60 km pull all alone on the climbs and then cracked is a bit funny. It was absolutely deadlock situation if one reasons logically and knows these riders really well. All who think that Movistar could crack Froome on that stage just went monkey from utopian theories 'plz, anyone but Froome' and 'everything but 1st place is crap'.


How did you come to it guys lol? Probably, Contador's fail in the Tour will learn you to handle the things calmly...

Oh yeah Hitch it is strange you forgot to comment your legendary Froome (gazelle) / Contador (lion) cue special for airstream? Don't you have anything to reply?

 

[The Hitch]

If you know exactly how everything is going to work out, to the letter, please tell us how tomorrows vuelta stage will work out.

Who will get into the BOTD. At what point will it form? At what point will it get caught. Which teams will ride on the front and exactly for how long etc.

The fact is you don't. You always claim to but you can't, and as always you will refuse the above challenge with some **** poor explanation and by pretending to not speak English.

No one knows how the stage would have ended up, least of all you, but by attacking with Costa or Quintana Movistar would have created chaos, and with 7 Movistar riders in the front group and only 1 sky rider they would have been in a very good position to weather that chaos.

 

[airstream]

If you know exactly how everything is going to work out, to the letter, please tell us how tomorrows vuelta stage will work out.

Who will get into the BOTD. At what point will it form? At what point will it get caught. Which teams will ride on the front and exactly for how long etc.

The fact is you don't. You always claim to but you can't, and as always you will refuse the above challenge with some **** poor explanation and by pretending to not speak English.

No one knows how the stage would have ended up, least of all you, but by attacking with Costa or Quintana Movistar would have created chaos, and with 7 Movistar riders in the front group and only 1 sky rider they would have been in a very good position to weather that chaos.

Pf, damn I don't know anything but I try to avoid extremenesses and black-and-white evaluations. To think that Movistar could break Froome just because there were three ridersagainst 1 Froome (who was stronger physically) while the peloton would anyways have become a Froome's helper in a situation of movi breakaway IS a pure extremeness built on dislike towards Sky.

 

[oldcrank]

The way Froome won this years tour was pretty dominant, although I thought the last week he faded slightly, and arguably Quintana was the stronger climber in the last week. Contador is always a threat and isn't old enough to be written off and there is also Nibali, Valverde, Rodriguez etc. who are all obvious genuine threats as well as the numerous other GT contenders and the up and coming youngsters everyone knows of, that you would expect at least one of to reach their potential.

However, Froome this year has been the best GT rider in the world this year, and is at a pretty good age. Also, you could argue Froome won't have a team as weak as this years which left him vulnerable, and although Nibali was superb at Il Giro, personally I don't think he would have lived with Froome at Le Tour. My question is do you think Froome could dominate for 5, 6 years or will he find it hard to repeat this years form, coupled with possibly up and coming riders developing? Can he equal or even beat the five wins record? What do you think?

Please leave the Clinic stuff for the Clinic.

While Froomie and his SKY team-mates may come to the
2014 and future TdF's with as good or better form it may
be difficult to repeat the tactical brilliance that won the 2013
Tour. While SKY prepared mentally and physically for stage
eight/Ax 3 Domaines and took a huge risk by pushing into
the red zone so early in the Tour, every other team was either
too timid or just caught with their pants down by thinking
the first shots would be fired on stage nine at the earliest.

Whether Froomie was invincible or not this year, he appeared
to be after Ax 3 Domaines, and every other team was on the
back foot and demoralised with two weeks to go and even
with all the brave "we're always better in the third week'' talk
coming from every other contender, the stage was set for
another SKY victory. It may be not as easy to fool everyone
next year.

 

[airstream]

Who will get into the BOTD. At what point will it form? At what point will it get caught. Which teams will ride on the front and exactly for how long etc.

The talk is not about that. You wittingly or unwittingly contemplate with one idea 'how it was not to allow Froome to win'. You don't care that even podium would have been a huge success for Valverde. Riders think differently.

The fact is you don't. You always claim to but you can't, and as always you will refuse the above challenge with some **** poor explanation and by pretending to not speak English.

I can take any challenge because I know a little bit about it. And unlike some other forum members, I don't burst out from arrogance and smirks. My English is quite good to discuss cycling. Thanks.

 

[gustienordic]

While Froomie and his SKY team-mates may come to the
2014 and future TdF's with as good or better form it may
be difficult to repeat the tactical brilliance that won the 2013
Tour. While SKY prepared mentally and physically for stage
eight/Ax 3 Domaines and took a huge risk by pushing into
the red zone so early in the Tour, every other team was either
too timid or just caught with their pants down by thinking
the first shots would be fired on stage nine at the earliest.

Whether Froomie was invincible or not this year, he appeared
to be after Ax 3 Domaines, and every other team was on the
back foot and demoralised with two weeks to go and even
with all the brave "we're always better in the third week'' talk
coming from every other contender, the stage was set for
another SKY victory. It may be not as easy to fool everyone
next year.

I disagree with this. To say that Froome completely demoralized his competition & made no one have the moral is not true I don't think. Plenty of guys (Contador in particular) raced with passion, even if their form was sub-Froome level. It did not look like riders were demoralized, especially after the echelon stage.

 

[Afrank]

Competition is about riders and their teams and exactly team factor makes the Tour win the hardest despite on softer parcours. As we discussed above a certain Giro edition can gather a comparable (to the TdF) squad of big guns, but the race will anyways have a lower general level. Ascents are got over at a crazy rhythm in the Tour. It was said by many outstanding riders: Basso, Armstrong, Contador. Captains provide crazy tempo only on last kms, all the rest is done by their teammates. Yes, naturally it can't be always expressed in higher wattages on MTF's, but it occurs only for one reason — penultimate and earlier climbs are ridden waaay faster in the Tour as well.

A strong team will massively increase a riders chances of a high placing (especially a team like Sky), that is true. But in the end when it comes down to it, it will be the individual riders duty to make their bids to win the race. And when the level of one team is so high, and the level of the GC contenders so much lower, the competition for that one team and their leader can't be that good.

And I'm still unclear about how the presence of one strong team makes that teams competition good?

 

[del1962]

A strong team will massively increase a riders chances of a high placing (especially a team like Sky), that is true. But in the end when it comes down to it, it will be the individual riders duty to make their bids to win the race. And when the level of one team is so high, and the level of the GC contenders so much lower, the competition for that one team and their leader can't be that good.

And I'm still unclear about how the presence of one strong team makes that teams competition good?

The 2013 Sky team were not that strong though.

 

[42x16ss]

The 2013 Sky team were not that strong though.

Porte was enough though. Apart from one day where he didn't pay attention he was easily the strongest domestique in the race (with the possible exception of Valverde)

 

[Vino attacks everyone]

Nop, Horner will dominate the tour

 

[Bernie's eyesore]

Nop, Horner will dominate the tour

I think next year could be too soon for Horner. We won't see the best of him for another four or five years.