Contador 2010

[Publicus]

A press release from AC (posted on his website and from which the quotes in the CN front page article were derived):

http://www.albertocontador.com/prensa.detalle.php?id=297

Have you changed your training or have done it as previous years?


No, I have done more or less like other years, perhaps with more long trainings in 2009, with the idea to adjust a little more weight, because I'm still 63,5 kg, 2 kg above the weight of the Tour , and you can feel that.


How about the course of the Volta ao Algarve 2010, it’s better or worse than last year?


It's great for doing a good training, but it is a little worse than 2009, because the time trial is shorter and completely flat, people told me. Last year was very hard and it allowed me to draw differences. This year, however, there are other riders with more posibilities on this course.


How about participation, who are the favorites?


Waiting the official confirmation, I know that come Leipheimer, Klöden, Luis Leon Sanchez, Ivan Gutierrez, Samuel Sanchez and Vandevelde. And there will have, among others, Chavanel, Ezequiel Mosquera and Joaquin Rodriguez, not forgetting the riders of the Portuguese teams, which are very good and at home have a special motivation.


Do you want to check yourself in front of your rivals?


No, I just want to check my form and how do I respond in the race, not a matter of comparison.

So for those expecting him to put on a show, you will be disappointed. The first real race (i.e., that he will contest) will be Paris-Nice.

 

[Carboncrank]

A press release from AC (posted on his website and from which the quotes in the CN front page article were derived):

http://www.albertocontador.com/prensa.detalle.php?id=297



So for those expecting him to put on a show, you will be disappointed. The first real race (i.e., that he will contest) will be Paris-Nice.

He put on a bit of a show today evidently. Props to him.

on the other hand, he're Horner's reaction to TdF stage 17.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ituh5z6P6TU&feature=related

 

[Delicato]

Though it is a Clinic-related matter, I was sure that despite all that "This year I am even stronger than last year" stuff Contador would definitely suffer without Bruyneel's medical program. Seems that today Contador just ruined my prejudices.

 

[thehog]

He put on a bit of a show today evidently. Props to him.

on the other hand, he're Horner's reaction to TdF stage 17.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ituh5z6P6TU&feature=related

Classic. Horner must be gunning for Liggetts job!

 

[lagartija]

He put on a bit of a show today evidently. Props to him.

on the other hand, he're Horner's reaction to TdF stage 17.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ituh5z6P6TU&feature=related

on the other hand? ......what..........how can you rationally post a 5 month old vid and state that it in any way relates to algarve today........

you know i dont dislike horner but not only are his opinions skewed he is flat out wrong.......paulinho is portuguese, not spanish, so the big spanish contingent theory is crap.
he also admitted what we all allready knew, inner team conflict was rampant.
and according to horner , ' berto wanted more spaniards in order not to weaken lances side' oh really, so what are you saying mr horner that some riders are riding for different leaders within the team?
the lances side comment is really telling along with the 'he hurt the TEAMS podium opportunities ' ......oh and' he was not riding like the team leader '

man seriously when did lance ever not make it all about lance?
a podium place for Kloeden may have happened if lance rode for him and not the other way around.......
you need to remember Astana never had leadership issues pre lance......

i like and enjoy watching plenty of riders compete although i will admit armstrong was never one of them (a bit to much info about him for that)
but after this last tour my indifference to him has grown into outright disgust.

and by the way as far as team frienships or loyalty goes , both kloeden and paulinho are low key , keeping to themselves much of the time, thats just who they are...........and according to paulinho the one guy he has a real frienship with and is actually close to , well its andreas kloeden

 

[Race Radio]

Classic. Horner must be gunning for Liggetts job!

It would be easy to be hard on Chris for his ridiculous parroting of easily discredited company line but I would go easy on him. He is 38 years old, has a bunch of kids and an ex wife he needs to support. He knows that tossing Armstrong's salad could results in 2 more years of paychecks.

 

[Publicus]

He put on a bit of a show today evidently. Props to him.

on the other hand, he're Horner's reaction to TdF stage 17.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ituh5z6P6TU&feature=related

I see you reached into your suitcase of irrelevancy for that one. Maybe if you try hard enough you can get Horner onto the 2009 Astana team and Stage 17 could play out differently. Let me know how that turns out for you.

Glad to be wrong about my original post though. Pleasantly surprised and looking forward to seeing the video highlights.

 

[Mellow Velo]

Suitcase of smoke, more like. Trying to hide the Algarve agony.

1 Alberto Contador (Spa) Astana 5:02:55
2 Tiago Machado (Por) Team RadioShack 0:00:11
3 Levi Leipheimer (USA) Team RadioShack 0:00:22
4 Peter Velits (Svk) Team HTC - Columbia 0:00:25
5 Tejay Van Garderen (USA) Team HTC - Columbia
6 Jean Christophe Peraud (Fra) Omega Pharma - Lotto 0:00:29
7 Samuel Sanchez (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi 0:00:31

All done in under 3kms and 3kg overweight.
Contador ought to ride the Muy in April and put a few more grains of sand up Charmwrong's
butt crack.

 

[Publicus]

Suitcase of smoke, more like. Trying to hide the Algarve agony.

1 Alberto Contador (Spa) Astana 5:02:55
2 Tiago Machado (Por) Team RadioShack 0:00:11
3 Levi Leipheimer (USA) Team RadioShack 0:00:22
4 Peter Velits (Svk) Team HTC - Columbia 0:00:25
5 Tejay Van Garderen (USA) Team HTC - Columbia
6 Jean Christophe Peraud (Fra) Omega Pharma - Lotto 0:00:29
7 Samuel Sanchez (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi 0:00:31

All done in under 3kms and 3kg overweight.
Contador ought to ride the Muy in April and put a few more grains of sand up Charmwrong's
butt crack.

Would love it if he road the Ardennes Classics. Don't know if it is realistic given how he rides (to win). He and his squad will need a rest after Paris-Nice and Volta a Cataluyna.

 

[Publicus]

Luis Leon Sanchez is now going to ride Paris-Nice along side Valverde. I think Caisse is going to be a very hard team to beat with that combination. Very hard.

 

[sandman]

lol @ lance amstrongs twitter

"And @teamradioshack are leading the Team GC!!
about 1 hours ago from UberTwitter
Congrats to Tiago Machado and @levileipheimer on their gr8 rides in Volta Algarve. AC was strong but the boys rode gr8. TT coming soon.
about 1 hours ago from UberTwitter"

Pistolero comes out swinging

Lance have fun on ur little tweet rides in Kona

oh and keep highlighting who rode "gr8" while your RS minions get destroyed

22 seconds in 3k lol

can't wait for the Tour, just hope all the boys (from all teams) make it to the decisive stages in tact

 

[UpTheRoad]

lol @ lance amstrongs twitter

"And @teamradioshack are leading the Team GC!!
about 1 hours ago from UberTwitter
Congrats to Tiago Machado and @levileipheimer on their gr8 rides in Volta Algarve. AC was strong but the boys rode gr8. TT coming soon.
about 1 hours ago from UberTwitter"

Pistolero comes out swinging

Lance have fun on ur little tweet rides in Kona

oh and keep highlighting who rode "gr8" while your RS minions get destroyed

22 seconds in 3k lol

can't wait for the Tour, just hope all the boys (from all teams) make it to the decisive stages in tact

I don't think the LA bashing is warranted in this particular case. Sure, he should probably be racing somewhere, but Team Lance has done well and he is merely congratulating them on a good ride.

Basically nobody can climb with Contador. It is not surprising that when he took off he was not seen again until the finish.

LA must realize that the team classification is the only this Team Lance has a shot at in July, so he is practicing his "team first" tweeting style now.

 

[El Oso]

Hope this isn't taking this off-topic, but I couldn't help but to post this. You know the Pistolera has gone a bit too far when it leads to a finger up your a$$:

 

[kurtinsc]

I find it interesting that prior to Lance's comeback, I saw a lot of hatred aimed at Contador... almost as if they viewed him as the "new Lance".

Now that Lance is back, it seems like a lot of people who were trashing Contador in 2008 now seem to be huge fans in 2010, celebrating every percieved victory over Lance or his team.

In 2008, the primary word association with Contador was probably "dope".

In 2010, it seems to be "class".

In the long run I wonder if Lance coming back for a few years might really be a huge positive for Contador's legacy... simply because it may have moved him from "villain" to "hero" status for a lot of fans.

 

[ravens]

I see you reached into your suitcase of irrelevancy for that one. Maybe if you try hard enough you can get Horner onto the 2009 Astana team and Stage 17 could play out differently. Let me know how that turns out for you.

As CC's non-sequitur's go, I'd rate it a solid 6.5.

I hope some of these online videos are a little higher def than what I have found thus far. It's like watching the damned zapruder film. These eyes are gettin' old...

 

[ravens]

I find it interesting that prior to Lance's comeback, I saw a lot of hatred aimed at Contador... almost as if they viewed him as the "new Lance".

Now that Lance is back, it seems like a lot of people who were trashing Contador in 2008 now seem to be huge fans in 2010, celebrating every percieved victory over Lance or his team.

In 2008, the primary word association with Contador was probably "dope".

In 2010, it seems to be "class".

In the long run I wonder if Lance coming back for a few years might really be a huge positive for Contador's legacy... simply because it may have moved him from "villain" to "hero" status for a lot of fans.

To your last paragraph, I agree.

To your first, Lance got me into cycling but Landis 2006 tdf kept me there. And resulted in heartbreak ...

then along came AC (for me, it's not like I was watching much racing so AC pre-Disco was a non-entity). I am not saying you're wrong but I really have no clue what you are talking about. I saw him at TOC 2006 and was a fan instantly.

As for doping, see sig

 

[Publicus]

I find it interesting that prior to Lance's comeback, I saw a lot of hatred aimed at Contador... almost as if they viewed him as the "new Lance".

Now that Lance is back, it seems like a lot of people who were trashing Contador in 2008 now seem to be huge fans in 2010, celebrating every percieved victory over Lance or his team.

In 2008, the primary word association with Contador was probably "dope".

In 2010, it seems to be "class".

In the long run I wonder if Lance coming back for a few years might really be a huge positive for Contador's legacy... simply because it may have moved him from "villain" to "hero" status for a lot of fans.

Even when it's not about Lance, it's about Lance.

I don't recall it being anywhere near what you portray it to be, but whatever. All hail Lance! LiveStrong and Prosper!

 

[Publicus]

As CC's non-sequitur's go, I'd rate it a solid 6.5.

I hope some of these online videos are a little higher def than what I have found thus far. It's like watching the damned zapruder film. These eyes are gettin' old...

LOL. Unfortunately it will be the best we can do state side until Lance saddles up for a race. Then, and only then will, Versus roll out the HD cameras.

 

[Ripper]

There he goes again ... does he not understand there is no I in TEAM?

 

[kurtinsc]

Even when it's not about Lance, it's about Lance.

I don't recall it being anywhere near what you portray it to be, but whatever. All hail Lance! LiveStrong and Prosper!

Maybe it wasn't here. I was on other cycling message boards at the time.

I remember the majority of people on the site I was on were cheering for Ricco to beat Contador in the Giro in 2008 due to considering Contador a doper.

Ricco.

Perhaps it was just anti-bruyneel or anti usp/disco/astana sentiment.

 

[Publicus]

Maybe it wasn't here. I was on other cycling message boards at the time.

I remember the majority of people on the site I was on were cheering for Ricco to beat Contador in the Giro in 2008 due to considering Contador a doper.

Ricco.

Perhaps it was just anti-bruyneel or anti usp/disco/astana sentiment.

Maybe it was here. I wasn't around these parts until March of last year, so I'm not going to argue the point. The doping allegations didn't phase me--if I follow the usual logic just about everyone is doping (if A beats C, who was convicted/suspected of doping, then A must be doping). I was purely driven by his racing style. He didn't say much in the press, so it's hard for me to understand why folks would consider him a villain.

I do agree that Lance's un-retirement has been a blessing in disguise for him. But then, AC has said the same thing.

 

[ravens]

LOL. Unfortunately it will be the best we can do state side until Lance saddles up for a race. Then, and only then will, Versus roll out the HD cameras.

It's not like I am asking for (or have the patience) for a 1080p download, but 720 on youtube works great for me. My DVD player is modern enough for it to read the torrent files (from CD) so I have the luxury of watching most of those where god intended them to be watched: on a big square 4:3 TV monitor.

 

[Potomac]

...

Now that Lance is back, it seems like a lot of people who were trashing Contador in 2008 now seem to be huge fans in 2010, celebrating every percieved victory over Lance or his team.

...

Very true.

 

[Carboncrank]

It would be easy to be hard on Chris for his ridiculous parroting of easily discredited company line but I would go easy on him. He is 38 years old, has a bunch of kids and an ex wife he needs to support. He knows that tossing Armstrong's salad could results in 2 more years of paychecks.

I think that was recorded the same day as the stage so there wasn't any company line, just the exact same observation I heard every other pro give. It was an amateur move, like missing the split on 3 was an amateur move. It's exactly the thing that will come back to bite him.

 

[pmcg76]

I think that was recorded the same day as the stage so there wasn't any company line, just the exact same observation I heard every other pro give. It was an amateur move, like missing the split on 3 was an amateur move. It's exactly the thing that will come back to bite him.

Like today!!!