Contador offered $12M/year

[peloton]

I know this has been done to death, but really. How can you say he didn't have much support?

I don't deny there was tension in the team and he didn't have the moral support of JB and LA with all the media foolishness...

... but on the road... he didn't win the TTT by himself... he didn't ride on the front into the wind wearing the Yellow jersey.... the rest of the Astana team did.

Did you watch the Tour?

The only Team support AC had was in the TTT.

His own teammates were chasing him after he attacked in the mountains.
Insane.

 

[ggusta]

I know this has been done to death, but really. How can you say he didn't have much support?

I don't deny there was tension in the team and he didn't have the moral support of JB and LA with all the media foolishness...

... but on the road... he didn't win the TTT by himself... he didn't ride on the front into the wind wearing the Yellow jersey.... the rest of the Astana team did.

wearing the yellow jersey? the closest thing anyone on astana had resembling a yellow jersey was AC's spanish champion's 'jersey' (skinsuit)

Fabian was in yellow at that point.

AC WAS in yellow at Annecy, the time trial he did win against Fabian, with no radio last half of the race and no team car ride to the start.

He had a teammate doing everything in his power to distract him from the race and a DS who turned a blind (impotent) eye.

Kloden came in 9th, 54 seconds down at Annecy, Lance was 16th down 90 seconds.

You are correct, he didn't win the TTT by himself, but he did win the ITT truly alone,

and Astana didn't win the TTT without him.

It's been done to death precisely because some people are still not dealing with reality, and I won't get tired of it as long as people continue to act like they are blind to it.

 

[Anonymous]

Still trying to find out just how accurate this is, and if Astana really has the money. The article is still up on the front CN page, so they seem to be holding to it.

Anyway you slice it, this is a sihtload of money. I mean, who would turn this down? Contador showed last year he didn't have much team support, and won the Tour anyway. If the money is real, and they can get him two dedicated domestiques for the Tour, he'd have to sign away.

see this is where i strongly disagree..

first, the team time trial, there is no doubt that had a massive impact on the tour, and lance, kloden and levi where a big part of that..

secondly, although AC won the tour, all of the major contenders had to be aware at all times of the threat of levi, lance and to a lesser extend kloden.. they had to watch all four riders, they where not until the third week just focusing on alberto.. And even then there was a certain amount of their focus had to be on lance and kloden stealing their podiums..

if astana had just been about AC i think baby schleck would have run him much closer, but saxo devoted a lot of time watching lance, watching levi, watching kloden..

AC Did NOT under any circumstances win it on his own, he had three perfect decoys giving the other teams a lot to think about...

 

[karlboss]

I agree with you dim, its hard to measure the effect of three decoys, but would you agree he didn't have the type of all for one support that lance did99-05? Infact 3 decoys riding for themselves may help you, but do you count it as support?

 

[Anonymous]

I agree with you dim, its hard to measure the effect of three decoys, but would you agree he didn't have the type of all for one support that lance did99-05? Infact 3 decoys riding for themselves may help you, but do you count it as support?

he didnt have the train riding on the front like the old discovery days no..
but there is no doubt that the mere presence of lance, levi and andreas gave saxo particularly something to think about... morning meetings instead of discussing marking contador, protecting andy until it was just him and AC would instead have been who was watching lance, what to do if lance attacked who goes with him etc, what to do if AC attacked, it gave the other teams so many things to cover and left their resources thinner than maybe they would have been..

its like football (or soccer) the best player on the team isnt always the one who scores the goals, its the player who runs into space, draws a defender with him, makes the runs that free other players up.. you can defend against a world class striker, but you cannot defend against four...

i guess the question is, without lance, levi and kloden on the team would ac have won the tour de france.. And i for one am not convinced.. the TTT would have made things different and with saxo able to just worry about AC the overall result would have been different...

a scenario, frank schleck, andy, AC and a few astana domestiques going up a mountain.. frank and andy can take it in turns to attack AC, wear him down, they couldnt do that this tour because they where worried about the other threats from lance and levi.. they also in a rare tour had no other support, menchov, evans etc where busy going backwards.. wiggins was hanging on for grim death.. they where basically outnumbered and couldnt do anything about it..

there is no doubt that AC is the best tour rider in the world right now, but, for me there is no doubt that the presence of lance, levi and kloden, along with the pathetic performances of cadel, menchov and some others had a big impact on AC winning the tour

it all also hinges on that first stage he put time into lance.. if that had not happened we could all easily be sitting here discussing lance winning the tour.. do i think lance deserved to, no, by the same token i dont think AC won it alone... for me, i still think the rider that deserved to win the tour, and the rider in who my mind won it is Andy Schleck

 

[ggusta]

see this is where i strongly disagree..

first, the team time trial, there is no doubt that had a massive impact on the tour, and lance, kloden and levi where a big part of that..

secondly, although AC won the tour, all of the major contenders had to be aware at all times of the threat of levi, lance and to a lesser extend kloden.. they had to watch all four riders, they where not until the third week just focusing on alberto.. And even then there was a certain amount of their focus had to be on lance and kloden stealing their podiums..

if astana had just been about AC i think baby schleck would have run him much closer, but saxo devoted a lot of time watching lance, watching levi, watching kloden..

AC Did NOT under any circumstances win it on his own, he had three perfect decoys giving the other teams a lot to think about...

A) When other teams had more than one guy going for the GC, was there anything close to the degree of tension that Lance raised at Astana. If AC wasn't even there, he had no chance of winning. EG, Garmin, Was Wiggins supposed to be their GC threat? I think not. Did van deVelde throw the team into disarray like a little b-iotch for not getting his way? Especially when it was obvious he couldn't hang with the top guys on the climbs?

B) All those other guys who couldn't figure out which Astana All-Star to pay attention to....do you think they were still confused who to watch after Arcalis? Answer that! Answer it or forever hold your tongue!!

C) He won it alone as much as anyone I have ever seen. Was Saxo going to work harder or less if Lance wasn't sitting there distracting AC at every opportunity.

 

[Anonymous]

Answer it or forever hold your tongue!!

who on earth do you think you are! Dont ever tell me what to do!

i have put forward my point of view in a rational and non abusive way.. I wouldnt take someone in the pub talking to me like that and i wont take it here..

(and if you read my post you will notice that i also mentioned they where concerned about their podium spots which if you remember where under threat from both LA and Kloden)

 

[lagartija]

see this is where i strongly disagree..

first, the team time trial, there is no doubt that had a massive impact on the tour, and lance, kloden and levi where a big part of that..

secondly, although AC won the tour, all of the major contenders had to be aware at all times of the threat of levi, lance and to a lesser extend kloden.. they had to watch all four riders, they where not until the third week just focusing on alberto.. And even then there was a certain amount of their focus had to be on lance and kloden stealing their podiums..

if astana had just been about AC i think baby schleck would have run him much closer, but saxo devoted a lot of time watching lance, watching levi, watching kloden..

AC Did NOT under any circumstances win it on his own, he had three perfect decoys giving the other teams a lot to think about...

thats a joke..if astana had been all about berto he would have won by 8 minutes........and im tired about people talking about levi.....HE WASNT THERE ,he crashed and abandoned, the midget didnt make it a week.......and whats that marking armstrong from where 2 minutes back down the road.......so you think berto is slimy , ok a family guy who called his mom every day , who maintained class and composure in the face of a twittering ego maniac , whom had his own director turn his back on him in public under huge media scrutiny , a young man who held his space and valued his family and was happiest when they arrived to see him.....but you see him as slimy
as they say ...i do not think that word means what you think it means.....
or is it some kind of brit thing i dont understand......again

 

[Publicus]

he didnt have the train riding on the front like the old discovery days no..
but there is no doubt that the mere presence of lance, levi and andreas gave saxo particularly something to think about... morning meetings instead of discussing marking contador, protecting andy until it was just him and AC would instead have been who was watching lance, what to do if lance attacked who goes with him etc, what to do if AC attacked, it gave the other teams so many things to cover and left their resources thinner than maybe they would have been..

its like football (or soccer) the best player on the team isnt always the one who scores the goals, its the player who runs into space, draws a defender with him, makes the runs that free other players up.. you can defend against a world class striker, but you cannot defend against four...

i guess the question is, without lance, levi and kloden on the team would ac have won the tour de france.. And i for one am not convinced.. the TTT would have made things different and with saxo able to just worry about AC the overall result would have been different...

a scenario, frank schleck, andy, AC and a few astana domestiques going up a mountain.. frank and andy can take it in turns to attack AC, wear him down, they couldnt do that this tour because they where worried about the other threats from lance and levi.. they also in a rare tour had no other support, menchov, evans etc where busy going backwards.. wiggins was hanging on for grim death.. they where basically outnumbered and couldnt do anything about it..

there is no doubt that AC is the best tour rider in the world right now, but, for me there is no doubt that the presence of lance, levi and kloden, along with the pathetic performances of cadel, menchov and some others had a big impact on AC winning the tour

There is something to said about the value of the decoys at Astana. From what I recall from the race, at no point in time, did Levi, Kloden or Lance for that matter put in an attack. Not once. So from a decoy stand point, they were rather meaningless. Second, I think to whatever extent they were decoys, the gig was up on the stage to Arcalis. If anyone was wondering who was the strongest Astana member, and thus the one to be watched, it was then. The attacks that came on Verbier, Stages 16 and 17 were all covered by AC. Kloden was along for the ride, but as you will recall, on Stage 17, he did ZERO work on AC's behalf when they were with the Brothers Schleck. He was sucking AC's wheel the entire time.

I think you will definitely see Radio Shack try to employ this decoy-strategy to the fullest since no one of the riders is strong enough to separate himself from the peloton. They will have to rely on subterfuge, which is why AC is going to need a real strong team coming into the mountains--to actually cover those attacks.

EDIT: One other point. If the TTT wasn't there, then I'm guessing that they would have inserted either another mountain top finish or more ITT kilometers. In any event, I think AC would have raced the stages differently. I could speculate how or where, but the fact is he was much stronger than Andy Schleck in the mountains--he was able to put considerable distance between the two of them and maintain it. I don't think it would have been any different had the TTT not been part of the race. They raced the the course that was laid out, not some mythical course. And on that course, AC was the stronger man.

 

[Anonymous]

why is this thread all about lance, if youre anti contador you must be pro lance, if you are anti lance you are pro contador.. contador won the tour despite lances twittering, blah blah blah..

if twittering had an impact on the tour joan rivers would be in the ****ing yellow jersey..!

as for 2010.. i have my money on Andy schleck.. £20 at 10/1 will do me nicely thanks..

From what I recall from the race, at no point in time, did Levi, Kloden or Lance for that matter put in an attack. Not once. So from a decoy stand point, they were rather meaningless.

that i on the whole agree with.. but, saxo didnt know that each morning, or during each stage.. they still had to prepare for that eventuality..

this could go on for ever..

one thing though, chill guys, everyone has an opinion and last i looked is free to express it as long as we are rational and non abusive.. this is not a court of law.. there is no right and wrong, only opinion.. something we are all very well capable of defending vociferously

 

[lagartija]

he didnt have the train riding on the front like the old discovery days no..
but there is no doubt that the mere presence of lance, levi and andreas gave saxo particularly something to think about... morning meetings instead of discussing marking contador, protecting andy until it was just him and AC would instead have been who was watching lance, what to do if lance attacked who goes with him etc, what to do if AC attacked, it gave the other teams so many things to cover and left their resources thinner than maybe they would have been..

its like football (or soccer) the best player on the team isnt always the one who scores the goals, its the player who runs into space, draws a defender with him, makes the runs that free other players up.. you can defend against a world class striker, but you cannot defend against four...

i guess the question is, without lance, levi and kloden on the team would ac have won the tour de france.. And i for one am not convinced.. the TTT would have made things different and with saxo able to just worry about AC the overall result would have been different...

a scenario, frank schleck, andy, AC and a few astana domestiques going up a mountain.. frank and andy can take it in turns to attack AC, wear him down, they couldnt do that this tour because they where worried about the other threats from lance and levi.. they also in a rare tour had no other support, menchov, evans etc where busy going backwards.. wiggins was hanging on for grim death.. they where basically outnumbered and couldnt do anything about it..

there is no doubt that AC is the best tour rider in the world right now, but, for me there is no doubt that the presence of lance, levi and kloden, along with the pathetic performances of cadel, menchov and some others had a big impact on AC winning the tour

it all also hinges on that first stage he put time into lance.. if that had not happened we could all easily be sitting here discussing lance winning the tour.. do i think lance deserved to, no, by the same token i dont think AC won it alone... for me, i still think the rider that deserved to win the tour, and the rider in who my mind won it is Andy Schleck

ok how did andy deserve to win the tour..........by losing time to berto on multiple occassions.......did sprocket get ahold of your password....

 

[Anonymous]

[/B]
ok how did andy deserve to win the tour..........by losing time to berto on multiple occassions.......did sprocket get ahold of your password....

same reason i dont think valverde won the vuelta.. clinic territory

no further comment needed from me on that one..

i admit it, and just accept it, im a contador hater, its a bit like being a secret lemonade drinker except less fizzy

 

[lagartija]

I agree with you dim, its hard to measure the effect of three decoys, but would you agree he didn't have the type of all for one support that lance did99-05? Infact 3 decoys riding for themselves may help you, but do you count it as support?

sorry.....but what, who, are these decoys...........levi was not in the race, period , he went home
and lance or klodi where behind as in not riding in the front group every time things got serious

 

[Murray]

to clarify...support in the Lance days would have seen the peloton hit the bottom of a hill, 9 astana boys on the front in order of strength and pull until you can't pull anymore, did you ever see anything that approached this at this years tour?
Further did you ever see, kloden, levi, lance on the front taking wind?

No, this was not teamwork to the same degree as they had in the USPS/Discovery years. I do not think everyone on the team buried themselves for Contador.

Unfortunately, (or maybe not) I don't have the time to sift through Tour video to find examples of Astana teammates taking wind for Contador, but I did watch and it did happen.

He got more support on Astana than he would have gotten at Lotto.

 

[lagartija]

same reason i dont think valverde won the vuelta.. clinic territory

no further comment needed from me on that one..

i admit it, and just accept it, im a contador hater, its a bit like being a secret lemonade drinker except less fizzy

you know we are not talking about that, comon keep it strategic, just like you dont like every thread being about lance(as do i) they all dont have to revolve around the clinical stuff

 

[lagartija]

No, this was not teamwork to the same degree as they had in the USPS/Discovery years. I do not think everyone on the team buried themselves for Contador.

Unfortunately, (or maybe not) I don't have the time to sift through Tour video to find examples of Astana teammates taking wind for Contador, but I did watch and it did happen.

He got more support on Astana than he would have gotten at Lotto.

that made me laugh..........

 

[filipo]

Still trying to find out just how accurate this is, and if Astana really has the money. The article is still up on the front CN page, so they seem to be holding to it.

That CN publishes, holds to,, references or even makes mention of an article is no proof of its accuracy.

 

[Anonymous]

He got more support on Astana than he would have gotten at Lotto.

.....................

 

[karlboss]

sorry.....but what, who, are these decoys...........levi was not in the race, period , he went home
and lance or klodi where behind as in not riding in the front group every time things got serious

They were decoys, or could have been going in, I never said they were effective or even used as such. That is why decoys may help you.

 

[karlboss]

No, this was not teamwork to the same degree as they had in the USPS/Discovery years. I do not think everyone on the team buried themselves for Contador.

Unfortunately, (or maybe not) I don't have the time to sift through Tour video to find examples of Astana teammates taking wind for Contador, but I did watch and it did happen.

He got more support on Astana than he would have gotten at Lotto.

i didn't see it, beyond muravyev and rast

maybe this is the support that wasn't at lotto? sorry forgot TTT

 

[Publicus]

why is this thread all about lance, if youre anti contador you must be pro lance, if you are anti lance you are pro contador.. contador won the tour despite lances twittering, blah blah blah..

if twittering had an impact on the tour joan rivers would be in the ****ing yellow jersey..!

as for 2010.. i have my money on Andy schleck.. £20 at 10/1 will do me nicely thanks..



that i on the whole agree with.. but, saxo didnt know that each morning, or during each stage.. they still had to prepare for that eventuality..

this could go on for ever..

one thing though, chill guys, everyone has an opinion and last i looked is free to express it as long as we are rational and non abusive.. this is not a court of law.. there is no right and wrong, only opinion.. something we are all very well capable of defending vociferously

Only until Arcalis. After that, everyone knew what the score was and their strategy and tactics changed accordingly.

 

[Publicus]

No, this was not teamwork to the same degree as they had in the USPS/Discovery years. I do not think everyone on the team buried themselves for Contador.

Unfortunately, (or maybe not) I don't have the time to sift through Tour video to find examples of Astana teammates taking wind for Contador, but I did watch and it did happen.

He got more support on Astana than he would have gotten at Lotto.

Better question, WHO buried themself for Contador? I don't recall anyone doing so. And you don't need video of the Astana team riding to protect AC, they did it. But what you won't ever find is anyone pacing him up the mountain. Look at Stage 17. Kloden makes the break but never once actually breaks the wind for AC. He rides his wheel until AC goes and then it's game over Kloden.

 

[ggusta]

who on earth do you think you are! Dont ever tell me what to do!

i have put forward my point of view in a rational and non abusive way.. I wouldnt take someone in the pub talking to me like that and i wont take it here..

(and if you read my post you will notice that i also mentioned they where concerned about their podium spots which if you remember where under threat from both LA and Kloden)

A) It was not said in all seriousness. (And although you inspired it, I directed it to anyone who is still delusional about Arcalis, not you in particular.)

B) You still won't answer it.

 

[ggusta]

.....but you see him as slimy
as they say ...i do not think that word means what you think it means.....
or is it some kind of brit thing i dont understand......again

dark skin, black hair, mediterranean complexion.

I have only heard variations of the code ..... ohhh... about a million times....

 

[rata de sentina]

In order to function as a decoy, conventional wisdom and the dictionary definition suggests a person has to draw attention. Doing nothing is certainly a novel strategy for a "decoy". In cycling terms your typical GC threat decoy has to actually attack since watching someone isn't particularly arduous. The decoy argument doesn't seem to have much merit to me.

Astana's decoys either didn't or couldn't perform as such. Most likely AC would have chased down the decoy himself since he would have realised that Bruynheel's "decoy" was probably going to morph into an agent of duplicity.