Critérium du Dauphiné May 30-June 6 2021

[Broccolidwarf]

I was about to make a whole post in reply to Red Rick about how back in june 2019 when Froome had the crash there was kind of a power vacuum. And Froome was really the only available rider that looked like he could potentially challenge Ineos.

Then I looked it all up again and saw that Israel Start-Up Nation bought Froome after a disastrous 2020 where we had since seen the rise of Bernal, Roglic and Pogacar. Yeah that's a stupid bet.

Look, in hindsight it was - obviously - a bad bet.

I'm just saying it might have worked.

They spoke at length about it on the Danish TV2 broadcast today, with Rolf Soerensen making the interesting point, that for a GC rider the build back after such an injury is very difficult.

The point he made was, that after losing a lot of muscle mass (by prolonged inactivity), you need to build back all that muscle from the ground up (so to speak), usually by doing a lot of work with weights.

But doing that (while necessary for recovery) in fact makes you overweight (in terms of muscle mass) for a climber, so you then face a secondary long process of making your muscles "leaner", before you can even hope to reach your former level.

He pointed to Froome being a visibly "bigger" (in terms of muscles) rider now, than he was when he was at top level, as an example of the problem.

It's a specific problem to climbers/GC riders, because heavy rider types can "just" build back up from injury, and avoid the second part.

 

[Panda Claws]

Snippet

My main problem is just that they gave him a monster contract. Sure you can bet on the guy because at least there is a chance he will do something. If you take Mollema for example he is simply never going to win a GT.

But imo the contract should have been more focused on bonuses if he actually managed to win things OR at least for one-year only. That's basically what QST did with Philippe Gilbert who was not looking like the hottest bet at the time either.

Of course I might say all that but Froome could potentially have had a very strong negotiation position if other teams were interested as well.

 

[BlueRoads]

I just got home from work. It's hot...

You'd get along great with my son.
That being said I will now grab him from his room and force him to go for a walk with me.

 

[Broccolidwarf]

My main problem is just that they gave him a monster contract. Sure you can bet on the guy because at least there is a chance he will do something. If you take Mollema for example he is simply never going to win a GT.

But imo the contract should have been more focused on bonuses if he actually managed to win things OR at least for one-year only. That's basically what QST did with Philippe Gilbert who was not looking like the hottest bet at the time either.

Of course I might say all that but Froome could potentially have had a very strong negotiation position if other teams were interested as well.

The point still is, if you have enough money to not really care if you lose the bet, all that goes out the window.

 

[Vasilis]

I don't really have time to go to France. I have a job... also... travel restrictions.

Well I really can't think of anything else, personally I think it's a good excuse to travel there...

 

[will-10]

Ineos has saved many a career of a breakaway rider - Unless, other teams boss the race this will continue to happen like the last ten years.

Might not fit the narrative but there were a number of teams who had more reason to chase than Ineos today.

 

[Samu Cuenca]

You'd get along great with my son.
That being said I will now grab him from his room and force him to go for a walk with me.

As long as you stick to kidnapping you're own kid, I'm fine with it

 

[Panda Claws]

The point still is, if you have enough money to not really care if you lose the bet, all that goes out the window.

If I bet 2 euros on Cavendish winning the Tour that is still a stupid bet even if I don't care about that money. Very low odds.

But yeah I get the overall point. If you have a fountain of money to spend you might as well put it all on the guy who has a 1% chance to win. Seeing as how there was no real alternative probably.

 

[Mayomaniac]

What happened to Vingegaard? He finished 5min behind the Froome group.

 

[bajbar]

What happened to Vingegaard? He finished 5min behind the Froome group.

I would guess he is a type of rider that needs some time to get his motor running coming straight of an altitude camp.

 

[Bolder]

What happened to Vingegaard? He finished 5min behind the Froome group.

I’m guessing that with Kuss and SK as coleaders, they want him to be as strong as possible in the mountain stages. No point in going deep today if he’s not 100%.

 

[Broccolidwarf]

If I bet 2 euros on Cavendish winning the Tour that is still a stupid bet even if I don't care about that money. Very low odds.

But yeah I get the overall point. If you have a fountain of money to spend you might as well put it all on the guy who has a 1% chance to win. Seeing as how there was no real alternative probably.

Cavendish wasn't on track to win his 5th Tour when he got a severe injury.

It wasn't outside the realm of possibility that Froome could come back.

 

[Broccolidwarf]

Interesting finish tomorrow.

On the overall view it looks like its for the sprinters, but apparently (race preview on Feltet.dk) the last 1.4K is 4.1%, on a completely straight, only 5 metres wide road.

The fight for getting onto that road first will probably be quite something.

Not only do Bahrain, DQ, Movistar, Astana and UAE all have riders that fancy winning up that, but with 42 riders inside 11 seconds of the leaders jersey, and the gaps that can form on such a narrow road, at least 50 riders will want to hit the road in the first 10.

Mayhem to ensue

 

[tobydawq]

As long as you stick to kidnapping you're own kid, I'm fine with it

I think your in need of checking you're grammar.

 

[Broccolidwarf]

I think your in need of checking you're grammar.

Dude, you always try to pick a fight with people in here

 

[tobydawq]

Dude, you always try to pick a fight with people in here

Always...?

Samu knows I am kidding and know that he can spell and communicate perfectly fine and I would think he would enjoy my hilarious response.

You, on the other hand... No humour. And now you feel the need to interfere here... Picking a fight with me

 

[Samu Cuenca]

Always...?

Samu knows I am kidding and know that he can spell and communicate perfectly fine and I would think he would enjoy my hilarious response.

I must have been focusing too much on the wording of the end of the sentence to realise what a stupid mistake I'd already made
Thanks for pointing it out, and I choose to believe you could have done it in an even funnier way, if you had wanted to at the time.

 

[tobydawq]

I must have been focusing too much on the wording of the end of the sentence to realise what a stupid mistake I'd already made
Thanks for pointing it out, and I choose to believe you could have done it in an even funnier way, if you had wanted to at the time.

I think that was to the maximum of my abilities

 

[Samu Cuenca]

I think that was to the maximum of my abilities

I nearly wrote that it would probably be better for you to leave the humour stuff to the professionals, but that would obviously just come back to haunt me
I'm sure you can come with an equation/math problem that would get the right people to laugh a lot more than I ever could.

 

[18-Valve. (pithy)]

What happened to Vingegaard? He finished 5min behind the Froome group.

He's coming back from a minor injury, according to Niermann.

 

[Broccolidwarf]

Always...?

Yes

 

[tobydawq]

Yes

I think when I engage you, that is generally true (except for when I answered honestly what my problem with Brian Holm was which of course got a rude response from you) but not so much for other posters. This case being proof of that.

 

[broppo]

My main problem is just that they gave him a monster contract. Sure you can bet on the guy because at least there is a chance he will do something. If you take Mollema for example he is simply never going to win a GT.

But imo the contract should have been more focused on bonuses if he actually managed to win things OR at least for one-year only. That's basically what QST did with Philippe Gilbert who was not looking like the hottest bet at the time either.

Of course I might say all that but Froome could potentially have had a very strong negotiation position if other teams were interested as well.

seriously what do you care about how much money israel nation spends on froome?? I always see these stupid things who cares how much certain people pay or get. It is imo so much more interesting to talk about other cycling related topics, than contracts....

 

[Panda Claws]

seriously what do you care about how much money israel nation spends on froome?? I always see these stupid things who cares how much certain people pay or get. It is imo so much more interesting to talk about other cycling related topics, than contracts....

Cool down this comes across as far too agressive.
His contract is dumb. They way overpaid for him. I am not jealous and I am not bitter.

My post was about the merits of giving Froome a contract. I said that I could see the arguments about giving him a contract but that the problem with it was that it was too much money. That made it a dumb contract to hand out as well as an ill-advised decision.

If you want to talk about other stuff I urge you to do so instead of adding another post about a topic you don't want to talk about. So counter-productive.

 

[Panda Claws]

Cavendish wasn't on track to win his 5th Tour when he got a severe injury.

It wasn't outside the realm of possibility that Froome could come back.

I'm not committed to the Cavendish example at all. The specific example was not the point. It's just an example of something very unlikely.

No it's not impossible that Froome comes back strong but I don't think it was at all likely after a very bad 2020 and given Froome's age. Like I said in my first post, if this had been the end of 2019 I would have found the contract somewhat more reasonable but at the end of 2020 it was just never going to be good odds to give Froome such a long contract. I'm not saying that Froome did not justify any contract just not the one he was given.

I find this distinction between 2019 and 2020 to be key.
But you don't seem to find this distinction between 2019 and 2020 as important. Because 2020 is deemed to be part of the normal recovery process. I think the warning signs were there though and that given his age due diligence would dictate to be careful with the contract.

Them having money to burn does not excuse this in my opinion. Saying that it's okay to just gamble excess money away because you have enough of it anyway is the fast track to 'nouveau poverty'. The odds still need to be there and they weren't there in the case of Froome imo.

But we can agree to disagree as far as I am concerned. Perhaps this is hindsight speaking sure but I think the odds of Froome succeeding were very low back then, you seem to think they were higher and that is fine. I wouldn't mind it if Froome makes a strong comeback.