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Teams & Riders EF Pro Cycling

Mar 14, 2016
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A thread for discussing news about the Cannondale-Drapac Pro Cycling Team.

They've had a lacklustre start to the 2016 season, but Slagter (Tour du Haut Var) and Clarke (GP Industria & Artigianato di Larciano) picked up a couple of wins for the team.

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Re: Cannondale Pro Cycling

They definetely have better start of the season this year than last year (last year was really disastrous), but they're still not where they used to be as a Garmin team and not where they should be considering the amount of talent in that team.

Woods, Bevin, Craddock and Van Baarle are bright points this year. Most of the rest has been kind of disappointment so far.

Giro has been pointed as the team's main goal for this year. We'll see if they match expectation. It seems they'll send a strong roster, but some of the riders need to show improvement over what they've shown so far this year.
 
Mar 14, 2016
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Re: Cannondale Pro Cycling

Anderis said:
They definetely have better start of the season this year than last year (last year was really disastrous), but they're still not where they used to be as a Garmin team and not where they should be considering the amount of talent in that team.
Has their budget been cut compared with Garmin?
 
Re: Cannondale Pro Cycling

CheckMyPecs said:
Has their budget been cut compared with Garmin?
Garmin has never been a high budget team compared to other WT teams but I think I've read something about Vaughters complaining that his budget for 2016 is $2m (or €2m, can't recall) smaller than for 2015.

It's strange, because they've expanded their roster from 27 to 30 riders this year and they brought to the team more big names (Uran, Rolland, Breschel, Clarke) than they lost (Martin, Hesjedal).

I think Cannondale deal runs out after 2017. I'm curious if this will affect their transfer activity, because that would mean Vaughters probably couldn't offer deals beyond 2017, while most of the good riders as well as the most promising neo-pros will most likely demand 2 years deals.

Interesting to see if Talansky will get an extension. Unless he does something very good by the end of July, he will probably need to take a pay cut for his next deal, as the previous one was signed straight after his Dauphine win and with rumours about Team Sky interest around. He might look for a fresh start with a new team, since his last 2 seasons were way below expectations.
 
Re:

jmdirt said:
Its too early for this discussion. Their goals are coming up with the Ardennes, the Giro, and the TdF.

So eh, betting on Slagter for F-W and L-B-L? Still remember that day in the Tour (I think Gallopin won) where Garmin suddenly decided to start an all out chase on the break and Slagter wasn't among the 50 best that day. That was hilarious

They should be very good in the Giro and decent in the Tour depending on Tolansky, Rolland always performs well
 
Mar 14, 2016
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Re: Re:

Valv.Piti said:
They should be very good in the Giro and decent in the Tour depending on Tolansky, Rolland always performs well
He could be an outsider for the podium if he doesn't lose time on purpose to go stage hunting.
 
Re: Re:

CheckMyPecs said:
Valv.Piti said:
They should be very good in the Giro and decent in the Tour depending on Tolansky, Rolland always performs well
He could be an outsider for the podium if he doesn't lose time on purpose to go stage hunting.
Rolland? He is a better bet than Talansky, thats for sure, but podium is stretching it. Top-5 if he is 2011-level at best. And I dont think he should give up on stages and Polkadots, he should do like Rasmussen did in 2005 and 2007 on stage 8, thats perfect to try to get a few minutes and a considerably lead in the polkas.
 
Re:

PeterB said:
Nice opening pictures but there's already an established thread for this team http://forum.cyclingnews.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=23020.
Well, that thread title is "Garmin cannondale" which doesn't really fit the current team name.

Valv.Piti said:
So eh, betting on Slagter for F-W and L-B-L? Still remember that day in the Tour (I think Gallopin won) where Garmin suddenly decided to start an all out chase on the break and Slagter wasn't among the 50 best that day. That was hilarious
Yeah, that was an embarassing day during TdF (not only Slagter's performance, but for the fact the whole team went 100% on those hills and when the last guy finished his work, there were still like 100 guys in the peloton), but about Ardennes, Slagter was pretty good there in 2014, wasn't he? And in 2015 he finished top10 in Fleche despite being way off his best form. He is a decent bet maybe not for a win, but for a top5 somewhere, at least on paper, because I'm not convinced about his form this spring and it's rather worrying he was dropped so early at AGR.

GenericBoonenFan said:
I think Wippert also performed decently so far.
He has not embarassed himself, but neither he hasn't exceeded expectations.
 
VanBaarle getting 6th at Flanders was a good result for a team that is a long way from the strength on the cobbles that they once had. In the sprints they've done about as expected, although they will be hoping Wippert brings in a few small wins. The problem has been the team on the terrain where they are supposed to be good, ie when it goes uphill.

That was a desperately bad AGR for a team that looks strong on paper, although FW should suit Slagter more.

I'd rate Uran about fourth or fifth favourite for the Giro, but I don't think a top 5 would be a good result given how much they have resting on his performance. The positive side is that the bigger favourites are all, for various reasons, people he might reasonably hope to beat if he's better than expected and they are worse. Nibali, Landa, Valverde are tough opponents, but not as obviously invincible to an Uran as say Froome, Contador, Quintana.
 
Re:

Zinoviev Letter said:
That was a desperately bad AGR for a team that looks strong on paper, although FW should suit Slagter more.
Well, as I said in other thread, their selection for AGR didn't look that strong on paper, eventhough it was expected more from Slagter and Clarke. Also FW and LBL rosters are far from the best with Uran and Moser being left home. And you could find a few more guys in the team who on their good form should be upgrade over Brown or King in this kind of terrain (like Villella).

Van Baarle has exceeded my expectations on cobbles this year. Not only finished 6th in Flanders, but showed himself nicely in E3 and Roubaix, where he finished inside top20 despite not being at the front of the race when some major splits appeared. Possibly he could have the legs for top10 in all 3 races.
The rest of the cobbled team was abysmal, though. Cannondale is not one of the strongest cobbled teams on paper, but also nowhere near as bad as they performed. Langeveld was a consistent top10 performer in cobbled monuments not so long ago (and not like he is an old rider), and they also have two top10 E3 finishers from last year in Breschel and Bauer. They justified themselves by ilnesses and stomach problems that hit them very badly, but still so many decent riders underperformed badly all throughout cobbled campaign.

I hope Uran is up to the task in Romandie and Giro. Last year he had 120 WT points collected already by this point of the year. This year he only has mere 4 points for 10th in Catalunya. He was supposed to be the most consistent point-scorer of the team.
 
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Yeah, Uran never had many great results before doing well at the Giro, so I'm not too worried.
It will be nice to see what Formolo will be able to do in his 2nd Giro.
I'm also hoping that Dombrowski will be able to do something, it's his 2nd GT and he said that the 2nd half of the Vuelta and the 3rd week was a lot easier for him than the first week (he was also pretty strong on the Andorra stage, he tried to go in the breakaway, crashed, had to chase back to the main group and finished with Quintana and Torres), so I want him to go full Sella in the high mountains. :cool:
Simon Clake could do well in the hilly stages, Cannondale could have a great team for the Giro.
 
Re:

PeterB said:
Nice opening pictures but there's already an established thread for this team http://forum.cyclingnews.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=23020.
Some teams have at least two or three threads, top riders have three or four threads, and some races have several (P-R, Predicting P-R, Rating the Field at P-R, Rating P-R, Who will win P-R...). Why? 1) The search function is poor so you might not be able to find the thread you are looking for so you start a new one, 2) Some people like to separate things out more (in my mind everything about a race could be in one thread, in others minds different aspects deserve their own thread).

EDIT: Another thread was added about Valverde today, he might be up to five now.
 
Mar 14, 2016
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Re: Re:

Valv.Piti said:
Rolland? He is a better bet than Talansky, thats for sure, but podium is stretching it. Top-5 if he is 2011-level at best. And I dont think he should give up on stages and Polkadots, he should do like Rasmussen did in 2005 and 2007 on stage 8, thats perfect to try to get a few minutes and a considerably lead in the polkas.
That's why I said outsider. E.g. if Landa blows up because of not enough training or if Nibali gets disqualified for an extra-sticky bottle again... :D
 
Re: Re:

CheckMyPecs said:
Valv.Piti said:
Rolland? He is a better bet than Talansky, thats for sure, but podium is stretching it. Top-5 if he is 2011-level at best. And I dont think he should give up on stages and Polkadots, he should do like Rasmussen did in 2005 and 2007 on stage 8, thats perfect to try to get a few minutes and a considerably lead in the polkas.
That's why I said outsider. E.g. if Landa blows up because of not enough training or if Nibali gets disqualified for an extra-sticky bottle again... :D

Wait, I thought you were talking about Rolland, Urán can easily podium.
 
Re: Cannondale Pro Cycling

Woods 12th in La Fleche. That's really good performance for Ardennes debut. Who knows if he didn't miss top10 due to the fact the team didn't ride for him and didn't work to position him well for the final climb. IIRC, he has only one year deal for 2016. I wonder if he decides to stay with Cannondale or go elsewhere. With this kind of results, it will be his decision about this, I'm sure.

Slagter really disappointing this spring. I wonder why his 2014 level disappeared. He said last year that he had some health problems disrupting his 2015 season preparations, that's why he was not so good early last year. But even then he managed 9th in la Fleche and then he came good in 2nd half of the season (2 stage wins in Alberta, 2 top10 in Canadian classics and decent Eneco). I thought he could have a decent spring this year again, but that's not the case. It seems like he is getting worse year by year.

I also expected more from Craddock. He did well on those short and steep climbs in Pais Vasco.

Roll on Romandie and Giro. This team seriously needs some results. One of just 5 WT teams without a WT win this season, if I'm not mistaken.
 
Their season now basically depends on Uran/Rolland/Talansky coming good in the GTs, or at least doing well in a few week-long stage races. I'm not enormously hopeful as the GC field is a crowded one these days, although Uran could do well in the Giro again.
 
Re: Cannondale Pro Cycling

Anderis said:
Who knows if he didn't miss top10 due to the fact the team didn't ride for him and didn't work to position him well for the final climb.
I thought it was the matter of the team expecting Slagter to do better, but apparently Woods took the blame for his positioning himself.

vedrafjord said:
Their season now basically depends on Uran/Rolland/Talansky coming good in the GTs, or at least doing well in a few week-long stage races.
The problem is that half of the WT week-long stage races in the calendar took place already this year and the best Cannondale managed was 9th overall in Pais Vasco with Craddock. There are just 4 one-week WT races for climbers (as Eneco is not for climbers) left in the calendar. And the next one starts next week, so Cannondale better find improvement soon.

Still, it's nowhere near as disastrous as last year. They sit 12th in UCI WT Team ranking with 114 points. Last year at this point of the year they were dead last with just 19 points if I'm not mistaken. But in 2014 they were over 200 points despite missing some opportunities due to bad luck (Slagter in PN overall).
 

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