European Championship 2025: Men’s RR, October 5

[dobrien]

This gets confusing. What exactly are you comparing, again? You leave out altitude camps but include more professional preparation... I would consider altitude camps part of that.

I'm saying that you don't even know for sure if Pog would even break through as a rider in the 1960s. You claim that Merckx would have been less succesful in the current era (which I agree with), but you can't seem to understand that Pog's career could have gone very differently in the 1960s. There was less competition by less nationalities, but there was still a very big base of riders wanting to become a pro. Who says Pog would have found the races to excel in, that would have grabbed the attention of team managers? There weren't any VO2 max tests in those days, so he (and guys like Vine) would maybe never have become a pro in the first place.

I don't mean to offend you, but I don't think you're reply actually address what I'm actually saying. How about if I use the world professional 'approach' rather than preparation? And let's just say back then for the sake of argument that Pog was Belgian, rather than Slovenian; I mean, Greg LeMond was a teenager from Northern California and Cyrille Guimard managed to find him.... I don't have the time to dig into my reply right now, later I'll reply in more depth.

 

[Barkintheeye]

I thought we were comparing Pog with Merckx? Why are you mentioning others now?

Because I believe Pog is as tough and proficient as Merckx ever was and also as tough (and almost as proficient) as some of today's most gritty riders that thrive in mud, rain and adverse conditions.

 

[BubbaChuck]

always remember,harder it is,better for pog.you cant comparae how pog looks on climbs to that era.they would die with him,lol.pog is biological marvel.if any other rider today did his calendar,thye would look like jonas after 2 months.vdp was laready dead after pr.

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

You don't have to imagine Pog in the 1960s. Just imagine Pog at any other team than UAE. If you look at how McNulty, Wellens, Del Torro... level up after joining. It's clear that they are doing something other teams are not doing. I'm not insinuating it's clinic related, I don't know what it is, but it would be nice if other teams caught up to make it a more even fight. All the Pog fangirls can chose to ignore the elephant in the room of course.

 

[Cycling111]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1975190153263231328

View: https://x.com/LosBrolin/status/1975190153263231328?t=b3sdWwpjQ2sjaAfC0BiWBw&s=19

 

[Zoetemelk-fan]

Maybe it's more fair to turn it around as well: How much would Pog have won in the days of Merckx, on old steel bikes, bad hotels without airco during the Tour, unfomfortable clothing, having to change your tubulars when flatting during training rides, without altitude camps and sunny winter training stints in southern Spain but only CX and track to keep you fit? Would Pog even have made it into the pro ranks having to fight his way through amateur races where, in those days, GT -focused riders weren't thriving?

Yes he would.

 

[Breh]

You don't have to imagine Pog in the 1960s. Just imagine Pog at any other team than UAE. If you look at how McNulty, Wellens, Del Torro... level up after joining. It's clear that they are doing something other teams are not doing. I'm not insinuating it's clinic related, I don't know what it is, but it would be nice if other teams caught up to make it a more even fight. All the Pog fangirls can chose to ignore the elephant in the room of course.

It hasn't been three years since "the media" were praising how Visma were leading the pack peformance-wise.
Yates is back to winning GT's, they made a GT winner out of Kuss, Campenaerts has been phenomenal, Laporte started winning classics and GT stages, Jorgenson took a huge step forward.

It feels like UAE caught up to Visma and UAE just has more money to spend on better riders cleaning up minor races.


Mcnulty joined in 2020 and his trajectory feels kinda normal to me? His prime years are coming. Atleast what we all used to think of prime years.

 

[The bald fraud]

You don't have to imagine Pog in the 1960s. Just imagine Pog at any other team than UAE.

Something like EC RR Slovenia team with four riders from continental level and two TBV riders who are clearly not climbers?

Actually, if we believe that mou guy, only from 2024 onwards UAE started to perform similar training regimes that were already normal for long in teams like Visma.