Geraint Thomas, the next british hope

[Alpe73]

Re: Re:

This is nothing more, nothing less than an Internet message board. The UCI, WADA, British Cycling and above all Dave Brailsford don't give a toss what goes on in here. It's purely banter and speculation. If you shut down the other side it's not even entertaining anymore.

I read this dozens of times from the old Lance fans and from martinvickers and his future sockpuppets here

The counter argument is the same as always.

1 No one here has ever claimed that these people care what we post. In fact we don't like the Brunyeels and Brailsfords of this world so impressing them is not the motivation for posting.

2 These people also don't care what YOU post.

Which probably grates you more. Because for us we don't want to impress Brailsford or Brunyeel.

But you hold them in high regard. You would probably be shakinf with anxiety if you ever found yourself in a room with Dave Brailsford in a room. That almost certainly none of your contributions will ever be aknowledged by him must hurt you more than it does us. Probably why you guys try to use this argument so often.

Its always hillarious to see the FANS of athletes mock the sceptics as fat, loser keyboard warriors etc. But what are you? You are just a fan too. Sorry to break it to you but being a diehard fan of Chris froome does not make you Chris Froome.

If we are losers, you are a loser just like us.

Only worse because we live our own lives. The only happines you guys ever have is when some guy you never meet wins an event you see on tv.

Peace, brutha.

 

[pastronef]

Re: Re:

This is nothing more, nothing less than an Internet message board. The UCI, WADA, British Cycling and above all Dave Brailsford don't give a toss what goes on in here. It's purely banter and speculation. If you shut down the other side it's not even entertaining anymore.

I read this dozens of times from the old Lance fans and from martinvickers and his future sockpuppets here

The counter argument is the same as always.

1 No one here has ever claimed that these people care what we post. In fact we don't like the Brunyeels and Brailsfords of this world so impressing them is not the motivation for posting.

2 These people also don't care what YOU post.

Which probably grates you more. Because for us we don't want to impress Brailsford or Brunyeel.

But you hold them in high regard. You would probably be shakinf with anxiety if you ever found yourself in a room with Dave Brailsford in a room. That almost certainly none of your contributions will ever be aknowledged by him must hurt you more than it does us. Probably why you guys try to use this argument so often.

Its always hillarious to see the FANS of athletes mock the sceptics as fat, loser keyboard warriors etc. But what are you? You are just a fan too. Sorry to break it to you but being a diehard fan of Chris froome does not make you Chris Froome.

If we are losers, you are a loser just like us.

Only worse because we live our own lives. The only happines you guys ever have is when some guy you never meet wins an event you see on tv.

Incredible....WTF makes you think you're in any way informed as to what 'some guy you never meet' does or does not have in their life, based on internet forum postings?

Low, even by previous standards

The only happines you guys ever have is when some guy you never meet wins an event you see on tv


well, same can be said "The only happines you guys ever have is when some guy you never meet loses an event you see on tv"


both are stupid sentences

 

[Elagabalus]

Thomas has had a 100% free pass.

My social media timeline is full of people swooning over 'G'

Guilty! OK, I'm not on social media-but did you see this coming?! I certainly didn't! Granted it's still SKY but, at least, it ain't Froomedawg.

 

[Elagabalus]

Re:

G's transformation is as abnormal and absurd as the Magic Kenyan, if you think of the old G "classics type of rider" that suddenly realized he's best suited for Grand Tour contention.........

I agree with the premise of G being allowed to win Le Tour to ease up the controversy behind Froome, but yet SKY still have to answer to the public how "G" beat Froome & trashed riders the likes of Quintana, Doumolin, Bardet, etc.......

TBF, Lance did say that he didn't think Froome could do the double a few weeks back. That, of course, doesn't address G's stellar rise to the top of the food chain. What's Lance saying about G in his podcasts? Anybody watching regularly?

 

[Alpe73]

Re: Re:

G's transformation is as abnormal and absurd as the Magic Kenyan, if you think of the old G "classics type of rider" that suddenly realized he's best suited for Grand Tour contention.........

I agree with the premise of G being allowed to win Le Tour to ease up the controversy behind Froome, but yet SKY still have to answer to the public how "G" beat Froome & trashed riders the likes of Quintana, Doumolin, Bardet, etc.......

TBF, Lance did say that he didn't think Froome could do the double a few weeks back. That, of course, doesn't address G's stellar rise to the top of the food chain. What's Lance saying about G in his podcasts? Anybody watching regularly?

Anybody ... who is anybody ... is tuning in, brutha. Go figger.

 

[thehog]

Thomas has had a 100% free pass.

My social media timeline is full of people swooning over 'G'

Guilty! OK, I'm not on social media-but did you see this coming?! I certainly didn't! Granted it's still SKY but, at least, it ain't Froomedawg.

TV ratings including the U.K. are down around 10% across the board. Only the Netherlands with a slight uptick. That’s post World Cup as well. The Tour is losing its shine as a TV event.

 

[Elagabalus]

Re: Re:

G's transformation is as abnormal and absurd as the Magic Kenyan, if you think of the old G "classics type of rider" that suddenly realized he's best suited for Grand Tour contention.........

I agree with the premise of G being allowed to win Le Tour to ease up the controversy behind Froome, but yet SKY still have to answer to the public how "G" beat Froome & trashed riders the likes of Quintana, Doumolin, Bardet, etc.......

TBF, Lance did say that he didn't think Froome could do the double a few weeks back. That, of course, doesn't address G's stellar rise to the top of the food chain. What's Lance saying about G in his podcasts? Anybody watching regularly?

Anybody ... who is anybody ... is tuning in, brutha. Go figger.

So what's he saying? I can't stand to watch him talk for that long!

 

[Elagabalus]

Thomas has had a 100% free pass.

My social media timeline is full of people swooning over 'G'

Guilty! OK, I'm not on social media-but did you see this coming?! I certainly didn't! Granted it's still SKY but, at least, it ain't Froomedawg.

TV ratings including the U.K. are down around 10% across the board. Only the Netherlands with a slight uptick. That’s post World Cup as well. The Tour is losing its shine as a TV event.

Not surprising. I stopped watching the Giro when it became the Dawg and pony show.

 

[The Hegelian]

Re: Re:

Jeebus Chryst there are some idiots on this thread. And sometimes they get persnickety at MI.

It's a strange, troll like world

I understand your frustration.

He is not an idiot, in the low intelligence sense, though. He is an advocate. He is one of a number. They are paid or have a vested interest (there is little difference) to go on social media and rebut accusations of doping or other cheating against Sky and to try to present one side of an argument. They may also be using these threads as information banks and training programmes to try to examine how discussions proceed and to test arguments.

You cannot reason with an advocate. The good ones simply push a specific agenda constantly, minimising or dismissing any evidence against and accentuating any evidence for. If all else fails, they just turn the subject to something else.

Maybe, although isn't the above bolded phrase...normal? If you sift out the hysteria in this forum it's a pretty thin gruel. It mostly boils down to "well of course he's doping because doping." It's not cool to dismiss the other side as trolls or Russian bots or as having some kind of secret "agenda." What would that agenda be, then? To convince others that Rider X is clean/not as dirty as others? What's wrong with that? Because nearly all the evidence offered here is circumstantial, it's fair game to debate it.

To your point about "advocacy," couldn't we say the same against those who insist -- despite zero evidence that could be presented in a court of law or WADA tribunal -- that Rider X is a doper?

This is nothing more, nothing less than an Internet message board. The UCI, WADA, British Cycling and above all Dave Brailsford don't give a toss what goes on in here. It's purely banter and speculation. If you shut down the other side it's not even entertaining anymore.

Disagree entirely. Brailsford and Sky care greatly about the brand image of Sky - and if you think that social media and internet forums are somehow not important in contemporary marketing, then you clearly haven't examined the way that advertising and marketing have radically shifted in the digital age.

Every team has a marketing department, and every marketing department has a social media arm/team. Ergo, it's not a stretch at all to conceive of Sky's social media team paying a few people to disarm criticism and restore the 'correct' brand image. This is one meaning of the word 'bot' or 'troll' - I suspect it is quite legitimate to use this in some cases here.

 

[Ripper]

Re: Re:

Well said that man....A person pushing the notion that anyone who has and tries to present a different opinion to their own must be either getting paid to do so or has some other materially incentivised agenda, should really be a little more worried about their own mentality than that of others....

Given that your response was perhaps partly to my quote within a quote, within a quote, I should clarify something. I don't think someone who has a different opinion to me is an idiot. There are lots of folks with opinions contrary to mine that I don't call an idiot. I have, for example, not called you an idiot, but I don't think we completely agree about some things

However, I think there are a few idiots posting. Or perhaps some that seem to have more of a fixed agenda. Whatevs!

 

[Bolder]

Re: Re:

This is nothing more, nothing less than an Internet message board. The UCI, WADA, British Cycling and above all Dave Brailsford don't give a toss what goes on in here. It's purely banter and speculation. If you shut down the other side it's not even entertaining anymore.

I read this dozens of times from the old Lance fans and from martinvickers and his future sockpuppets here

The counter argument is the same as always.

1 No one here has ever claimed that these people care what we post. In fact we don't like the Brunyeels and Brailsfords of this world so impressing them is not the motivation for posting.

2 These people also don't care what YOU post.

Which probably grates you more. Because for us we don't want to impress Brailsford or Brunyeel.

But you hold them in high regard. You would probably be shakinf with anxiety if you ever found yourself in a room with Dave Brailsford in a room. That almost certainly none of your contributions will ever be aknowledged by him must hurt you more than it does us. Probably why you guys try to use this argument so often.

Its always hillarious to see the FANS of athletes mock the sceptics as fat, loser keyboard warriors etc. But what are you? You are just a fan too. Sorry to break it to you but being a diehard fan of Chris froome does not make you Chris Froome.

If we are losers, you are a loser just like us.

Only worse because we live our own lives. The only happines you guys ever have is when some guy you never meet wins an event you see on tv.

It's the barely literate ad hominem attacks like this one that destroy the credibility of posters such as yourself. When something is posted that you don't like, it's like Donald Trump fat-fingering Twitter at 5 a.m. after binge-watching Fox & Friends. Seriously, that's the best you got? That I wish I was Chris Froome?

For the record, I wish I was Romain Bardet, but he seems to have gone missing lately.

 

[samhocking]

Interesting comments from Brian Holme who said Rod Ellingworth told him when Cavendish was riding for T-Mobile which would have been 2007/8 I guess, that Thomas would win Tour de France one day. Interesting that this was known long before Team Sky existing, suggesting at least BC knowing Thomas had the numbers as a u23 accademy rider I thought.

 

[brownbobby]

Re: Re:

Well said that man....A person pushing the notion that anyone who has and tries to present a different opinion to their own must be either getting paid to do so or has some other materially incentivised agenda, should really be a little more worried about their own mentality than that of others....

Given that your response was perhaps partly to my quote within a quote, within a quote, I should clarify something. I don't think someone who has a different opinion to me is an idiot. There are lots of folks with opinions contrary to mine that I don't call an idiot. I have, for example, not called you an idiot, but I don't think we completely agree about some things

However, I think there are a few idiots posting. Or perhaps some that seem to have more of a fixed agenda. Whatevs!

Thanks for taking the time to respond, but my post wasn't really directed at your original post at all but was to the follow up comment....fwiw i really don't mind being called an idiot, as insults go its one of the more endearing and i readily admit to being a bit of an idiot occasionally :lol:

 

[MartinGT]

Re:

Interesting comments from Brian Holme who said Rod Ellingworth told him when Cavendish was riding for T-Mobile which would have been 2007/8 I guess, that Thomas would win Tour de France one day. Interesting that this was known long before Team Sky existing, suggesting at least BC knowing Thomas had the numbers as a u23 accademy rider I thought.

So Sky had him doing the Cobbles. Yeh, makes sense.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Re:

G lost only 49 seconds to Tommy D at the Giro's 40 km TT after crashing.

And that was a time trial where dumoulin pretty much obliterated the rest of the field with Nibali the best GC rider at 2 minutes.
So if Thomas was fit that day he'd probably been close to winning. I won't be surprised at all if Thomas roflstomps the opposition in the TT

 

[samhocking]

Re: Re:

Interesting comments from Brian Holme who said Rod Ellingworth told him when Cavendish was riding for T-Mobile which would have been 2007/8 I guess, that Thomas would win Tour de France one day. Interesting that this was known long before Team Sky existing, suggesting at least BC knowing Thomas had the numbers as a u23 accademy rider I thought.

So Sky had him doing the Cobbles. Yeh, makes sense.

Well in 2007, I doubt G had a path available to him in any WT team to be a GC leader to winning it until Wiggins showed the way in 2010/11, and was basically why BC started U23 and then Sky began later to show a pathway into WT. Ellingworth headed up BC U23 Accademy from 2004 in Italy which is basically where Cavendish, Thomas, Swift, Kennaugh, Rowe, Stannard & Dowsett began their road careers after, or alongside the track.

 

[hrotha]

Re:

Interesting comments from Brian Holme who said Rod Ellingworth told him when Cavendish was riding for T-Mobile which would have been 2007/8 I guess, that Thomas would win Tour de France one day. Interesting that this was known long before Team Sky existing, suggesting at least BC knowing Thomas had the numbers as a u23 accademy rider I thought.

You could compile a list of all the riders that were ever touted as future Tour winners, read it and laugh your pants off.

 

[The Hitch]

So now that Thomas might ridiculously win the tour de France, some guy who likes Thomas (no motivation to lie right?) claims that some other guy at some unclear point of time said that Thomas would win the Tour de France one day.


The arguments for Sky are so weak its amazing. On the one hand reject as "no evidence" the idea that doping exists in cycling. On the other hand accept as gospel absolutely unverifiable heresay from dodgy sources like the above, as long as it backs the desired viewpoint.


I had a dream that Nostradamus said that a Welsh a African and a neurotic Englishman would one day truimph in France. When can I get on ITV to retell this important story proving that Sky are clean?

 

[The Hitch]

Re: Re:

This is nothing more, nothing less than an Internet message board. The UCI, WADA, British Cycling and above all Dave Brailsford don't give a toss what goes on in here. It's purely banter and speculation. If you shut down the other side it's not even entertaining anymore.

I read this dozens of times from the old Lance fans and from martinvickers and his future sockpuppets here

The counter argument is the same as always.

1 No one here has ever claimed that these people care what we post. In fact we don't like the Brunyeels and Brailsfords of this world so impressing them is not the motivation for posting.

2 These people also don't care what YOU post.

Which probably grates you more. Because for us we don't want to impress Brailsford or Brunyeel.

But you hold them in high regard. You would probably be shakinf with anxiety if you ever found yourself in a room with Dave Brailsford in a room. That almost certainly none of your contributions will ever be aknowledged by him must hurt you more than it does us. Probably why you guys try to use this argument so often.

Its always hillarious to see the FANS of athletes mock the sceptics as fat, loser keyboard warriors etc. But what are you? You are just a fan too. Sorry to break it to you but being a diehard fan of Chris froome does not make you Chris Froome.

If we are losers, you are a loser just like us.

Only worse because we live our own lives. The only happines you guys ever have is when some guy you never meet wins an event you see on tv.

It's the barely literate ad hominem attacks like this one that destroy the credibility of posters such as yourself. When something is posted that you don't like, it's like Donald Trump fat-fingering Twitter at 5 a.m. after binge-watching Fox & Friends. Seriously, that's the best you got? That I wish I was Chris Froome?

For the record, I wish I was Romain Bardet, but he seems to have gone missing lately.

Not that you wish you were Chris Froome but that you mistake his successes for your own.

Its always hillarious to see the diehard fans use the "you are just jealous of my favourite athlete", or "my favourite athlete is more famous than you" insult attempt.

As if you were the one winning the TDF and getting booed. You are not. Sorry to remind you of that.

 

[dacooley]

So now that Thomas might ridiculously win the tour de France, some guy who likes Thomas (no motivation to lie right?) claims that some other guy at some unclear point of time said that Thomas would win the Tour de France one day.


The arguments for Sky are so weak its amazing. On the one hand reject as "no evidence" the idea that doping exists in cycling. On the other hand accept as gospel absolutely unverifiable heresay from dodgy sources like the above, as long as it backs the desired viewpoint.


I had a dream that Nostradamus said that a Welsh a Kenyan and a Brit would won day truimph in France. When can I get on ITV to retell this important story proving that Sky are clean?

some folks have an amazing capacity of looking at any sky-related things in two angles: sceptical and toxicly sceptical. why should the tour be won by a rider with a perfect perfomance trajectory and credible development? why do gt winners have to be clean? where does such an immense commitment to cleanliness transparency come from? it doesn't make much sense, given the past of the sport. why not just to reconcile with thomas winning the tour?

 

[hrotha]

why should the tour be won by a rider with a perfect perfomance trajectory and credible development? why do gt winners have to be clean? where does such an immense commitment to cleanliness transparency come from? why not just to reconcile with thomas winning the tour?

Because Sky is not perceived to be your run-of-the-mill dopers, but to have a significant competitive advantage that pushes things so far it shatters our suspension of disbelief.

 

[The Hitch]

So now that Thomas might ridiculously win the tour de France, some guy who likes Thomas (no motivation to lie right?) claims that some other guy at some unclear point of time said that Thomas would win the Tour de France one day.


The arguments for Sky are so weak its amazing. On the one hand reject as "no evidence" the idea that doping exists in cycling. On the other hand accept as gospel absolutely unverifiable heresay from dodgy sources like the above, as long as it backs the desired viewpoint.


I had a dream that Nostradamus said that a Welsh a Kenyan and a Brit would won day truimph in France. When can I get on ITV to retell this important story proving that Sky are clean?

some folks have an amazing capacity of looking at any sky-related things in two angles: sceptical and toxicly sceptical.

Cycling/ Sport. Not "Sky". And its a real sleight of hand to paint - those believing that TDF winners dope (after the sceptics were proved right time and time again) as "toxicly sceptical".

why should the tour be won by a rider with a perfect perfomance trajectory and credible development?

I never said it should.

why do gt winners have to be clean?

never said they should.

where does such an immense commitment to cleanliness transparency come from?

Well in Sky's case its probably their claims that they are the most transparent team in history that brings the mockery towards their lack of transparency.

why not just to reconcile with thomas winning the tour

Who said I wasn't reconciled?

Just because i point out flaws in fantastically weak arguments, doesn't mean any of the assumptions you made above are true.

Do you not agree that the argument of "some guy just said that at some point in the past this other guy told him Thomas would win the Tour" is weak? Its not even worth posting. I could say that some guy told me 10 years ago that Thomas would dope.

 

[samhocking]

Re: Re:

Interesting comments from Brian Holme who said Rod Ellingworth told him when Cavendish was riding for T-Mobile which would have been 2007/8 I guess, that Thomas would win Tour de France one day. Interesting that this was known long before Team Sky existing, suggesting at least BC knowing Thomas had the numbers as a u23 accademy rider I thought.

You could compile a list of all the riders that were ever touted as future Tour winners, read it and laugh your pants off.

Yes, but how many were track cyclist at the time in that list?

 

[hrotha]

Re: Re:

Interesting comments from Brian Holme who said Rod Ellingworth told him when Cavendish was riding for T-Mobile which would have been 2007/8 I guess, that Thomas would win Tour de France one day. Interesting that this was known long before Team Sky existing, suggesting at least BC knowing Thomas had the numbers as a u23 accademy rider I thought.

You could compile a list of all the riders that were ever touted as future Tour winners, read it and laugh your pants off.

Yes, but how many were track cyclist at the time in that list?

This guy off the top of my head.

Anyway, Thomas wasn't a "track cyclist" per se. He did both. He was racing plenty on the road. Full seasons, including GTs. And none of this changes the fact that you're reading waaaay too much into what might have been a one-off comment by a fellow British rider and which probably didn't go beyond "this guy got class and I'm too British to think of other venues than the Tour de France for class to shine properly".

 

[samhocking]

So you're now arguing Thomas did have potential to win, or just the potential because he did race road?

The point of what Holme has said, is not what was said, but that it was said in 2007 and that rider is achieving that a decade later. If you're now arguing Thomas in his first year at Barloworld in 2007 would be in a list of riders touted as the next Tour winner, i'm not sure many would believe it, regardless of him doping or using doping to justify why they placed him in that list. In 2007 we now know everyone was doping more or less so in that context it's suggesting rider transformation was at least within BC and Ellingworth's understanding, possible for Thomas, otherwise Ellingworth wouldn't have been trying to get Thomas into T-Mobile via Holme saying he could win Tour.