Gilbert V Cancellara - who is the best one day rider of this generation?

[El Pistolero]

That he had a major rivalry with Roger de Vlaeminck. Everyone in Belgium knows that.

If you want to put in in a different way: the peloton was his big rival as everyone rode against him.

 

[Rechtschreibfehler]

As it has been mentioned earlier a quite often, this question doens't make any sense without including Tom Boonen.

They lie in between approximatly 1.5 years. That's pretty much as close as it can get inbetween real top contenders.

So to answer the question who is the greates of their generation you have to look at all the years of each respective riders to do that. If you want to compare top years or overall sucess, it doesn't matter because they are basically of even age.

It has been claimed that Cancellara and Gilbert were better natural talents. I just can't see how you'd come to that judgement. Both of them took quite long to really perform. Booen on the contraty has Monument podiums over the spread of 9 years! And i'm quite sure it'll be 11 after this year. He was third in Paris-Roubaix at the age of 21!!! in 2005. So you have very good arguments for Boonen to be the "most natural talented" rider as well, just looking at the results.

I'm just amazed that people would count out Boonen just because he had two bad years, in which he also wasn't very lucky. There were years in which Cancellara couldn't compete in long TTs, and wasn't taken to the tour because he wasn't a lot of use outside of prologues...

Also it's true that Boonen is a good/very good sprinter in mass sprints (wel'll have to see if he's very good again this year, don't think so though, but who knows), but that shouldn't lead to the conclusion that he's just relying on it! He also soloed to wins and he does attack to make racing hard. It would be stupid of him though if he'd attack when he's the best sprinter in the group. Better to controll the race than to rist blowing it attacking. Maybe this might conjour up the idea of him being only an opportunist.
It's even more impressive that he actually has such good speed, power and stanima. But as I said, I'm just amazed how you couldn't appreciate his talent and forgert him.

 

[killswitch]

It has been claimed that Cancellara and Gilbert were better natural talents. I just can't see how you'd come to that judgement. Both of them took quite long to really perform. Booen on the contraty has Monument podiums over the spread of 9 years! And i'm quite sure it'll be 11 after this year. He was third in Paris-Roubaix at the age of 21!!! in 2002. So you have very good arguments for Boonen to be the "most natural talented" rider as well, just looking at the results.

Canc was 4th at Roubaix three weeks after his 23rd birthday. Both won their first Monument while being 25 (in '05 and '06).

I'm just amazed that people would count out Boonen just because he had two bad years, in which he also wasn't very lucky. There were years in which Cancellara couldn't compete in long TTs, and wasn't taken to the tour because he wasn't a lot of use outside of prologues...

The prologue only period was over by the end of 2005 though.

Also it's true that Boonen is a good/very good sprinter in mass sprints (wel'll have to see if he's very good again this year, don't think so though, but who knows), but that shouldn't lead to the conclusion that he's just relying on it! He also soloed to wins and he does attack to make racing hard. It would be stupid of him though if he'd attack when he's the best sprinter in the group. Better to controll the race than to rist blowing it attacking. Maybe this might conjour up the idea of him being only an opportunist.
It's even more impressive that he actually has such good speed, power and stanima. But as I said, I'm just amazed how you couldn't appreciate his talent and forgert him.

Completely agree with that.

This year could be the first since '06 when both Tommeke and Canc are both at 100% (absolute peak condition) in the spring classics. Can't wait for the Ronde.

 

[c&cfan]

That he had a major rivalry with Roger de Vlaeminck. Everyone in Belgium knows that.

If you want to put in in a different way: the peloton was his big rival as everyone rode against him.

they didn't rode against him.. it was each rider on it's own. different times.

 

[Rechtschreibfehler]

@killswitch

I didn't want to criticize or take anything away from cancellara, I just wanted to show some points which are different in their developements in order to get a better view on the "natural talent" topic. I meant to show that it's not easy arguing something like that only on result stats. You can't rule out Boonen, nor can you Cancellara or Gilbert just by when they got their results. I can't say if Boonens very earlie to late sucess might indicate more natural talent or more (I guess the number of indicators to tell this can be huge).
The topic isn't that important really, but while being so amazed with how people thought of Boonen I focused a little on turning about points on him.

 

[killswitch]

The topic isn't that important really, but while being so amazed with how people thought of Boonen I focused a little on turning about points on him.

That's probably because many have started watching cycling since 09, after the cocaine positive till now Boonen has been either sick/injured and/or not motivated and people think he's overrated.

 

[birthmark]

I guess the teams play a big factor in this discussion.
If Cancellara had a stronger team with him last year, he would probably have won PR and RVV and we wouldn't even be having this discussion.

Gilbert did his Ardennes triple because he had a very strong team with him controlling the races to perfection, knowing he would deliver in the end.

Boonen is winning again this year why? He is in a hell of a shape and has a hell of a team with him!

My point is, results alone do not make anyone the best rider, there are other factors..

 

[Angliru]

As it has been mentioned earlier a quite often, this question doens't make any sense without including Tom Boonen.

They lie in between approximatly 1.5 years. That's pretty much as close as it can get inbetween real top contenders.

So to answer the question who is the greates of their generation you have to look at all the years of each respective riders to do that. If you want to compare top years or overall sucess, it doesn't matter because they are basically of even age.

It has been claimed that Cancellara and Gilbert were better natural talents. I just can't see how you'd come to that judgement. Both of them took quite long to really perform. Booen on the contraty has Monument podiums over the spread of 9 years! And i'm quite sure it'll be 11 after this year. He was third in Paris-Roubaix at the age of 21!!! in 2005. So you have very good arguments for Boonen to be the "most natural talented" rider as well, just looking at the results.

I'm just amazed that people would count out Boonen just because he had two bad years, in which he also wasn't very lucky. There were years in which Cancellara couldn't compete in long TTs, and wasn't taken to the tour because he wasn't a lot of use outside of prologues...

Also it's true that Boonen is a good/very good sprinter in mass sprints (wel'll have to see if he's very good again this year, don't think so though, but who knows), but that shouldn't lead to the conclusion that he's just relying on it! He also soloed to wins and he does attack to make racing hard. It would be stupid of him though if he'd attack when he's the best sprinter in the group. Better to controll the race than to rist blowing it attacking. Maybe this might conjour up the idea of him being only an opportunist.
It's even more impressive that he actually has such good speed, power and stanima. But as I said, I'm just amazed how you couldn't appreciate his talent and forgert him.

Excellent post!

 

[El Pistolero]

they didn't rode against him.. it was each rider on it's own. different times.

Lol, watch the Tour of '71 on on youtube and then tell me they didn't ride against him

Merckx even used his team to break away from the rest of the peloton on a descent for the entire stage. He rode up front for most of the stage with an average per hour that would put most time trial specialists today to shame. Merckx went faster than everyone expected and most people missed the finish because of that. The entire KAS team was DQED because they finished outside of the time limit, but were later put back in the Tour. The mayor of the city that hosted the finish was so angry that he missed the finish that he didn't allow the Tour to come back there for the remainder of his life.

 

[Cult Classics]

Gilbert

First of all, time trial results don't belong in that list.

Cancellara is ahead on monuments, but Gilbert is the more rounded rider in terms of one day races - if you were to take the old World Cup races, Gilbert could win every one of them except Roubaix I think. Can't think of many more who could win the Omloop on the one hand and Lombardia and San Sebastian on the other.

 

[Wallace]

Gilbert

First of all, time trial results don't belong in that list.

Cancellara is ahead on monuments, but Gilbert is the more rounded rider in terms of one day races - if you were to take the old World Cup races, Gilbert could win every one of them except Roubaix I think. Can't think of many more who could win the Omloop on the one hand and Lombardia and San Sebastian on the other.

Why couldn't Gilbert win Roubaix? He has the power and the skills. I think he's said that it's something he wants to aim for in the future. If he can win Flanders, he can win Roubaix--and everyone agrees that an in-form Gilbert (which we sadly aren't going to see this year) is a serious Flanders contender. The World Cup race he probably can't win is Milan-San Remo, unless the organization changes the end as they're threatening to do to make it harder, in which case he could win it. The only thing is that he's got to be in form to win any of these races, which seems to be a bit of a problem now.

 

[Panda Claws]

Why couldn't Gilbert win Roubaix? He has the power and the skills. I think he's said that it's something he wants to aim for in the future. If he can win Flanders, he can win Roubaix--and everyone agrees that an in-form Gilbert (which we sadly aren't going to see this year) is a serious Flanders contender. The World Cup race he probably can't win is Milan-San Remo, unless the organization changes the end as they're threatening to do to make it harder, in which case he could win it. The only thing is that he's got to be in form to win any of these races, which seems to be a bit of a problem now.

Well if Gerrans can win it. Gilbert just needs a lot of luck there.

 

[Caruut]

Why couldn't Gilbert win Roubaix? He has the power and the skills. I think he's said that it's something he wants to aim for in the future. If he can win Flanders, he can win Roubaix--and everyone agrees that an in-form Gilbert (which we sadly aren't going to see this year) is a serious Flanders contender. The World Cup race he probably can't win is Milan-San Remo, unless the organization changes the end as they're threatening to do to make it harder, in which case he could win it. The only thing is that he's got to be in form to win any of these races, which seems to be a bit of a problem now.

He can definitely win MSR, so long as Canc is kind enough to tow him to the line á la Gerrans. In all seriousness, he's shown that he's a decent sprinter, it's something he could win, though it's unlikely.

 

[Froome19]

He can definitely win MSR, so long as Canc is kind enough to tow him to the line á la Gerrans. In all seriousness, he's shown that he's a decent sprinter, it's something he could win, though it's unlikely.

Cancellara would never tow Giilbert to the line because he would know there is no chance of him winning, he isnt that stupid

 

[Caruut]

Cancellara would never tow Giilbert to the line because he would know there is no chance of him winning, he isnt that stupid

Did you watch MSR? He does whatever gives him the best chance of winning on the day. Sub Gilbert for Gerrans and he'd do the same thing.

 

[Froome19]

Did you watch MSR? He does whatever gives him the best chance of winning on the day. Sub Gilbert for Gerrans and he'd do the same thing.

Yes but there was a chance he could drop Gerrans (he nearly managed) that isnt so with Gilbert (if he is on decent form of course)

 

[The Hitch]

Yes but there was a chance he could drop Gerrans (he nearly managed) that isnt so with Gilbert (if he is on decent form of course)

In 2011 they were together and Gilbert did all the work canc dis not tow him to the line.

Which reminds me. pitis excuse for canc outsprinting Gilbert in 2011 msr was that Gilbert did all the work. but when canc did the same he was behaving stupid. so wasn't Gilbert also being stupid ?

 

[El Pistolero]

Gilbert didn't do all the work, he did an all or nothing attack because he was never going to beat Goss in the sprint

 

[Caruut]

Gilbert didn't do all the work, he did an all or nothing attack because he was never going to beat Goss in the sprint

Cancellara, Sagan?

 

[El Pistolero]

Cancellara, Sagan?

Was stuck in a group behind. Force some of the workload on Gerrans or at least try and start your sprint in his wheel. He didn't try any of those things. Up until the descent of the Poggio he was using the correct tactic, but after the descent he made a mistake.

Cancellara uses the same tactic as the Schleck bros use in the classics and it's incredibly stupid. Don't tell me he would have done it differently in Roubaix or Vlaanderen. He did the same thing there last year...

 

[Caruut]

Was stuck in a group behind. Force some of the workload on Gerrans or at least try and start your sprint in his wheel. He didn't try any of those things. Up until the descent of the Poggio he was using the correct tactic, but after the descent he made a mistake.

Cancellara uses the same tactic as the Schleck bros use in the classics and it's incredibly stupid. Don't tell me he would have done it differently in Roubaix or Vlaanderen. He did the same thing there last year...

What I mean is that Cancellara was going all out because he knew Sagan or Freire would beat him if they closed him down. It's easy to say now that he should have done this or that, but he had no idea what Gerrans had left. Any time in the lead-up he hands over to Gerrans, then it's game over. Then any time he tries to get in Gerrans' wheel once they enter the final sprint, Gerrans just goes as soon as Canc pulls over. I think he was just hoping that Gerrans had nothing left, and banking on that. Not exactly crazy.

Also, comparing Canc to the Schlecks isn't entirely fair - if you mean LBL, they had two of them there, and hence far more tactical options

 

[Angliru]

Was stuck in a group behind. Force some of the workload on Gerrans or at least try and start your sprint in his wheel. He didn't try any of those things. Up until the descent of the Poggio he was using the correct tactic, but after the descent he made a mistake.

Cancellara uses the same tactic as the Schleck bros use in the classics and it's incredibly stupid. Don't tell me he would have done it differently in Roubaix or Vlaanderen. He did the same thing there last year...

It's not like he didn't attempt to get them to share the work. Had he simply slowed enough for them to pass him they would've certainly have been caught if you look at the time differences at the finish. Cancellara's only option was to hope that he could ride at a tempo that would minimize Gerrans sprint making him unable to come around at the line.

 

[El Pistolero]

Bump..........

 

[will10]

Bump..........

What for .

 

[El Pistolero]

What for .

Read the discussion here and you'll find out

I'll give you a hint: Tommeke wat doe je nu?