Giro d'Italia 2020, stage 15: Rivolto - Piancavallo 185 km

[42x16ss]

Climbing times don't necessarily mean a field is strong.

Please... explain how

 

[roundabout]

Leather Bilbao?

And that's probably the strangest GC top 5 after 15 stages in a while.

 

[fbjim]

Almeida has turned into Portugese Voeckler and I'm all here for it


If it was a normal race I'd be saying it's in the bag but I think Kelderman is going to remember "wait I'm Wilco Kelderman lmao" and die on the Stelvio or something

 

[broppo]

almeida should be worried to not crack completely, he still has to defend the white jersey and a second place, I fear he might be overreaching a bit now in trying to keep the jersey.

 

[HelloDolly]

Sunweb are best team this year ...They seem to be able to let somany top riders leave and yet have a whole bunch more coming through

Kelderman and Oomen may be leaving but the 2 Australians will be able to fill that gap no problem in the Giro or Vuelta

 

[Eclipse]

If you take Almedia and Kelderman out of the equation ...the riders behind are very close

and for all those complaining about the quality of the field

https://twitter.com/x/status/1317843041915457537

View: https://twitter.com/ammattipyoraily/status/1317843041915457537?s=20

Yeah so much for weak pace and weak performances that's pretty monstrous from the lead trio.

Still underwhelming for many of the others but seems a case of great days vs weak days rather than a real lack of quality.

 

[Breezy1985]

anyway only 1'30 off Pantani means they were going pretty fast so that weak field *** can get canned already

And did everything happen the exact same this time as the last time over the rest of the stage?

Climbing times are poor as a comparison as this year or one of the others the rider could have been ridden into the ground before the climb

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

well almeida did 6.3 w/kg in the final 3kg alone and he was losing time

You are not going to convince me the quality was poor etc

 

[Red Rick]

And did everything happen the exact same this time as the last time over the rest of the stage?

Climbing times are poor as a comparison as this year or one of the others the rider could have been ridden into the ground before the climb

Over an entire GT they make nice comparisons, especially if tactics were somewhat similar, difference in climbing times are super large, and if climbs are climbed frequently. If an entire field is faster or slower due to external circumstances it's hardly an indication of the quality of the field.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Please... explain how

There are other variables: wind speed and direction, difficulty of the rest of the stage, earlier or later in the race. Also, the 2017 field was mediocre in general and poor on the day with the entire podium cracking.

 

[luckyboy]

Nobody can really be convincing themselves that Kelderman vs Geoghegan Hart vs Almeida and some past-it GC guys is not a weak GC field lol.

So they were a minute slower than Pantani? You can put Pogacar, Roglic, Bernal here and they would break the record like they did on Peyresourde and Grand Colombier..

Anyway there's so much that goes into a time on a climb than just minutes and seconds, everyone knows that.

 

[Eshnar]

Over an entire GT they make nice comparisons, especially if tactics were somewhat similar, difference in climbing times are super large, and if climbs are climbed frequently. If an entire field is faster or slower due to external circumstances it's hardly an indication of the quality of the field.

true, but in the end you can only compare the riders that raced today, there is no way to ever gauge their absolute "quality" (whatever that even means)

 

[Red Rick]

true, but in the end you can only compare the riders that raced today, there is no way to ever gauge their absolute "quality" (whatever that even means)

With young guys, you can't really say it now, but you can probably make a better assessment down the road.

 

[Luthor]

well almeida did 6.3 w/kg in the final 3kg alone and he was losing time

You are not going to convince me the quality was poor etc

And he went deeply into red. Same as the rest from the front. 2017 Giro was really different, it was in 3rd week with a hard mountain stage coming and the deciding TT after already some hard mountains, here a rest day is coming. The fatigue was there comparing to this Giro where 2nd week was lame in terms of difficulty and peloton didn't ride that hard. Climbing time doesn't mean much unless it's the same context. Otherwise you are just cherry picking.

 

[OldCranky]

I'm in awe of that ride from Almeida today, was certain he'd lost the jersey when he got dropped but he put in such a ballsy ride to fight for it, left everything on the road.

 

[Eshnar]

Nobody can really be convincing themselves that Kelderman vs Geoghegan Hart vs Almeida and some past-it GC guys is not a weak GC field lol.

So they were a minute slower than Pantani? You can put Pogacar, Roglic, Bernal here and they would break the record like they did on Peyresourde and Grand Colombier..

Anyway there's so much that goes into a time on a climb than just minutes and seconds, everyone knows that.

Roglic was at the Giro last year, he did pretty much what he did at the tdf this year: follow wheels and get worse by the day.

 

[fbjim]

shockingly any GC field can become weak when three of the pre-race favorites withdraw before the mountain stages

 

[Red Rick]

Roglic was at the Giro last year, he did pretty much what he did at the tdf this year: follow wheels and get worse by the day.

Are we talking about the same Roglic that finished 2nd, 2nd and 1st of the GC contender on the final 3 mountain stages? Including dropping the guy who would go poggers in the ITT on him?

 

[McEwen2006]

the only embarrassment is your comment

Climbing times today were faster than Pinot in 2017

People on here moan and undermine races becasue the narrative doesn t live up to their limited world view of cycling where only their decreed riders perfrom well or else its a shambles ....

Climbing times don't always mean something special, you need to analyze the context. Look at Schleck and Contador's climbing time in Ax 3 Domaines (2010), both were extremely strong but they spent too much time looking at each other... so they didn't go as fast as they could. There are plenty of factors to analyze and you know it.

 

[italoc]

Now I fully agree that climbing times should not be treated as science, but they can still provide rough useful indications, and are ultimately the only way to compare races that were ridden in different years.

If we look at today's times and compare them to 2017, for example, we can learn that four riders were 'off the chart', while the others more or less in line with the leaders last time. So if Nibali tells us that his numbers were good, well, climbing times would support that.
And I would also say that they clearly suggest that the absolute level is not too bad. The claim "anyone in the Tour top 15" would have won the Giro seems to be non-sense.

 

[Luthor]

Roglic was at the Giro last year, he did pretty much what he did at the tdf this year: follow wheels and get worse by the day.

This has to be the worst cherry picking I have ever seen in these forums, well done.

 

[Eshnar]

Are we talking about the same Roglic that finished 2nd, 2nd and 1st of the GC contender on the final 3 mountain stages? Including dropping the guy who would go poggers in the ITT on him?

yes, him. To me he still looked much worse than at the beginning. Regardless, he still followed wheels the whole time so we'll never know I guess.

 

[Eshnar]

This has to be the worst cherry picking I have ever seen in these forums, well done.

Well, if one mentions Pogacar. Roglic and Bernal only one of them has done the Giro (iirc), so that was the only pickable option, wasn't it.

 

[fbjim]

I'm in awe of that ride from Almeida today, was certain he'd lost the jersey when he got dropped but he put in such a ballsy ride to fight for it, left everything on the road.

portugese voeckler is now my favorite rider. absolutely masterpiece of suffer face climbing by him today.

 

[roundabout]

I think 'anyone in the top-15' is a bit of a reference to Bilbao who finished 16th in the Tour being 5th on GC.

Obviously things are a bit more complex than that and at a glance Bilbao's relative climbing level in this Giro is not that much different to the level he showed in the Alps in the Tour.