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Giro d'Italia Giro d'Italia 2021 stage 11: Perugia – Montalcino 162 km

Page 5 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.

???

  • Poll?

    Votes: 11 12.6%
  • No

    Votes: 12 13.8%
  • Yes

    Votes: 10 11.5%
  • Maybe

    Votes: 12 13.8%
  • Bag?

    Votes: 22 25.3%
  • Rain?

    Votes: 14 16.1%
  • Button?

    Votes: 8 9.2%
  • Ban poll

    Votes: 14 16.1%
  • Delete OP

    Votes: 21 24.1%
  • Vin(cenz)o

    Votes: 24 27.6%

  • Total voters
    87
40-50km? That's short!

A proper TT is at least 55 km. Probably need 2 in a race, plus a 65km TTT. This short TT BS is a very new thing, largely driven by Contador strangling the Giro in a 59km TT back in 2015.

If the climbers cannot hack it, tell them to become better ITT riders
Oh... hi Bavarianrider! Long time no see. Great days of over 100k TTT on a Hamburgian highway (an obscure ref. to the Race Design Thread).

Anyone not named Formolo won't win this stage.
I can sign that. However, the likes of Bernal or Bardet also have good sprint while Ciccone and Vlasov are also decent. If Martin survives then he's most likely candidate for the stage. I dunno if Skineos will like to ride for Moscon if the selection won't be that big.

Also, i wonder if after one of the sterrato/climbing sections the group will be small, with limited amount of helpers and some outsider like i dunno... Tobias Foss or Pello Bilbao will be let go and solo to the line.
 
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This "lack of time trialing in the GTs favours the pure climbers, a true allrounder should be able to win a GT" topos is the worst of all.
Please, how many pure climbers won the Tour or the Giro in the past 15 years?
Why did Sky make such a living from looking for the best time trialers and then making them climb instead of just looking for the best climbers, if those win GTs?
What is Pogacar if not a true allrounder?
Since when is Froome, the most successful GT rider of the past 10 years, a pure climber?

Now let's imagine there were 100k of more or less flat time trialing. Guys like Bernal, decent, but not great time trialers, wouldn't stand any chance. Nibali wouldn't stand a chance. Instead Ganna might have a good chance and I wouldn't call him an allrounder. Rohan Dennis would be among the absolute top candidates anyway. Now then it's always "you need to make the mountain stages harder", but how hard exactly would you have to make them? Lasting for 8 hours?

The level of athletism and professionalism has just risen to a level, where the old physical builds don't work anymore as good comparisons.

If Evenepoel manages to only hang on to Bernal in the mountains he will win this Giro with it's ridiculous amount of time trialing. And he's for certain not a pure climber.
So with Pogacar, Roglic and Evenepoel being among the best GT riders we have at the moment, and van Aert probably able to turn into one, not even the Vuelta being won by a pure climber the last years, please stop this "the allrounders are discriminated against" for now. You can come again when Bardet wins this Giro, Landa the Tour and Ciccone the Vuelta.
I agree, my favorite example is the 2018 Tour where the first four places were Thomas, Dumoulin, Froome and Roglic, argubly 4 of the best time trialers and allrounders in the world, yet there was only one TT in that race, and these 4 riders had already been the top 4 before that TT even took place.

That said, I'm still in favor of putting a decent amount of TT kilometres somewhere midway through the race, but less to balance the route, and more because I think gaps between the gc contenders make the racing more exciting. If Remco was currently 2 minutes in front of Bernal I'd be much more looking forward to tomorrow.
 
Should be included every year. The winner should be the best overall cyclist. Not the best at youtube sprints at the end of a stage

Gravel doesn't have much to do with being the best overall pro road cyclist on a GT race. We have other disciplines and races for that. AFAIK in general GC riders are all rather good on gravel, hence they include gravel to GT race to include some sensationalism. And when a GC rider gets a puncture as a result, that just has nothing to do with being the best all rounder. It's just nonsense.
 
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This "lack of time trialing in the GTs favours the pure climbers, a true allrounder should be able to win a GT" topos is the worst of all.
Please, how many pure climbers won the Tour or the Giro in the past 15 years?
Why did Sky make such a living from looking for the best time trialers and then making them climb instead of just looking for the best climbers, if those win GTs?
What is Pogacar if not a true allrounder?
Since when is Froome, the most successful GT rider of the past 10 years, a pure climber?

Now let's imagine there were 100k of more or less flat time trialing. Guys like Bernal, decent, but not great time trialers, wouldn't stand any chance. Nibali wouldn't stand a chance. Instead Ganna might have a good chance and I wouldn't call him an allrounder. Rohan Dennis would be among the absolute top candidates anyway. Now then it's always "you need to make the mountain stages harder", but how hard exactly would you have to make them? Lasting for 8 hours?

The level of athletism and professionalism has just risen to a level, where the old physical builds don't work anymore as good comparisons.

If Evenepoel manages to only hang on to Bernal in the mountains he will win this Giro with it's ridiculous amount of time trialing. And he's for certain not a pure climber.
So with Pogacar, Roglic and Evenepoel being among the best GT riders we have at the moment, and van Aert probably able to turn into one, not even the Vuelta being won by a pure climber the last years, please stop this "the allrounders are discriminated against" for now. You can come again when Bardet wins this Giro, Landa the Tour and Ciccone the Vuelta.

Sorry but that's not 100% accurate. While its true that professionalism, conditions (ranging from gearing and materials to road surfaces) and overall athletic level has greatly improved I would say that only accounts for 30% of changes in race results and racing trends. The other 70% relates to changes in stage designs and parcours of the race.

History tells us that mountain stages featuring close/above 200 KMS and 3/4 mountain passes are what truly shatters the pack. Currently it's hard to see a single mountain stage in a GT with those conditions. Whenver we see those stages, peloton is ripped to pieces and subpar climbers (or those with low endurance) are exposed.

Also, ultra steep climbs are killing cycling. Climbing Rocca di Cambio with a steep 1KM ramp with gravel and 15% gradient is just stupid fireworks, but not real climbing. Stelvio, Madeleine, Croix de Fer... Those are real mountain passes for real climbers.

Of course Bardet and Landa will never win a GT. They are simply not good enough. They are "climbers" who can't even consistently win mountain stages, let alone a whole GT. Put Bardet in the 2000 TDF. All he would be able to do is winning a mountain stage in a breakaway and the polka dot jersey while finishing 10th or 11th.
 
This "lack of time trialing in the GTs favours the pure climbers, a true allrounder should be able to win a GT" topos is the worst of all.
Please, how many pure climbers won the Tour or the Giro in the past 15 years?
Why did Sky make such a living from looking for the best time trialers and then making them climb instead of just looking for the best climbers, if those win GTs?
What is Pogacar if not a true allrounder?
Since when is Froome, the most successful GT rider of the past 10 years, a pure climber?

Now let's imagine there were 100k of more or less flat time trialing. Guys like Bernal, decent, but not great time trialers, wouldn't stand any chance. Nibali wouldn't stand a chance. Instead Ganna might have a good chance and I wouldn't call him an allrounder. Rohan Dennis would be among the absolute top candidates anyway. Now then it's always "you need to make the mountain stages harder", but how hard exactly would you have to make them? Lasting for 8 hours?

The level of athletism and professionalism has just risen to a level, where the old physical builds don't work anymore as good comparisons.

If Evenepoel manages to only hang on to Bernal in the mountains he will win this Giro with it's ridiculous amount of time trialing. And he's for certain not a pure climber.
So with Pogacar, Roglic and Evenepoel being among the best GT riders we have at the moment, and van Aert probably able to turn into one, not even the Vuelta being won by a pure climber the last years, please stop this "the allrounders are discriminated against" for now. You can come again when Bardet wins this Giro, Landa the Tour and Ciccone the Vuelta.
Excellent post. There's also a point to be made that a great TTer is also better suited for the unexpectedly hard hilly or transition stages than a pure climber, setting aside any actual ITTs. Basically, you need to be fairly physically robust to handle 21 stages in 3 weeks.
 
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Poll: Yes. They used to be corny but now they're funny and they annoy some serious ppl which is always a bonus.
Vino to start stage 11: I wish!
Gigs to watch: kidnap him
Bag: A candy coloured clown they call the shark man.
Mayhem: Yes
GC: Volcanic eruptions
Stage followed by 1000 posts on Bernal vs Remco and a one liner about the other "contenders"
 
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I don't think the GC contenders are going to be as bad as people think.

Yep, I think most will do fine.

Also, while I'd expect some action this isn't a one day race, most teams are going to be focused on shepherding their leader through and mitigating risk. We'll probably see some action but it feels likely there's more of the GC teams trying to reduce danger than create it.
 
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Yep, I think most will do fine.

Also, while I'd expect some action this isn't a one day race, most teams are going to be focused on shepherding their leader through and mitigating risk. We'll probably see some action but it feels likely there's more of the GC teams trying to reduce danger than create it.
To some extent, but the climbing in the stage does kill flat domestiques here, and you only need a few stage hunters/aggressive 2ndary GC riders to take off to create chaos.

The battle for the break, then the battle for positioning should be absolutely insane.
 
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But then the TT strong GC guys could just limit their losses in the mountains, and settle it in the TTs. After all, if the TTers cannot hack it, they need to become better climbers.
Besides, I'd worry that with 75+ TTs, the number of technical TTs might decline.

Then you need to design mountain stages like the 2007 TDF, which allow the climbers to attack and take back time
 
What those long TTTs from 15-29 years ago would do is not allow teams to bring teams full of climbers. They'd be forced to bring a more all around team, which should lead to more wide open mountain stages

Mountain trains are not made up of a line of flyweights. All a TTT does is award free time to GC riders on rich teams, as if it wasn’t already a big enough advantage to have Dennis, Ganna etc on your team.

Any race director who puts a TTT in a stage race should be given a stiff prison sentence
 
Maybe the major shift is that today the most important difference isn't to be made between time trialers (heavy) and climbers (light) but between in comparison better anaerobic/steady and aerobic/irregular riders. Of course these are linked and it's not a complete turn, but I feel that time-trialer vs. climber just isn't that much of a helpful category anymore. Now that punch has become increasingly important due to the routes, okay.
 

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