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

Page 11 - 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
I'm surprised that you don't remember his world championship rides, and you can't dismiss "at 21 years old" as though it were half a lifetime ago: it was his last race.

I'm not wishing the guy any ill, I just think it is a potential weakness that hasn't been discussed in a thread to which (unlike most of the last few pages) it is very relevant, and wondered what others thought.

Maybe it is a weakness. Evenepoel's possible deficiencies in bike handling have often been pointed out. But there's also a huge element of luck and unknown about it. There seem to be some riders who have an almost magical talent at avoiding crashes, but on the other hand many crashes in the peloton really are 100% down to bad luck or errors from other riders. Take Landa's and Serry's incidents in this Giro for example.

And Evenepoel's crash in Lombardia was particularly unfortunate. Ok, he overshot the corner, clearly a mistake, but I would bet that has even happend to Nibali a few times in his career. Had there not been a bridge with a low railing in that corner, but maybe a ditch or something, or a wall, then maybe he would have lost the race and gotten some scratches but he wouldn't have had a half year break in racing.

Time will tell if bike handling is a factor in his success/failure, but that one crash doesn't mean much imo.
 
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Blueroads, i like you a lot, so i don't mean to offend you, but this has to be the biggest crock i've read on the forum in quite some time.

I suggest taking a map with elevation differences of France. Then look at how much of it consists of high mountains and compare that to the amount of stages that pass through there. It's the Tour de France, not Nepal, yet every year 1/4th or more of the stages are in favor of climbers while the high mountains are only a small part of France. The Tour does not represent France's topology by a long shot. And still you are making an argument for those poor climbers who wouldn't stand a chance with 100k's of TT. So? What about the poor TT'ers who don't stand a chance with more than double the km's of climbing? What about poor Tony Martin and poor Ganna. How are they ever to win the Tour? Why shouldn't classics riders like van der Poel or Van Avermaet have a chance of winning the Tour? There are many more classical routes and rolling terrain to be traveled than mountain routes in France.

But i get it, we all like watching mountain stages, and god forbid those skinny climbers lose 5 minutes in the crosswinds. How unfair. While i'm all for the amount of mountain stages in the Tour, the Tour, if anything, is far more skewed towards climbers than it is towards all-rounders and TT'ers. As it stands, van Aert doesn't stand a chance against a fit Bernal, while he is by far the more complete and all-round rider. Even when skin and bones like last year, it would be no contest. He would need to lose an additional -anorexic low- 5kg in order to stand a chance. Why is that deemed normal? And why are you saying Roglic and Evenepoel aren't climbers? Because they weren't born in Colombia? Or because they ALSO can timetrial? I'd praise the day we get an actual mountain TT. Start at the foot of Mont Ventoux, all the way up. And we'll see who the real climbers are. Or because they can't hide behind their team mates for 2/3rds of the way, this is also unfair for the climbers? Then what do they actually do better, and why should we favor or protect them so much? Why do they get a different treatment that heavy TT'ers or classic specialists don't get? How come a guy like Alaphilippe, one of the most versatile riders in the peloton, can't even get near a top spot in his best season ever, and even when he finishes outside of the podium, the clinic forum is bursting at the seams, because apparently he shouldn't even be considered to be able to compete. That's how much the poor climbers are at a disadvantage.

A 100km of ITT is deemed unfair, but 250km of climbing isn't. Not that i'm expecting 100k of TT anytime soon, but it would be a good thing. Maybe the "climbers" would learn to practice riding crosswinds and get on their TT bikes once in a while, instead of assuming they can get away with focusing only on what they do best. Maybe they would also get better at solo efforts in the valley. Last year, one of the smallest guys in the peloton was one of the most impressive riders in the crosswinds, even in heavy rain, so if Higuita can, why can't others? He's not half bad at TT'ing either by the way.

To be clear, i'm not advocating of doing away with mountain stages, i'm simply saying a race like the TDF is in fact already skewed towards climbers. And if you don't want to see Pogacar, Roglic and Evenepoel as climbers, than at least they are TT'ers who learned/invested in how to climb. In doing so, they also lose part of their TT capacities. But that's normal... so why can't we expect climbers to learn how to TT at the cost of their top-end climbing skills? You can't have it both ways. Either they're all climbers, and Roglic, Evenepoel, Thomas... are just better riders since they can also TT. Or you see them as TT'ers who learned to climb, and in that case i don't see why they should learn to climb at the expense of their main skill while "climbers" shouldn't learn to TT.

I'll take one short flat TT (13k), one long rolling terrain TT (40k) and a mountain TT (20k).

PS: TTTs should only count for team classification, not for individual GC.

Love and kisses regardless.

Logic, be careful. Keep this up and I might develop a crush on you like your crush on Remco.
 
Muddy photos from Montalcino in 2010 - Cadel Evans winssirotti/rcs

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For me "GTs being balanced" doesn't mean that every GT should have the same formula, but that sometimes there should be GTs with a lot of TTing, sometimes GTs with a lot of climbing, sometimes GTs with climbing TTs. Every now and then GTs should include a type of road that is special for that particular country - for example the kinds of roads we're having for this stage - sometimes there should be TTTs, but not every year.
I call for a GT in Nepal.
 
The clouds of dust from hot gravel can be just as bad as the wet muddy stuff.

It's gonna be an existing stage regardless of the weather.
I think there will be hardly any dust today cause it was raining last week as well as today some rain showers are expected just before riders hit the gravel. Don't anticipate 2020 Strade replay.
I wrote this few posts earilier - imho it's gonna be the lightest version of gravel as possible - good message for Yates and other gravel "lovers", not that good for those who were going to d**p some Belgian ex-footballers on technical sections
 
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For me "GTs being balanced" doesn't mean that every GT should have the same formula, but that sometimes there should be GTs with a lot of TTing, sometimes GTs with a lot of climbing, sometimes GTs with climbing TTs. Every now and then GTs should include a type of road that is special for that particular country - for example the kinds of roads we're having for this stage - sometimes there should be TTTs, but not every year.

I mostly agree. Some variance, but within some parameters. The year (2015?) when they had 13kms of ITT at the Tour, that's just wrong.

Something like this:

Giro: At least 45 kms of ITT, up to 100km. Every 2nd or 3rd edition they have a second ITT that is more or less a MTT. Occasionally ride on sterrato. More chaotic medium mountain stages (with climbs that are unclassified) than the other GT's. Possibly less high mountain stages than the other GT's, but in general these stages are harder. Generally speaking, you need to be a climber who can time trial.

Tour: More flat stages, as per the natural French terrain, though this can include more potential echelon stages. 60-120 kms of ITT. At least 40 kms of that for the pure time trialer. High mountain stages are not as steep as the Giro, but go to higher altitude (weather allowance), with emphasis on endurance (a couple of 200kms + 3 or 4 HC/cat 1 stages). Cobblestones maybe every few editions. Maybe even a TTT occasionally that is a proper length (perhaps less ITT and more mountains in that edition). Hypothetically some Tours could be won by a time trialer who can climb (not Ganna).

Vuelta: 30-70 kms of ITT. More of a climbers GT. Short TTT sometimes (as they like this for some reason). More short, steep walls than the other GT's. Less high altitude. Less pure sprinters stages.

P.S. If ITT's are unpopular with viewers, GT's could just have one of these in many editions (but a proper length, 40-60 kms).
 
Maybe it is a weakness. Evenepoel's possible deficiencies in bike handling have often been pointed out. But there's also a huge element of luck and unknown about it. There seem to be some riders who have an almost magical talent at avoiding crashes, but on the other hand many crashes in the peloton really are 100% down to bad luck or errors from other riders. Take Landa's and Serry's incidents in this Giro for example.

And Evenepoel's crash in Lombardia was particularly unfortunate. Ok, he overshot the corner, clearly a mistake, but I would bet that has even happend to Nibali a few times in his career. Had there not been a bridge with a low railing in that corner, but maybe a ditch or something, or a wall, then maybe he would have lost the race and gotten some scratches but he wouldn't have had a half year break in racing.

Time will tell if bike handling is a factor in his success/failure, but that one crash doesn't mean much imo.

It's not about Lombardia. It's about purely having less experience riding and having 25km of lower grip surface to deal with today.
 
I found it hard to say much about this stage in advance, because there are so many possibilities what can and cannot happen, that there's hardly room for reasoning, just pure speculation.
Evenepoel is not a great bike handler, but the sterrato favours guys with big engines as well, and he does have that. The really steep sterrato part, like I mentioned before, I think, probably comes to early to, eh, drop him. I read a few times about the importance of Serry and Cavagna here, but honestly I don't know about Cavagna's possible role here, apart from bringing him to the front at the first sterrato entrance. After that I wouldn't trust him on this stage anymore, because he's not exactly the best handler or positioner himself.

Since it's not a one day race I doubt many guys will go so deep that there's real carnage, and still many riders could be left behind, practically everybody, if only due to mechanicals.
For Vlasov this could become a very decisive stage, I don't really know how to rate his chances here, but probably he's just going to be 15 seconds behind the GC contender of the day...
Bernal was really great in Strade, but the (tactical) situation here might lead to a worse outcome here for him.
My major hope is for Bardet not to puncture, because that would be a shame.
 
Nibali, Brändle, Pozzovivo (out already), Cataldo, Mollema were there in 2010.

yeah i know i meant class more as in career achievements and lore in cycling history.

4 of the main protagonists back then were guys who have won both monuments (or worlds) and GT's. There aren't many riders like that in the current peloton but in 2010 3 of them on the same podium with a 4th one in pink :D

Only Sagan and Nibali have a palmaras that can compete with those. Who knows maybe Bernal and Remco can join the but who knows. Lots still to prove for those two.
 
My expectations for today:

  1. Bahrain going on the offensive with Bilbao
  2. Formolo and Bardet up there with main favourites
  3. Evenepoel to surprise those who expect Serry to shepherd him through the stage.
  4. Yates out of contention after today's stage (given how poorly he has performed on the stages that should suit him the most.
PS: Seems like rollthedice read my mind while i was posting
 
Sorry, but I don't buy part of that pespective. Agreed, GT's should be somewhat balanced, but the things they offer compared to most one-day races and shorter stage races are long climbs. Personally I love the classics (especially the cobbles) much more than stage racing, but I still don't think we should neglect, that the Grand Tours (and some other weeklong races) are, for various reasons, one of the few races, where a pure climber actually can compete for overall glory.
Why? Why should a guy who is only good at climbing get the most prestigious races tailored to his skills, while the guy who is good at everything but climbing has literally 0 chances? Because the other guy can win classics? So can the climber. He can win Lombardia, Liège, San Sebastian. There are also enough 1 week stage races where they can shine. They can also go for stagewins. Why should a limited rider even be in contention to win a GT?

Again, and to be clear, i like mountain stages. I love them. But you can't pretend GT's aren't skewed in favor of climbers, because they are. And by a huge margin. Why is a guy like Gaudu even to be considered as a possible GT winner? He can't do anything that isn't climbing. The fact that you and many others can't even see it anymore is most telling of all. Van Aert, who is basically top 5 in the world in everything he does but ONLY top 50 at climbing has -as it stands- zero chances at winning a GT, unless he loses further weight. But Gaudu, who doesn't make top 200 at most things except climbing, where he might be top 10, should have a shot.

Maybe it's time people see "the climbers" (by which i mean guys who are good at climbing, but suck at most other things, because as Blueroads said, those other guys aren't considered to be climbers anymore but "all-rounders") are basically one-trick ponies with limited capabilities who shouldn't be able to win a GT. Pogacar isn't a "climber" because he's also a good ITT'er, well then why should a guy is not even a better climber, or only just, be favored in route design? If they want to win a GT, they need to get better overall riders.
 

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