Horner' s interview

[maltiv]

Oh really, how would you account for a stomach ache, drastic changes of weather conditions, crashes, motivation, tiredness, etc.

If we could apply your predictive modeling why even bother and watch the races?

Example: La Vuelta 2011

Your post is very strange indeed

You can't, but my post was fairly simple. Even if Frank Schleck had been the one 2 minutes ahead, he would still have ended up 2:28 behind Sastre in the GC, given their real time in the time trial. Would the yellow jersey have made Schleck ride faster? Perhaps. Would he have been 2:30 faster? Now that's almost possible. Not like he did not have motivation from the position he was already in because with such a time trial as suggested (i.e 2:30 faster than he was) with his real GC position he would have been on the podium.

 

[cineteq]

You can't, but my post was fairly simple. Even if Frank Schleck had been the one 2 minutes ahead, he would still have ended up 2:28 behind Sastre in the GC, given their real time in the time trial. Would the yellow jersey have made Schleck ride faster? Perhaps. Would he have been 2:30 faster? Now that's almost possible.

Why do you think Evans stuck to Fränk's wheel? Motivation IS huge. Sastre would not have been as motivated among other things.

 

[thehog]

Oh really, how would you account for a stomach ache, drastic changes of weather conditions, crashes, motivation, tiredness, etc.

If we could apply your predictive modeling why even bother and watch the races?

Example: La Vuelta 2011

Your post is very strange indeed

All the "states" you mention are based from previous "form". An athlete builds a "pattern" and that's how you predict. Motivation included - have they been in this situation before? That assists with prediction. Shleck's time trialling in many situations has been tested before - everyone knew what the result would be.

Of course no one knows the results - that's why it's called "predictive". It's much more accurate than your chaos therom!!! - which is just plain stupid.

Riis might as well out all the riders names into a hat and selected one to win following your logic.

 

[maltiv]

Why do you think Evans stuck to Fränk? Motivation IS huge. Sastre would not have been as motivated among other things.

Impossible to argue with such logic. Clearly Frank Schleck lost 2:30 because he wasn't motivated (although he was 2nd in GC before the TT) whilst Sastre would have been much slower in the TT if he didn't have the yellow jersey (although he still would have been fighting for the GC win). I guess if you believe so much in motivation then you also think that Voeckler in yellow could have won the time trial in the TDF this year, because an improvement of 2:30 would have made him do so

 

[18-Valve. (pithy)]

IIRC, it was Hautacam where he lost 9 minutes.

Ah, okay.

“Cadel had no teammates and he still has no teammates. With the exception of Tejay [Van Garderen] – and we’re not sure how he’ll do in the Grand Tours – they’ve signed no help,” Horner said incredulously. “And by signing Gilbert and Thor [Hushovd], they are effectively taking help away from him. He has less help now than he ever had in the past, and the guys that they’re paying millions of dollars to come ride during the Tour de France are going to take one or two riders themselves.”

I hope Lelangue is smart enough to send Thor to the Giro instead. Having Phil and Thor both at the tour team is problematic. Both should put aside their own personal ambitions to ride for Evans. He is the defending champion and a big favourite to win the tour.

BMC TDF team
Evans
Gilbert
Van Garderen
Cummings
Burghardt
Hincapie
Morabito
Frank
Schar/Moinard

Pinotti will be part of the BMC Tour team, barring injuries / illness or bad form, IMO. When he stated that he "liked" the 2012 TDF course and Cadel retweeted him that pretty much said it all. It would be quite dumb if he didn't make the Tour team anyhow.

And yes, Gilbert and Hushovd will both be on it. I don't expect problems, though...

 

[El Pistolero]

Gilbert
Hushovd
Burghardt
Evans
Pinnoti
Cummings
Hincapie

^ Those will be in it for sure if nothing bad happens

 

[Christian]

Gilbert
Hushovd
Burghardt
Evans
Pinnoti
Cummings
Hincapie

^ Those will be in it for sure if nothing bad happens

I wonder if there will be a token swiss or if Burghardt will pass as swiss

 

[ElChingon]

Way to totally misunderstand what I am saying!

So what did I miss?

 

[karlboss]

Pinotti would be one of my first picks for the BMC TDF team, the only thing that could throw it would be racing the Giro for the win and being unable to find form for the tour.
Horner, a canny interview. Managed to cast doubt on Evans and his team, throw his hat into the ring for leadership, send a warning to others about the climbing strength of the team.
I'll vote Evans was stronger than Sastre at the 2008 tour, but Sastre was number 2. For mine Evans lost on tactics, Sastre didn't win with them. More important Evans lost by not having a super strong team able to control the race.
I'm not sure this TDF is one for train tactics on MTFs, not for Schleck anyway. If he is the strongest climber and gives this a shot what is the maximum time he can take in 3 MTFs and one of those only on medium mountains? Surely it can't be enough to account for almost 100km individually against the clock.

 

[Panda Claws]

I would not underestimate A. Schleck. All it takes is for F. Schleck to work for him from the start and for A. Schleck to finally go all out.

 

[maltiv]

Pinotti would be one of my first picks for the BMC TDF team, the only thing that could throw it would be racing the Giro for the win and being unable to find form for the tour.
Horner, a canny interview. Managed to cast doubt on Evans and his team, throw his hat into the ring for leadership, send a warning to others about the climbing strength of the team.
I'll vote Evans was stronger than Sastre at the 2008 tour, but Sastre was number 2. For mine Evans lost on tactics, Sastre didn't win with them. More important Evans lost by not having a super strong team able to control the race.
I'm not sure this TDF is one for train tactics on MTFs, not for Schleck anyway. If he is the strongest climber and gives this a shot what is the maximum time he can take in 3 MTFs and one of those only on medium mountains? Surely it can't be enough to account for almost 100km individually against the clock.

Pinotti is a very underestimated rider. He was 9th in one of the hardest Giro's ever, without being in the big breakaway. Had he been in that breakaway, he would have finished on the podium! Nonetheless, the course didn't suit him at all, so one can just imagine how well he could have done there with 2 long time trials.

 

[Cobblestoned]

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/andy-schleck-must-reach-tour-de-france-in-better-form-says-horner

Gad.
I can't believe a couple of his comments....

The one about him on front on tv.....
really?

Did I misread this?

You are really a tool.
Instead of just appreciating it, and especially the jokes, you go on mission and hope for the best.
Chris will ride at the front, even more km than Ultra-Pate and Bak added up together, hands free and holding a Coke and Snickers up in the air. Fully loaded of course.

To then even deliver excellent race analysis every night. Excellent. Godlike.
This guy even remembers each hundredth second of crashing.

 

[La Pandera]

I would guess he is talking about 2011.

That IS what he is referring to in regards to Evans. Where have they strengthened the team in terms of lending assistance to Evans in the mountains?

His talk of dropping everyone but 5 riders--I don't know whether he's serious or not. He has yet to display this level of climbing skill so I would say he has to be joking.

 

[Ripper]

Actually, more people seem to overestimate AS. He has yet to deilver too terribly much. His win in L-B-L is his best. He has been second in the TdF and, while that is not by any means poor, when you consistently put your whole season on it, it ain't a win.

 

[La Pandera]

Horner has been talkin' a lot of smack the past couple of years.
I thought it a bit "interesting" when he so openly declared that Contador was the only rider capable of matching his climbing skills, which is why I was so disappointed that he crashed at the Tour. I wanted to see what he could do to back it up given his pre-Tour level of fitness and his overall confidence going in.

Technically he said that Contador is the only rider that could drop him. I took that to mean that he is at least the equal in the mountains of everyone else. I too was looking forward to seeing if he was capable of backing up his big talk. Still in that interview he implies that there is still a chance that he could prove to be the strongest on the team at the Tour in 2012 but also that should he not be the strongest that he willingly will destroy the field for his team leader.

 

[La Pandera]

My issue with him is he certainly wasn't this candid when he was riding on the same team as Armstrong. He was quite docile and subservient. Where before he joined Bruyneel he never hesitated to speak his mind and issue his critiques. Not so in the 2 years with LA.

 

[La Pandera]

I would probably agree with that hindsight. On Horner, he has always been a loud mouth American who just spins the cliches and crap around whenever the media talks to him so no big story here. After his win in ATOC he seems to rate himself very highly. I can't wait till he is put back in his place in 2012.

What does his being an "American" have to do with anything? You say it as if it's a trait quite common in all Americans. Is that fair to imply or say?

 

[El Pistolero]

What does his being an "American" have to do with anything? You say it as if it's a trait quite common in all Americans. Is that fair to imply or say?

He's a loud mouth + American = Loud mouth American

If he was an Aussie he'd be a loud mouth Aussie. Some people just want to get offended these days I guess...

 

[La Pandera]

It is refreshing compared to the often canned responses we get from some riders. Not to mention that we're in the dead of the off-season and anything that brings some excitement into the mix should be welcome.

I definitely agree. Keep them coming Chris! Although I would love to see more a more rounded selection of rider interviews than the extremely heavy doses of Shack/Nissan/Leopard (whatever they're called) with the Schlecks seemingly being force fed to us every other day. There are other riders out there from other teams and countries. Hello????

 

[La Pandera]

Acf,

Chasing down/Controlling long range attacks if and when they come should be important. Evans could relive the Alpe of 08 (and all other mountain stages of that edition basically) by having 3 or 4 Radioschack riders against him on a final climb.

Luckily the course is neutered to the extent that there are only 2 perhaps 3 such stages.

Still it's possible that he will need to rely on allies like Liquigas/Saxobank/Sky etc. Or be exposed to attacks from some of them as well

With the depth that Shack has matched against Evans and his band of mediocre climbing talents, Bruyneel could really wear Evans out in the mountains if he alters his usual, conservative strategy. If Evans is the favorite teams will look to BMC to control the race. Evans may not have the luxury of depending on Liquigas or any other team to assist him and his team.
It seems like the story of his grand tour life that he quite often finds himself in a position of looking at his opponents to do the work that his team should/would be doing if they had capable talent in the mountains. It's a broken record to use a generational metaphor.

 

[La Pandera]

If you seriously think that Evans was stronger than Sastre when Evans gained a full 30 seconds on that little climber in the TT then you're quite delusional. Also Evans continued losing time to Sastre after starting doing all the chasing behind. Come on, be realistic. Tactics was a part of it, yes, but Sastre was the strongest. Also his timing up Alpe d'Huez (much faster than Contador this year, mind you) shows that it was no "fluke" by Sastre.

In Contador's defense and trying to keep all this in perspective a rider that has been on a solo break for 75% of a mountainous stage certainly isn't going to have a comparable climbing time on the final mountain to a rider that launches his attack at the base of that final climb. Sastre was strong for sure on Alpe d'Huez in 2008 but I don't think the comparison you used is doing Carlos any justice, in all fairness.

 

[La Pandera]

I'll give you this one, thus Sastre was not the strongest, yet he won the Tour.

Sastre was the saviest and the smartest. Plus he had the strongest team, inspite of the long faces displayed by the Schlecks after the stage. It was similar to the Armstrong/Contador dichotomy of the 2009 Tour, except Armstrong could only play the teammate for so long before he began riding for himself and against Contador, actually dragging competitors with him in his pursuit of preserving his chances for overall victory.

 

[El Pistolero]

Sastre was the saviest and the smartest. Plus he had the strongest team, inspite of the long faces displayed by the Schlecks after the stage. It was similar to the Armstrong/Contador dichotomy of the 2009 Tour, except Armstrong could only play the teammate for so long before he began riding for himself and against Contador, actually dragging competitors with him in his pursuit of preserving his chances for overall victory.

But yet we only hear people complaining about Contador's attack on Arcalis and when he dropped Klöden lol.

What Armstrong did was much more disgusting IMO. At one stage you could see him talk to Frank Schleck right before he attacked and Franki was right on his wheel and they co-operated till they were back to the front of the race.

 

[La Pandera]

Yep. This is another bull and I'm surprised it came from Horner:



Andy wasn't part of the game, he was 9 something minutes out of the game, Evans didn't have to worry about him. When Sastre went, IMO Evans just didn't quite have the legs or was hoping Sastre wouldn't be able to pull it off and he chose to see what he can do with Frank. And he tried to hurt Frank but it just didn't work out the way he hoped. Good move by CSC but there's nothing brilliant about it, any other team would have done the same.

I honestly think that Evans and his team thought it wiser to stick with the yellow jersey wearing Frank Schleck at the time of the attack. Had Frank attacked first Evans would've IMO shadowed him all the way up the climb (if he had the legs to do so). At that point in his career Evans was looking for someone else to bridge the gap for him. Only when the time splits for Sastre's attack continued to increase did Evans finally realize the error of his choice. Additionally he anticipated getting the time back in the ITT. Of course that never happened.

 

[El Pistolero]

I wonder if there will be a token swiss or if Burghardt will pass as swiss

Gilbert and Burghardt will fuse together to form a Swiss.

But seriously, I don't know a lot about the Swiss cyclists at BMC, so can't give my opinion on that.