Julian Alaphilippe

[red_flanders]

Re: Re:

Hate Ineous all you like but this isn't how to counter them. Pinot would have been more plausible. This is simply embarrassing for the sport. Glowing in the dark for sure. This guy couldn't even hold Bardet or Pinot's wheel in September, let alone Valverde. Now look.

So lets quit all the (bad) attempts to be funny and ask the question again - what is he on??

Now you're worried about the embarrassment to the sport? FFS. What have the last 7 years been?

I hope you don't think I'm British? Check my post history. No need to be coarse but yes you are right. I guess I was getting used to it. Along comes a new anomaly. Its been a much better Tour, but not because of JA. At least Skyneos have been consistent for those 7 years. Alaphilippe definitely an outlier. Looks like he's fading though so maybe he dialled back whatever he was on or else three weeks was simply to long to hold that form.

I assumed you are British or close as you are consistently defending Sky/Ineos/Froome with what seems to me, little justification. I guessed it was nationalistic. Apologies for the error.

Consistently doped to the gills and boring is what we've seen for the last 7+ years. i'll take open and doped any day.

 

[proffate]

Re: Re:

At least Skyneos have been consistent for those 7 years.

Who else was consistent for 7 years?

 

[Cookster15]

Re: Re:

Hate Ineous all you like but this isn't how to counter them. Pinot would have been more plausible. This is simply embarrassing for the sport. Glowing in the dark for sure. This guy couldn't even hold Bardet or Pinot's wheel in September, let alone Valverde. Now look.

So lets quit all the (bad) attempts to be funny and ask the question again - what is he on??

Now you're worried about the embarrassment to the sport? FFS. What have the last 7 years been?

I hope you don't think I'm British? Check my post history. No need to be coarse but yes you are right. I guess I was getting used to it. Along comes a new anomaly. Its been a much better Tour, but not because of JA. At least Skyneos have been consistent for those 7 years. Alaphilippe definitely an outlier. Looks like he's fading though so maybe he dialled back whatever he was on or else three weeks was simply to long to hold that form.

I assumed you are British or close as you are consistently defending Sky/Ineos/Froome with what seems to me, little justification. I guessed it was nationalistic. Apologies for the error.

Consistently doped to the gills and boring is what we've seen for the last 7+ years. i'll take open and doped any day.

Where have I consistently defended Sky / Ineos? To the contrary I don’t think you read all my comments. What I do object to are assertions not based upon facts, logic or reason which actually lets Ineos off the hook. This place can be rife with Groupthink although maybe a little less so than when I joined.

 

[red_flanders]

Re: Re:

Hate Ineous all you like but this isn't how to counter them. Pinot would have been more plausible. This is simply embarrassing for the sport. Glowing in the dark for sure. This guy couldn't even hold Bardet or Pinot's wheel in September, let alone Valverde. Now look.

So lets quit all the (bad) attempts to be funny and ask the question again - what is he on??

Now you're worried about the embarrassment to the sport? FFS. What have the last 7 years been?

I hope you don't think I'm British? Check my post history. No need to be coarse but yes you are right. I guess I was getting used to it. Along comes a new anomaly. Its been a much better Tour, but not because of JA. At least Skyneos have been consistent for those 7 years. Alaphilippe definitely an outlier. Looks like he's fading though so maybe he dialled back whatever he was on or else three weeks was simply to long to hold that form.

I assumed you are British or close as you are consistently defending Sky/Ineos/Froome with what seems to me, little justification. I guessed it was nationalistic. Apologies for the error.

Consistently doped to the gills and boring is what we've seen for the last 7+ years. i'll take open and doped any day.

Where have I consistently defended Sky / Ineos? To the contrary I don’t think you read all my comments. What I do object to are assertions not based upon facts, logic or reason which actually lets Ineos off the hook. This place can be rife with Groupthink although maybe a little less so than when I joined.

We're not going to agree and it's all rather off the topic of Alaphillipe, so I'll bow out of that discussion at this point. Apologies for making it personal about your posting history.

Regarding Alaphillippe, he is certainly beyond suspicious. Of course that is totally subjective and based on his performances so far––which are facts. He's been cooking the entire year, this is just another level.

I certainly prefer the brand of racing this year to the preposterous vision of 7 guys from one team dragging the peloton over multiple cols, day after day. But that has less to do with Alaphillippe than the absurd Froome not being present.

We'll see how long he lasts. I think it's going to end up between the comical track rider Thomas and the surprising Pinot. At least the racing is good and riders are having (mildly) bad days, which we almost never saw in the Armstrong or Froome eras. I think Alaphillippe cracks on the Vars/Izoard/Galibier stage. Brutal stuff.

 

[jmdirt]

Clean, dirty, or somewhere in between, Vino questioning how JA could TT so well on a course made for him is beyond funny!

JA doing so well at the TdF isn't as alerting as JA going so well for this many months.

As discussed in another thread though, maybe others are being more careful with their program so that slows things down a bit.

 

[Cookster15]

Red Flanders:- Thanks, a fairer post and now I generally agree! Yes the high altitude and long climbs of the Alpes are a different kettle of fish compared to the steeper but generally shorter mountains ridden so far which better suit a Puncheur like JA.

Again I am not defending Ineous but too many are happy to look the other way with JA simply because he might upset their apple cart. I am curious why the Ineous train is weaker this is why attacks such as Pinot are sticking in 2018 Ineous swatted away such attacks like flies.

I think it is a combination of loss of Froome which is a massive loss of horsepower plus Kwiatkowski looks down and the rest of Ineous not pulling the same watts for whatever reason. Thomas I think is low probability to win now and he crashed today even if low speed. He came into this Tour not on the same form plus last year benefited hugely from the train which is not the same force this year. Thomas is exposed plus when Bernal goes up the road that is one less teammate in the train to help him and make rival attacks off the front impossible.

 

[therealthing]

Sickening the hear the Eurosport commentators saying how Alaphilippe winning would be 'great for cycling.'

To have a classics rider suddenly turning into a monster time trialist and dropping established climbers on huge climbs would be a total farce for cycling and a slap in the face for fans.

 

[brownbobby]

Sickening the hear the Eurosport commentators saying how Alaphilippe winning would be 'great for cycling.'

To have a classics rider suddenly turning into a monster time trialist and dropping established climbers on huge climbs would be a total farce for cycling and a slap in the face for fans.

Well if you share the view of some that all TDF winners are doped to the gills, then the Eurosport commentators are right....JA winning will be great for the Tour and thus great for the sport in general.

Far better this than the processions and neutralised racing of the past 8 years which have caused large swathes of the French public to disengage with the Tour, and worse still spread a toxic atmosphere along the roadside in recent tours.

Without wanting to go down the rabbit hole of nationalistic bias, a French winner, even more so one with the style of Allaphillipe, can only be a good thing for the sport......until he gets caught of course, but i'm for enjoying the show whilst its good

 

[MartinGT]

Sickening the hear the Eurosport commentators saying how Alaphilippe winning would be 'great for cycling.'

To have a classics rider suddenly turning into a monster time trialist and dropping established climbers on huge climbs would be a total farce for cycling and a slap in the face for fans.

:lol:

 

[Saint Unix]

Sickening the hear the Eurosport commentators saying how Alaphilippe winning would be 'great for cycling.'

To have a classics rider suddenly turning into a monster time trialist and dropping established climbers on huge climbs would be a total farce for cycling and a slap in the face for fans.

:lol:

Ain't that right. Cycling absolutely loved it the last time it happened. The UCI was all aboard that particular gravy train and would still have been on it if it had been up to them.

I'd say a lot of fans were right there with them too. The crowds at Alpe d'Huez in 2004 were unlike anything I've seen in cycling before or since, and a lot of them were there because of that one guy, either to cheer him on or watch what the race became because he was riding in it.

 

[Koronin]

Sickening the hear the Eurosport commentators saying how Alaphilippe winning would be 'great for cycling.'

To have a classics rider suddenly turning into a monster time trialist and dropping established climbers on huge climbs would be a total farce for cycling and a slap in the face for fans.

Well if you share the view of some that all TDF winners are doped to the gills, then the Eurosport commentators are right....JA winning will be great for the Tour and thus great for the sport in general.

Far better this than the processions and neutralised racing of the past 8 years which have caused large swathes of the French public to disengage with the Tour, and worse still spread a toxic atmosphere along the roadside in recent tours.

Without wanting to go down the rabbit hole of nationalistic bias, a French winner, even more so one with the style of Allaphillipe, can only be a good thing for the sport......until he gets caught of course, but i'm for enjoying the show whilst its good

If we were talking about Pinot I'd agree. We're talking about Alaphilippe. A rider who has NEVER once shown this kind of climbing abilities and now all of a sudden (and yes overnight) he can drop the best climbers in the world. Nope, sorry, that just doesn't work. Alaphilippe winning would be about the worst thing that can happen to cyclist. Not only will you get doping, but also major favoritism accusations.

 

[Cookster15]

Agree with Koronin. Pinot would be a plausible French winner. Julian Alaphilippe simply isn't based upon Grand Tour results before this Tour started. Anyway the high altitude of the Alpes might take care of it so we don't have to worry. We will see.

 

[gmedina]

Well at least JA showed a bit more than the likes of Froome before turning into a GC rider....in any case, I like JA and I really hope he loses yellow soon....

 

[Koronin]

Re:

Agree with Koronin. Pinot would be a plausible French winner. Julian Alaphilippe simply isn't based upon Grand Tour results before this Tour started. Anyway the high altitude of the Alpes might take care of it so we don't have to worry. We will see.

I truly hope so. However I won't see stages 19, 20, and the parade of 21 until after the weekend. I'm headed to a Sci-Fi Convention for the weekend.

 

[red_flanders]

Re:

Well at least JA showed a bit more than the likes of Froome before turning into a GC rider....in any case, I like JA and I really hope he loses yellow soon....

A bit more? :lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[jmdirt]

Sickening the hear the Eurosport commentators saying how Alaphilippe winning would be 'great for cycling.'

To have a classics rider suddenly turning into a monster time trialist and dropping established climbers on huge climbs would be a total farce for cycling and a slap in the face for fans.

Is a good classics race basically a TT?

 

[MartinGT]

Outrage at JA NEVER showing climbing ability. Same as The Ghee Man. Once racing Gent Wevelgem and the Ronde with a total engine in him that was a GT winner, who knew! I am so surprised that the geniuses at Sky / Ineos didnt know from day one. Maybe that nasty Leinders didnt weigh him after his massive morning Sh*t so the scales were out of balance.

 

[macbindle]

It's a bit weak to be invoking Sky/Ineos on a thread about an almost certain doping rider on a known dirty team.

 

[Gung Ho Gun]

Re:

Well at least JA showed a bit more than the likes of Froome before turning into a GC rider....in any case, I like JA and I really hope he loses yellow soon....

He reminds me more of 2005 Di Luca

 

[Sestriere]

Apparently he was woken up at 6:30 in the morning ahead of the queen stage for a doping test (blood test).

 

[meat puppet]

Re:

It's a bit weak to be invoking Sky/Ineos on a thread about an almost certain doping rider on a known dirty team.

Thats just half the picture, though. JA would not shine like a doped to the gills turd if the ineos train was on its not-normal rails. In that case froome would have ridden circles around him and they sweep 1-2-3 placements. But the train is not, because for one reason or another they are doping less efficiently.

Agree about JA btw.

 

[MartinGT]

Re:

It's a bit weak to be invoking Sky/Ineos on a thread about an almost certain doping rider on a known dirty team.

I dont doubt JA is glowing.

 

[brownbobby]

Re:

Apparently he was woken up at 6:30 in the morning ahead of the queen stage for a doping test (blood test).

Yeah early/pre stage doping controls getting a lot of press coverage this morning....i suppose its in certain peoples (maybe even nations) interests now to 'leak' details about just how thorough the testers are being this year

 

[bigcog]

Apparently, Ala and Pinot didn't have doping control this morning but Ineos and Jumbo GT riders did. Well that aint suspect ... haha

 

[brownbobby]

Sickening the hear the Eurosport commentators saying how Alaphilippe winning would be 'great for cycling.'

To have a classics rider suddenly turning into a monster time trialist and dropping established climbers on huge climbs would be a total farce for cycling and a slap in the face for fans.

Well if you share the view of some that all TDF winners are doped to the gills, then the Eurosport commentators are right....JA winning will be great for the Tour and thus great for the sport in general.

Far better this than the processions and neutralised racing of the past 8 years which have caused large swathes of the French public to disengage with the Tour, and worse still spread a toxic atmosphere along the roadside in recent tours.

Without wanting to go down the rabbit hole of nationalistic bias, a French winner, even more so one with the style of Allaphillipe, can only be a good thing for the sport......until he gets caught of course, but i'm for enjoying the show whilst its good

If we were talking about Pinot I'd agree. We're talking about Alaphilippe. A rider who has NEVER once shown this kind of climbing abilities and now all of a sudden (and yes overnight) he can drop the best climbers in the world. Nope, sorry, that just doesn't work. Alaphilippe winning would be about the worst thing that can happen to cyclist. Not only will you get doping, but also major favoritism accusations.

I never mentioned plausibility did I? Just what's good for the sport, in the short term at least....much like Lance was good for the sport in the short term

Of course those of us who frequent this and similar forums have different thresholds when it comes to what's plausible....but I maintain that JA winning the tour would be great for cycling in the short term, and who knows how long that lasts or how widespread the pisitive boost, but dont confuse the cynicism of the forums with the 'see no evil' enthusiasm of the casual fan

I do agree though that Pinot would be an even better winner