March 19: Milan - San Remo 2011 298km

[L'arriviste]

I was also a bit disappointed to see Boonen tailed off. I know he's been ill recently, but I was pretty excited to see him up there with Chavanel and Malacarne. He could have been good in an 8-man sprint, though I daresay Goss would still have taken it.

I hope we're not going to be sold that "getting there, getting there, preparing for later objectives" line and then, houpla, all of a sudden it's July!

 

[Tuarts]

Yeah, I have noticed SMH do a lot (thanks to Rupert Guinness). Shame out West we have Murdoch or Stokes as our only rags.

 

[El Pistolero]

Oh well, Goss is better than Cancellara winning

 

[jens_attacks]

does anybody know if michele beat francesco casagrande's time on cipressa?

i didn't see something like that since a long time.grande michele!!!

congrats to goss of course.aussie monster.

 

[The Hitch]

Surely most hated is Contador and those 23 seconds?

Contador isnt really competing against Aussies thesse days. He just woops everyone at the GTs he does. Valverde meanwhile faces Cuddles in Ardennes, Cuddles in smaller stage races (dauphine) cuddles in Vuelta, and some of the sprinters maybe even on occasion.

ANd Valverde is often the main target of anglophile fans.

 

[Captain_Cavman]

Lots of teams getting castigated. But sometimes the cards don't fall your way, that's sport, that's life.

Sky had to happy to have their main contender up in the break, he wasn't good enough as it turned out but there certainly wasn't any reason to try and help with the chase; until it was too late. HTC only had one rider up there too and given a choice, most would have gone with EBH.

Garmin had their top man and a helper in the break. Why would they chase? So Haussler wasn't good enough on the day, that's the way it goes.

Leopard had two in the final shake up and picked up a podium, so they did well.

Rabobank? Without Freire they clearly didn't have much motivation for the chase.

BMC had a great race as did FDJ. Katushya probably did the most work for the least return.

All in all a great race and one which was up for grabs until the line. And as so often happens when it's up for grabs, HTC grabs it.

 

[Cobblestoned]

They'll get a warmup in May, where they and Bob Stapleton will have a brown-nosing contest over how important the Tour of California is.

Looking forward to follow this race with you. Will be much fun.

It will be a terrible, boring and useless piece of s***race with a boring ars*holewinner and team, that don't even deserve to win this race which is torturing us all in May.

Always two kinds of extremes out there, you know ?

 

[Kvinto]

Why? No one could drop Goss. Gilbert did everything he could, just wasn't good enough.

Just goes to show that the Poggio isn't hard enough, even after 290km.

Gilbert tried several times, but it was not enough and in the end Goss started his sprint from his wheel (I haven't seen the replays yet, maybe it's not correct?). Ya, Poggio isn't hard enough but it doesn't make Goss's performance less awesome for me

 

[ansimi]

I was also a bit disappointed to see Boonen tailed off. I know he's been ill recently, but I was pretty excited to see him up there with Chavanel and Malacarne. He could have been good in an 8-man sprint, though I daresay Goss would still have taken it.

Boonen made the initial split right? I hope he's coming in to form in time to make the cobbles more interesting. I only saw Chavenel crashed out on the side of the road. Is he OK?

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Dude, seriously, take them off. You're worse than ACF, and that's saying something.

Well, the thing is... why WOULD they mention Ventoso? The point I was making was not "wah wah Ventoso was ignored". Somebody pointed out that he was there but not mentioned.

I was saying "if it took them so long to recognise somebody who is more of a threat to win and more recognisable to British Eurosport's audience, why on earth would they point out somebody like Ventoso?"

 

[maltiv]

How easily would Scarponi have won this race if he were in the front group from the beginning?

Unbelievable how strong he was.

 

[Anonymous]

contador isnt hated really.

I hate the whole of LayoTard Wreck far more.

 

[Arnout]

Finishing is the real deal, racing only counts for fantasy points...

I understand what your saying of course. Gilbert tried his on his advantage and was gutsy. I'm just saying Canc's sprint is a newly witnessed tool in whats already a pretty big box.

Goodbye to cycling in ten years then... what would happen to cycling if we didn't have Gilbert, Nibali, Offredo, guys that always want to attack even if they're the favourite?

I think a lot of teams fail to understand it. A lot of casual cycling fans couldn't care less about winners, they want to see an exciting race.

 

[sublimit]

Another nomination for race of the year?

I enjoyed it anyway. Despite most of my favorite riders going out the back, falling off, stuck in a dropped group or whatever.

I love races above 240/250 K as It gives it time to play out properly. Roll on 2012 M-S-R .

 

[Cobblestoned]

Cobblestoned said 'see you all at Gent-Wev'. These races are before then.

No, that was cobblestones

 

[joy118118]

Only Cav, Renshaw and Eisel were on those bikes though.

Specilazed said Goss won with Venge

 

[The Hitch]

Oh well, Goss is better than Cancellara winning

Canc has already won mate. Hes got this PR and RVV in the bag.

Its our friend "big phil" who needs to win MSR if he wants to even consider challenging Spartacus on the monument grand slam front.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Looking forward to follow this race with you. Will be much fun.

It will be a terrible, boring and useless piece of s***race with a boring ars*holewinner and team, that don't even deserve to win this race which is torturing us all in May.

Always two kinds of extremes out there, you know ?

To be totally honest, I think the parcours for California this year is really good.

I just think the commentary will be embarrassingly sycophantic and oversell what the race can offer. This year it should offer some really good racing - but they'll try and sell it as being the equal to or better than the Giro, which always hurts the race's credibility in the eyes of many fans.

 

[jens_attacks]

congrats!
not a fan but he really deserved the victory

 

[will10]

1) why do we need this thread

and

2) have a bit of respect for those who may have come on here not knowing the result to read through the race thread who have now had the result ruined for them.

It's a cycling forum, if you don't want to know the result, why would you come on here? Bit of a chance to take IMO.

 

[The Hitch]

It's a cycling forum, if you don't want to know the result, why would you come on here? Bit of a chance to take IMO.

Some people want to read through the race thread while watching replays. Its better than the commentary usually.

 

[Christian]

Wow that was some awesome fighting by Steve Chainel when Nibali closed up to him! In general great race by FDJ

 

[Libertine Seguros]

I enjoyed it anyway. Despite most of my favorite riders going out the back, falling off, stuck in a dropped group or whatever.

I love races above 240/250 K as It gives it time to play out properly. Roll on 2012 M-S-R .

This is it. My view on no-hill, no-wind, no-cobble sprint stages is well known. I feel that there are two ways to solve the problem:-

1) make stages much shorter so attackers are fresher, and even if we do get the inevitable bunch sprint we've been bored for less time before we get to the important part;
2) make stages much longer so that any hill, no matter how small, becomes a genuine test of endurance and the teams have more trouble controlling it, leading to less predictable climaxes, such as today

well, there is a third way, but I think banning flat stages outright is going too far, even for me.

 

[El Pistolero]

Canc has already won mate. Hes got this PR and RVV in the bag.

Its our friend "big phil" who needs to win MSR if he wants to even consider challenging Spartacus on the monument grand slam front.

Big Phil would rather win Luik 2 times than 1 time Ronde and one time Luik.

Think that says enough about how he rates San Remo Even lower.

Shouldn't Cancellara have powered off as he according to the posts always does?

He doesn't have PR and RVV in the bag. But he'll be there in the final.

Now Boonen is one to watch out to for the cobbled classics. If he's bad at San Remo he's good at Roubaix. If he's good at San Remo he's bad at Roubaix. It will be Phil, Boonen and Cancellara in the Ronde and Boonen in Roubaix.

 

[joy118118]

A lot of casual cycling fans couldn't care less about winners, they want to see an exciting race.

Nope, casual fans in my country only care about big names like Armstrong or Cancellara. If today Cancellara didnt podium, they would have thought it was another boring race because one of some unnamed riders in the breakaway won.