May 1st, Tour de Romandie Stage 5: Champagne - Geneve, 164.6km

[Captain_Cavman]

I'm waiting for the eurosport highlights, so didn't see the race. Why was wiggo in trouble?

http://velonews.competitor.com/2011/04/news/alexander-vinokourov-wins-stage-at-tour-de-romandie-pavel-brutt-keeps-lead_170413

“It was extremely disappointing,” Yates told VeloNews. “Ben obviously had the legs. He won that sprint ahead of the three-time world champ (Freire). But Ben was alone. We had the firepower there, in Bradley (Wiggins), to close that gap down. But there was no commitment from Bradley to help Swifty.

“Rabo had no one else; they’d been chasing all day. And, yes, BMC had someone there for GC, but they didn’t have a sprinter, and the real commitment is obviously for the stage win.

“Rabobank was committed but they’d been on the front for 150K. We’d been on the front with Morris (Possoni) for 20K; he did his bit. I wasn’t expecting (climbers) Chris Froome or Dario (Cioni) to close down gaps or put Swifty in the right place. G (Geraint Thomas), who would normally do that job, was dropped with Michael Barry, so the only guy left was Brad.

“I’m disappointed in the situation (with Wiggins) but it’s nothing new, and without being too derogatory, it’s just frustrating basically. It’s not every day that an opportunity like that comes along. And except for Oscar Freire there was no other sprinter there.”



Interesting times at Sky. And of course it will all have a knock-on effect at team GB.

 

[Waterloo Sunrise]

http://velonews.competitor.com/2011/04/news/alexander-vinokourov-wins-stage-at-tour-de-romandie-pavel-brutt-keeps-lead_170413

“It was extremely disappointing,” Yates told VeloNews. “Ben obviously had the legs. He won that sprint ahead of the three-time world champ (Freire). But Ben was alone. We had the firepower there, in Bradley (Wiggins), to close that gap down. But there was no commitment from Bradley to help Swifty.

“Rabo had no one else; they’d been chasing all day. And, yes, BMC had someone there for GC, but they didn’t have a sprinter, and the real commitment is obviously for the stage win.

“Rabobank was committed but they’d been on the front for 150K. We’d been on the front with Morris (Possoni) for 20K; he did his bit. I wasn’t expecting (climbers) Chris Froome or Dario (Cioni) to close down gaps or put Swifty in the right place. G (Geraint Thomas), who would normally do that job, was dropped with Michael Barry, so the only guy left was Brad.

“I’m disappointed in the situation (with Wiggins) but it’s nothing new, and without being too derogatory, it’s just frustrating basically. It’s not every day that an opportunity like that comes along. And except for Oscar Freire there was no other sprinter there.”



Interesting times at Sky. And of course it will all have a knock-on effect at team GB.

Very interesting - rather confirms my opinion on Bradley, formed by picking him for the CQ team and watching him systematically quit or even fail to try in umpteen situations where he had a decent chance.

If he's like that with his own career it's no shock he can't be arsed for team mates either.

His comments about his week of track cycling were really pretty terrible for someone being paid quite so well to do quite so little on the road.

 

[El Pistolero]

He should be ditched, he's a joke.

 

[peloton]

http://velonews.competitor.com/2011/04/news/alexander-vinokourov-wins-stage-at-tour-de-romandie-pavel-brutt-keeps-lead_170413

“It was extremely disappointing,” Yates told VeloNews. “Ben obviously had the legs. He won that sprint ahead of the three-time world champ (Freire). But Ben was alone. We had the firepower there, in Bradley (Wiggins), to close that gap down. But there was no commitment from Bradley to help Swifty.

“Rabo had no one else; they’d been chasing all day. And, yes, BMC had someone there for GC, but they didn’t have a sprinter, and the real commitment is obviously for the stage win.

“Rabobank was committed but they’d been on the front for 150K. We’d been on the front with Morris (Possoni) for 20K; he did his bit. I wasn’t expecting (climbers) Chris Froome or Dario (Cioni) to close down gaps or put Swifty in the right place. G (Geraint Thomas), who would normally do that job, was dropped with Michael Barry, so the only guy left was Brad.

“I’m disappointed in the situation (with Wiggins) but it’s nothing new, and without being too derogatory, it’s just frustrating basically. It’s not every day that an opportunity like that comes along. And except for Oscar Freire there was no other sprinter there.”



Interesting times at Sky. And of course it will all have a knock-on effect at team GB.

not surprised, at all.

 

[Captain_Cavman]

not surprised, at all.

Really? I was fairly astonished.

Not that a DS would think such a thing about their main man, but that they would come out and say it. Desperate measures.

 

[on3m@n@rmy]

yeah. couldn't agree more.
i don't like him as a a person, but i admire, highly respect and enjoy his aggressive and risky way of riding, fighting and attacking.

and I couldn't agree more either.
cheers

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Last year Wiggins was everything-for-the-Tour-de-France. A lot of us would have felt a lot happier with that approach if we'd seen him replicate his 2009 Tour form somewhere - anywhere - before then.

This year he said he'd learnt from his mistakes and would be racing a fuller calendar to try and accumulate results beforehand.

I get the feeling he got his candy-from-a-baby podium at Paris-Nice and now feels that has justified his whole season so it's okay to sleepwalk to the Grand Départ.

 

[Waterloo Sunrise]

Last year Wiggins was everything-for-the-Tour-de-France. A lot of us would have felt a lot happier with that approach if we'd seen him replicate his 2009 Tour form somewhere - anywhere - before then.

This year he said he'd learnt from his mistakes and would be racing a fuller calendar to try and accumulate results beforehand.

I get the feeling he got his candy-from-a-baby podium at Paris-Nice and now feels that has justified his whole season so it's okay to sleepwalk to the Grand Départ.

It really annoys me - if he actually tried he could be 2nd place in every race Martin wins - heck he might even get lucky once in a while, but now he seems totally uninterested in road cycling, just going through the motions to pick up his massively over-inflated salary.

The worst thing that has happened to Team Sky was signing him, by a distance.

 

[uphillstruggle]

Thanks for posting that Cavman. I agree that for a DS to come out and say that about their own rider is a sure sign of back room struggle.

Interesting interview on cycling news with Thomas where he talks about the team time trail and looking for stage wins as his personal objectives for the tour. Which is a contrast to all the media coming out last year that constantly talked about helping Wiggins in the GC. Last year was laughable really with Lovkvist helping Wiggins and ending up above him. Up shot being Sky may offer something for the tour this year rather than being a 'not quite also ran' GC team.

I read somewhere that Wiggins is getting 1.5 million euros salary, which must put him above the pay scale of some very good riders.

 

[peloton]

Really? I was fairly astonished.

Not that a DS would think such a thing about their main man, but that they would come out and say it. Desperate measures.

Yeah, that was surprising (that he said it out loud), but maybe that's a wake up call for Wiggo.
Didn't he drop out off a race lately, tweeting something along the lines that he didn't bother etc.?

 

[Frosty]

Yeah, that was surprising (that he said it out loud), but maybe that's a wake up call for Wiggo.
Didn't he drop out off a race lately, tweeting something along the lines that he didn't bother etc.?

The three days of De Panne.

FWIW the team sky report it looks as though Wiggins helped in the finale yesterday

http://www.teamsky.com/article/0,27290,21137_6908052,00.html