Most Disappointing Team of the Tour

[hrotha]

I think you're a bit unfair. When it comes to completely pointless and doomed attacks with 3-5km out when the leadout trains are in full swing, nobody on this earth can touch Linus. Not even Vino, cos at least Vino thinks to attack on tricky run-ins and at a distance he might be able to hold on for.

Yes, but if he had waited for a distance he could hold on for, he'd have had to wait for the final 100 meters of the stage.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Yes, but if he had waited for a distance he could hold on for, he'd have had to wait for the final 100 meters of the stage.

The Eurosport commentators have taken to calling him "Mad Linus" for the sheer ridiculousness of some of the attacks he tries. Some of them, like one 20km out on a pan-flat Vuelta stage last year and the one on Friday, have people like Amets Txurruka and Johnny Hoogerland shrugging their shoulders and saying "what's this idiot playing at?"

 

[M Sport]

Cofidis by a mile!!! they are just makeing up the numbers at the tour,time to cut them lose,

French team so I doubt that will happen.

 

[Von Mises]

A bit OT but i was away for a lot of the tour - what happened to Taaramae?

Achilles + generally out of form (he talked already before Dauphine that he is overtrained and tired, didnt recover for Tour, Achilles problems were partly the result of overtrainig I guess).

Cofidis were definitely dissapointment, they were in some breaks but achieved nothing).

Radiohack was big dissapointment, team build around GC, loaded with bi names and what - 13th place in GC?

For me Liquigas and SKY were minor dissapointments for me, probably because I did not expect from them much.

Milram was failure, but again, how much there was to expect them anyway?

I dont understand how can people name Rabobank, they went for GC and achieved pretty much maximum.

 

[DrC0721]

You can't say the first place team was the most disappointing team. Garmin had the most disappointing luck, but with Ryder claiming a top 10 it wasn't too bad for them. BMC for loosing Cadel, but they had the yellow for a day and it is the teams "first tour". I still think Liquigas because the only time you knew they were in the race, is when Basso or Roman were dropping back.

 

[Roude Leiw]

But to me the tiebreaker was the fact that I didn't even consider Milram as I had totally forgotten that they were in the race!!

Exactly what I thought

 

[sublimit]

I understand why Sky are getting a lot of stick here and i dont really disagree on most of it but they are overhyped but thats not really their fault.. I always thought Wiggans getting on the podium was unrealistic but i did expect a stage win from somebody but it didnt happen.

But they finished all their riders, Geraint Thomas, Lovquist, did well, Hagen did fairly well, Wiggans and Flecha a big disappointment.

 

[theyoungest]

I understand why Sky are getting a lot of stick here and i dont really disagree on most of it but they are overhyped but thats not really their fault.. I always thought Wiggans getting on the podium was unrealistic but i did expect a stage win from somebody but it didnt happen.

But they finished all their riders, Geraint Thomas, Lovquist, did well, Hagen did fairly well, Wiggans and Flecha a big disappointment.

I thought he did ok. He performed at his level, at least. This is how he's been for years at Rabo: high morale, always features in one or two breakaways, but nothing spectacular. If Sky tried to present him as one of the best riders in the world: he's not.

 

[happychappy]

Sky unfortunately.

 

[pmcg76]

I think level of disappoint depends on expectations before the race, I didnt have any expectations for Footon, Milram for example.

Last year, all the talk was about Astana sweeping the podium, so RadioShack with the same riders minus Contador managing 1 in the top 10 and their main domestique at that, is a dig drop despite winning team competition and a stage.

I never expected Wiggins to do much so SKY were not as much a dissappointment for me personally but were still poor, so much for the hype.

Liquigas were very poor with Kreuziger very poor indeed, expected him to move up a level this yea.

 

[Kazistuta]

Ok, 80+ posts and noone has mentioned Euskaltel???

Besides Samuel Sanchez, who did great as a single rider, they acchieved absolutely shyte! Where was Egoi Martinez, the supposed first favorite for the KOM? What did they do in "their" territory, the Pyrenees? Major fail for not reeling the breakaway in on stage 15 and giving Samu a sure-fire win.

Granted, the great breakaway artist Txurruca crashed out, but I'm sure a lot of you guys agree with my dissappointment in the team as a whole. Right?

Just thought I would mention them, the two biggest failures this tour has to be Milram and Cofidis for the reasons already stated. But both these teams came with less expectations than GC teams like Sky, Liquigas and BMC, who all for different reasons failed to live up to expectations. I thought Sky was pretty visible throughout the tour regardless of their lack of results, though.

 

[Clemson Cycling]

Horner finished 10th by the way. Radioshack really showed their age at the Tour this year a lot more then I ever dreamed they would. They do have some of the best prospects in the sport on Trek-Livestrong to revamp their team next year.

 

[sublimit]

I thought he did ok. He performed at his level, at least. This is how he's been for years at Rabo: high morale, always features in one or two breakaways, but nothing spectacular. If Sky tried to present him as one of the best riders in the world: he's not.

I was hoping he would do better in the first week and maybe get a stage, he started looking better as the tour went on to be fair to him. But slightly disappointed though maybe i shouldnt be as he's mainly a classics rider.

 

[Marva32]

-Footon-Servetto: No stage, no GC, no jersey... Although with 9 Tour debuts I don't know how much could've been expected from them in the first place.

For a group of Tour debutantes, I would have to say that they seemed to do a decent job of getting into moves and helping to animate the race.

 

[Sørensen]

OT, but I love your sig. I'm stealing it for use on another forum I visit.

Hehe sure nps bud

 

[Timmy-loves-Rabo]

cofidos rode the tour?

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Ok, 80+ posts and noone has mentioned Euskaltel???

Besides Samuel Sanchez, who did great as a single rider, they acchieved absolutely shyte! Where was Egoi Martinez, the supposed first favorite for the KOM? What did they do in "their" territory, the Pyrenees? Major fail for not reeling the breakaway in on stage 15 and giving Samu a sure-fire win.

Granted, the great breakaway artist Txurruca crashed out, but I'm sure a lot of you guys agree with my dissappointment in the team as a whole. Right?

Martínez was put into the role of being Sánchez' main helper. He had a good race. You didn't see too many Euskies in the breakaways in the Vuelta last year, because Sánchez was so high on GC. The same thing happened here. Martínez stayed by Sánchez' side most of the time, and the Basques will be just as happy with 4th overall as they would be with a bunch of failed, doomed breakaways. Their big breakaway specialist crashed out, as you mentioned, and Rubén Pérez was in three or four breakaways.

I want to see Euskaltel win everything on earth as much as the next guy (as long as the next guy wants to see Euskaltel win lots), and would rather have seen more orange jerseys in the Tour, but they won't go away from the Tour disappointed. Not like Sky or Radioshack will.

 

[Big Doopie]

radioshack.

disclaimer: i am a full-fledged hater.

 

[La Pandera]

Ok, 80+ posts and noone has mentioned Euskaltel???

Besides Samuel Sanchez, who did great as a single rider, they acchieved absolutely shyte! Where was Egoi Martinez, the supposed first favorite for the KOM? What did they do in "their" territory, the Pyrenees? Major fail for not reeling the breakaway in on stage 15 and giving Samu a sure-fire win.

Granted, the great breakaway artist Txurruca crashed out, but I'm sure a lot of you guys agree with my dissappointment in the team as a whole. Right?

Just thought I would mention them, the two biggest failures this tour has to be Milram and Cofidis for the reasons already stated. But both these teams came with less expectations than GC teams like Sky, Liquigas and BMC, who all for different reasons failed to live up to expectations. I thought Sky was pretty visible throughout the tour regardless of their lack of results, though.

For a team with self-imposed limitations on who can ride for them, I'd say that Samuel Sanchez finishing 4th is a major plus. He featured prominently throughout the race and held the last podium spot till the penultimate stage.
I'm personally disappointed only that Sanchez couldn't hold on to that last podium spot, not in the team, Sanchez or its performance. At the same time, I'm thrilled for Menchov, who is a class rider who is deserved of his podium spot the same as Sanchez is (class) and would have been (had he held his spot). I'm an Euskatel fan from way back so I'm a bit biased.

 

[Frosty]

HTC. I was expecting to see some sort of exciting drama with Cav getting thrown out or something yet all they did was set Cav up for a series of predictable wins. Kudos to Renshaw for trying to liven things up though

 

[rxgqgxnyfz]

Astana

They disappointed so many people refusing to be punch bags they were expected to be.
________
MERCEDES-BENZ VARIO

 

[spanky wanderlust]

man you people are obsessed with radioshack. they won team classification, took a great stage win and finally got horner the top ten he deserves. not a horrible tour from them, unless you bought into the pre tour hype. in that case there is no helping you. my advice is: stop drinking the kool aid!

garmin had a decent tour, especially with the production of another surprise top ten finisher in hesjedal. terrific ride by him. farrar crashed. vdv crashed. but they still managed to mix it up a bit in the sprints with dean and farrar who both rode pretty awesomely.

surprised to see rabo come up, since they had two top tens. wierd.

lg should have done better. are you guys willing to rethink your exuberance for kreuziger?

someone mentioned euskaltel. huh? they were in a podium hunt until yesterday. sanchez was in the mix on every mountain stage. sometimes i wonder if i am watching the same race as the rest of you. one of ee's better tours of late actually.

things didn't fall into place for caisse. not much to say. it wasn't because they weren't trying. they were in the hunt for mtns and team, so good on them.

lotto had jvdb, nuff said.

cofidis was crap. terrible. milram was slightly worse (i agree with the person that couldn't remember they were even in the race!). and can someone explain why footon was here? i will never understand this. at least the feillu bros could have produced some excitement and animation...without those nasty brown kits!

sky performed about like any reasonably knowledgeable cycling fan would have expected, and that is not very well. boassen hagen isn't quite where he was last year. hopefully he can come up with a fall classics win. i like him for paris tours. and as a dark horse for the wc.

i vote milram. with sky a close second. milram was the worst team and should have done better. cofidis and footon were weak but were expected to be. sky is a big money team and did nothing with their talent.

 

[Martinello]

In my opinion it's a close race between Cofidis, Milram and Liquigas.

Cofidis were absent for most of the race, except for a couple of half-hearted attempts from Auge, Pauriol and Moinard. Too bad about Taraamae having to quit, he would have been a contender for the maillot pois in the first 2 weeks.

Milrams performance was abysmal. Ciolek never a threat in any kind of sprint and Gerdeman even tried to get away from his own sprinter on the run-in to Bordeaux. Only highlight was Knees in several (doomed) breaks.

Liquigas does take the prize however. A quality team of solid riders (Kreuziger, Basso, Smzyd, Quinziato et al) and what do they have to show for it? Kreuziger with a rather anonymous 9th (with 3 top-10 placings), Basso a total dud and placing Oss and Vandborg in some breaks.

Footon did rather well, Valls Ferri performing better than expected on several difficult stages and Cappechi doing reasonably well.

Although Radioshack failed to get a top3, I still think they did better than Caisse, Sky and Garmin - they did walk away with the teams classification and stage win - looks better on paper than Caisse's numerous second-places.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

man you people are obsessed with radioshack. they won team classification, took a great stage win and finally got horner the top ten he deserves. not a horrible tour from them, unless you bought into the pre tour hype. in that case there is no helping you. my advice is: stop drinking the kool aid!

The problem was not that they were bad per se, but there were much higher expectations of what they could achieve than there were of, say, Lampre, or Milram.

and can someone explain why footon was here? i will never understand this. at least the feillu bros could have produced some excitement and animation...without those nasty brown kits!

Because of the 2008 agreement that said they had to be.

 

[Izzy eviel]

Cofidis. I didn't realize they were still going let alone competing in the tour!