Ninja of the Tour

[Armchair cyclist]

Re:

On a more serious note: For me Kreuziger is the true ninja. He was barely mentioned by the (german) commentators, and never shown on TV, leave alone being interviewed. And his "T-10" in the TTT came by pure chance. Even the official TdF page doesnt count it (correctly) as a T-10, since 40+ % of riders do finish T-10 in a TTT. That is like we consider every rider who made a "normal" stage T-10 not available for ninja if he finished better than 80th. That would be ridiculous...

A close 2nd (even if having a T-10 in a "normal" stage) is Cherel. But he is one place down to Kreuziger in the CG. A undeniable fact, and thus out of contention...

Please read the OP before you rail against it: top ten in the TTT was never a criterion. I stated top 5, although in hindsight, yes, that might have opened up too much.

 

[Vino's Mum]

Re:

Can I change my vote?

To Pippo Pozzato. Who I didn't even know was in this Tour!

Seen here recovering after Alpe d'Huez...

Cheers!

 

[FoxxyBrown1111]

Re: Re:

On a more serious note: For me Kreuziger is the true ninja. He was barely mentioned by the (german) commentators, and never shown on TV, leave alone being interviewed. And his "T-10" in the TTT came by pure chance. Even the official TdF page doesnt count it (correctly) as a T-10, since 40+ % of riders do finish T-10 in a TTT. That is like we consider every rider who made a "normal" stage T-10 not available for ninja if he finished better than 80th. That would be ridiculous...

A close 2nd (even if having a T-10 in a "normal" stage) is Cherel. But he is one place down to Kreuziger in the CG. A undeniable fact, and thus out of contention...

Kreuziger seems like the moral victor here, "T-10" in TTT or not.

I saw SSanchez on NBCSports Tour coverage a lot, especially after TvG abandoned. But genuinely didn't catch any mention of Kreuziger before then (admittedly I didn't watch much of the first week tho).

Anyway, this has been the best thread on CN during TdF. Cheers.

OP - can we have your decision on the official ninja GC soon?

Saw SSanchez too lots of time, plus he had his T-10. And ofc was interviewed by Eurosport. No ninja at all...

Yes, Kreuziger is the moral winner.

On a more serious note: For me Kreuziger is the true ninja. He was barely mentioned by the (german) commentators, and never shown on TV, leave alone being interviewed. And his "T-10" in the TTT came by pure chance. Even the official TdF page doesnt count it (correctly) as a T-10, since 40+ % of riders do finish T-10 in a TTT. That is like we consider every rider who made a "normal" stage T-10 not available for ninja if he finished better than 80th. That would be ridiculous...

A close 2nd (even if having a T-10 in a "normal" stage) is Cherel. But he is one place down to Kreuziger in the CG. A undeniable fact, and thus out of contention...

Please read the OP before you rail against it: top ten in the TTT was never a criterion. I stated top 5, although in hindsight, yes, that might have opened up too much.

Ok, sorry then. T-5 TTT... still DQes 20+% of riders, equal to DQ any rider that finished a "normal" stage better than round T-40something...

As I said, even the official TdF page doesnt consider a TTT placing as T-10. They simply put a (rightfully) "-" in the stage.
I mean you can hide in the slipstream for some 20 kms (of 3.000+ kms), thus contribute nothing to the TTT performance, and still get credited with a high placing > out of ninja contention...

IOW: I recommend to skip TTT placings all together for future ninjas.

 

[Armchair cyclist]

The definition that in previous years would have given us a rider in the top twenty simply did not do so this year; not sure why, probably the range of riders in successful, or partially successful, breaks.

However, I'm not generally in favour of changing the rules halfway through, so I declare the ninja of the tour to be Mick Rogers, followed by Bak and Oliveira. The best placed ninja to have been predicted before the Tour was Peraud, and the prediction spoils are taken by Gunara.

The traditional definition might not be seen to apply to him, as TV picked him out for his previous podium, his nationality, his triple roll fall and subsequent indecent exposure and bandages. But rules is rules.

However, if I were running such a thread/prediction game again, I would probably drop the TTT criterion altogether. Had I done that, Kreuziger and Tangert would be ahead of Rogers, and we would have the top twenty rider that the thread probably deserves.

If additionally, instead of top ten on a stage, I had specified top eight (because the captions on ITV prior to this year showed 8 names, and who knows the identity of 9th and 10th yesterday without looking it up?) for exclusion, then Sanchez and Barguil would have beaten Kreuziger.

But as far as I am concerned, that is matter for discussion for future editions of this thread, and this time around, the winners (barring something extraordinary today) are Rogers and Gunara.

Let's have some discussion before the Vuelta as to what can be objective criteria to apply next time around.

 

[FoxxyBrown1111]

But rules is rules

It only needs some editing in the OP to change them. It´s easy. I know that from own experience with the GGTG.

Anyway, good work Armchair...

 

[gregrowlerson]

Mikaël Cherel for me. Began with a solid 198th in the ITT, and now up to 18th on GC.

Ok, there was a minor infraction of the ninja code when he placed 8th on the stage to Plateau de Beille, but he finished very discreetly on his own over 6 minutes down on Murito.

Excellent career-long ninja stats, with a best-ever result of second (once) in a Romandie stage won by Vino: http://www.procyclingstats.com/rider/Mikael_Cherel

Some excellent ninja journalistic work here

But the winner is Roma Kreuzinger.

And the team time trial shouldn't play a part in the ninja rules....except for maybe the team that wins....

 

[deValtos]

Did anyone see Jan Bakelants ?

Apparently he finished 20th

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Did anyone see Jan Bakelants ?

Apparently he finished 20th

He figured in multiple large breakaways, even doing a lot of work for Bardet too.

 

[PremierAndrew]

Re:

**** the rules! Pauwels is my man, almost 0 tv time

He gained about 1 minute and a half on Froome from stages 11-20 with hardly any TV coverage

 

[joe_papp]

Re:

...I'm not generally in favour of changing the rules halfway through, so I declare the ninja of the tour to be Mick Rogers, followed by Bak and Oliveira. The best placed ninja to have been predicted before the Tour was Peraud, and the prediction spoils are taken by Gunara...

Dang. Mick Rogers. Should've seen that coming. He's been a winner in everything related to the bike since at least '97. Apparently ninja-competitions now, too.

Thumbs-up to OP for making a decisive call and not backsliding on his rules.

 

[Steven Roots]

Did anyone see Jan Bakelants ?

Apparently he finished 20th

His teammate Chérel, 18th, was even more invisible, i think.

 

[gregrowlerson]

29 Haimar Zubeldia (Spa) Trek Factory Racing 0:01:21

Is the master coming back to his best Ninja form?

 

[gregrowlerson]

Re:

We all like to joke, but the story of Haimar Zubeldia is actually a sad and dark one.

Once, long ago, there was a young and talented rider named Haimar Zubeldia. In 2000, he showed his promise by finishing second in the Dauphine, joining Hamilton and Armstrong on the podium. Later that year, he rode his first GT, finishing tenth in the Vuelta.

He was an exciting, aggressive, attacking rider. In the 2003 Tour de France, Zubeldia was his usual aggressive self. In stage 8, on the Alpe d'Huez, he led the chase after Vinokourov attacked: https://youtu.be/1-y38WZAtgc?t=368

Then came the fateful stage 13 to Ax-3 Domaines. Sastre is up the road; behind him is a very select group of Armstrong, Ullrich, Vinokourov, Basso, and...Zubeldia. Then Zubeldia attacks: https://youtu.be/SJyZ7X_b7Ww?t=2013. Basso is dropped and Armstrong struggles to respond. A couple of minutes later, Zubeldia attacks again: https://youtu.be/SJyZ7X_b7Ww?t=2123. After this, the attacks keep coming, and eventually Armstrong is dropped. This is the stage where Armstrong almost lost the Tour to Ullrich.

After the Tour, Armstrong, furious with Zubeldia, asks some friends to "talk with" the young rider. Rumour has it that things escalated and Armstrong's friends soon had a dead body on their hands. Even with Armstrong's connections, this was too much. He quickly reached an agreement with Zubeldia's family: the death would be kept secret, but in exchange, Armstrong and the UCI agreed that Zubeldia's name would continue to appear in the results of UCI-sanctioned races, and that Zubeldia's family would receive the prize money earned by the "ghost" rider.

Thus is explained the sad truth behind Zubeldia's frequent top-10 finishes without ever being seen on camera.

I watched some of the '03 Tour the other day.

What is particularly amusing is that on the climb of Alpe d'Huez, Haimar is almost always in the thick of the action, but Phil and Paul continually ignore naming him. There are two Euskaltel riders in the main group, and Mayo is mentioned regularly, but they keep referring to the other orange guy as the just the other Euskaltel rider, or asking themselves if it is in fact Laiseka or Etxebarria. It takes about four kms before Zubeldia's name is mentioned, and it is only said less than a handful of times during the entire climb.

As for that fateful, unlucky, stage 13; Haimar really asked for his own death sentence. I reckon that Lance and his cronies would have let him off with just a warning, but to have the audacity to not finish strongly enough to stop Ullrich getting the second place time bonus, and at the same time refusing to sit up enough so as to allow Armstrong to take the third place bonus....well, that was the final nail in his coffin