Olympic Road Race Men

[auscyclefan94]

With the way the race panned out, O'Grady was a better chance than Goss in the finale so Australia did the right thing not to chase.

 

[hrotha]

Junior-level fail by Urán there. And weird that Canc crashed like that.
And hahaha, screw you, UK Postal.

Course tailor made for Cav, Uran will be working for GB etc etc

The course *was* tailor-made for Cav. But with only 5 riders per team, this sort of thing happens.

 

[Parrot23]

i have figured it out. Uran was looking backwards to see if cavendish was in his wheel. When that wasn't the case he was so confused he didn't pay attention anymore

+1, lol

 

[Walkman]

Were you watching the same race as everyone else? O'Grady was in the sprint for third and ended up fifth. That's not even a fail let alone a huge fail.

Where were the other cycling powerhouses? No Italy, no Spain, no Belgium. Then no GB and no Germany. In that company of failures, Australia was nowhere near a fail.

Fifth place is great but I still don't understand why the rest of the team did nothing? Goss was going to take on Cav, Greipel and Sagan? In that case, why not help the chase? And what about Evans, Rogers and Gerrans? They were going to to lead out? Again, why not help the chase then? Just sitting in the peloton for 250 km without doing anything (save Rogers "attempt")is a huge fail for them as a team. Al least Belgium made an effort (though not a very smart move) with Gilbert. Spain, HUGE fail! Doing a lot of work during the most hectic chase and then just sit and do nothing in the finale....

GB did everything they could, it's not their fault that nobody wants to win medals... Germany, too late and they ended up with nothing. Greipel must be happy.

 

[BillytheKid]

Honestly don't see how this is a GB fail. Everyone raced not to win, but to not lose to Cav. Most of these countries "man in the break" wasn't really a threat to win there either. Kind of a weak excuse to not race.

But I'm happy to see Vino winning in Vino fashion. Just laying it all on the line.

GB should have been putting men up the road. Trying to ride the front as supermen with some help from the Germans was too predictable.

 

[Arnout]

GB should have been putting men up the road. Trying to ride the front as supermen with some help from the Germans was too predictable.

Yes, got too cocky and they're paying the price.

 

[Cervelo77]

Honestly don't see how this is a GB fail. Everyone raced not to win, but to not lose to Cav. Most of these countries "man in the break" wasn't really a threat to win there either. Kind of a weak excuse to not race.

But I'm happy to see Vino winning in Vino fashion. Just laying it all on the line.

Umm, when you're tipped for the win and don't even medal, and don't arrive with the lead group, it's a fail. But I give them a pass because they ended up down 2 riders at the point they would have chased it all back together.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Also give a huge award to Gesink please.

He attacked 4 times and finally joined the lead group. Then worked his @ss off for Boom, even after he was held up by Cancellara's shenanigans.
Way to come back from the Tour. He'll be ready for the Vuelta

 

[Don't be late Pedro]

At least they created more options for themselves than GB and Germany.

Thats a fair point. It was all in for Cav and it did not work. With only 5 riders it made it much more difficult. I would have liked to see someone from GB in the break as it might have, in the long term, take pressure of them. Hence, been better off with only 3 riders pulling. Not sure who would be a good fit for that though?

 

[boomcie]

Pleased that GB failed.

And Vino... He's worth jack sh*t as a rider today, but is probably the cyclist with the best racing instinct in the peloton. He has no ethics whatsoever: cheats, bribes (Uran will be pleased) and does who knows what else. But he does it brilliantly, he's a full-blown criminal mastermind.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

True enough. What were Sanchez and Valverde waiting for 30 riders back then?

Can't pretend to know that. They dropped the ball, just felt the comment was a bit harsh on Castroviejo, who did his job brilliantly.

Uran has been a pro for quite some time and podiumed a Monument already. He's not as experienced as Vino, but what he did was so stupid... Don't make it sound like he's a neo pro...

Urán's also got a decent sprint on him on small uphills and isn't a total pure climber either. But he still made a mistake that Vino took advantage of.

Sky should take the high road and keep their mouths shut. They did not lose to Vino, they lost to quite a large group. No excuses.

Technically speaking they did lose to Vino, because Urán is on Sky, but I'm not sure Urán's activities were really in the Sky playbook the same way as, say, Eisel's were.

 

[spalco]

While I agree that hog is a hypocrite i suppose the point is that, with lance anyway he is still treated as a great, greatest ever and most people ignore anything else.

Vino meanwhile did the same thing but is treated aas evil for it
he is the scapegoat so chats why one might be far more sympathetic to vino who has ptaken a big punishment, and lance who has so far gone free.

Vino never made any excuses, but he also never said any bull****. He took his punishment and that was it. I can respect that more than slimy weasels like Miller or Basso.

 

[online-rider]

Spain had a couple in the lead group even during the final 5km and they just sat back!

They had been grinding their nuts off for 50k though.

 

[Walkman]

I couldn't stop laughing all day. What were Sky thinking? Didn't they honestly expect to ride for 250km with four guys?

That's the worst tactics I've seen since my racing days!

What should they have done? Cav climbing along while Froome ripping it up during the hills?

They knew Cav would be dropped no matter what so they probably counted on theam like Germany and Italy for some help. But today the help came to late and contained of too few riders.

 

[Cervelo77]

I couldn't stop laughing all day. What were Sky thinking? Didn't they honestly expect to ride for 250km with four guys?

That's the worst tactics I've seen since my racing days!

Yes, I've got to say that they might have had a bit of overconfidence thinking they could just drive the gap to nil when they wanted to.

 

[HiCadence]

I don't understand why Germany didn't put more than 1 rider on the front, Surely Greipel was in for a shout for gold in an out-right sprint? I've seen Greipel beat Cav before so it's not like it's out of the question unless he wasn't feeling good?

 

[richwagmn]

Junior-level fail by Urán there. And weird that Canc crashed like that.
And hahaha, screw you, UK Postal.

The course *was* tailor-made for Cav. But with only 5 riders per team, this sort of thing happens.

LOL.

So happy to see it not come down to a bunch sprint.

 

[AmateurSpirit]

A Vino victory is the only consolation for what happened to Cance.

 

[dannywpt]

Uran and Vino got a gap of like 10-12 secs. Everyone, including Uran, knows Vino is a MUCH better finisher. Uran has no problem taking a 5km long turn at 100% effort to just GIVE Vino the gold. He didn't even want to win.

99/100 riders with a worse sprint would have let Vino do at least half the work.

I guess Vino bribed him well.

 

[Parrot23]

And Vino... He's worth jack sh*t as a rider today, but is probably the cyclist with the best racing instinct in the peloton. He has no ethics whatsoever: cheats, bribes (Uran will be pleased) and does who knows what ells. But he does it brilliantly, he's a full-blown criminal mastermind.

Looks like it.

I remember when he won on the Champs Elysee from the sprinters. Great instincts.

 

[Andre.J]

Damn it Gilbert! You missed again. You were almost there. Ride on Gilbert...hope your luck and form are ready for WC.


Disheartened,

Andre

 

[UlleGigo]

You clearly are still hurting from the Tour.
I suppose 5th here, does seem like a good result, after France.

Not really. No where near as **** hurt as I knew you guys would be if 'Team GB' failed today anyway. That's alright though you go on thinking I'm seething if it helps you cope.

 

[Mellow Velo]

With the way the race panned out, O'Grady was a better chance than Goss in the finale so Australia did the right thing not to chase.

That's pretty rough on Goss, given that up until today, he's always received pretty positive hype.

 

[Opalius]

No, I would disagree, he put in some massive pulls....just drilled it when it counted. To bad it was a course set up for a sprint finish. The U.S. just raced a brillant tactical race. The Eurosport commentators, Boardman and Skippy, just could not see what they were doing. So close.....

Sometimes nationalism colors opinions big time. I could argue that Fuglsang was the real hero because he pulled big time initially on Box Hill... But just nah , even though I am a Dane.

He did a great ride and is a promising rider for sure. But blindly stating that he was the best rider of this race...? I can think of at least ten riders who were just as good, if not better (especially if we are not considering final position, which we are not, as he placed fourth).

 

[Walkman]

Also give a huge award to Gesink please.

He attacked 4 times and finally joined the lead group. Then worked his @ss off for Boom, even after he was held up by Cancellara's shenanigans.
Way to come back from the Tour. He'll be ready for the Vuelta

Yeah, nice seeing someone do something! Hope he can reach absolute peak for the Vuelta!