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Over- and underachievers during the last 20 years

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I don't think so. IMHO people expect more from him than what he is. He's never been among the top tier GC riders but consistently in the mid-Top 10. He could win a Giro or Vuelta if the circumstances were right (i.e., a very weak field).
Pretty much. I think he's shown a remarkable consistency that you don't really expect from a rider of his calibre, performing in the spring and then in 2 GTs but he's not getting the positive outliers that lead to GC wins.

I do think Landa has been underperming in getting GT podiums and stage wins, and he's simply had a lot of bad luck there.
 
Ciolek is actually an underachiever, the guy beat Zabel at the German NC RR before turning 19 and won the U23 WC one year later. The same could be said about Linus Gerdemann, who was seen as the next German gc hope.
Sergio Henao is an underachiever and I'd say the same about Sebastian. The guy finished top 10 on the 2 hardest stages of the 2014 Giro, in his first gt, while being the youngest rider in the race. I saw him as a future gc rider.
I view Chernetski as a huge underachiever, not just because his great u23 results, he has actually shown his potential as a pro. Fast enough to outsprint Ala in a Catalunya stage, top 10 a in Milano-Torino and a top 10 on the gc in a really hard Tour de Suisse in 2016, while working for Spilak. One would think that he'd have become a mayor player the harder hilly one day races, but he has never been able to take it to the next level.
 
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I am surprised that anyone would think Nibali is an overachiever . he is super talented, dedicated with a killer instinct

Anyway for me under achiever means you did not deliver the wins that were expected. In todays peloton that has to be Landa and Porte
But maybe I m just comparing them to the hype on here . Moscon and Kwiotkowski certainly have not delivered based on expectation but there are lots of riders like that in the peloton

Talent is only a very small part of achieving.Lots of talent has come out of Colombia but did not achieve the results expected of them...Quintana for one

The decisions you make early on on which team to join and what path you take can determine alot. Kreuizger and the 2013 Tour come to mind ..maybe a better rsult there could have changed so much for him

EBH also a big underachiever and Van Marke considering how he rides cobbles

TJ V Garderen ...well that is well documented
 
Biggest overachiever -Christopher Froome

C'mon who would have thought when he ran into the UCI official at the olympics despite there being acres of road to ride on !!
He is tall, gangly and has no physical attributes that put him so above other elite riders

Comparing his data to say Joe Domboski ..I know who SKY were most excited to sign and even for ages after that !!!

But Froome took what he had and got better and better and better
 
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Underachievers: Edvald Boasson Hagen, Moreno Moser, Taylor Phinney (due to bad luck), Yaroslav Popovych, Evgeni Petrov, Peter Velits, Giuliano Figueras, Thomas Dekker, Christoph Rinero, Maurizio Soler...

Overachievers: Chris Horner, Ryder Hesjedal, Oscar Pereiro, Simon Gerrans, Gerard Ciolek, Matthew Goss...
 
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Despite the forum jokes, Porte is an underachiever in GT's for sure. Has had some bad luck, but like many other riders could have possibly benefitted from not being so TDF focused.

I don't see how Quintana has overachieved. He and Porte are very even when you look at their one week stage achievements, and despite Porte being a better TT'er, he has no podiums and 2 top 10 finishers, whereas I've lost count of Nairo's high placed finishers over three weeks (most notably Giro and Vuelta wins, and TDF 2nd places).
 
TJVG showed promise really young with 3rd in Dauphine, 5th in TDF, 5th again in 2014 but declined gradually from there. think he could have done at least as much as Mollema but didn't happen.
Taylor Phinney looked like a potential Cancellara dare i say early on but the crash put that to rest.
TJ also showed some interesting puncheur skills in his time with Rabo Continental and with HTC that he has long since neglected. Realistically I think TJ has achieved to his level, unfortunately for him because of the style of rider he is, he's best suited to longer, lower gradient tempo climbing which means he best suits the Tour of the three GTs, and because of its prestige he would alway find it difficult to make that step from secondary contender to primary contender there. If there had been a Vuelta with a route similar to the early 2000s Vueltas during the 2010s, he might have been better served there (the ones with tempo grinding MTFs like Arcalis, Navacerrada, the traditional side of Sierra Nevada) seeing as he always tends to perform well in Catalunya, but with the current parcours trends he was always going to be restricted. The Rettenbachferner win perhaps hints there's more to give on a wider range of climbs, but he settled into a niche of being strong in the US races, Catalunya and Suisse and has kind of been limited to those.

Phinney is, I feel, an unfair one to include because the subject is not people who underdelivered on their promise but people who are underachievers - I feel we cannot class Phinney as an underachiever because it wasn't so much his fault that he didn't deliver on his promise due to laziness or psychological issues, like, say Rujano or Zubeldia. Phinney may have been meandering a bit relative to his perceived talent, but he also could have rectified that. The crash put paid to his career, and therefore I feel he belongs in a separate category for lost talents, along with people like Kai Reus and, more unfortunately, Antoinie Demoitié and Björg Lambrecht.

There is also a lot of trouble in placing several riders who were great prospects but were likely training like pros in U23s and so had no room for improvement as pros, like Thomas Vedel Kvist or André Steensen. And of course Yaroslav Popovych.
 
Despite the forum jokes, Porte is an underachiever in GT's for sure. Has had some bad luck, but like many other riders could have possibly benefitted from not being so TDF focused.

I don't see how Quintana has overachieved. He and Porte are very even when you look at their one week stage achievements, and despite Porte being a better TT'er, he has no podiums and 2 top 10 finishers, whereas I've lost count of Nairo's high placed finishers over three weeks (most notably Giro and Vuelta wins, and TDF 2nd places).
If Porte is, so is Špilak. Porte is a great one-week racer (better than I usually give him credit for) that doesn't have the endurance for a GT without a crucial bad day or three, and has demonstrated this several times. No shame in that. It's just that Špilak has recognised it and tailored his calendar and his palmarès accordingly, and Richie is still banging his head against the GT wall at age 35.
 
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If Porte is, so is Špilak. Porte is a great one-week racer (better than I usually give him credit for) that doesn't have the endurance for a GT without a crucial bad day or three, and has demonstrated this several times. No shame in that. It's just that Špilak has recognised it and tailored his calendar and his palmarès accordingly, and Richie is still banging his head against the GT wall at age 35.

Yes and no. Richie showed it was possible in the 2016 TDF (his only real time loss, that caused him to miss the podium, was due solely to bad luck), when he rode out the three weeks pretty strongly.

At least Porte hasn't totally neglected the one week races either, in preference for the TDF.

Regarding Spilak, did he ever really try? And was it just as much to do with the heat as it was endurance? I know he likes the Swiss races.
 
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If Porte is, so is Špilak. Porte is a great one-week racer (better than I usually give him credit for) that doesn't have the endurance for a GT without a crucial bad day or three, and has demonstrated this several times. No shame in that. It's just that Špilak has recognised it and tailored his calendar and his palmarès accordingly, and Richie is still banging his head against the GT wall at age 35.
Tbh I think Porte is also mentally fragile and many of his GT fails have been due to crashes and mechanicals. That's not to say he doesn't have what it takes to win and that he's undoubtedly more suited to shorter stage races.
 
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Despite the forum jokes, Porte is an underachiever in GT's for sure. Has had some bad luck, but like many other riders could have possibly benefitted from not being so TDF focused.

I don't see how Quintana has overachieved. He and Porte are very even when you look at their one week stage achievements, and despite Porte being a better TT'er, he has no podiums and 2 top 10 finishers, whereas I've lost count of Nairo's high placed finishers over three weeks (most notably Giro and Vuelta wins, and TDF 2nd places).
Quintana was the best climber of the race in the 3rd week of his first Tour. Based on his best performances, winning a single Giro and Vuelta has been the bare minimum.
 
Underachievers: Edvald Boasson Hagen, Moreno Moser, Taylor Phinney (due to bad luck), Yaroslav Popovych, Evgeni Petrov, Peter Velits, Giuliano Figueras, Thomas Dekker, Christoph Rinero, Maurizio Soler...

Surely Soler belongs in the sub-category of "due to bad luck" as well; surely almost dying is gonna put a damper on your career trajectory! And didn't that happen when it looked like he was finally on his way back after a period of bad luck?

(surely)
 
Don't know about Ciolek, but Gerdermann and Fothen seemed to disappear as contenders when something came into the sport in 2008.
Gerdeman was just a guy who won a breakaway stage. Fothen I literally only remember from white jersey battle with Cunego, and I always forget Cunego won that thing.

I couldn't resist
:p
Lol.

Landa was considerably older though, and he also never really showed that level of climbing again even if he became a top 8 mainstay in GTs. However, he's still a big underachiever, but mainly due to how screwed he has been by team decisions.

2015: We'll never know if he could've beaten Contador that Giro, and my guess is with perfect luck/tactics they could have in hindsight, but at the very least there's no way he deserved to finish behind frigging Aru. Then he has to ride the Vuelta in service of Aru again. Basically wins the Vuelta for Aru.

2016: is leader for Sky at the Giro, but is hit by gastro while in really good position, and that would probably be his best shot at the win considering all contenders ended up throwing minutes away at some point. Then he has to waste the rest of his season being the 5th climbing domestique at the Tour. This one is funny considering if you send him to the Vuelta that year he might save it for Froome.

2017: Gets Keldermanned at the 2017 Giro. Gets screwed out of a Tour podium cause he has to domestique for Froome.

2018: Only Tour is the biggest waste of a year for him.

2019: Is desginated leader, then somehow Carapaz flies away with it before he once again has to bring home a leaders jersey for somebody else at the expense of his own podium. AGAIN. Then goes to the Tour after a Giro, and is the best of his team. Underrated Giro/Tour double from Landa here. Might have landed podium in Vuelta?
 
Gerdeman was just a guy who won a breakaway stage. Fothen I literally only remember from white jersey battle with Cunego, and I always forget Cunego won that thing.


Lol.

Landa was considerably older though, and he also never really showed that level of climbing again even if he became a top 8 mainstay in GTs. However, he's still a big underachiever, but mainly due to how screwed he has been by team decisions.

2015: We'll never know if he could've beaten Contador that Giro, and my guess is with perfect luck/tactics they could have in hindsight, but at the very least there's no way he deserved to finish behind frigging Aru. Then he has to ride the Vuelta in service of Aru again. Basically wins the Vuelta for Aru.

2016: is leader for Sky at the Giro, but is hit by gastro while in really good position, and that would probably be his best shot at the win considering all contenders ended up throwing minutes away at some point. Then he has to waste the rest of his season being the 5th climbing domestique at the Tour. This one is funny considering if you send him to the Vuelta that year he might save it for Froome.

2017: Gets Keldermanned at the 2017 Giro. Gets screwed out of a Tour podium cause he has to domestique for Froome.

2018: Only Tour is the biggest waste of a year for him.

2019: Is desginated leader, then somehow Carapaz flies away with it before he once again has to bring home a leaders jersey for somebody else at the expense of his own podium. AGAIN. Then goes to the Tour after a Giro, and is the best of his team. Underrated Giro/Tour double from Landa here. Might have landed podium in Vuelta?

In 2017 didn't he comeback from the crash and show great form in week three, winning the queen stage?

Loved that Tour ambush stage with Contador.
 
Overachievers: Chris Horner, Ryder Hesjedal, Oscar Pereiro, Simon Gerrans, Gerard Ciolek, Matthew Goss...

IMHO Horner, Hesjedal and Pereiro aren't overachievers. They got fluke or one-off victories but didn't win much overall. Same can be said about Ciolek.

Goss won more races but I think he showed talent at an early age. He could even be considered an underachiever since he stopped getting results by his late 20's.

I agree with Gerrans.
 
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How could I forget about Horner and Hesjedal. I don't think Goss was a huge overachiever. He was a top sprinter with better climbing wheels than some so him winning MSR isn't a crazy thing. He was also 2nd at the Worlds the same year. Then he just vanished all of a sudden.
 
It’s easy to consider Andy an underachiever, but part of me puts him in the same group as Taylor Phinney and Soler.

Remember that Schleck’s career should’ve been winding down about now. He was only like 26 or 27 when he had the crash that ended his career as a GC rider.
 

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