Paris-Nice 2017, 5th-12th March

[Põhja Konn]

De la Cruz had every right to wheelsuck and every right to sprint for the stage, but the way it transpired on the road, taking away those 4 bonus seconds still felt like a low blow. I guess its just frustration over Sky yet again winning a Paris-Nice they should have lost and an immense effort from Contador going unrewarded again.

For all the fight Henao put up, he would not have pulled back enough time mano-a-mano with Contador. He lucked out that Bahrain started work for a ridiculous 4th place sprint.

 

[frisenfruitig]

Re: Re:

Prudhomme with his favourite Sky bots hehe

Is he really happy? Sky is not really appreciated in France, and I don't think that this win (they won 16 out of 19 french main stage races) will do better.

Sky is not really appreciated anywhere except in Britain, which is understandable since they are the USPS of the current era

 

[Vasilis]

Sky will be bankrupt if they have to pay everyone who has chased Contador over the past two years for no reason in P-N.

What about the riders that helped Contador for no reason?

Can you mention who?

Matthews for example? Although it was mainly meant to illustrate the bias. Helping Sky is bad, helping Contador is good.

 

[Forever The Best]

This is just getting ridiculous. How many stage races has Contador lost by less than 10 seconds in the last few years? And especially the two PN defeats hurt because he lost both races not because he was weaker than his rival but because his rival was in a stronger group on the final descent. And both times his rival was a sky rider which makes the pain even worse.
And btw, he already has 6 2nd places this season. Even Sagan would be impressed by that.

He was 2nd in the points classification as well, make it 7.

 

[benzwire]

Re:

Do people here not watch much cycling? Teams/riders work together for many different aims and today was no different. The way some are posting today reminds me of all the hate Gallopin was getting last year in this race when he was working to protect his place in the GC and in turn Thomas held onto the race lead by getting the tow. It's cycling people!!!

Totally agree. Lots of anger built up in here. It was a great race. Go ride your bikes people.

 

[BigMac]

Re: Re:

Calling people cancerous, aid s or asking for SKY to die is just dreadful...mods ??

Why are these coments allowed on here...everyone rode the race as they chose and that is cycling

Bravo Alberto but also great great ride by Henao who never gave up ...chapeau

if only Contador fans had 1% of his class

Yes, I want the team that has a way too high budget to disappear from cycling. They have more than the 3 next richest teams combined.

And that's leaving out all the clinic stuff.

Don't you ever get tired of spreading misinformation?

 

[deValtos]

Re: Re:

So why were they pulling? because they like Henao better than Contador? LOL.

Like I said before they could have closed that gap down so easily if they'd not spent the entire climb attacking Henao and offering zero help.

Plus towards the end you should never give up, people crack badly, other teams might assist, things happen ... it's cycling. Contador fans of anyone should know you should never give up.

If even there's the slightest chance you should fight for the win and there was, if anything they cocked it up by leaning on Sky and Henao too much.

 

[Simurgh]

Re:

Do people here not watch much cycling? Teams/riders work together for many different aims and today was no different. The way some are posting today reminds me of all the hate Gallopin was getting last year in this race when he was working to protect his place in the GC and in turn Thomas held onto the race lead by getting the tow. It's cycling people!!!

Gallopin did it because he "preferred" Thomas winning. Why would a rider of his calibre defend a friggin' 8th in Paris-Nice?

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re:

Wow a lot of butt hurt fans.

In reality I think Contador had more help from other teams than Henao over the stage.
Matthews started riding with Contador while Contador needed it most, if Matthews had not done that the COntador group likely would not have made it and Matthews could have sprinted for the win. And the UAE guys helped Contador for no real reason as Ulissi himself was also pulling and because of that could not stay with the group. De la Cruz also took pulls to take Soler back but that was logical as it was for his own gains.
Henao had help from a rider from Delko for a bit (till Henao decided to drop back to the group with Seb Henao and Nieve) and in the end a bit from the Bahrain guys who had a reason to ride (though the chances of getting back were obviously very slim).

A great race and in the end a deserved winner (Contador would deserve it as well ofc)

I think you'd end up making that conclusion rewatching the stage being neutral, actually.

The big mistake was that Trek didn't get ONE rider in the break. That would most likely have swung it in Contador's favour.

 

[VayaVayaVaya]

Sky will be bankrupt if they have to pay everyone who has chased Contador over the past two years for no reason in P-N.

What about the riders that helped Contador for no reason?

Can you mention who?

Michael Mathews. De La Cruz let Contador take the intermediate sprint, earning 2" bonus seconds that would have put him ahead of his teammate, Dan Martin, if the chase group had latched back on.

 

[StryderHells]

Sky will be bankrupt if they have to pay everyone who has chased Contador over the past two years for no reason in P-N.

What about the riders that helped Contador for no reason?

Can you mention who?

I remember Igor Anton helping Contador for a brief period on the mortirolo in the 2015 Giro when he had absolutely no reason to do it

 

[Scarponi]

Sky will be bankrupt if they have to pay everyone who has chased Contador over the past two years for no reason in P-N.

What about the riders that helped Contador for no reason?

Can you mention who?

Matthews for example? Although it was mainly meant to illustrate the bias. Helping Sky is bad, helping Contador is good.

Matthews has held on to GC riders in the past on climbs for chances to win stages.

 

[Gloin22]

Re: Re:

Do people here not watch much cycling? Teams/riders work together for many different aims and today was no different. The way some are posting today reminds me of all the hate Gallopin was getting last year in this race when he was working to protect his place in the GC and in turn Thomas held onto the race lead by getting the tow. It's cycling people!!!

Gallopin did it because he "preferred" Thomas winning. Why would a rider of his calibre defend a friggin' 8th in Paris-Nice?

French riders value top 10s in races like PN.. its the french mentality

 

[Vasilis]

Re: Re:

Do people here not watch much cycling? Teams/riders work together for many different aims and today was no different. The way some are posting today reminds me of all the hate Gallopin was getting last year in this race when he was working to protect his place in the GC and in turn Thomas held onto the race lead by getting the tow. It's cycling people!!!

Gallopin did it because he "preferred" Thomas winning. Why would a rider of his calibre defend a friggin' 8th in Paris-Nice?

Why would he sit in behind Thomas, just to make him lose? Also, WT points are important, even for 8th place.

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

So the position of the Contador fans is that Soler and De La Cruz are morally obliged to work with Contador, but everyone in the second group is morally obliged to make Henao work alone?

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

So why were they pulling? because they like Henao better than Contador? LOL.

Like I said before they could have closed that gap down so easily if they'd not spent the entire climb attacking Henao and offering zero help.

Plus towards the end you should never give up, people crack badly, other teams might assist, things happen ... it's cycling. Contador fans of anyone should know you should never give up.

If even there's the slightest chance you should fight for the win and there was, if anything they cocked it up by leaning on Sky and Henao too much.

Indeed. The hate for Bahrain is ridiculous. Though I'm not sure they could have helped much earlier - I guess Colbrelli was on his limit following Henao on the climb - Matthews probably as well. They then recovered a bit and tried to pull in the break on the descent and run into the line - absolutely standard bike racing in the circumstances.

 

[Scarponi]

Re:

So the position of the Contador fans is that Soler and De La Cruz are morally obliged to work with Contador, but everyone in the second group is morally obliged to make Henao work alone?

2 had a 90% chance of winning ( which happened) Bahrain had to close the gap and still best ullisi and Matthews but I get your point g

 

[StryderHells]

Re: Re:

Do people here not watch much cycling? Teams/riders work together for many different aims and today was no different. The way some are posting today reminds me of all the hate Gallopin was getting last year in this race when he was working to protect his place in the GC and in turn Thomas held onto the race lead by getting the tow. It's cycling people!!!

Gallopin did it because he "preferred" Thomas winning. Why would a rider of his calibre defend a friggin' 8th in Paris-Nice?

Why wouldn't he try and defend 8th place in a WT stage race that also happens to be in his home country?

 

[Alexandre B.]

Re: Re:

Do people here not watch much cycling? Teams/riders work together for many different aims and today was no different. The way some are posting today reminds me of all the hate Gallopin was getting last year in this race when he was working to protect his place in the GC and in turn Thomas held onto the race lead by getting the tow. It's cycling people!!!

Gallopin did it because he "preferred" Thomas winning. Why would a rider of his calibre defend a friggin' 8th in Paris-Nice?

French riders value top 10s in races like PN.. its the french mentality

Well he was losing WorldTour points because if he hadn't chase, he would have lost his top-10.

Colbrelli, on the other hand, had nothing to gain.

 

[El Pistolero]

Re:

So the position of the Contador fans is that Soler and De La Cruz are morally obliged to work with Contador, but everyone in the second group is morally obliged to make Henao work alone?

No, as you can see by a previous post by me I don't blame De La Cruz for anything, he did what he had to do. I don't even mind Bahrain (although it was pointless and dumb by them).

 

[deValtos]

Re: Re:

Why would a rider of his calibre defend a friggin' 8th in Paris-Nice?

Well if you gave someone a choice between 8th place and 12th place for example I guess most people would take 8th place. Why would you choose 12th? I can't think of a reason to choose the worse placing honestly.

 

[jaylew]

Re:

The truth is that Trek had no riders in the break, and that's probably the reason why Contador didn't win it.

Yes, this.

 

[Poursuivant]

Re:

Every day of this race has been amazing. What a week a racing it has been. No matter how this end, the 2017 Paris-Nice did a fine job of giving us entertainment each and every day.

Couldn't agree more.

 

[frisenfruitig]

Re: Re:

So why were they pulling? because they like Henao better than Contador? LOL.

Like I said before they could have closed that gap down so easily if they'd not spent the entire climb attacking Henao and offering zero help.

Plus towards the end you should never give up, people crack badly, other teams might assist, things happen ... it's cycling. Contador fans of anyone should know you should never give up.

If even there's the slightest chance you should fight for the win and there was, if anything they cocked it up by leaning on Sky and Henao too much.

Indeed. The hate for Bahrain is ridiculous. Though I'm not sure they could have helped much earlier - I guess Colbrelli was on his limit following Henao on the climb - Matthews probably as well. They then recovered a bit and tried to pull in the break on the descent and run into the line - absolutely standard bike racing in the circumstances.

Let's not forget that many Cotnador fanboys here girls. And they do tend to have short fuse on emotions in general

Oh wow, good one mate! sick burn

 

[VayaVayaVaya]

Re: Re:

Wow a lot of butt hurt fans.

In reality I think Contador had more help from other teams than Henao over the stage.
Matthews started riding with Contador while Contador needed it most, if Matthews had not done that the COntador group likely would not have made it and Matthews could have sprinted for the win. And the UAE guys helped Contador for no real reason as Ulissi himself was also pulling and because of that could not stay with the group. De la Cruz also took pulls to take Soler back but that was logical as it was for his own gains.
Henao had help from a rider from Delko for a bit (till Henao decided to drop back to the group with Seb Henao and Nieve) and in the end a bit from the Bahrain guys who had a reason to ride (though the chances of getting back were obviously very slim).

A great race and in the end a deserved winner (Contador would deserve it as well ofc)

I think you'd end up making that conclusion rewatching the stage being neutral, actually.

The big mistake was that Trek didn't get ONE rider in the break. That would most likely have swung it in Contador's favour.

I agree Contador received some help, but I don't see how you're coming to the conclusion that he had more help than Henao. Contador received very brief assistance but led the way 95% of the last 50km. Henao had teammates and other parties pulling for significant portions, plus the advantage of numbers on the descent.