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Paris - Roubaix 2021 (03.10)

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Ilmaestro99

Ilmaestro99

Apr 13, 2021
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Ranagazoo said:
Van der Poel rides so aggressively that any other rider in his group is a wheelsucker in comparison
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Exactly, if you are Colbrelli in the final 30km of a race you dreamed of winning since you were a boy, in the front group, with a guy who stupidly insists on doing 80% of the work, and you are on the limit, you are not going to waste energy to sprint around him on wet cobbles and pull more just so that anonymous fans on a forum don't call you a wheelsucker.

Anybody calling sonny a wheelsucker please watch the race, he did pulls all day, he was not missing turns, he chose the right moves, it was him who started the final selection, he was the only one who attacked on the Carrefour de l'arbre. A deserving winner and he honored the race
 
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Volderke

Volderke

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Frankschleck said:
I can't say if you are trolling, hope you are. Next we will call all the riders in the peloton for wheel suckers expect Tim De Clerq
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I'm not and never on this forum.

It still takes a darn good rider to win Roubaix, especially in these conditions, wheelsucking or not. I would call out any other rider that was wheelsucking in any other race as well. This isn't personal (about Colbrelli, a rider I heavily defended against wrongdoing when he bumped into Roglic), or national (about Italian riders) or subcontinental (about S-European riders). Just pointing out a fact.
 
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Ricco'

Ricco'

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I agree that VDP did too much, but otoh if he didn't pull they wouldn't have a chance to catch Moscon (and they were heavily helped by the puncture and crash) and they would be very likely caught by Van Aert's group. So it was a choice of risking working to much to be able to fight for the win or save something but only fighting for the podium together with a couple of good sprinters like Colbrelli, Van Aert or Laporte.

For me the main problems were three:

  • Letting the break get go big and have so much advantage
  • Philipsen almost didn't pull when they were together
  • Changing bikes where it happened, having to get to the peloton on a sector and on the next sector attack
 
tobydawq

tobydawq

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Turgis did complete his amazing set of top 15-placings in all the seven cobbled classics of the season (Omloop, Kuurne, E3, GW, DdV, De Ronde and PR). That must be an incredibly rare feat. And considering that he was also fourth in De Ronde of 2020, that means he has a string of eight consecutive top 15 placings.

The one who came closest this year, other than Turgis? GVA with 5 of the races.

Edit: And he also got 10th in MSR but the list would seem quite arbitrary if that was included.
 
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Extinction

Extinction

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Rackham said:
Truthfully none of us have any idea, so you can't speculate either way. Maybe he does have a sad life? You don't know.

What I won't do is veer off onto a meta conversation about a "crying conversation". I simply remarked on a small specific detail in a Tweet.



That's funny because I was watching & thinking... the complete opposite. I mean thank god many riders (including my favorites, i.e. the climbers) nope out of this butchery.

This race cannot even be healthy (or at least far less than usual), i.e. imagine the sheer amount of muck & mud & dirt inhaled & swallowed yesterday? And the burning eyes (some like van Aert admitted they made a mistake in taking off their glasses to see better). Riders usually say they sleep like babies after a very demanding race. I doubt many of them slept well last night (especially the numerous riders who crashed themselves).

So I love their bravery, I love the visual & cultural impact it has on the sport (i.e. cementing cycling as "the" toughest sport in the world), but let's leave it for the specialists to have their fun.

It's bad enough when they include cobbles in the Tour de France & the yellow jersey fight can become a lottery.
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I cannot agree. It is THE MONUMENT par excellence and a relic from a harder past that builds character. I was being somewhat facetious of course. Not every rider would even get selected for Paris-Roubaix by the team. It's an ideal that can't be realized. Still any pro that has ridden the World Tour circuit should bemoan not having ridden it once. It is truly epic, from another time, yet present, is the one day race that transcends cycling, is like an Olympic event, has a place in the very Pantheon of sport itself.
 
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tobydawq

tobydawq

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Extinction said:
I cannot agree. It is THE MONUMENT par excellence and a relic from a harder past that builds character. I was being somewhat facetious of course. Not every rider would even get selected for Paris-Roubaix by the team. It's an ideal that can't be realized. Still any pro that has riden the World Tour circuit should bemoan not having ridden it once. It is truly epic, from another time, yet present, is the one day race that transcends cycling, is like an Olympic event, has a place in the very Pantheon of sport itself.
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True. And the year 2020 doesn't deserve to be on the list of years because it didn't have a PR.
 
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Extinction

Extinction

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As far as having Paris-Roubaix cobbles in the Tour, well in the 89 edition there was a stage in which many sectors appeared and the favorites came through more or less unscathed. To be sure, that was a different cycling, in part because the modern way of hyper-specialization has meant that fewer and fewer grand tour candidates ever ride the pave during their careers. But this is another reason why more pros should get a taste of the Hell of the North. It would make them, if not necessarily better cyclists, more prepared for an aspect that can't be ignored in the history of this great sport. Paris-Roubaix should not be treated as such a freakish anomaly, because it has generated an interest in the sport globally that perhaps ONLY the Tour rivals.
 
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tobydawq

tobydawq

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Extinction said:
As far as having Paris-Roubaix cobbles in the Tour, well in the 89 edition there was a stage in which many sectors appeared and the favorites came through more or less unscathed. To be sure, that was a different cycling, in part because the modern way of hyper-specialization has meant that fewer and fewer grand tour candidates ever ride the pave during their careers. But this is another reason why more pros should get a taste of the Hell of the North. It would make them, if not necessarily better cyclists, more prepared for an aspect that can't be ignored in the history of this great sport. Paris-Roubaix should not be treated as such a freakish anomaly, becuase it has generated an interest in the sport globally that perhaps ONLY the Tour rivals.
Click to expand...

And the Tour favourites didn't manage that in 2018 or what?
 
L

Leinster

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Extinction said:
As far as having Paris-Roubaix cobbles in the Tour, well in the 89 edition there was a stage in which many sectors appeared and the favorites came through more or less unscathed. To be sure, that was a different cycling, in part because the modern way of hyper-specialization has meant that fewer and fewer grand tour candidates ever ride the pave during their careers. But this is another reason why more pros should get a taste of the Hell of the North. It would make them, if not necessarily better cyclists, more prepared for an aspect that can't be ignored in the history of this great sport. Paris-Roubaix should not be treated as such a freakish anomaly, becuase it has generated an interest in the sport globally that perhaps ONLY the Tour rivals.
Click to expand...
There have been multiple stages with Roubaix-or-Roubaix-type cobbles included since 1989. The only times a lot of the current peloton have raced on wet Pave has been at the Tour.

One difference in 1989 was that 4 of the Tour top 10, Lemond (4th), Fignon (3rd), Mottet (15th), and Kelly (2 wins) had not only competed but got some good results at PR in their careers. And of the rest, Rooks had 2 top 10s at De Ronde, so wasn't unfamiliar with cobbles.
 
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F

fbjim

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fuiers said:
Not gonna give any attention to people commenting on wheelsucking. Only thing that I noticed was that when Van Der Poel made that last attack before Moscon went down and Boivin could not close that gap to Van Der Poel anymore by himself Colbrelli really looked done as well. But Colbrelli closed that gap and came back. That was the winning move in my opinion.
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Arguably the winning move was when Vermeersch was brought back by Colbrelli and VDP didn't counter it. Of course it's hard to say if any of them had the ability that late in the race given the on-the-saddle sprint at the end, but VDP certainly shouldn't have been trusting his sprint in that situation.
 
Extinction

Extinction

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tobydawq said:
And the Tour favourites didn't manage that in 2018 or what?
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They did, but not in 2014 except for Nibali, who had not, nor has, ridden Paris-Roubaix. It is a tough call, because Paris-Roubaix is a crap shoot in which the best rider without problems (who may or not have been the best on the day) wins. You can be the best, on the from of your life, and still be screwed by mechanicals and crashes in a way that is unique to the sport. In the past rarely a Tour winner had the qualities to win Paris-Roubaix, but it happened. By contrast a normal Paris-Roubaix winner has no hope of winning the Tour. And frankly eliminating potential Tour winners before we even get to the mountains and decisive stages, because someone or several have broken bones falling on the cobbles of Northern France seems contradictory to what the spectacle intends to be: namely a direct fight between the best grand tour racers in the world where their strengths come to the fore (in the mountains and timetrials). For the rest, we have Paris-Roubaix in the spring.
 
F

fbjim

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Froome was injured entering the cobbled stage in 2014 and the Tour is not a race where you can hide an injury. Nibali put minutes into his rivals because he had a plan and his team executed perfectly.


The Tour is a bike race across all types of terrain. It does not require cobbled stages but the idea that stages which aren't mountains are "contradictory to the tour" is silly. Not everything revolves around GC rider W/KG numbers.
 
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U

Unchained

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Unable to watch the women's or men's race..just the less than @10 minutes of highlights. Amazing how different each winner looks..female monument champion looks pretty clean, has composure..Men's champ has 10 kilos of muck all over and left everything on the road to get the victory. Was astonished at how treacherous going towards the middle of the road was for everyone..once the tiny contact patch was loose you were going down..neither brake was a good choice..touch on the front,you were down,tap the back and you start fishtailing all over..saw some good saves by both groups..as many know I live w w dog named Roubaix ..she has had her share of accidents,rough road and falling..I hope full race is available for us to watch soon
 
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