Richard Carapaz discussion thread

[jaylew]

Re: Re:

Would not go as far as calling it convincingly when he got gifted 3 minutes by 2 dudes who are at like 2 minutes.

Very generous dudes then, I'm sure Richie will say thanks at the end
Anyway they have three stages left to take back what they "gifted", so let's see.

Yeah, by the end he may have been "gifted" 5-6 minutes.

 

[Valv.Piti]

Also not totally irrelevant that he lost 45 seconds or so on a flat stage.

Richie has been the best rider in this years Giro, deploying the best tactics and having the best team. End of story.

 

[Red Rick]

Richie won't care. And rightfully so.

 

[Escarabajo]

Re:

Would not go as far as calling it convincingly when he got gifted 3 minutes by 2 dudes who are at like 2 minutes.

You are certainly watching from different glasses than I am.

The first time I take it. But the second time? they are either *** or they are just playing stupid to avoid people to see that they are weak. The second day basically there was no excuse for that.

 

[gregrowlerson]

Re: Re:

It is hard to get respect when your name is Richie on this forum

 

[jaylew]

Re:

Also not totally irrelevant that he lost 45 seconds or so on a flat stage.

Richie has been the best rider in this years Giro, deploying the best tactics and having the best team. End of story.

Yes, I agree with all of this, though I don't think it's necessarily over yet. He wouldn't be the first to fade really late and Nibs could still have something up his sleeve.

 

[Salvarani]

Anything can happen tomorrow.

 

[Red Rick]

Re: Re:

Would not go as far as calling it convincingly when he got gifted 3 minutes by 2 dudes who are at like 2 minutes.

You are certainly watching from different glasses than I am.

The first time I take it. But the second time? they are either *** or they are just playing stupid to avoid people to see that they are weak. The second day basically there was no excuse for that.

Roglic was weak the 2nd time, and Nibali misread it completely.

 

[Valv.Piti]

And that's the beauty of cycling really, especially a stage race over 3 weeks. Riders are prone to misreading, miscalculating, taking too much risk, too less etc. The strongest rider isn't always winning as in, lets say running or something like that.

That said, Carapaz IS the stronger rider.

 

[RattaKuningas]

Well deserved Giro victory for Carapaz (it is not possible to lose 2 min tomorrow). Today showed us that he really was the strongest rider in the Giro. Hopefully this victory is just the first one.

 

[huge]

Congrats to Carapaz. Fully deserved.
Let's see if he is only a one race horse or we've found a new GT contender for the next few years.

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re:

Congrats to Carapaz. Fully deserved.
Let's see if he is only a one race horse or we've found a new GT contender for the next few years.

4th last year.
1st this year and the strongest rider in the bunch. Just turned 26. Huge motor, endurance and also explosive at the same time. Only lacking a proper TT.

Im convinced this isn't a one-off, altho it surely will be hard to replicate this level (won't do it in La Vuelta, Im sure), but this is a man for the GT's the next 5 years.

 

[Red Rick]

I feel there is a big difference between being a one race horse and replicating a win. Ofcourse he will compete again, but he also will never be underestimated again. This time the stars aligned.

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re:

I feel there is a big difference between being a one race horse and replicating a win. Ofcourse he will compete again, but he also will never be underestimated again. This time the stars aligned.

Still dont understand how the stars aligned when you are the strongest rider in the race. He even lost 45 seconds for free.

 

[Red Rick]

Re: Re:

I feel there is a big difference between being a one race horse and replicating a win. Ofcourse he will compete again, but he also will never be underestimated again. This time the stars aligned.

Still dont understand how the stars aligned when you are the strongest rider in the race. He even lost 45 seconds for free.

He also gained 25s for free on the stage Dumoulin crashed out.

Dumoulin crashed out.

Carapaz put a grand total of 8s into Nibali after Nibali stopped giving away free time. Sure he was the strongest in stage 13/14 but I think without blundering the gap would've been about a minute.

TTs are a part of GTs. Joaquim Rodriguez wasn't the strongest rider in the 2010 Vuelta.

 

[Valv.Piti]

But Joaquim Rodriguez was the strongest rider in 2012!

Btw, I feel you can do that for most of the GT's winners. Realistically, the stars will have align if you are winning a GT without being super superior. Can always come up with lots and lots of stuff that went x rider's way.

 

[johnymax]

Chapeau Carapaz. Well deserved victory. Another one who seems to get better the harder it gets. He's been underestimated during the whole Giro from everyone. The media was still talking more about Nibali, Roglič, Landa, Yates...even in the beginning of the 3rd week. Only then the cycling World was starting to realise he is the real deal. I can't think of any moment of difficulties for him during the race. The most consistent and strongest rider has won.

 

[JosephK]

Re:

Chapeau Carapaz. Well deserved victory. Another one who seems to get better the harder it gets. He's been underestimated during the whole Giro from everyone. The media was still talking more about Nibali, Roglič, Landa, Yates...even in the beginning of the 3rd week. Only then the cycling World was starting to realise he is the real deal. I can't think of any moment of difficulties for him during the race. The most consistent and strongest rider has won.

This, for sure. He seized the moment when others made miscalculations, and that is part of cycling. He was also the strongest rider over the 3-week race -- this was not a fluke victory. That said, Richard will not race another grand tour where he is underestimated, so the opportunity for this particular type of surprise (e.g., stage 14) may not present itself again. That said, I wouldn't be surprised if he ends his career with more than one grand tour victory . . . though if he joins Ineos, who knows.

 

[jaylew]

Congrats to him and good to see a rider from a smaller cycling nation win. He was clearly the strongest rider over the 3 weeks and even won two road stages - the rest of the top 10 only managed one combined, and that was 10th place Zaka. No telling how it would have played out if Bernal and Dumo had been around but Carapaz winning was always the most likely scenario as it was, "gifted" time or no.

 

[huge]

Nibali is fading and the only guy that could maybe challenge him is on the same team. Congrats on the win.

Let’s hope Carapez can develop another level again because in my opinion it’s a fairly weak GT with a lack of contenders and most of it soft pedaled except 1-2 stages and one attack by Vincenzo. Big attacks from Froome, Contador or riders who attack again and again like Contador used to would be a different ball game. In saying that he can only beat who is in the race , he has shown amazing maturity at 25 to handle the pressure with worrying about a 4 time GT champion going hard.

Contador has retired... or should we say that it was a weak field because Merckx wasn't there?

IMO it was one of the strongest fields the current peloton can offer, and that was shown by the fact that there wasn't any dominant rider. A very high, even level.

 

[Valv.Piti]

I think all the talk of this being a weak GT is ***. I think the climbing level has been quite high and Carapaz has never been in problem ONE time. How many times can you say that of a GT-winner?

 

[del1962]

Assuming he doesn;t melt down in ITT congrats on winning Giro

 

[Valv.Piti]

Looking at Richie's results prior to this Giro, its pretty interesting that he raced 5 stage races beforehand.

Two of them were in South America which obviously is 100% training. Still, he performed quite well there with two top-10s in Argentina and Colombia. Then he raced a couple of one day races in Italy prior to T-A without doing too much. In T-A, he did well on the first hard stage finishing with Alaf, Nibs and Dumoulin and on the harder stage the next day, he finished 22th. Ended 20th overall after a time trial in which he ended 99th.

Then he went to Catalunya and did a very nice first MTF to Vallter, the harder of the MTFs, where he finished 8th. Didn't do too much else in the race. Then I assume he went back so SA or went to altitude camp for about a month before Asturias where he and Landa demolished a weak opposition. Hard to gauge how good they were since it was a against much inferior competition.

Thats 32 racedays before the Giro, he is at 53 after today. Thats a lot of racing. Last year his prep was basically the same where he more or less raced at the same level apart from the early races in SA where he was undercooked.

 

[Red Rick]

Re:

I think all the talk of this being a weak GT is ***. I think the climbing level has been quite high and Carapaz has never been in problem ONE time. How many times can you say that of a GT-winner?

It really depends on definitions, which are always gonna be fluid and which are very often gonna change dependent on which case we're arguing for.

I would say though that 'no problem in one time' would make the definition very biased towards climbers.

I don't see anybody denying Carapaz is strong. But if you ask me if this Giro peloton starts the Giro 100 times in the exact same starting shape how often do we get the same winner I don't think it's more than for many other GTs.

 

[Asero831]

He surely deserve 1 million contract now. Not sure if Movistar have budget for this.