Hahaha you actually mentioned Pereiro?!?! He was not even better than Sepp Kuss. He would never even be close to win that Tour if there were competent guys in the DS car of Telekom and Phonak.
Mancebo, there are no reason to hold him higher than for example Enric Mas. Sastre won a Tour mainly because of team strength a year that Christian Vandevelde was 4th and Kim Kirchen was 7th, both way too close to pretend Sastre was at a much much higher level than for example what Lipowitz did in the Tour this year. Ullrich doesn’t belong with the rest of the guys you mentioned, he was legit strong also in a historical context.
The others are maybe only “more consistent” because you look back at their whole career while many of the guys today are still young. Lipowitz for example has never been worse than 7th in a Grand Tour. Almeida has 5 top 10 in GTs. Ayoso has also a bunch of top 10 already. In 5 years time these might have equal consistency as Valverde, Sastre, Kloden etc. Valverde won his only GT at 29, Sastre at 33. Valverde didn’t finish on the podium at the tour before he was 36. Kloden had 3 top 10 in 18 GTs and DNF 9 out of 18. His GT results from his whole career isn’t even really better than Remco at 25. I see no reason to hold these guys you mentioned (minus) Ullrich at a level higher than Roglic, Lipowitz, Remco, Simon Yates or even Carapaz.
Yeah they might have consistency in the next 5 years. Pogacar hasn’t won those tours yet though has he.
I’m talking about the last 5 years, which have been poor.
And I’ll take sastre, Valverde, basso, Kloden, Vino
Over
Lipowitz, Porte, Roglic, Yates , Onley
Roglic DNF’s most of the time too, and i guess he’s the standout of the current contenders outside of Pog and vin.
Also, Pereiro takes some flak from cycling fans, but he is a tour winner, and finished in the top ten four times.
Sepp kuss has never finished in the top ten, and is unlikely to now, and his only grand tour victory, in the inferior vuelta was gifted to him even more so than Pereiros tour!
Pereiro is far ahead of a guy like him.