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Teams & Riders Tadej Pogačar discussion thread

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Well, whatever claim I made, it certainly isn't the one you put in my mouth.
I don't say whoever is the strongest on the Kwaremont is the strongest in PR. But historically there clearly is a very very strong correlation between being good in either. And mixed with the fact that the one time we saw him on PR cobbles he was argubly the strongest rider, why wouldn't I think he would also be the strongest rider next sunday?

I see the weight argument, one which would have been made about the ronde two years ago too. But other than that? I know I cannot prove any of this until he races PR, but frankly, neither can you. It's just pure speculation from our side and I'm not claiming to 100% be on the right side here. But behaving like my claim is ridiculous? That's just childish.
I put no words in your mouth unless your quote on Pogacars ride on the Oude Kwaremont had a different meaning. I'm just giving my opinion on that interpretation of data. By Kwaremont logic Alberto Bettiol was also the best flat cobbled rider in 2019 he just didn't even start PR.

I also think that when you make a very strong claim the onus is up to you to support it rather than on me to support the contrary. I think it's weird in any sport to assume an athlete is the best in the world at an event he's never done before if there's a lot of specialisation for that event.
 
I put no words in your mouth unless your quote on Pogacars ride on the Oude Kwaremont had a different meaning. I'm just giving my opinion on that interpretation of data. By Kwaremont logic Alberto Bettiol was also the best flat cobbled rider in 2019 he just didn't even start PR.

I also think that when you make a very strong claim the onus is up to you to support it rather than on me to support the contrary. I think it's weird in any sport to assume an athlete is the best in the world at an event he's never done before if there's a lot of specialisation for that event.
I supported my claim with two arguments, you ignored one and responded to the other with "wtf".

And as you said, Bettiol didn't start in 2019. The best examples of riders only performing well in the Ronde are those who never even try Roubaix. Before 2019, would the best example of a rider who can only compete at the Ronde have been Gilbert?
 
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Well said, thank you for posting that. People will dismiss Don Bradman simply because its "only" cricket and not one of the American sports or football (soccer). But Bradman's record was so superior that it was simply incredible, and no words can fully describe. And whilst during Bradman's time, cricket wasn't as strong in India as it is now, today cricket is likely only 2nd to soccer for global popularity (number of followers).

Cycling fans here would do well to check Bradman's record against every other cricket player then or since. The raw statistics say Bradman was certainly even more superior in cricket than Merckx was in the sport of cycling.

But on Pogacar and Merckx - nobody will ever beat Merckx's record, not even if Pogi continues like this.

Certainly The Don will always have an argument for being the greatest sports person ever......his numbers were simply so superior to anyone else, either during his era or since. Having said that, Bradman was purely a batsman, and there are two main components to cricket; he didn't bowl (so perhaps some cricketers with decent averages with bat and ball could argue that they're maybe within 25% of him in terms of statistics.

He only ever played tests in Australia and England though, strangely (never went to India or South Africa.

It's a little similar to another great Aussie, Rod Laver. He did the grand slam twice (which none of the current day 'goats' have ever done), and perhaps could have done it even more (he was banned from the tennis Tour for many years after turning professional).....could have had Bradmanesque numbers perhaps. But as with cricket, tennis wasn't very global, mostly being Australia vs. America for a while. For a while 2 (maybe even 3) of the 4 grand slams were played on grass also. These days 2 are played on hard courts, but that's a neutral surface.

Tennis has probably been effected even more by technology than cycling imo......who knows, but the touch and net attacking game of Laver may have been totally useless today, just as the heavy topspin backcourt game of Nadal may have been a joke on tour in the 60's.

I think that the greater depth in teams is what made the big difference in cycling, and forced greater specialisation. Perhaps Cancellara could have won grand tours in the 60's?

As for Pogacar, one could make a decent argument for him being the greatest cyclist ever if he keeps a similar level for at least a few more years. He'd probably need a minimum of 4 TDF's, at least 7 GT's in total, and at least 7 monuments in total (and to win at least 4 of the 5, plus a WCRR would help). That would put him way ahead of purely classics guys like Gilbert, Boonen and Cancellara, and GT guys like Contador and Froome (and he's already arguably ahead of the more versatile Nibali and Valverde).

Making a case for him will also depend on superiority against his current day rivals.......winning 7 monuments for example will seem a little less impressive if Evenepoel (or someone else) achieves the same.
 
On another note, am I the only one thinking Roubaix actually suits him better than MSR?
I just don't really see why I shouldn't believe he is currently the best rider in the world on flat cobbles. Like, the Kwaremont is 2/3 flat and he was literally the strongest rider in the Roubaix stage at the Tour last year. The strongest cobbles rider can usually win Roubaix at some point in their career. The strongest puncheur will still always struggle to win MSR if they don't also have a good sprint.

I agree that Roubaix could suit Pogačar better than MSR in the sense that is an harder race that can be open from afar and those seem to be the best kind of races from a strongman like Pogačar. Having said that, I think that it will be more difficult for him to win it than MSR because MSR doesn't need any specific preparation so Pogačar can race it every single year until he wins it even if in one in which he goes to the Giro. In Roubaix he is going to have less chances to win it, as I predict that he will continue to skip it in the next couple of years until possibly he reaches 5 Tour wins and gets a Giro under his belt too.

However even if he doesn't win Roubaix and MSR, he looks set to overtake Boonen and Cancellara as the most successful monument rider of XXI century and it wouldn't even surprise me if he gets into double digit wins.
 
You say cycling wasn't global, but it was a bigger sport. If that is true that would actually mean you had at least the same amount of riders/races, but coming from a much smaller talent pool. Logically that would mean the overall level/quality would be much lower.

The talent pool was much larger: that was my point. Households had one car, if any. Kids would ride their bike to school, there were no school busses back then. For many, a bike was the primary mode of transportation. Paris, 1950.

9GYzNgp.png


It was extremely hard to make it to a pro level, it's not like Coppi or Anquetil were racing against a bunch of nobodies as the post suggested. One only needs to look at their hour records to realize how great they were. 45+ km with that equipment, diet and logistics, it's amazing.

That's my point: the opposition wasn't weak, but riders like Coppi, Anquetil, or Merckx were just incredibly good.
 
One word of caution': The first half of the year, Pog was by far the best. By the end of the year, Remco had the Velo D'Or with an even more dominant second half

Is it possible Pog peaked a little too early last year and may not be able to sustain this form again through the end of the season?

One CANNOT say Remco is not on Pog's level, given that Remco was the world's best rider last year, and he has done nothing to show his form has dropped this year
Yeah I don't think that's a given :)
Since when is Velo d'Or some kind of objective metric of who is the world's best rider? I say it's UCI standings... now what? :)
 
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The talent pool was much larger: that was my point. Households had one car, if any. Kids would ride their bike to school, there were no school busses back then. For many, a bike was the primary mode of transportation. Paris, 1950.

9GYzNgp.png


It was extremely hard to make it to a pro level, it's not like Coppi or Anquetil were racing against a bunch of nobodies as the post suggested. One only needs to look at their hour records to realize how great they were. 45+ km with that equipment, diet and logistics, it's amazing.

That's my point: the opposition wasn't weak, but riders like Coppi, Anquetil, or Merckx were just incredibly good.
The relevant question is not so much how popular cycling was among ordinary people or how much they used bikes for their day-to-day transportation. This has nothing to do with the quality of the field in those days...

What's important is how many among the guys in the field were actually pros in those days - meaning they would live exclusively of cycling and would dedicate all of their "working hours" to cycling. I'll admit I don't have the slightest idea if that's true or not, but I would take a guess only a handful of top dogs in those days could afford to dedicate their lives to cycling and those would have huge advantage over everybody else (referred to as scrubs)..
 
Certainly The Don will always have an argument for being the greatest sports person ever......his numbers were simply so superior to anyone else, either during his era or since. Having said that, Bradman was purely a batsman, and there are two main components to cricket; he didn't bowl (so perhaps some cricketers with decent averages with bat and ball could argue that they're maybe within 25% of him in terms of statistics.

He only ever played tests in Australia and England though, strangely (never went to India or South Africa.

It's a little similar to another great Aussie, Rod Laver. He did the grand slam twice (which none of the current day 'goats' have ever done), and perhaps could have done it even more (he was banned from the tennis Tour for many years after turning professional).....could have had Bradmanesque numbers perhaps. But as with cricket, tennis wasn't very global, mostly being Australia vs. America for a while. For a while 2 (maybe even 3) of the 4 grand slams were played on grass also. These days 2 are played on hard courts, but that's a neutral surface.

Tennis has probably been effected even more by technology than cycling imo......who knows, but the touch and net attacking game of Laver may have been totally useless today, just as the heavy topspin backcourt game of Nadal may have been a joke on tour in the 60's.

I think that the greater depth in teams is what made the big difference in cycling, and forced greater specialisation. Perhaps Cancellara could have won grand tours in the 60's?

As for Pogacar, one could make a decent argument for him being the greatest cyclist ever if he keeps a similar level for at least a few more years. He'd probably need a minimum of 4 TDF's, at least 7 GT's in total, and at least 7 monuments in total (and to win at least 4 of the 5, plus a WCRR would help). That would put him way ahead of purely classics guys like Gilbert, Boonen and Cancellara, and GT guys like Contador and Froome (and he's already arguably ahead of the more versatile Nibali and Valverde).

Making a case for him will also depend on superiority against his current day rivals.......winning 7 monuments for example will seem a little less impressive if Evenepoel (or someone else) achieves the same.
Oh...I thought of an even better example of an athlete in modern times conquering an all time record, at and early age and in the face of very qualified specialists.
The One and Only:
Mikaela Shiffrin
 
I supported my claim with two arguments, you ignored one and responded to the other with "wtf".

And as you said, Bettiol didn't start in 2019. The best examples of riders only performing well in the Ronde are those who never even try Roubaix. Before 2019, would the best example of a rider who can only compete at the Ronde have been Gilbert?
Everyone has raced it, but there's a few like Nuyens and Devolder who were really bad at Roubaix.

Now to address your arguments.

1. Oude Kwaremont isn't 2/3rds flat. It has a 400m stretch of 1% and lower, and even on that stretch Pog benefits because he starts the easy section at a higher speed and accelerating onto a flatter section also goes by W/kg. And as others pointed out, this ignores about 18 other hills with the previous 5-6 hills having been raced super hard. And if you do a berg say of 1'30 at 9 W/kg between relatively even rouleurs the the guy with the 6.2 W/kg threshold is gonna recover better than the guy with the 5.5 W/kg threshold or whatever it is. If you ask me if Pogacar drops MvdP if Oude Kwaremont was just a flat cobbled section, my guess is really no.

2. Cobbled stages in the Tour simply are a lot different than Paris Roubaix. Very different preperation, more fatigue to start, and overall way less hard. Pure sprinters basically survived in the GC group that finished like 12s behind, I think these stages miss most of the endurance and attrition Roubaix is about. Also Van Aert didn't really get a chance to race Pog on that stage considering he was on baby sitting duty.

And I'm not arguing Pog can't win PR. I agree on that. But I think the assertion he's the best flat cobbles rider is an extremely strong claim based on what we've seen.
 
Everyone has raced it, but there's a few like Nuyens and Devolder who were really bad at Roubaix.

Now to address your arguments.

1. Oude Kwaremont isn't 2/3rds flat. It has a 400m stretch of 1% and lower, and even on that stretch Pog benefits because he starts the easy section at a higher speed and accelerating onto a flatter section also goes by W/kg. And as others pointed out, this ignores about 18 other hills with the previous 5-6 hills having been raced super hard. And if you do a berg say of 1'30 at 9 W/kg between relatively even rouleurs the the guy with the 6.2 W/kg threshold is gonna recover better than the guy with the 5.5 W/kg threshold or whatever it is. If you ask me if Pogacar drops MvdP if Oude Kwaremont was just a flat cobbled section, my guess is really no.

2. Cobbled stages in the Tour simply are a lot different than Paris Roubaix. Very different preperation, more fatigue to start, and overall way less hard. Pure sprinters basically survived in the GC group that finished like 12s behind, I think these stages miss most of the endurance and attrition Roubaix is about. Also Van Aert didn't really get a chance to race Pog on that stage considering he was on baby sitting duty.

And I'm not arguing Pog can't win PR. I agree on that. But I think the assertion he's the best flat cobbles rider is an extremely strong claim based on what we've seen.

A big reason for this is that dweeb, Gouvenou. He is allergic to any GC stage being a proper length stage.

In 2010, the cobbled stage was 213km, and is proved to be very decisive. Now, we have these junior length stages that just do not have enough km to really cause the separation that 2010 did.

Yes, Pescheux was a better race director than Gouvenou
 
A big reason for this is that dweeb, Gouvenou. He is allergic to any GC stage being a proper length stage.

In 2010, the cobbled stage was 213km, and is proved to be very decisive. Now, we have these junior length stages that just do not have enough km to really cause the separation that 2010 did.

Yes, Pescheux was a better race director than Gouvenou
The best grand tour route in 2022 was the Tour france.
 
Other than the MVDP hotel incident all the big guns for a course like that were there in Australia. The leaders could have gone in the move Remco went away in but held back conservatively expecting the race to come back to them and finding out it would not do so. Their fault for a tactical error.


Well MVDP and Van Aert didn't make such a tactical error at the Flanders, so it does make it more impressive that Pog still won.
 
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A big reason for this is that dweeb, Gouvenou. He is allergic to any GC stage being a proper length stage.

In 2010, the cobbled stage was 213km, and is proved to be very decisive. Now, we have these junior length stages that just do not have enough km to really cause the separation that 2010 did.

Yes, Pescheux was a better race director than Gouvenou
Correlation does not equal causation. It's not like adding 50km of flat asphalt is gonna make make riders dead tired when they're sitting in the bunch doing 150 W.

In that particular stage, a split happened because Fränk Schleck crashed out.
 
Correlation does not equal causation. It's not like adding 50km of flat asphalt is gonna make make riders dead tired when they're sitting in the bunch doing 150 W.

In that particular stage, a split happened because Fränk Schleck crashed out.

However, some of that extra hour is fighting for position, especially if there is an early pave section, as I believe there was on that stage. That adds just a touch more fatigue for the finale
 
The relevant question is not so much how popular cycling was among ordinary people or how much they used bikes for their day-to-day transportation. This has nothing to do with the quality of the field in those days...

What's important is how many among the guys in the field were actually pros in those days - meaning they would live exclusively of cycling and would dedicate all of their "working hours" to cycling. I'll admit I don't have the slightest idea if that's true or not, but I would take a guess only a handful of top dogs in those days could afford to dedicate their lives to cycling and those would have huge advantage over everybody else (referred to as scrubs)..
If you take the '50s in France as an example, there were races everywhere, all the time, a talented kid could compete weekly, locally. Every town, every village had races. The next step often consisted of turning "independant", which would allow a rider to mix it up with stars in one of the many, many criteriums. Many riders made a living racing in their region of origin. Faring well could mean a spot in a pro team.

The top dogs also participated in those criteriums: they needed to make a living too. They weren't making today's money. Look at Merckx's 525 wins: many of his wins were in criteriums/kermesses.

So yes, there were many races, many riders at or near the top level, and also many opportunities to live off the sport, even without racing all over the map.
 
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However, some of that extra hour is fighting for position, especially if there is an early pave section, as I believe there was on that stage. That adds just a touch more fatigue for the finale
Possibly. But if there's one cobbled sector then 50km nothing I don't think they do that much.

The 2010, 2014 and 2015 stages actually has considerably fewer cobbles than the 2018 and 2020 ones. Especilaly 2010 only had like 3 regular length sectors.

They really shouldn't go overboard with cobbles in the Tour cause the more you force it you're just more likely to ruin the GC battle. Most of the differences are simply because of crashes.
 
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Possibly. But if there's one cobbled sector then 50km nothing I don't think they do that much.

The 2010, 2014 and 2015 stages actually has considerably fewer cobbles than the 2018 and 2020 ones. Especilaly 2010 only had like 3 regular length sectors.

They really shouldn't go overboard with cobbles in the Tour cause the more you force it you're just more likely to ruin the GC battle. Most of the differences are simply because of crashes.
Here is the solution: 70km cobbled TT
 
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Is he going to ride all 3 ardennes classics?
How would you rate his chances at Amstel Gold an Fleche Wallone
I would rate his Flèche Wallone chances very high based on the characteristics of the route, but his performances on this event has always been a bit underwhelming. I remember in 2020 I was pretty pissed at him. It was his first event after he won the Tour and it looked like he would only win if he gets to mess up the poor Roglič’s race. :D
 
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