Congratulations Pogačar, fantastic cycling season opening. Can't wait for Paris–Nice, Tour before the Tour.
The Cycling News forum is looking to add some volunteer moderators with Red Rick's recent retirement. If you're interested in helping keep our discussions on track, send a direct message to
In the meanwhile, please use the Report option if you see a post that doesn't fit within the forum rules.
Thanks!
Most of the stages with where boni's matter the most are before where Ineos likely takes yellow anyway. Sure Jumbo might try to do the same, but if they bet on Roglic they might as well go for the punchy stages too.
You are completely correct that, like in this case, one can not help it when another is simply too dense to understand the premise. On this we can agree. Unfortunately, in this case, i have some bad news for you...
We were discussing Pogacar's kick or punch to win sprints on MTF, not unlike how Valverde or Purito used to do it. In many cases sprint away far enough to take not only the win, a few seconds on rivals in the same group, but also take boni seconds. Everybody who has been following cycling for longer than a week, indeed knows, that in order to take boni seconds, you need to finish (among the) first in that stage. That if a break goes to the finish, that there are no longer boni seconds to receive by the group of favorites. I know, we all know, my 7 year old knows. Thank you for pointing out the obvious. The fact that Ineos doesn't ride when there is a break that is no threat, is completely besides the point and irrelevant. They can all take a piss break of 10 minutes or start playing cards on the side of the road. Like Bonimenier already pointed out 2 days ago and half a page up, Ineos isn't the only team in the peloton, other teams (like UAE) can ride and control the race.
As such, when UAE knows the finish is perfect for Pogacar, and he can take 10 to 20 seconds (time dif + boni) on such a finish on a rider who is either breathing down his neck, or who is within spitting distance in GC, why wouldn't his team control the race and make sure he gets those boni seconds? If there are 2 or 3 such finishes, he could possibly win 30 seconds MORE thanks to bonis.
A GC rider doesn't need boni seconds to make a difference, you say. In theory this is correct. Assuming you are the better climber or ITT'er. But if you are only equal or slightly worse, those boni seconds could very well be the only weapon you have.
Hoping you now understand the premise,
sincerly
It comes down to fitness. The team can ride hard all day and have Froome (now Bernal) beat their leader on the final climb— was that worth it?Let's put this theory into practice, because it's rarely happened in the Ineos period of domination at the TDF - I have been calling on teams for two or three years to back in their GC leaders by riding select stages hard to win stages and bonuses - I will add to achieve this, you need to select balanced teams which means not having too many climber support riders - Have strong rouleurs along with two top notch climbing domestiques is what you need.
That may be so, but that wasn't the point, and neither is it impossible. There can be a number of reasons why teams of GC riders might not have taken control of the race. Maybe their guy didn't benefit from the stage finish. Maybe he was too far ahead/behind the guy in front or behind him that the 10s didn't make any real difference. Maybe their guy wasn't feeling well and would suffer from the high tempo leading up to the MTF. Maybe their team was indeed too weak and they wouldn't risk burning their matches to win 15 seconds when they might end up losing minutes later on because of it. But again, it doesn't change the fact that they can, it they want and are able to.Let's put this theory into practice, because it's rarely happened in the Ineos period of domination at the TDF - I have been calling on teams for two or three years to back in their GC leaders by riding select stages hard to win stages and bonuses - I will add to achieve this, you need to select balanced teams which means not having too many climber support riders - Have strong rouleurs along with two top notch climbing domestiques is what you need.
Hammer down on first mountain stage is only when they know they're in great form and the stage suits their leaders. Bernal who normally is their best bet isn't all that suited to those punchy finishes. Thomas could be good there, Froome is an unkown to anyone, but Ineos doesn't have the rofldominance anymore to decide a Tour on the first mountain stage.Traditionally Ineos target the first mountain stage to put the hammer down to make time and possibly grab the yellow jersey - And if there is an early ITT this even strengthens their position - It's a simple equation - You are a team that wants bonus seconds, then you ride hard to ensure the breakaway doesn't take the bonus seconds, and that means you don't allow Ineos ' To Play the Piano' for most of the stage before you get to the final.
It comes down to fitness. The team can ride hard all day and have Froome (now Bernal) beat their leader on the final climb— was that worth it?
Hammer down on first mountain stage is only when they know they're in great form and the stage suits their leaders. Bernal who normally is their best bet isn't all that suited to those punchy finishes. Thomas could be good there, Froome is an unkown to anyone, but Ineos doesn't have the rofldominance anymore to decide a Tour on the first mountain stage.
They could well have the strongest team and rider, but it shouldn't be by such a crazy margin anymore. They can't really expect to win minutes in the ITTs and are even a slight underdog in them vs Roglic and Dumoulin.
I do think they're likely to have the best climber between the 2 teams, and I think Ineos should basically be able to mostly ignore any shenanigans Kruijswijk pulls cause he's never winning while Jumbo would be pretty dumb to let Froome go anywhere. Jumbo could have the problem that Roglic could easily be the best rider in the race in the first 2 weeks before fading in the 3rd, in which case he could be *** in the ITT as well and Dumoulin could easily be 2/3 minutes better than Roglic in the Alps + ITT alone.
According to GCN (sourcing a tweet from Dig Deep Coaching), he rode 422 watts during the 18 & half minute final climb of stage 4 in Valencia resulting in 6.45w/kg.
You can check for yourself on his Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/3083051458/overview, power measured with a Stages device (note for his earlier stage 2 victory it was off for some reason). 423 W for the final climb, which is indeed about 6.45 W/kg for 65.5kg. Not bad, but it is only for a 20ish minute effort after what I assume was a relatively easy, sheltered ride before. And for comparison, both Jack Haig and Moscon were at 6.3 W/kg on that climb (assuming their Wikipedia weights and power meters are correct)...According to GCN (sourcing a tweet from Dig Deep Coaching), he rode 422 watts during the 18 & half minute final climb of stage 4 in Valencia resulting in 6.45w/kg.
It wasn’t easy beforehand. Check the full stage analysis.You can check for yourself on his Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/3083051458/overview, power measured with a Stages device (note for his earlier stage 2 victory it was off for some reason). 423 W for the final climb, which is indeed about 6.45 W/kg for 65.5kg. Not bad, but it is only for a 20ish minute effort after what I assume was a relatively easy, sheltered ride before. And for comparison, both Jack Haig and Moscon were at 6.3 W/kg on that climb (assuming their Wikipedia weights and power meters are correct)...
From what I could gather (cyclingnews stage summary), it looked pretty standard stuff though - break (with GVA etc) up on the road, a few small and medium size climbs, pace picking up leading into the final climb. His average power on the stage minus the final climb was 264W (normalized power would be better to look at but hard to get from Strava for a partial track), so that all sounds pretty 'easy'.It wasn’t easy beforehand. Check the full stage analysis.
I'm not really into these things, but in the Evenepoel topic some people were asking for references. So i looked some stuff up and 430 is about what Froome did as AnT in a testlab. That's (as you probably know) over 20 minutes. Froome pushed 6.4w/kg in the 2015 TDF.Point is that for an in-form GT podium finisher, 6.5 W/kg isn't all that exceptional or 'incredible' (as per GCN) on a shortish, steep climb. Heck, even Phil Gaimon in retirement does about 7 W/kg for 10-15 minute efforts when fresh... I guess the surprising thing here may be that he is in such good form so early in the season, but the upcoming UAE tour may be the culprit for that...
264 in very uneven doses (normalized well over 300) for four hours isn't easy for a 65kg climber. Sure the big rouleurs would laugh at it, but this is nearly 5w/kg for Pogacar.
The point about Gaimon is true, though the numbers are a bit exaggerated. He would come pretty close to the top GC riders in a one-off MTT. What separates GT contenders from Gaimon is their endurance and ability to repeat 10-30 minute efforts, as is necessary on a 200k mountain stage in a Grand Tour.
6.5 for 20 isn't crazy, but the point is he wasn't fresh, and it's February. If he and his coaches are getting it right, that number should be 6.7 or 6.8 in July.
I'm not really into these things, but in the Evenepoel topic some people were asking for references. So i looked some stuff up and 430 is about what Froome did as AeT in a testlab. That's (as you probably know) over 20 minutes. Froome pushed 6.4w/kg in the 2015 TDF.
Dumoulin pushed 420 watts over 25 minutes in the Vuelta on Ermita de Alba, but he weighed 70kg.
Assuming not every GT contender pushes the same numbers as Froome (or else he wouldn't have won so easily many times), i would say that those numbers are quite extraordinary. It would seem that both Pogacar and Evenepoel are pushing comparable numbers at a young ages as the big GT guys, but both weigh considerably less (Evenepoel even 5kgs less than Pogacar) and not even in peak form.
Froome climbed the Madone at 459 watts in 2013. That’s about 6.8, for 30 minutes. No one else in the world could’ve done that then. We will see Pogacar’s data this July. I expect the numbers will be very impressive considering the firepower Jumbo and INEOS are bringing.
Froome climbed the Madone at 459 watts in 2013. That’s about 6.8, for 30 minutes. No one else in the world could’ve done that then. We will see Pogacar’s data this July. I expect the numbers will be very impressive considering the firepower Jumbo and INEOS are bringing.