Teams & Riders Tadej Pogačar discussion thread

[YavorD]

what a disgrace of a team uae is, christen is already out (remember he crashed in tirreno, and already before that he did too many race days). I said it 2 weeks ago that this team was gonna be a failure and you will see it for yourself in a few hours. All of this because they do not plan the season to support pogacar in this race, letting all these riders doing useless races in january/february. Same thing applies to wellens/narvaez/christen/mcnulty (crash in PN) and even del toro will not be at his best (too many races, already ill in tirreno)

Yes, because people like Narvaez, Del Toro, Wellens etc will sign for UAE if you tell them "you only do the races Pogacar does, so you can support them".
Crashes happen in cycling. Sometimes Pogacar benefits from them (2021, 2024), sometimes he doesn't.
Nothing wrong with giving the other riders some races to ride for themselves.

 

[yaf2]

what a disgrace of a team uae is, christen is already out (remember he crashed in tirreno, and already before that he did too many race days). I said it 2 weeks ago that this team was gonna be a failure and you will see it for yourself in a few hours. All of this because they do not plan the season to support pogacar in this race, letting all these riders doing useless races in january/february. Same thing applies to wellens/narvaez/christen/mcnulty (crash in PN) and even del toro will not be at his best (too many races, already ill in tirreno and he said he had a fever this week)

He was never gonna be in position for cipressa anyway. I said the team is destined to fail when the team roster came out. I know matxin is the one who makes the schedule of each rider but imo pog should be strong in having a say in the schedules

 

[rafa92]

Yes, because people like Narvaez, Del Toro, Wellens etc will sign for UAE if you tell them "you only do the races Pogacar does, so you can support them".
Crashes happen in cycling. Sometimes Pogacar benefits from them (2021, 2024), sometimes he doesn't.
Nothing wrong with giving the other riders some races to ride for themselves.

there are priorities, these riders can do what they want in the rest of the season, you are asking them to sacrifice useless races in january/february, pogacar is trying to make history and this is the only race of the year in which he absolutely needs a superteam. Pogacar has given so much more to the team compared to what he's getting

 

[rafa92]

He was never gonna be in position for cipressa anyway. I said the team is destined to fail when the team roster came out. I know matxin is the one who makes the schedule of each rider but imo pog should be strong in having a say in the schedules

I agree with you, pogacar should pretend to decide the team for msr already in december and they should plan the riders' first part of the season based on that. He has given so much to this team

 

[YavorD]

there are priorities, these riders can do what they want in the rest of the season, you are asking them to sacrifice useless races in january/february, pogacar is trying to make history and this is the only race of the year in which he absolutely needs a superteam. Pogacar has given so much more to the team compared to what he's getting

Yes.
And when they crash before the Tour, you'll complain again. So according to you they can only do something for themselves in August.
It doesn't work this way.

 

[rafa92]

Yes.
And when they crash before the Tour, you'll complain again. So according to you they can only do something for themselves in August.
It doesn't work this way.

the tour is different for 2 reasons: first you don't need a perfect team, pogacar can compete for the win even if 2/3 important riders are out. Second, the race is in july so you can't plan so far ahead, I agree with you, you can't ask these riders to race few days until july. Here we are talking about march, historically the cycling season had just started, now they have added some useless races before, but if you really care about making history it's a no brainer you should sacrifice these races. By sacrificing I mean simply sending other riders instead of those who are important for MSR. By the way, with this strategy you would increase the chances for these riders to race when the actual cycling season starts (with strade bianche) instead of loosing the entire classics season

 

[YavorD]

the tour is different for 2 reasons: first you don't need a perfect team, pogacar can compete for the win even if 2/3 important riders are out. Second, the race is in july so you can't plan so far ahead, I agree with you, you can't ask these riders to race few days until july. Here we are talking about march, historically the cycling season had just started, now they have added some useless races before, but if you really care about making history it's a no brainer you should sacrifice these races

Again, you can't tell Tim Wellens and Jhonatan Narvaez "sorry guys, you're not doing Down Under and Onloop because we want to put you in a bubble so you don't crash*.
They simply won't sign for you.

Every team suffers from crashes. It happens, part of the sport.

 

[yaf2]

Idt the team should hold its riders back from competing in earlier races just because there is a monument in march, but there is a common sense here that based on data from this year only, christin has crashed 3 times already & they put him in a hectic monument hoping a miracle will happen of him entering cipressa in the top 50 positions. We could see it coming & they never did? It was a matter of time that Jan christin would be irrelevant in today’s race. On the other hand the team has cosnefory & venmarke who are proven classics riders & they didn’t bring at least one of them. Look at ineos,lidle,visma,alpecin… they brought all of their best classics riders for this race. It’s unbelievable

 

[rafa92]

Again, you can't tell Tim Wellens and Jhonatan Narvaez "sorry guys, you're not doing Down Under and Onloop because we want to put you in a bubble so you don't crash*.
They simply won't sign for you.

Every team suffers from crashes. It happens, part of the sport.

yes you can, do you really think narvaez would prefer riding down under (which he has already won) or increase his chances to race without pogacar in Gand, E3, Amstel. Same thing for wellens. We are talking about priorities, making history vs the absolute nothing. You are not asking these riders to sacrifice nothing, just shift their focus to races that start later, their total race days would not change. There are so many great races they can do after msr, all the classics, basque, catalunya (thinking about mcnulty)..

 

[rafa92]

Idt the team should hold its riders back from competing in earlier races just because there is a monument in march, but there is a common sense here that based on data from this year only, christin has crashed 3 times already & they put him in a hectic monument hoping a miracle will happen of him entering cipressa in the top 50 positions. We could see it coming & they never did? It was a matter of time that Jan christin would be irrelevant in today’s race. On the other hand the team has cosnefory & venmarke who are proven classics riders & they didn’t bring at least one of them. Look at ineos,lidle,visma,alpecin… they brought all of their best classics riders for this race. It’s unbelievable

"Idt the team should hold its riders back from competing in earlier races just because there is a monument in march" then they deserve to loose msr every single year, that's very simple. Btw you are not asking anyone to hold back, just to shift their focus, if they race less in january/february they have a bigger chance to race more when the big races start in march, in the end they can do the same race days, just in different parts of the season and in much nicer races. It's called planning, not holding back.
"On the other hand the team has cosnefory & venmarke who are proven classics riders & they didn’t bring at least one of them". I agree with you, that's simply a mistake, these 2 should have been here

 

[YavorD]

yes you can, do you really think narvaez would prefer riding down under (which he has already won) or increases his chances to race without pogacar Gand, E3, Amstel. Same thing for wellens. We are talking about priorities, making history vs the absolute nothing

Yes. I think its important for Narvzez to ride Down Under . It's a WT stage race and he has nationals only a couple of weeks later.
I also think that for Wellens the opening weekend IS rather important.
If you want to have star riders in support, you have to make sacrifices.

 

[yaf2]

"Idt the team should hold its riders back from competing in earlier races just because there is a monument in march" then they deserve to loose msr every single year, that's very simple. Btw you are not asking anyone to hold back, just to shift their focus, if they race less in january/february they have a bigger chance to race more when the big races start in march, in the end they can do the same race days, just in different parts of the season.
"On the other hand the team has cosnefory & venmarke who are proven classics riders & they didn’t bring at least one of them". I agree with you, that's simply a mistake, these 2 should have been here

Team uae is obsessed with having the most wins every year so i wouldn’t blame them if they’re a small race merchants but they should do much better in their team selections. Even with wellens & narvaez out they have enough firepower in their arsenal but they never used them

 

[rafa92]

Yes. I think its important for Narvzez to ride Down Under . It's a WT stage race and he has nationals only a couple of weeks later.
I also think that for Welles the opening weekend IS rather important.
If you want to have star riders in support, you have to make sacrifices.

"Yes. I think its important for Narvzez to ride Down Under", I did not ask you if that's important for him, but if he would prefer having a chance in Gand, E3, Amstel or Basque country. Those are all much bigger races where pogacar is not present and narvaez could try to get big results. His race days would remain the same, simply in different parts of the season. You are asking a rider to do a different plan, not to sacrifice anything!! It's a very simple concept, it's called planning

 

[rafa92]

Team uae is obsessed with having the most wins every year so i wouldn’t blame them if they’re a small race merchants

That's the real problem

Even with wellens & narvaez out they have enough firepower in their arsenal but they never used them

I'm not sure they still have enough firepower but yes they could still do a better job with the selection you're right

 

[yaco]

there are priorities, these riders can do what they want in the rest of the season, you are asking them to sacrifice useless races in january/february, pogacar is trying to make history and this is the only race of the year in which he absolutely needs a superteam. Pogacar has given so much more to the team compared to what he's getting

Most of the injured were riding in WT races. Do you expect the team to skip WT races and be fined. You are out of touch with reality.