Tadej Pogacar and Mauro Giannetti

[Panda Claws]

Lol here comes the 30s-1m timeloss.

Wuyts immediately like "this shuts down the non-believers"

 

[saganftw]

classic evergreen, as soon as doping questions come out a guy has a down day

 

[Froome]

If pogacar has some weakness, could be the altitude.

 

[Platonic]

I'm bored by this race. I shouldn't be, I wasn't in the Induran and Armstrong era, and that was no different was it to be honest. Maybe it's that Pogacar has done a Floyd Landis too early in the race and I can't kid myself that at least everyone is cheating on a level

The whole GC scenario, and the fact that Pogacar is just going to back it off now when we all know he could win this by 25-30mins, has killed it. I feel for the portion of top riders in the race trying to do it clean(ish - who really knows).

 

[topt]

reading this I dont really know if any of you acctually remembers Landis ride, it was nothing like Pogacar did; froome in giro is the only close thing

 

[Red Rick]

Lol here comes the 30s-1m timeloss.

Wuyts immediately like "this shuts down the non-believers"

Wuyts takes the piss every single itme. His job depends on it.

 

[18-Valve. (pithy)]

Lol here comes the 30s-1m timeloss.

lol, PogChamp looked pretty fresh at the finish line for someone who got dropped by Jumbo's latest doper.

But.... with O'Connor out of the picture and Vingegaard descending like a wet towel there's room for more. Maybe some Voeckler-like antics next time around?

 

[18-Valve. (pithy)]

reading this I dont really know if any of you acctually remembers Landis ride, it was nothing like Pogacar did; froome in giro is the only close thing

Froome's "Landis" was nothing like the real thing, either, IMO.

 

[staubsauger]

Froome's "Landis" was nothing like the real thing, either, IMO.

Froome's ride wasn't even on Les Deux Alpes 1998 level honestly. Dumoulin never should have waited for Pinot & Reichenbach, then López & Carapaz work with him to secure a podium spot and Froome doesn't gain enough time to win the race.

 

[Fergoose]

I was actually refreshed by Pog saying he has no nerves and him seeking to take time whenever the opportunity presented itself rather than sandbagging. I think he was doing it against a somewhat limited field in a way that wasnt actually taking the Michael. I actually find his mysterious semi-crack but perfectly fine at the finish more suspect than him just smashing a banged up field.

 

[Nick2413]

I was actually refreshed by Pog saying he has no nerves and him seeking to take time whenever the opportunity presented itself rather than sandbagging. I think he was doing it against a somewhat limited field in a way that wasnt actually taking the Michael. I actually find his mysterious semi-crack but perfectly fine at the finish more suspect than him just smashing a banged up field.

This definitely looked like a calculated move to reduce suspicion to me. “Crack” for the last minute or two of the climb and drop back to the chasing group to make it down the mountain in the same time anyway. Did he ever even have to stop nose breathing? No jostling around on the bike, no resorting to getting out of the saddle, no near collapse like when Ala got dropped earlier, it looked like a casual Sunday ride. He doesn’t want to win this tour by more than he’s already ahead.

 

[bNator]

I was actually refreshed by Pog saying he has no nerves and him seeking to take time whenever the opportunity presented itself rather than sandbagging. I think he was doing it against a somewhat limited field in a way that wasnt actually taking the Michael. I actually find his mysterious semi-crack but perfectly fine at the finish more suspect than him just smashing a banged up field.

Yes - everything he does makes him even more suspicious than anything could have done but didn’t do

 

[Cookster15]

Nice sandbagging job today. Still finished with Carapaz who he will demolish in the TT.

 

[Ripper]

lol, PogChamp looked pretty fresh at the finish line for someone who got dropped by Jumbo's latest doper.

But.... with O'Connor out of the picture and Vingegaard descending like a wet towel there's room for more. Maybe some Voeckler-like antics next time around?

Yup, I know why commentators are trying to drum up some drama but still, this was hardly a "crack" in the armor. Pretty easy to spot someone 30 seconds when you are up by this many minutes and can descend with others who have a vested interest. LOL at the sprint for 4th ... no time bonus, so a bit of an FU to the V-man?

 

[Ripper]

Lol here comes the 30s-1m timeloss.

Wuyts immediately like "this shuts down the non-believers"

Priceless. Especially given so many predicted exactly this might happen. If the guy starts shipping major time in the coming stages then obviously he is cracking, but today did not look at all like cracking.

 

[Koronin]

I believe you're right, which is one of the bases for my train of thought. From rider testimony, we know that it was common practice for riders to do their first seasons pan y agua in the 90's - which indeed could explain why we didn't see many young riders delivering top results in that era - Ullrich of course being the odd one out.

I think some of that started changing in the '00s's. However, it was still rare to see riders that young having break out seasons. It was more like mid-20's to have their breakout seasons.

 

[solo80k]

Lol here comes the 30s-1m timeloss.

Wuyts immediately like "this shuts down the non-believers"

He was bluffing of course, smiling when following blood-bagged JV squad. I saw no signs of weakness, just let a rival have a little bit of fun.

If someone was having a small bad day - it was Carapaz. I think it was the reason why Kwiatkowski was drilling hard until last 2 kms. This is what Sky did when Froome wasn't feeling good.

 

[Fergoose]

Yes - everything he does makes him even more suspicious than anything could have done but didn’t do

Not really. I just think it is more believable to outclass a beaten up field consistently than it is to smash them one day then get gapped by a domestique on another day (but in a very controlled manner whereby you still expend the lions share of the effort out of the trio in descent even though there was zero tactical requirement to do so).

As such, today is the first day I've posted on Pog as, in isolation, nothing else he has done this TdF has struck me as absurd as I personally don't rate his rivals. Unless there is any precedent of Pog not liking the heat this just didn't pass my eye test.

 

[bNator]

Not really. I just think it is more believable to outclass a beaten up field consistently than it is to smash them one day then get gapped by a domestique on another day (but in a very controlled manner whereby you still expend the lions share of the effort out of the trio in descent even though there was zero tactical requirement to do so).

As such, today is the first day I've posted on Pog as, in isolation, nothing else he has done this TdF has struck me as absurd as I personally don't rate his rivals. Unless there is any precedent of Pog not liking the heat this just didn't pass my eye test.

I thought it was a well known fact that he’s worse in heat than he is in “normal” conditions while he excels in the rain and cold. But to prove this point, let’s take Vuelta 2019. There, he convincingly won Andorra stage and Plataforma de Gredos stage where it was cold and rainy. On the other hand, he was dropped on stage 18 where it was hot. Last years Duphine was hot and Pogacar was not very good and during the tour he was definitely better on cold/cloudy stages (peyresourde) than hot stages (de la Loze and stage 19).

Apart from that, he’s been saying for years he likes rain and cold and doesn’t like heat. But I understand his word doesn’t have a great value here...

 

[Froome]

I thought it was a well known fact that he’s worse in heat than he is in “normal” conditions while he excels in the rain and cold. But to prove this point, let’s take Vuelta 2019. There, he convincingly won Andorra stage and Plataforma de Gredos stage where it was cold and rainy. On the other hand, he was dropped on stage 18 where it was hot. Last years Duphine was hot and Pogacar was not very good and during the tour he was definitely better on cold/cloudy stages (peyresourde) than hot stages (de la Loze and stage 19).

Apart from that, he’s been saying for years he likes rain and cold and doesn’t like heat. But I understand his word doesn’t have a great value here...

I believe in that, and i don't think he is doped, because ha already showed some weaknesses. Pogacar has some weaknesses like the altitude and the heat.
And i don't think that doing 6.3 w/kg on colombiere and romme means that he is doped. He didn't do 6.7 w/kg like pantani and armstrong. He did ventoux in 49 min, not 46 like pantani.
On tignes it wasn't a great performance.
And we need to understand that is rivals are very weak.

 

[hrotha]

Not being 100% invulnerable all the time and not being as fast as Pantani at his best is a crazy low bar.

 

[Netserk]

Not being 100% invulnerable all the time and not being as fast as Pantani at his best is a crazy low bar.

But Pantani is the only doper in history?

 

[luckyboy]

If Pantani had Porte on the front riding as fast as an 80kg sprinter for 3/4 of the climb then he probably would set a time of 49 minutes too lol

Seriously the gap from the bottom to when Kwiatkowski took over went down by like 20 seconds...

 

[DoYouEvenRideBruh]

I'm gonna play the devil's advocate here: how about he just had somewhat bad legs today? A double Mont Ventoux ascent can take its toll on anyone, doping or not doping. Not every rider puffs and pulls ridicoulous pain faces when he is close to the limit, some just look fine until they crack.

His crack did look 'controlled' in a way, but considering how much of a lead he has, he didn't really have to go deep just to keep Vingegaard's wheels (we need a nickname for this guy), especially given the long descent that was just a few hundreds metres away.

It's also not particularly cunning to respond to the doping accusations by immediately sandbagging in the next hard stage. Most of the public wouldn't really pick it up and the most skeptical of his performances would also be skeptical of his newfound weakness.

 

[topt]

This definitely looked like a calculated move to reduce suspicion to me. “Crack” for the last minute or two of the climb and drop back to the chasing group to make it down the mountain in the same time anyway. Did he ever even have to stop nose breathing? No jostling around on the bike, no resorting to getting out of the saddle, no near collapse like when Ala got dropped earlier, it looked like a casual Sunday ride. He doesn’t want to win this tour by more than he’s already ahead.

everybody will see what they want to see, i saw the same Pogacar that was following Yates at UAE