TdF '17 - stage 5: Vittel>La Planche des Belles Filles 160km

[Zinoviev Letter]

Re:

A bit further down, surprisingly strong rides by Nicolas Roche and Jens Keukeleire.

Yes, Roche in particular is a good sign for Porte on a day that otherwise isn't particularly encouraging.

 

[perico]

Re: TdF '17 - stage 5: Vittel>La Planche des Belles Filles 1

General classification:
1 Christopher Froome (GBr) Team Sky 18:38:59
2 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Team Sky 00:00:12
3 Fabio Aru (Ita) Astana Pro Team 00:00:14
4 Daniel Martin (Irl) Quick-Step Floors 00:00:25
5 Richie Porte (Aus) BMC Racing 00:00:39
6 Simon Yates (GBr) Orica-Scott 00:00:43
7 Romain Bardet (Fra) Ag2r La Mondiale 00:00:47
8 Alberto Contador (Spa) Trek-Segafredo 00:00:52
9 Nairo Quintana (Col) Movistar Team 00:00:54
10 Rafal Majka (Pol) Bora-Hansgrohe 00:01:01

 

[DFA123]

Re:

Next time they won't let Aru go so let us be more realistic. Nevertheless very good performance by Fabio and the podium looks doable. Quintana can go home, Contador will battle for the last available podium spot with Richie. Froome remains the main favorite.

Not sure SKy could have done anything about Aru today; he was easily the strongest climber. He basically destroyed the Sky train and forced Froome to act earlier than he would have liked. It wasn't like Sky 'let him go', they were basically on their limit when he attacked and could do nothing to reel him in. Unfortunately, there are not many climbs left with these kind of gradients.

 

[meat puppet]

At least Froome did not obliterate everyone at will. Aru is clearly in stellar form.

Hope Astana wont play it safe but go all in and create chaos stage after stage. That is the only way to win, unless aru is a level above, which I dont think.

In reality Froome hits form soon and that's that.

 

[hfer07]

Sky and Froome were very weak by their own standards - No hard pacing by them throughout the entire climb length, and a shallow attack by the Alien was not enough today.......... Perhaps the freshness of Aru, a good day from Porte, a surprise attack by Bardet & perhaps an epic assault by Contador can break the Sky train apart.

 

[masking_agent]

Re: Re:

Next time they won't let Aru go so let us be more realistic. Nevertheless very good performance by Fabio and the podium looks doable. Quintana can go home, Contador will battle for the last available podium spot with Richie. Froome remains the main favorite.

Not sure SKy could have done anything about Aru today; he was easily the strongest climber. He basically destroyed the Sky train and forced Froome to act earlier than he would have liked. It wasn't like Sky 'let him go', they were basically on their limit when he attacked and could do nothing to reel him in. Unfortunately, there are not many climbs left with these kind of gradients.

I guess we can assume this stage makes Aru the team leader now and not Fuglsang

 

[Arredondo]

Re: Re:

Next time they won't let Aru go so let us be more realistic. Nevertheless very good performance by Fabio and the podium looks doable. Quintana can go home, Contador will battle for the last available podium spot with Richie. Froome remains the main favorite.

Not sure SKy could have done anything about Aru today; he was easily the strongest climber. He basically destroyed the Sky train and forced Froome to act earlier than he would have liked. It wasn't like Sky 'let him go', they were basically on their limit when he attacked and could do nothing to reel him in. Unfortunately, there are not many climbs left with these kind of gradients.

Aru and Astana should make war in the Chambery stage then.

 

[Ruby United]

Flecha: A brilliant cyclist, a horrible analyst

 

[movingtarget]

Re:

Porte did not impress me at all.

Pinot was impressive.

 

[Alexandre B.]

El Diablo Aru will look good on sunday.

 

[bob.a.feet]

Uran snuck his way in to the top 10, while Chaves lost 2 minutes.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Re: Re:

Next time they won't let Aru go so let us be more realistic. Nevertheless very good performance by Fabio and the podium looks doable. Quintana can go home, Contador will battle for the last available podium spot with Richie. Froome remains the main favorite.

Not sure SKy could have done anything about Aru today; he was easily the strongest climber. He basically destroyed the Sky train and forced Froome to act earlier than he would have liked. It wasn't like Sky 'let him go', they were basically on their limit when he attacked and could do nothing to reel him in.

He was easily stronger than Thomas, Landa, Henao and also some of the presumed contenders like Quintana and Contador. We don't really know if he was stronger than the four who followed the Sky doms, then chased and then stopped and looked at each other and finally raced each other. He put in a continuous max effort, they didn't. Apples, oranges.

 

[Alexandre B.]

Re: Re:

Porte did not impress me at all.

Pinot was impressive.

I'm not Tonton, there's no way you'll trigger any form of discontent coming from my part

 

[Moose McKnuckles]

Re:

Porte did not impress me at all.

I expect Porte will finish the TdF toward the end of the Top 10 in GC, if not just outside of it.

 

[yaco]

Re:

why is BMC even riding? They should leave it to sky, ok Porte wants to win the stage but surely GC is more important

Its all about the long game and tiring out the Sky Train. I would argue it worked today. The Sky train was not as dominant allowing Aru to successfully attack the Sky train. Ideally BMC wanted to win the stage but it sets a template.

 

[Põhja Konn]

Interesting that Froome was unable to keep his first attack going and let Contador group to temporarily come back before dropping them again on that 20% section just before the finish. Unless he improves significantly, there's a chance he might not win it, although obviously he is still the big favourite.

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Next time they won't let Aru go so let us be more realistic. Nevertheless very good performance by Fabio and the podium looks doable. Quintana can go home, Contador will battle for the last available podium spot with Richie. Froome remains the main favorite.

Not sure SKy could have done anything about Aru today; he was easily the strongest climber. He basically destroyed the Sky train and forced Froome to act earlier than he would have liked. It wasn't like Sky 'let him go', they were basically on their limit when he attacked and could do nothing to reel him in.

He was easily stronger than Thomas, Landa, Henao and also some of the presumed contenders like Quintana and Contador. We don't really know if he was stronger than the four who followed the Sky doms, then chased and then stopped and looked at each other and finally raced each other. He put in a continuous max effort, they didn't. Apples, oranges.

Because they didn't have confidence in their abilities. If Froome or Porte weren't on or close the limit, then they wouldn't have stopped to play games. We've seen enough of them in the past to know that's not that when they're feeling good they put the power down and don't look back in that kind of situation.

 

[HelloDolly]

What was very heartening was neither Froome or team sky were s dominant as we have seen them in the Tour before ...In other years Froome would have blitzed everyone else ...not today ....that gives the other confidence

It means the race is not by any means sown up....

Arun Martin, Porte , Quintana & Contdor can make a difference still
Thought cannot see Contador or Quintana wining

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

As I watched it looked bad for Contador, but in theory if you told me he'd lose 10 seconds to a peak form Martin and 6 seconds to a peak form Porte in a 2 km steep uphill charge, I would think he was doing pretty well.

 

[Arredondo]

Re: Re:

Next time they won't let Aru go so let us be more realistic. Nevertheless very good performance by Fabio and the podium looks doable. Quintana can go home, Contador will battle for the last available podium spot with Richie. Froome remains the main favorite.

Not sure SKy could have done anything about Aru today; he was easily the strongest climber. He basically destroyed the Sky train and forced Froome to act earlier than he would have liked. It wasn't like Sky 'let him go', they were basically on their limit when he attacked and could do nothing to reel him in.

He was easily stronger than Thomas, Landa, Henao and also some of the presumed contenders like Quintana and Contador. We don't really know if he was stronger than the four who followed the Sky doms, then chased and then stopped and looked at each other and finally raced each other. He put in a continuous max effort, they didn't. Apples, oranges.

Because they didn't have confidence in their abilities. If Froome or Porte weren't on or close the limit, then they wouldn't have stopped to play games. We've seen enough of them in the past to know that's not that when they're feeling good they put the power down and don't look back in that kind of situation.

Do you think Quintana will improve?

 

[loge1884]

Froome seems to ok, but not stellar (yet?), his team a tick less strong than previous years ...
Porte seems to be overhyped ... I can see him on the podium, but hard to imagine him winning
Aru is surprisingly strong, but can he hold that form for 3 weeks?
Contador & Quintana will be in Top5 (provided no crashes), but don't seem to be winning material at the moment
Bardet, Yates, Martin are not GT-winning material and should rather go for stage wins
Meintjes and Majka could make Top10, not sure if Majka wouldn't rather win the polka-dot jersey again ...

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Re: Re:

Next time they won't let Aru go so let us be more realistic. Nevertheless very good performance by Fabio and the podium looks doable. Quintana can go home, Contador will battle for the last available podium spot with Richie. Froome remains the main favorite.

Not sure SKy could have done anything about Aru today; he was easily the strongest climber. He basically destroyed the Sky train and forced Froome to act earlier than he would have liked. It wasn't like Sky 'let him go', they were basically on their limit when he attacked and could do nothing to reel him in.

He was easily stronger than Thomas, Landa, Henao and also some of the presumed contenders like Quintana and Contador. We don't really know if he was stronger than the four who followed the Sky doms, then chased and then stopped and looked at each other and finally raced each other. He put in a continuous max effort, they didn't. Apples, oranges.

Because they didn't have confidence in their abilities. If Froome or Porte weren't on or close the limit, then they wouldn't have stopped to play games. We've seen enough of them in the past to know that's not that when they're feeling good they put the power down and don't look back in that kind of situation.

They didn't have confidence in their ability to lead EACH OTHER and not get jumped. You are reading your view that Aru has been the strongest for weeks onto today's stage, not assessing just the evidence of today. Aru put in a continuous maximum effort. The chasing four did not. They sat behind the Sky doms when he built his gap, they chased, then stopped, then raced again. Therefore we don't have an objective way to measure who was strongest in a lab sense. Racing, thankfully doesn't measure who was strongest in a lab sense because it would be a very boring sport if it did.

 

[DenisMenchov]

Impressive ride by Aru! I'm really glad that he won

 

[Põhja Konn]

Re: Re:

Next time they won't let Aru go so let us be more realistic. Nevertheless very good performance by Fabio and the podium looks doable. Quintana can go home, Contador will battle for the last available podium spot with Richie. Froome remains the main favorite.

Not sure SKy could have done anything about Aru today; he was easily the strongest climber. He basically destroyed the Sky train and forced Froome to act earlier than he would have liked. It wasn't like Sky 'let him go', they were basically on their limit when he attacked and could do nothing to reel him in.

He was easily stronger than Thomas, Landa, Henao and also some of the presumed contenders like Quintana and Contador. We don't really know if he was stronger than the four who followed the Sky doms, then chased and then stopped and looked at each other and finally raced each other. He put in a continuous max effort, they didn't. Apples, oranges.

They started looking around, because Froome was unable to keep his attack going. He has the mentality of a predator, specially in the Tour, and wouldn't have stopped and started looking around if he had the legs to continue his attack. That also none of the others countered him, suggests they were all on the limit. All that strongly indicates that they were all weaker than Aru, who started attacking much earlier and kept it going to the line.

 

[loge1884]

Re: Re:

Porte did not impress me at all.

Pinot was impressive.

I'm not Tonton, there's no way you'll trigger any form of discontent coming from my part

Pinot needs to loose time in order to be free to attack in week 2 or 3 .... he's not a potential GT-winner at present, wether he'll ever be, shall be seen (I must acknowledge he did improve a lot this year)