TdF Team lineups

[joy118118]

HTC-Columbia:

Cavendish, Eisel, Grabsch, Hansen, Martin, Monfort, Renshaw, Rogers, Sivtsov.

Ouch, no Greipel

 

[kjetilraknerud]

Martin, Monfort, Rogers and Sivtsov is a half decent quartet for the mountains. Too bad for Rogers that the three others will be exhausted after every single bunch sprint.

 

[joy118118]

Martin, Monfort, Rogers and Sivtsov is a half decent quartet for the mountains. Too bad for Rogers that the three others will be exhausted after every single bunch sprint.

Aldag said Tony Martin would do less lead out than last year.

Our decisions were based on two goals," he added. "First, we wanted a strong team to support Mark Cavendish and winning the Green jersey. To win, we need to concentrate all points with one sprinter. As a result we have not included Andr? Greipel in the roster. Mark won six stages of the Tour de France last year and we have faith that he will be highly successful in the 2010 Tour.

"Renshaw, Eisel, Grabsch and Hansen will be the main support for the sprint stages with of course the other riders also playing a part in the lead out train as well.

"Second, we wanted to field a team who can focus on the overall. Rogers has had the best season of his career to date and is very focused on contending in the general classification. Tony Martin comes off a very successful Tour de Suisse where he held the yellow jersey for the first part of the race and won the closing time trial, making him the first person to beat Fabian Cancellara in a time trial in three years.

"They will be supported by Maxime Monfort, who showed excellent form at Tour de Suisse, Adam Hansen, who won the Ster Elektro stage race last weekend and Kanstantsin Sivtsov who is a tireless worker on both flat and mountainous terrain."

 

[Cobblestones]

Aldag said Tony Martin would do less lead out than last year.

Neither Rogers nor Martin will have a top 10 in the end. And the Manx dud will not get green. Likely he'll DNF the way he's riding.

 

[richo36]

No, I'm viewing my sports as entertainment rather than the pinnacle of objective physical capability. And I'm saying that Bruyneel's tactics make for boring racing. They're effective, but they don't exactly inspire much.

As for him being a tactical genius, I'm not sure how much of "hire lots of potential GC challengers with good time trials, then pay them enough so they're happy to slave away as domestiques, and instruct them to suck wheels and never attack so as to have four riders in the top 20 at the race's end" requires genius, but Bruyneel certainly has a gift for working out how to achieve that.

Spot on. His tactics are boring and often ruin races. Look at how boring the tour was last year was with his tactics.

 

[Boleyn]

Aldag said Tony Martin would do less lead out than last year.

Originally Posted by Rolf Aldag
Our decisions were based on two goals," he added. "First, we wanted a strong team to support Mark Cavendish and winning the Green jersey. To win, we need to concentrate all points with one sprinter. As a result we have not included Andr? Greipel in the roster. Mark won six stages of the Tour de France last year and we have faith that he will be highly successful in the 2010 Tour.

"Renshaw, Eisel, Grabsch and Hansen will be the main support for the sprint stages with of course the other riders also playing a part in the lead out train as well.

"Second, we wanted to field a team who can focus on the overall. Rogers has had the best season of his career to date and is very focused on contending in the general classification. Tony Martin comes off a very successful Tour de Suisse where he held the yellow jersey for the first part of the race and won the closing time trial, making him the first person to beat Fabian Cancellara in a time trial in three years.

"They will be supported by Maxime Monfort, who showed excellent form at Tour de Suisse, Adam Hansen, who won the Ster Elektro stage race last weekend and Kanstantsin Sivtsov who is a tireless worker on both flat and mountainous terrain."

Aldag may want to check his results: Contador won the Annecy TT (Beating FC by 3 Secs) at the Tour last year.

 

[Mellow Velo]

Spot on. His tactics are boring and often ruin races. Look at how boring the tour was last year was with his tactics.

Trouble is: other teams have seen this as a model for success, so have copied his "style".
Only he learnt his "style" from riding in the peloton when Indurain's Banesto first started rolling, en masse, on the front.
He was also partial to wheel sucking as a rider and this leopard doesn't change his spots.

A lethal combination for tedium and repetitiveness.

A lot of folks are going to be disappointed by the 2010 "spectacle", I suspect.

 

[Big GMaC]

Aldag may want to check his results: Contador won the Annecy TT (Beating FC by 3 Secs) at the Tour last year.

And Oman / Qatar he was well down

 

[RedheadDane]

Poor Lars Bak... he must have some sort of record in last-minute sorting-off from the Tour...

Still... 6 Danes (if Brian Vandborg's assumptions that he's in for Liqui is right) that's a double from last year...
And last year was more that a double from the years where it was... "there's the Dane!"

 

[Libertine Seguros]

And Oman / Qatar he was well down

And in California he was about 11th...

 

[Pharazon]

amazingly enough, 6 Brits as well.. if Sky's published list it to be believed.. Wiggins, Cummins, Thomas, Cavendish, Hunt and Wigelius, although does Wigelius still count as a brit anymore?

 

[stefrees]

amazingly enough, 6 Brits as well.. if Sky's published list it to be believed.. Wiggins, Cummins, Thomas, Cavendish, Hunt and Wigelius, although does Wigelius still count as a brit anymore?

And millar?

 

[hrotha]

Trouble is: other teams have seen this as a model for success, so have copied his "style".
Only he learnt his "style" from riding in the peloton when Indurain's Banesto first started rolling, en masse, on the front.

Banesto didn't really do that, did they? My memory may be failing me, but at least the perception around here was that Indurain's team was often not particularly strong. They had some good domestiques, like Aparicio for example, but you'd seldom see other Banesto riders when things got really serious in the final climb. The closest thing to having a Leipheimer in the team was... De las Cuevas, maybe? But again, I don't remember much of how they rode before the final selection was made and only the GC contenders were left.

 

[warmfuzzies]

No, I'm viewing my sports as entertainment rather than the pinnacle of objective physical capability. And I'm saying that Bruyneel's tactics make for boring racing. They're effective, but they don't exactly inspire much.

As for him being a tactical genius, I'm not sure how much of "hire lots of potential GC challengers with good time trials, then pay them enough so they're happy to slave away as domestiques, and instruct them to suck wheels and never attack so as to have four riders in the top 20 at the race's end" requires genius, but Bruyneel certainly has a gift for working out how to achieve that.

Perfect - who's your bet for the 10 stages of giggles, jiggles, and wiggles in that Italian women's cycling entertainment event? Wait, that should probably be moved to the "babes on bikes" thread.

Your second paragraph is also a generic complaint about Joe Torre and Phil Jackson in terms of retaining crazy talent on their teams.

 

[warmfuzzies]

Spot on. His tactics are boring and often ruin races. Look at how boring the tour was last year was with his tactics.

Individual and team race discipline is the foundation of winning races, not ruining them. Team accelerations on a mtn is a demonstrated winner for a GT. That's why JB has been DS for 9 Tour wins and at least 1 Vuelta and 1 Giro. The system has produced 2 generational champions in LA and AC, and is supported by another young talent in Taylor Phinney.

There is high risk in storming off the front without support in a GT mountain stage - you could overcook just like Andy in 2010 TdS. Better risk/reward in slowly increasing watts as your competitors succumb 1 by 1. On a bad day, this strategy gives you more physical/mental cards to play.

If you are supremely confident in your position as strongest in the peloton, storming up the mountain and dropping competitors like flies is supremely dramatic. If not, better to wage a war of attrition using all your assets, including your team.

 

[Glockers]

Banesto didn't really do that, did they? My memory may be failing me, but at least the perception around here was that Indurain's team was often not particularly strong. They had some good domestiques, like Aparicio for example, but you'd seldom see other Banesto riders when things got really serious in the final climb. The closest thing to having a Leipheimer in the team was... De las Cuevas, maybe? But again, I don't remember much of how they rode before the final selection was made and only the GC contenders were left.

Wasn't Olano his lieutenant in later tours?

 

[Grzdylu]

Olano was in Mapei (1994-1996).

Indurain has very strong domestiques: Jean-François Bernard, Pedro Delgado, Armand de las Cuevas and also Gérard Rué.

 

[tgsgirl]

Individual and team race discipline is the foundation of winning races, not ruining them. Team accelerations on a mtn is a demonstrated winner for a GT. That's why JB has been DS for 9 Tour wins and at least 1 Vuelta and 1 Giro. The system has produced 2 generational champions in LA and AC, and is supported by another young talent in Taylor Phinney.

Individual and team race discipline win (a) race (and maybe one or two more a season by accident), but they destroy entertainment and the beauty of the race.
Phinney isn't even on JB's team yet, and JB really can't take credit for Contador.

 

[auscyclefan94]

Martin, Monfort, Rogers and Sivtsov is a half decent quartet for the mountains. Too bad for Rogers that the three others will be exhausted after every single bunch sprint.

+1 - They won't be able to go full gas for the whole 3 weeks.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Individual and team race discipline is the foundation of winning races, not ruining them. Team accelerations on a mtn is a demonstrated winner for a GT. That's why JB has been DS for 9 Tour wins and at least 1 Vuelta and 1 Giro. The system has produced 2 generational champions in LA and AC, and is supported by another young talent in Taylor Phinney.

Of course JB's tactics have been very successful, and they win lots of races, but it just isn't interesting. It's like when Ferrari had the best car in F1 and Barrichello wasn't allowed to pass Schumacher, so every race they streaked away from the field and Barrichello pulled over to let Schumacher past. It wasn't entertaining.

Are Bruyneel's tactics incredibly effective? Sure. Would I rather watch almost any other team in the péloton? Definitely.

Also, a lot of (more interesting) teams would have somebody who is not in line to win the overall lose a lot of time deliberately so as to be allowed to escape (see Óscar Pereiro losing 28 minutes on one stage so as to be allowed to escape on the famous 29 minutes stage, or Cunego - before that 7th overall - coming in in the autobus on stage 13 of the Vuelta, so as to be allowed into the escape to win the following day). Bruyneel prefers to keep lots of riders up in the top 20, but you seldom see them do anything.

Why do you think more people on here like riders like Tommy Voeckler and Amets Txurruka than riders like Levi? Because we want to be entertained! Sure, Bruyneel's teams look pretty good if you just look at the classification after the race, but if you actually watch the race, they do little of any interest whatsoever.

Also, of course, the team leader is no longer the force that he was, meaning you could well be left with lots of riders up in the top 20 but nobody in the top 5, which is then a very weak set of results. If you're not going to be in the top 10, you may as well drop time and try to get into the escapes, just as Séan Kelly was moaning daily in the Vuelta about Deignan hanging on to about 15th place, because "it's irrelevant. Nobody remembers who came in positions 11 to 20".

 

[hrotha]

I can understand trying to secure a top 10 (or top 20 if I'm very generous, we're talking about a very young rider and there's perhaps a white jersey to be won) spot for someone who has never done it before in their career; it's a nice personal goal. However, I don't see what the appealing can possibly be for a guy like Leipheimer who has done it like a million times before.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Andy Schleck is still eligible for the white jersey, as is Robert Gesink. I expect at least one and probably both of these to finish ahead of Janez, who will be at best third last domestique for Lance.

 

[hrotha]

Oh, Janez isn't eligible for the white jersey anyway, I was talking in general terms.

 

[euanli]

Sky - Michael Barry, Steve Cummings, Juan Antonio Flecha, Simon Gerrans, Edvald Boasson Hagen, Thomas Löfkvist, Serge Pauwels, Geraint Thomas and Bradley Wiggins

http://www.teamsky.com/article/0,27290,17553_6226249,00.html

 

[Pharazon]

no sky lead out then...

that's probably a good thing considering who they'll be up against if Henderson was their main sprinter.. with EBH as their guy they might do better on the less normal sprints