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Team Ineos Discussion thread

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So during the Tour Ineos will have: a Tour winner (3 years ago), two Giro winners (1 and 2 years ago) and a Tour podium finisher (last edition). Huge power to control mountain stages and/or (more interestingly) collectively attack other teams/riders. And let's remember they have also another Tour/Giro winner (Bernal) as well as Yates, Martinez, Sivakov. They could theoretically assemble a squad consisted of GT contenders only, ridiculous. No wonder Chris chose a well-paid retirement job.
 
So during the Tour Ineos will have: a Tour winner (3 years ago), two Giro winners (1 and 2 years ago) and a Tour podium finisher (last edition). Huge power to control mountain stages and/or (more interestingly) collectively attack other teams/riders. And let's remember they have also another Tour/Giro winner (Bernal) as well as Yates, Martinez, Sivakov. They could theoretically assemble a squad consisted of GT contenders only, ridiculous. No wonder Chris chose a well-paid retirement job.
Despite all that, I think their best shot at beating BOTH Roglic and Podgacar is having the “2nd card” to play with Caracas, attacking from farther out and forcing the Slovenians to decide whether to follow or not. I’m not saying it will necessarily wirj
 
Despite all that, I think their best shot at beating BOTH Roglic and Podgacar is having the “2nd card” to play with Caracas, attacking from farther out and forcing the Slovenians to decide whether to follow or not. I’m not saying it will necessarily wirj

That's what I meant by "collective attack". Attack with one GC contender forcing rivals to chase tiring them out and then attack with another once the first one is caught.
Obviously another form of collective attack (2-3 strong guys cooperating to put time into rivals) is also an option. They can make Slovenians life difficult - at least Roglic has a superb team to rely on but Pogacar doesn't (but it's better than last year).
 
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Ineos squad is stacked top to bottom, but the heavy favorites ride for other teams.
Although cycling has team aspect, ultimately it is an individual sport so imho it will be very hard for them to win the tour.
Leaving basically 3 riders near the top of the classification will be extremely important and then it will take some brilliant tactic to beat the Slovenians. I think the Tour will be exciting for this very reason - Ineos will have to attack left and right, and they do have resources to destroy the peleton early in the race to give their leaders a shot at long-range attempt.
 
Ineos squad is stacked top to bottom, but the heavy favorites ride for other teams.
Although cycling has team aspect, ultimately it is an individual sport so imho it will be very hard for them to win the tour.
Leaving basically 3 riders near the top of the classification will be extremely important and then it will take some brilliant tactic to beat the Slovenians. I think the Tour will be exciting for this very reason - Ineos will have to attack left and right, and they do have resources to destroy the peleton early in the race to give their leaders a shot at long-range attempt.
A lot will probably be determined by Thomas' performance in the first ITT. Their best bet is benefitting from Roglic and Pogacar looking at each other probably, My guess is Jumbo will be slightly less strong than last year, but then UAE will probably be quite a bit better. IMO it's a problem that Carapaz is quite likely to lose in the vicinity of 3 minutes in the ITTs.
 
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A lot will probably be determined by Thomas' performance in the first ITT. Their best bet is benefitting from Roglic and Pogacar looking at each other probably, My guess is Jumbo will be slightly less strong than last year, but then UAE will probably be quite a bit better. IMO it's a problem that Carapaz is quite likely to lose in the vicinity of 3 minutes in the ITTs.

You forgot about Porte and TGH - their TT should be better and the team may sacrifice one or two of them for an attack that Pog&Rog will have to cover.
 
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Yeah, their squad is straight up ridiculous. Do we know about Adam Yates' plans btw? He is another guy who could be the leader of most teams but probably isn't even good enough to make the Ineos squad at all. I'm just glad the two top favorites are both not riding for them and are both not looking likely to join them in the near future. As long as they have to use this strength to attack and not to defend I'm somewhat fine with it.
 
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Carapaz
Thomas

Porte
Dennis
Hart

Kwiatkowski
Van Baarle

I think all of the above are sure of their spot and for the last spot it is between:

Amador
Rowe

It is basically choosing between Carapaz and Thomas ' favourite teammate.
I guess it will depend on their tactics. If they want to control the race in most places but mountains you take Rowe. If you want a more attacking team and put riders in breakaways, then you have to go with Amador.

I would not understand if Ineos wanted to control the race. They don't have to do that anymore. That right goes to other 2 teams, not Ineos. The tactics needs to change from previous editions. They don't have the hot favorite anymore. They have a bunch of good riders, but not the main favorite.
 
I guess it will depend on their tactics. If they want to control the race in most places but mountains you take Rowe. If you want a more attacking team and put riders in breakaways, then you have to go with Amador.

I would not understand if Ineos wanted to control the race. They don't have to do that anymore. That right goes to other 2 teams, not Ineos. The tactics needs to change from previous editions. They don't have the hot favorite anymore. They have a bunch of good riders, but not the main favorite.

There are a lot of days where there could be crosswinds, Rowe makes more sense.
 
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I think what truly separates Ineos from the other teams right now is that they have so many strong riders that they can send a fully stacked team to all GTs and most other important races, while other teams have to make a choice. Jumbo-Visma, UAE and perhaps other teams like Bahrain (with the likes of Landa, Caruso, Mohoric, Bilbao, Teuns, Tratnik...) can also be up there in terms of strength, but only if they concentrate their whole firepower on one objective.
 
That's what I meant by "collective attack". Attack with one GC contender forcing rivals to chase tiring them out and then attack with another once the first one is caught.
Obviously another form of collective attack (2-3 strong guys cooperating to put time into rivals) is also an option. They can make Slovenians life difficult - at least Roglic has a superb team to rely on but Pogacar doesn't (but it's better than last year).
Sorry, didn’t mean to contradict you—was just emphasizing, as you did, that Ineos has several potent tools to use even if their riders are not the outright favorites.
 
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Castroviejo seems to be game for the tour, at least according to his post-Giro interviews. He was huge in the Giro and is a pretty good descender, which comes in handy at times, but probably not worth taking given that he must be fatigued and that the other candidates are also absolute engines. It also seemed that Brailsford kinda kept the door open for Bernal to be on the team, which would be a huge mistake IMHO. Bernal himself seems to be more focused on the Vuelta.

Anyway, one point where Ineos has changed is in the globalization of the team. I'm betting this Giro team, with an Italian DS, four Italian riders, four spanish-speaking riders (two of which speak fluent Italian), spoke pretty much no English amongst themselves. Maybe the first time for an Ineos team. That being said, there are potentially a lot of English speakers on the Tour team. Probably somewhat intentional.
 
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