Team Ineos (Formerly the Sky thread)

[The Hitch]

Wiggins ITT wins per year:

2013: 2
2012: 7
2011: 1
2010: 2
2009: 3
2008: 0
2007: 3

If we place that as a % of tts he took part in 2012 will be about 70%? and every other year under 20 if not under 10

 

[pmcg76]

Wiggins best performance in a Tour TT pre 2009 was 5th in the Albi TT in 2007, in front of him that day were Vino(thrown out of the Tour a few days later for doping) Kash(whatever happened him) Kloeden(Mr.Teflon himself) and Evans.

This was the same Tour that Cofidis were thrown off and Wiggins had his anti-doping rants. I think it's around that time when Kimmage had a lot of time for Wiggins.

As other's have pointed out, it's not that he has improved in the TT but the fact that he has lost weight, improved dramatically in the mountains all whilst remaining a top TT rider, that is what raises the questions.

 

[the sceptic]

What if you're a clean athlete with a history of coming fifteenth, in a peloton with an endemic doping problem, and then the regulatory environment changes (let's say, for example, some kind of peloton wide longitudinal blood monitoring programme is introduced). Let's assume you then start placing top 3 regularly, and one year (when the two dominant athletes in the discipline happen to suffer all year with injury) you are top dog.

Did you get faster in absolute terms, or did your results improve because others got slower?

sounds like you really want it to be one way. but it is the other.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

sounds like you really want it to be one way. but it is the other.

It is?
Because RownhamHills point was pretty good, but it was a question.
What makes your answer interesting is that it is a certainty - I like that, we don't need theories anymore.

So, you can back this up, with facts figures etc

 

[RownhamHill]

sounds like you really want it to be one way. but it is the other.

Just asking questions that I don't know the answer to.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

If we place that as a % of tts he took part in 2012 will be about 70%? and every other year under 20 if not under 10

Also it's worth questioning the lengths of those TTs. He was a prologue specialist who only won occasional prologues for years, before unlocking the secret of holding that power down for 45-50k. In 2012 he won every long TT he entered, and was 2nd in every prologue but 1.

 

[kingjr]

sounds like you really want it to be one way. but it is the other.

 

[the sceptic]

It is?
Because RownhamHills point was pretty good, but it was a question.
What makes your answer interesting is that it is a certainty - I like that, we don't need theories anymore.

So, you can back this up, with facts figures etc

Maybe you should read the thread? I posted before about how Wiggins improved relative to the competition from the copenhagen ITT to the olympics.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

Maybe you should read the thread? I posted before about how Wiggins improved relative to the competition from the copenhagen ITT to the olympics.

I did, thanks.
The Worlds TT at the end of the season and the Olympics TT a week after the Tour.
What has that to do with anything - and it still does not address RownhamHils point, nor your certainty.

 

[the sceptic]

I did, thanks.
The Worlds TT at the end of the season and the Olympics TT a week after the Tour.
What has that to do with anything - and it still does not address RownhamHils point, nor your certainty.

What do you think the reason is for Wiggins beating the same people with so much more in the olympics then?

according to cyclingpowerlab he did 447 watts in Copenhagen and 478 watts in London. (I can provide links if you insist)

 

[Dr. Maserati]

What do you think the reason is for Wiggins beating the same people with so much more in the olympics then?

according to cyclingpowerlab he did 447 watts in Copenhagen and 478 watts in London. (I can provide links if you insist)

Watts are better than what he did relative to the opposition.

But - was Wiggins in the best form he has ever had in July 2012? I think so.
Was Martin? I would doubt it. (You are free to disagree)
The Olympics was more a slog between the guys who had just done the Tour.

 

[Dear Wiggo]

What do you think the reason is for Wiggins beating the same people with so much more in the olympics then?

Lowering his cadence to match Tony Martin, and low gear FTP efforts (on a road bike) in the mountains after his normal climbing training.

Apparently.

Personally, I think it was a good "program".

 

[Dr. Maserati]

Lowering his cadence to match Tony Martin, and low gear FTP efforts (on a road bike) in the mountains after his normal climbing training.

Apparently.

Personally, I think it was a good "program".

I assume you mean a doping program? Right?
If so, then why was BWs better than Martins, from Copenhagen to Olympics. Is Martin clean? What is the difference that you think?

 

[Dear Wiggo]

I assume you mean a doping program? Right?
If so, then why was BWs better than Martins, from Copenhagen to Olympics. Is Martin clean? What is the difference that you think?

No solid ideas but being in your home country would be an advantage, imo.

Wiggins final TT at the TdF in 2012 was more impressive than his Olympic medal, imo. He smashed everyone with what must have been a top 10-20 in terms of fatigue due to leading the race for 2 weeks. Coming a month after that, his Olympic medal could just about be the result of his Tour, and probably only needed a slight top up.

I think it's helpful to look at the year's performance vs one single event.

 

[Dr. Maserati]

No solid ideas but being in your home country would be an advantage, imo.

Wiggins final TT at the TdF in 2012 was more impressive than his Olympic medal, imo. He smashed everyone with what must have been a top 10-20 in terms of fatigue due to leading the race for 2 weeks. Coming a month after that, his Olympic medal could just about be the result of his Tour, and probably only needed a slight top up.

I think it's helpful to look at the year's performance vs one single event.

Ok, I thought you said it was a good "program".

 

[Dear Wiggo]

Ok, I thought you said it was a good "program".

I think it's helpful to look at the year's performance vs one single event. The year's performance to that day was based around an incredible program. Better than anything Armstrong ever did. Ever.

On the Myers Briggs test, I am definitively N, and some people are definitively S - keep this in mind when interacting with some people, who need things spelt out for them one letter at a time...

 

[Dr. Maserati]

I think it's helpful to look at the year's performance vs one single event. The year's performance to that day was based around an incredible program. Better than anything Armstrong ever did. Ever.

Sure - but this evenings discussion is more on the differences between WC11 & OlY12 - that the differences essentially indicated doping.

What you are suggesting (& i would broadly agree) is the role of other factors to show the difference.
Which neither indicates or eliminates doping.

On the Myers Briggs test, I am definitively N, and some people are definitively S - keep this in mind when interacting with some people, who need things spelt out for them one letter at a time...

I like my hunches, and thats why I think Sky dope.
But I like to back them up too.

If Sky (Wiggins/Froome) are, then it should be possible to put something together that is reasonably coherent. Not saying it has to be consistent, let alone watertight, but the overall story should be there.
In fact someone wrote here earlier - that often these things are right there in front all along - that is something I feel could be true, but it won't be found working out watts or seeing which direction the wind came from.

 

[The Hitch]

Watts are better than what he did relative to the opposition.

But - was Wiggins in the best form he has ever had in July 2012? I think so.
Was Martin? I would doubt it. (You are free to disagree)
The Olympics was more a slog between the guys who had just done the Tour.

I don't know if someone who has just ridden a 3 week gt full on 110%, 2 of which were in a yellow jersey never moving from the front of the peloton, should be in any better state to win a time trial 10 days later than a rider who hurt his wrist in the gt but then spent the next weeks preparing for that 50k effort.

There's a reason why time trialists going for gold at the world championships pull out of the vuelta before the finish. And they aren't even wasting half the energy as Wiggins was in the Tour since a the vuelta is not the tour and b they are not gc contenders. Even still they understand its not good prep to finish a race like that so Wiggins in 2012 could not have been that we'll prepared for the tt to begin with (not even taking into account the underweight factor which others have mentioned)

And on top of that a few days before the tt Wiggins was part of a 4 man 7hour 250k ttt and was lauded as rider of the day. Martin rode a few k as training and then retired.

 

[SundayRider]

Wiggins best performance in a Tour TT pre 2009 was 5th in the Albi TT in 2007, in front of him that day were Vino(thrown out of the Tour a few days later for doping) Kash(whatever happened him) Kloeden(Mr.Teflon himself) and Evans.

This was the same Tour that Cofidis were thrown off and Wiggins had his anti-doping rants. I think it's around that time when Kimmage had a lot of time for Wiggins.

As other's have pointed out, it's not that he has improved in the TT but the fact that he has lost weight, improved dramatically in the mountains all whilst remaining a top TT rider, that is what raises the questions.

None of those riders are really in the league of Martin, Cancellara though are they?

 

[RownhamHill]

I don't know if someone who has just ridden a 3 week gt full on 110%, 2 of which were in a yellow jersey never moving from the front of the peloton, should be in any better state to win a time trial 10 days later than a rider who hurt his wrist in the gt but then spent the next weeks preparing for that 50k effort.

There's a reason why time trialists going for gold at the world championships pull out of the vuelta before the finish. And they aren't even wasting half the energy as Wiggins was in the Tour since a the vuelta is not the tour and b they are not gc contenders. Even still they understand its not good prep to finish a race like that so Wiggins in 2012 could not have been that we'll prepared for the tt to begin with (not even taking into account the underweight factor which others have mentioned)

And on top of that a few days before the tt Wiggins was part of a 4 man 7hour 250k ttt and was lauded as rider of the day. Martin rode a few k as training and then retired.

Maybe the lesson is that Martin should have trained harder?

 

[elduggo]

Maybe the lesson is that Martin should have trained harder?

yeah, Martin and others should 'get off their arses in their own life and apply themselves and work hard at something and achieve something'.

 

[ebandit]

credibility

sounds like you really want it to be one way. but it is the other.

desperate to see team sky 'popped'............desperate to see horner clean

i like your credibility

Mark L

 

[The Hitch]

Maybe the lesson is that Martin should have trained harder?

Yep, what can a 3 time world tt champ know about training for tts that skys tt expert, Tim kerrison, who has never ridden one and didn't know what it was till a few years ago, does not?

 

[RownhamHill]

Yep, what can a 3 time world tt champ know about training for tts that skys tt expert, Tim kerrison, who has never ridden one and didn't know what it was till a few years ago, does not?

Right, I was kind of making a joke back there, but regardless, it's interesting isn't it.

Because basically Tony Martin is a three time world tt champ, and he is consistently a better tt'er than Wiggins, and he did injure his wrist in the tour and pull out, and he was off his normal pace in the Olympics relative to Wiggins.

So if we accept that generally Tony Martin is better at preparing for/riding TTs than Wiggins, and yet he wasn't in that one case, then we need to look at what could explain the difference in that specific case.

So it could be that Wiggins did some special doping for that one particular race, which had the effect of improving his performance beyond his normal parameters. But then if that is the defining point of difference, it seems odd that he hadn't doped in 2011, and odder still that he didn't then repeat the trick (whatever it was) in 2013.

Or it could be that Wiggins doping regimen wasn't any different in 2012 to 2011 or 2013 (whatever you think his doping regimen is - from squeaky clean to dropping blood bags - whatever, let's just assume it is a constant, as that seems, well, the most plausible assumption). So then we need to look at what else made a difference, and perhaps it was a sub-optimum preparation (lack of quality training?) by Martin, which meant he didn't perform to his very peak, and so not surprising came second to the guy who had come second the previous year (and would the following year as well).

So my 'joke' actually had an element of truth in it. Just try this counter-factual thought experiment. Had Tony Martin not have injured his wrist in the first week of the tour, and followed what was his planned preparation for the Olympic TT, do you still think he would have withdrawn from the Tour after the first TT? Or do you think he would have seen the full three weeks through the mountains, and emptied himself on penultimate day's TT? Do you think he would have only gone 50ks in the road race before withdrawing to protect his painful wrist, or would he have contributed a bit more? And ultimately do you think he would have subsequently performed better in the TT?

Bear in mind, we've already established that Martin is generally better at training/preparing/performing in TTs than Wiggins, and from memory I don't recall him ever preparing for any major championship before or since by deliberately falling off and hurting himself. So I think it's a safe bet to think that his preparation for 2012 Olympics wasn't what he'd planned. I also think had he not been injured his prep would have looked much more similar to Wiggins.

As a result, for my money, I think - regardless of what Wiggins was or wasn't doing - that Tony Martin wasn't in his peak form at the 2012 Olympics, as a direct result of his injury/disrupted preparation.

Obviously this is all conjecture in a counter-factual thought experiment. So without comparing their power-files over the time I have no way of knowing whether that is true. Even if it's wrong, it's not that far-fetched though, is it?

 

[Alphabet]

And how "unusual" is that rise?

An increase like that is firmly in Lance territory. As others have said, Armstrong's Hgb increased about 0.6 of a point during the 2009 Tour, while Wiggins' increased by 0.8 of a point in the same race.