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Teams & Riders Team Movistar-thread

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Landa looks very "tranquil" in this pic... :D

DNu3DB-X0AI28cV.jpg:large
 
Re:

Moviestar said:
The second fiddle thing is nothing new. Unzue usually prefers to have 2 leaders, Think of Delgado/Indurain, Mancebo/Menchov, Valverde/Pereiro and more recent Valverde/Quintana. ''May the best claim the leaderspot''
Delgado-Indurain? Nope. Roles were clearly defined, see BigMig sacrificing himself for Perico in '90. That's when the change took place: Delgado proved that he didn't have it anymore. Then Indurain became the leader.

Nairito is going to be unhappy: he wants to be the leader, period. Not a co-leader.

Personally, I think that there should be no designated leader. It would keep Sky guessing, chasing three riders of this caliber is virtually impossible if they take turns. No need for a designated leader before at least the cobbles anyway.

But all three can't ride defensively for this to work. And history shows that Movistar riders chicken out versus Froome/Sky. Maybe Mikel can change the culture, go for it...

With this three-headed monster (and a good TTT), (one rider from) Movistar can win the '18 Tour.
 
Re: Re:

Tonton said:
Moviestar said:
The second fiddle thing is nothing new. Unzue usually prefers to have 2 leaders, Think of Delgado/Indurain, Mancebo/Menchov, Valverde/Pereiro and more recent Valverde/Quintana. ''May the best claim the leaderspot''

<Snipped>

With this three-headed monster (and a good TTT), (one rider from) Movistar can win the '18 Tour.
Or implode. They'll probably do either-or...
 
Re: Re:

Zinoviev Letter said:
Irondan said:
Landa looks very "tranquil" in this pic... :D

DNu3DB-X0AI28cV.jpg:large

I love this kind of awkward team enforced "unity" photo shoot. You can practically hear the team PR person hissing at them to smile.

Agreed. Someone took this picture and put thought bubbles over each rider's head (obviously in Spanish).
What is being said for each one:
Quintana: "The leader is me"
Valverde: "I'm going to win more races than these two together"
Landa: "What have I come here to do?"

Quintana's smile looks really forced. Landa isn't smiling at all. And Valverde, well he's always smiling. If he's not we're asking what's wrong. Actually his smile in the picture from the hospital bed after his surgery looked more forced than this one. Although with him he's also the only one that's actually confident with his position on the team.
 
Re: Re:

Irondan said:
Tonton said:
Moviestar said:
The second fiddle thing is nothing new. Unzue usually prefers to have 2 leaders, Think of Delgado/Indurain, Mancebo/Menchov, Valverde/Pereiro and more recent Valverde/Quintana. ''May the best claim the leaderspot''

<Snipped>

With this three-headed monster (and a good TTT), (one rider from) Movistar can win the '18 Tour.
Or implode. They'll probably do either-or...

They will have two riders within 1' of the first place when the last mountain stage come and they will do nothing at all because Unzue will not want to risk losing the most prized award, the all important team classification :D
 
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I think movistar would have a chance if piti, nairo and landa showed in top shape without a gt on their legs (landa and valverde). now, they are racing against 2 cyborgs, dumoulin can easily destroy them in the cobbled stage if they aren't in top shape
 
Re:

Mayomaniac said:
As long as nobody misses the respective main goal it should work.


Now there is an interesting question. Whose main goal? The team's, a specific riders, a combination there of? Valverde has said his two main goals are the Ardennes and the Worlds and then whatever else happens to be on his schedule. Heck I wouldn't be shocked if one of Movistar's goals is getting Valverde to the Worlds and Lombaria with less than 85 race days.
 
Its annoying these news are dominating the headlines (because there isn't racing going on), but I think its about to pump the brakes a little. Seeing to many ignorant comments in comment sections etc. just bashing everyone left and right. We don't even know what the schedules exactly will look like and we haven't seen them race together..
 
Re:

Valv.Piti said:
Its annoying these news are dominating the headlines (because there isn't racing going on), but I think its about to pump the brakes a little. Seeing to many ignorant comments in comment sections etc. just bashing everyone left and right. We don't even know what the schedules exactly will look like and we haven't seen them race together..

Good point. Valverde did give an idea of what his early season schedule is going to be. It is very likely he and Landa will be racing a couple of those races together. Movistar has said that Landa is starting his season at Andalucia. According to an interview with Valverde he's starting his season at Mallorca, but will be racing Andalucia and said his spring schedule will be similar to what it was this year. So it would make since to guess that he and Landa will race both Andalucia and Tour of Basque country together.
 
To be more clear

Giro - Landa w/Valverde to help him
Tour - Quintana w/Landa to help him
Vuelta - Valverde w/Quintana to either help him/have a free hit/rely on young guys and Quintana rests for Innsbruck maybe?

Either way, this makes the most sense, unless someone gets injured or sth bad happens, there is no way they shouldn't do it that way
 

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