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Re: Re:
AVV took those 3 minutes in 10km or so. Even Pantani in his most glorious moments, Armstrong on AdH 2001 or Froome PSM 2015 weren't able to do that.
Lequack said:
AVV took those 3 minutes in 10km or so. Even Pantani in his most glorious moments, Armstrong on AdH 2001 or Froome PSM 2015 weren't able to do that.
LaFlorecita said:
I was amazed how Annemiek was able to come back after that horrible crash in the 2016 Olympics; then after the broken kneecap in the World's RR (which she still finished). Very gritty performer, very endearing persona. She has just blown up the Giro Rosa (again).
Re:
Obviously leaving aside things like Ivaïlo Gabrovski, how about Carlos Sastre on Alpe d'Huez?jaylew said:
Prediction:
She'll win all the jerseys in the Giro!
Yes, she'll even find a way to win white, because she's just that awesome.
She'll win all the jerseys in the Giro!
Yes, she'll even find a way to win white, because she's just that awesome.
Re:
If she quickly applied for Italian citizenship, it would probably be granted.
Libertine Seguros said:
If she quickly applied for Italian citizenship, it would probably be granted.
Re: Re:
Thing about AVV's ride is that everyone knew she was the one to watch and she went from the bottom anyway. They tried to go with her and she just rode them off. Although I know I watched it, I don't remember the circumstances of Sastre's ride exactly but somehow I don't think everyone thought he was the best climber and the one to watch going into that stage.Libertine Seguros said:
Re: Re:
There was a bit of inertia in the group that led to the gap growing as large as it did; Annemiek used brute climbing strength to get away (she was out of the saddle pushing the tempo there for a long time!), but once the gap was established and especially once Kirchmann was swallowed up, there was a bit of a regrouping period. It looked to me like a few riders were not as strong as you might have expected; Hall did a bit of work on the front but I wonder if it was a bit of a false tempo as Anna VDB went through a rough patch and even dropped off the back at one point; Niewiadoma obviously had the leader's jersey but she clearly was struggling at times too; with Boels and Sunweb being the only teams with multiple riders in the group at that point, it seemed like others (e.g. Magnaldi, Merino, Moolman-Pasio and so on) didn't want to do all the work chasing a rider they almost certainly wouldn't catch anyway, only to get a number done on them by the big teams, and Sunweb didn't do much pacing because Kirchmann had been in the break and so needed to recover, and that enabled the gap to snowball to the point where not only was Annemiek's advantage going to be enough to get the maglia rosa, but it was going to be decisive for the race as a whole. It was going to take a concerted shared effort by the other elite climbers to limit Annemiek's advantage once she got virtual pink, and we didn't get that, partly because of lack of collaboration and partly because of lack of form, but either way, it was demonstrable that Annemiek was the strongest rider on the day regardless.
Everybody knew Sastre would ride off, but that was affected by a lot of inertia among the group. The Schlecks were in yellow and white, and so weren't going to do any work as they were teammates of Sastre; Andy even tried to attack at one point which was snuffed out immediately on the basis that they couldn't let him ride across to Sastre and work together. Evans was the man who should have been chasing, being the one who would be expected to win from there, 2nd on GC and clearly a superior TTer to Fränk (and Sastre), but he was still at the phase of "try to get others to do work for you, and if they don't, sulk" in his career; in the group the only real willing worker he found to collaborate with him was Kohl (Valverde had dropped time the day before, Vande Velde was just trying to hold what he had, Menchov had dropped the day before and also after attacking early on the climb, paid for it and had to regroup, which is where the famous clip of him riding with Froome comes in - notably while Froome was dropped at the same time as Menchov, the Russian regrouped and later finished some 9 minutes ahead of the future phenom), who had flushed his last blood bag after being told to tone it down - and Evans didn't realise until it was too late that Kohl didn't have the legs.jaylew said:
There was a bit of inertia in the group that led to the gap growing as large as it did; Annemiek used brute climbing strength to get away (she was out of the saddle pushing the tempo there for a long time!), but once the gap was established and especially once Kirchmann was swallowed up, there was a bit of a regrouping period. It looked to me like a few riders were not as strong as you might have expected; Hall did a bit of work on the front but I wonder if it was a bit of a false tempo as Anna VDB went through a rough patch and even dropped off the back at one point; Niewiadoma obviously had the leader's jersey but she clearly was struggling at times too; with Boels and Sunweb being the only teams with multiple riders in the group at that point, it seemed like others (e.g. Magnaldi, Merino, Moolman-Pasio and so on) didn't want to do all the work chasing a rider they almost certainly wouldn't catch anyway, only to get a number done on them by the big teams, and Sunweb didn't do much pacing because Kirchmann had been in the break and so needed to recover, and that enabled the gap to snowball to the point where not only was Annemiek's advantage going to be enough to get the maglia rosa, but it was going to be decisive for the race as a whole. It was going to take a concerted shared effort by the other elite climbers to limit Annemiek's advantage once she got virtual pink, and we didn't get that, partly because of lack of collaboration and partly because of lack of form, but either way, it was demonstrable that Annemiek was the strongest rider on the day regardless.
But I don't think Torri di Fraele and Alpe d' Huez are comparable climbs.
And she gained almost 2 minutes on 3rd place in a 20 km ITT after.
And she gained almost 2 minutes on 3rd place in a 20 km ITT after.
Maybe if she was required to ride every race on the oldest, heaviest "garden-fence" of a bike available, without wheels, then the others might have a chance...
I love it when racers race! CONGRATS AvV!
EDIT: The entire time that I was at the Y I couldn't stop thinking about how cool it was that she just went for it...and won!
EDIT: The entire time that I was at the Y I couldn't stop thinking about how cool it was that she just went for it...and won!
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I am amazed by her resilience as well as greatness as a rider. She has come back from really bad injuries several times, and today she came back from what was a sub-par performance for her in the elite women's ITT. Not just a rebound from disappointment, but probably the greatest performance of her life.
This is pretty cool.
www.cyclingweekly.com
Pro bike: Annemiek van Vleuten's rainbow themed Scott Addict
The bike carries a symbol of the Dutch rider's 105km solo breakaway
www.cyclingweekly.com
On some days, van Vleuten is my favorite rider (across all classifications and genders). Her performance is often outstanding, but it's her qualities of courage, persistence, resilience, and grace that I find endearing.
I would be nice to a kid that could have been my son if I started a family at 17!
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