With Nibali, Valverde and Gilbert all retiring within the last two days I was thinking about how unusual it is for so many great riders to retire within so little time. In particular I was wondering how rare careers with as many "major wins" as these three have are. Here I should elaborate, with a major win I mean a win at a GT, a monument, the WCRR and the ORR though I'm sure we could have our own debate about what races I chose here. So how does this look for Nibali, Valverde and Gilbert:
Nibali: 7 (2 Giro, 1 Tour, 1 Vuelta, 1 MSR, 2 GdL)
Valverde: 6 (1 Vuelta, 4 LBL, 1 WCRR)
Gilbert: 6 (1 RVV, 1 PR, 1 LBL, 2 GdL, 1 WCRR)
Now I'm not gonna go through the entire cycling history to find out where those numbers rank all time, but I do at least find it interesting to compare them to some of their peers. Currently only one active rider has more or as many major wins as these three, that one of course being Chris Froome with 7 (1 Giro, 4 Tour, 2 Vuelta), although some might argue he only has 6. Then you have Sagan with 5 (1 RVV, 1 PR, 1 WCRR) just like Pogacar (2 Tour, 1 LBL, 2 GdL) and going even lower Roglic with 4 (3 Vuelta, 1 LBL), but none of them have quite arrived at the numbers of Nibali, Valverde and Gilbert (although it's completely bonkers Pogacar is even that close, given he just turned 24)
Going back at least a few years, some of the more recently retired cycling greats are Boonen with 8 (3 RVV, 4 PR, 1 WCRR), Contador 7 (2 Giro, 2 Tour, 3 Vuelta) and Cancellara 7 (1 MSR, 3 RVV, 3 PR). I honestly don't know who the next most recent retiree with more than 5 major wins was. Maybe Oscar Freire with 6 (3 MSR, 3 WCRR), but in any case, you can see that kind of event really, really doesn't happen very often.
So what's my point? Great question! I don't really have one. I really just wanted to point out how unlikely it is that three riders of that caliber retired within such short time as their entire generation of cyclists only really produced something like 7 such riders altogether. And I guess I wanted to use the moment to remind everyone on just how good those 3 really were and just how hard it is to win as much as they did. So a final chapeau to all of them, as you may now start to talk about the greatness of Nibali, Valverde and Gilbert. And no negativity allowed!
Nibali: 7 (2 Giro, 1 Tour, 1 Vuelta, 1 MSR, 2 GdL)
Valverde: 6 (1 Vuelta, 4 LBL, 1 WCRR)
Gilbert: 6 (1 RVV, 1 PR, 1 LBL, 2 GdL, 1 WCRR)
Now I'm not gonna go through the entire cycling history to find out where those numbers rank all time, but I do at least find it interesting to compare them to some of their peers. Currently only one active rider has more or as many major wins as these three, that one of course being Chris Froome with 7 (1 Giro, 4 Tour, 2 Vuelta), although some might argue he only has 6. Then you have Sagan with 5 (1 RVV, 1 PR, 1 WCRR) just like Pogacar (2 Tour, 1 LBL, 2 GdL) and going even lower Roglic with 4 (3 Vuelta, 1 LBL), but none of them have quite arrived at the numbers of Nibali, Valverde and Gilbert (although it's completely bonkers Pogacar is even that close, given he just turned 24)
Going back at least a few years, some of the more recently retired cycling greats are Boonen with 8 (3 RVV, 4 PR, 1 WCRR), Contador 7 (2 Giro, 2 Tour, 3 Vuelta) and Cancellara 7 (1 MSR, 3 RVV, 3 PR). I honestly don't know who the next most recent retiree with more than 5 major wins was. Maybe Oscar Freire with 6 (3 MSR, 3 WCRR), but in any case, you can see that kind of event really, really doesn't happen very often.
So what's my point? Great question! I don't really have one. I really just wanted to point out how unlikely it is that three riders of that caliber retired within such short time as their entire generation of cyclists only really produced something like 7 such riders altogether. And I guess I wanted to use the moment to remind everyone on just how good those 3 really were and just how hard it is to win as much as they did. So a final chapeau to all of them, as you may now start to talk about the greatness of Nibali, Valverde and Gilbert. And no negativity allowed!