The Olympic Road Race 2016. Rio de Janeiro. 253km

[Buffalo Soldier]

I am incredibly happy, but seriously, why was Sagan not here??

 

[doperhopper]

Thrilling second part, big win for GVA. Big. A lot to say about smaller teams, I agree: Froome without Sky looked very vulnerable. Surprise: Vincenzaut Pinalot is falling in descents these days. Not a surprise: bad luck for Porte. Not a surprise: Alaphilippe is a wolverine on a bike. Hats of to him and also to Purito. Majka winning would have left a '88 RRWC Frondriest taste in my mouth. Very entertaining race, and a great, deserving winner. I think that GVA's detractors were silenced today...at least for a while . No one can take it away. Congrats Greg!

concerning N i b s - it's rather the other way round, riders falling in front of him nowadays (Froome, Henao), and he cannot jump over fallen stars like Sagan ;-)

 

[huge]

Broken collarbone for Nibali.

 

[DNP-Old]

Amazing race, best of the year arguably. But man, 2nd time in a row Colombia's hearts got ripped in just a split second. This one's even worse than London.

 

[Arredondo]

Re:

Broken collarbone for Nibali.

Maybe fit just in time for Lombardia.

 

[huge]

Re: Re:

Broken collarbone for Nibali.

Maybe fit just in time for Lombardia.

It shouldn't be a problem. It's two months away. And in a couple of weeks he should already be back on his bike.
Maybe not the one he was planning, but I guess he had already plans for a break after next Wed TT.

 

[dick the quick]

Re: Re:

Purito just cost Majka the gold medal... F***!

I can always count on Purito.

I think only polish people and an odd few Majka fans are dissapointed. Majka once again never ever had his nose in the wind until his 2 companions who did everything crashed and then when he hit the wind he got chased down. Hallelujah!

It's a big dissapointment henao and nibali crashed out, but from that moment on I so dearly hoped they chased Majka down. So glad GVA and Fuglsang did just that. Atleast GVA is a rider we can count on racing.

Well, this may be the very last success (?) of Purito in his career, so you must find someone else to count on in the future, especially as regards late and/or unsuccessful attacks.

As I am Polish-totally-biased-Majka-odd-supporter (though not a fan), I am disappointed to some extent, that's right. GvA and Fuglsang were good enough to chase him down after the last descent, and clearly were better/stronger at the finish line. Nothing more to add.

But still, I just can't imagine myself hoping that any rider who is alone on the front of the race (without doing anything wrong against his breakaway mates) will crash, or will fade against the wind, or simply won't win for any reason whatsoever. If Majka would be Dutch (or Spanish, or French, or German, or Italian, or...) and riding alone after Nibali and Henao crashed on the descent, I would just keep my fingers crossed for his win, because he would deserve it in the same way as Nibs, Henao, GvA or Fuglsang did.

 

[huge]

It gets worse. Nibali's collarbone is broken in two different points. Basically at the two ends, close to the neck and to the shoulder. I guess his season ends today.

 

[Catwhoorg]

I thoroughly enjoyed this race. Was a very well put together course.

Shame NBC kept leaping away to swimming, but that's when I hopped onto the life stream.

That said, the descent may have been just a touch too much (x3), but it certainly added to the drama in the race.

I hope those who got injured bounce back fast.

 

[BullsFan22]

Didn't catch the 2nd half of the race, sadly, but from the summary of the race, it seemed it didn't disappoint!! Congratulations to Van Avermaet for the gold and Fuglsang and Majka on their medals! Bummed for Nibali. What happened to him and Henao, exactly? Was it the sheer difficulty of the descent and one or both of them not judging it right, or was it an unforced error, was it slippery roads...?

 

[Gigs_98]

Re:

Matthias Mayer is baffled to learn that his Olympic title in the Downhill only lasted two years

This was posted shortly before fuglsang and gva attacked and it still confuses me. Can anyone explain?

 

[vedrafjord]

Thrilling second part, big win for GVA. Big. A lot to say about smaller teams, I agree: Froome without Sky looked very vulnerable. Surprise: Vincenzaut Pinalot is falling in descents these days. Not a surprise: bad luck for Porte. Not a surprise: Alaphilippe is a wolverine on a bike. Hats of to him and also to Purito. Majka winning would have left a '88 RRWC Frondriest taste in my mouth. Very entertaining race, and a great, deserving winner. I think that GVA's detractors were silenced today...at least for a while . No one can take it away. Congrats Greg!

Agree with a lot of that. One of my least favourite things here is people saying they 'hate' certain riders, hoping for them to fall etc., but even though he was very brave in this race, I have to admit I'm not a Rafal Majka fan and with 8km to go I was dreading having four years of commentators saying "Olympic champion Rafal Majka" to look forward to (except Phil & Paul, they'll be still saying "Olympic champion Sammy Sanchez" until they're put out of their misery). I was happy when someone in the chase group finally decided to stop Valverdeing.

Re: Froome, I don't think he missed his train so much as he was just off the pace. I think it's notable that nearly all the GC guys from the Tour looked a bit flat here - Meintjes and Purito were the only ones in the top 10 of both. Clearly doing the Tour is the best preparation, but Van Avermaet/Fuglsang/Majka/Alaphilippe/Nibali had a lot more days off than the GC guys, who had to bury themselves in every single mountain and TT stage.

It certainly was an entertaining race, not quite as good or as epic as this year's Paris Roubaix, which, lest we forget, had 9 man teams and race radio. I don't think today would have been all that different with race radio - the main factors were:

- good course design which encouraged action from further out, and allowed several different types of rider to win depending on how the race panned out
- small, ad hoc teams - trade teams can buy a mountain train, but national teams have to work with what they've got, so different teams are forced to try very different approaches
- prestige - specifically in combination with the other factors - everyone wanted to do well, but the fact that it was a hard to control one day race meant that everyone went for broke (versus the Tour, where the long steady climbs, the big mountain trains, the need to recover and ration out your effort meant the prestige made everyone cautious)

Great race though, and plenty of food for thought.

 

[deValtos]

I think France was a bit useless. They had the biggest numbers in the chase group when Valverde and Cancellara were working and did nothing. They should have communicated with each other and stuck the weakest guy on the front in the valley. Alaphillipe looked pretty good and could've maybe got a medal if he hadn't had to work so hard to close the big gap.

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

Re: Re:

Matthias Mayer is baffled to learn that his Olympic title in the Downhill only lasted two years

This was posted shortly before fuglsang and gva attacked and it still confuses me. Can anyone explain?

Your countryman, Matthias Mayer, won the Olympic downhill skiing title in Sochi 2014. Red Rick, thinking that Majka's descending skills were going to win him an Olympic medal, apparently considered this a humorous commentary on that opinion.

 

[Gigs_98]

Re: Re:

Matthias Mayer is baffled to learn that his Olympic title in the Downhill only lasted two years

This was posted shortly before fuglsang and gva attacked and it still confuses me. Can anyone explain?

Your countryman, Matthias Mayer, won the Olympic downhill skiing title in Sochi 2014. Red Rick, thinking that Majka's descending skills were going to win him an Olympic medal, apparently considered this a humorous commentary on that opinion.

As an Austrian I obviously know that Mayer won the downhill 2014 but I didn't get the context with another "olympic downhill champion". Thanks

 

[GuyIncognito]

Only just caught the last 50kms

I've said this a billion times and got shot down every time. I'll say it again.
Nibali isn't any better a descender than the average pro. He just takes a lot of risks, crashes a lot, gets up and continues to take risks

 

[This Charming Man]

Very sorry not to see Frank Schleck win the ORR, however great to see an American Team, with the excellent Greg Von Avermart, kill it at the win.

 

[Kwibus]

Re: Re:

Purito just cost Majka the gold medal... F***!

I can always count on Purito.

I think only polish people and an odd few Majka fans are dissapointed. Majka once again never ever had his nose in the wind until his 2 companions who did everything crashed and then when he hit the wind he got chased down. Hallelujah!

It's a big dissapointment henao and nibali crashed out, but from that moment on I so dearly hoped they chased Majka down. So glad GVA and Fuglsang did just that. Atleast GVA is a rider we can count on racing.

Well, this may be the very last success (?) of Purito in his career, so you must find someone else to count on in the future, especially as regards late and/or unsuccessful attacks.

As I am Polish-totally-biased-Majka-odd-supporter (though not a fan), I am disappointed to some extent, that's right. GvA and Fuglsang were good enough to chase him down after the last descent, and clearly were better/stronger at the finish line. Nothing more to add.

But still, I just can't imagine myself hoping that any rider who is alone on the front of the race (without doing anything wrong against his breakaway mates) will crash, or will fade against the wind, or simply won't win for any reason whatsoever. If Majka would be Dutch (or Spanish, or French, or German, or Italian, or...) and riding alone after Nibali and Henao crashed on the descent, I would just keep my fingers crossed for his win, because he would deserve it in the same way as Nibs, Henao, GvA or Fuglsang did.

I certainly as hell didn't hope he would crash. Majka is a rider which is hard to like. A rider that always tries to profit the most of other riders. Sure that's part of cycling so I don't blame for that, but it's not a way to become populair.
Today once again he only hit the front when he was forced too, because nibs and henao crashed. So he deserved to be up there, sure, but I just rather had a different winner. Someone who wouldn't give me an unsatisfying feeling. That's all

 

[Kwibus]

Very sorry not to see Frank Schleck win the ORR, however great to see an American Team, with the excellent Greg Von Avermart, kill it at the win.

Funny?

 

[El Pistolero]

Re:

Only just caught the last 50kms

I've said this a billion times and got shot down every time. I'll say it again.
Nibali isn't any better a descender than the average pro. He just takes a lot of risks, crashes a lot, gets up and continues to take risks

***, he's clearly better than most climbers. Obviously you crash less if you're too afraid to descent and take risks. We don't even know if Henao was in front of him when the crash happened, but that seemed to be the case. You can't avoid a crash on a descent if the person directly in front of you crashes.

 

[johnymax]

Re: Re:

Phenomenal race! Sad for Nibali and Henao, extremely happy for GVA...what a rider! Congrats to Majka and Fuglsang, too. Would have been happy to see Purito get a medal, but Spain made a tactical mistake.

Why do Spain always make a tactical mistake whenever they don't win? Valverde clearly didn't have the legs so sacrificed himself for Purito, who also couldn't quite hold on during the climb, and had no chance on the flat.

They tried their best but just weren't strong enough today.

The tactical mistake was in my opinion when they missed the split when Nibali and Aru attacked on the descent. For example Majka and Yates followed the move and that's why the Pole got a medal in the end. If Majka had stayed behind when the move happened, he wouldn't reach the podium. I don't know exactly what happened there because the camera didn't show. But Valverde and Purito should be easily able to follow Nibali, Aru, Yates and Majka on a descent. They didn't so they made a mistake. If it was bad positioning, it's an equally big mistake. I wonder if it had something to do with the Porte crash. If I'm not mistaken it happened just before the mentioned attack. Then on the last climb Purito clearly showed he was very strong. He bridged a gap of more then 30s. I think he was just as strong as Nibali, Henao and Majka, so he could have followed them in the finale IMO.

 

[This Charming Man]

Very sorry not to see Frank Schleck win the ORR, however great to see an American Team, with the excellent Greg Von Avermart, kill it at the win.

Funny?

TREK is an American brand, I think an American brand. Good to see Frank take 20th, not bad, on such a trying course. Kudoes to the designers, of such an awesome road race course, big action... BTW, Frank was only 3:31 back from Greg, wow! BMC, based in Santa Rosa, congrats Och, and Gavin.

 

[Jungle Cycle]

Well, it looks like we did a good job of a race.. I'm soooo happy that I was there...
The look on those guys faces was reeaaaally of pain. I was there exactly where Henao attacked and Nibali followed. That Nibs has NO problem going all-in.. Respect! So sorry for Henao.. he and the colombian team deserved a medal..
some points after reading the posts; 1- broadcasting is entirely up to uci, even the moto pilots.. 2-so does crono/gaps.. 3- that corner(porte/Nibs) is really tricky and not for lack of light, it just bents really weird... 4- if it wasnt for that green net, Porte would have stop 50mts down...
and the fun will not stop there. Imagine girls attacking that downhill?? TT will be interesting with those steep little climbs. Even the "hilly" bike part of triathlon is going to be worth watching..
Please, dont know how but make a push(!?) to make this a WT race...

 

[Climbing]

Re:

Only just caught the last 50kms

I've said this a billion times and got shot down every time. I'll say it again.
Nibali isn't any better a descender than the average pro. He just takes a lot of risks, crashes a lot, gets up and continues to take risks

That just makes you wrong a billion times, nothing more. :lol:

 

[Kazistuta]

Very sorry not to see Frank Schleck win the ORR, however great to see an American Team, with the excellent Greg Von Avermart, kill it at the win.

Funny?

TREK is an American brand, I think an American brand. Good to see Frank take 20th, not bad, on such a trying course. Kudoes to the designers, of such an awesome road race course, big action... BTW, Frank was only 3:31 back from Greg, wow! BMC, based in Santa Rosa, congrats Och, and Gavin.

Deck the halls with boughs of random,falalalala lala lala