Teams & Riders The Onley Fans thread

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red_flanders

red_flanders

Apr 3, 2009
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P4rthen0n said:
Great riding from Onley today!
And he's only 22.

He got 4th today and is currently sitting at 7th overall.
Before the Tour started he said he was going for stage wins, but right now he looks to be aiming at a top10 in GC, which he should tbh.

Tomorrow in the TT he will lose a lot of time, but maybe he still keeps a place in the top10.
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Ya, super impressive. Always great to see young riders showing out at the Tour!
 
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Squire

Squire

Dec 28, 2010
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scribers said:
Onley is consistently a factor on the scene. Will watch his Tt with curiosity. Deepening on almeidas dynamics I like him to podium if he can hold losses tomorrow
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While I like Onley and think he's a great talent, he has had his backside consistently handed to him on longer climbs. Today's stage was a perfect Onley stage. I think he's more of a puncheur than a proper climber. No chance for podium if you ask me, but a solid top ten is possible.
 
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Barnacle Bill

Barnacle Bill

Sep 22, 2020
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Extract from David Walsh's piece today, on Onley.

Full article (paywall)

“Oscar’s results in one-week races are very good. When you look at his career so far, he has done consistently well in them. Once a race goes beyond a week, it is unknown territory. Into the third week, if we’re still in this position, we will be trying to hold on to it. Of course we will. But for now we’re going to take it day by day. Oscar is 22.”

I mention that Onley’s best performance on his debut in last year’s Tour came in the middle of the third week. He was fifth on the 17th leg to Dévoluy in the southern Alps. “Yes, he still had something in the final week last year, but the thing with last year, when you’re going just for stages, you can recover on the days you’re not [going for stages]. You can sit up, you can lose ten minutes, you can ride in your easiest gear.

“So far in this race, Oscar has gone full gas every day, and that’s why we don’t know what week two and week three are going to look like. We’re not going to put pressure on him.”

It was Winston who brought Onley, then aged 18, to the team. “It was actually during Covid when we signed Oscar. He hadn’t done much racing. He was just a lad living up in Kelso. A tip-off came from Gary Coltman, who was head of Scottish Cycling at the time. We had worked at British Cycling together in 2007. Gary contacted me and said, ‘I think you should look at this guy,’ and when someone likes Gary comes to you with a name, you take that seriously.”

Coltman says the Scottish coach Mark McKay played an important part. “Mark came to me and said, ‘Look, there’s a rider who I believe will be a future Tour winner and I want to take him in a junior team to a race in the Alps.’ I said, ‘Mark, that’s not what we do now, there isn’t really a budget for it.’ He said, ‘This kid will go there, he will be seen there and he will get taken on by pro teams.’

“So we agreed to do it. There was some kind of mountain time-trial and Oscar just blew them all away. Two teams wanted to sign him. There was an offer from the AG2R La Mondiale amateur team and what I remember is that, as soon as the possibility of joining a French team arose, this 16-year-old kid from Kelso started learning French.

“He was very level-headed, very committed and very driven. What struck was the way he took control of his career.”

Onley is now in his fifth year with Winston’s team, having spent two years with the development team before graduating to the World Tour squad.

“Oscar is a quiet lad but he’s quiet in an Oscar way,” Winston says. “He won’t be the guy putting on the loud music in the bus but he’s not afraid to stand up and say what he thinks and tell the guys, ‘This is what I need from you.’ He shows leadership qualities without being the loud guy.

“He is now competing with the very best guys in the world and he’s 22 years old. Everyone is getting a little excited, which is fair, but Oscar won’t get ahead of himself and, as a team, we’ll keep taking it stage by stage.”
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Squire

Squire

Dec 28, 2010
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Potomac said:
I'm sure every commentator is dreaming of Oscar Onley coming in 7th place to make
OO7th jokes.
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Oh man, I can hear that in Kirby's self-satisfied voice already.

But great to see Onley doing well. When he surprised everyone in that Tour of Croatia, he actually said that he thought he was better on longer climbs. It's nice to see him finally showing it. Top 5 definintely looks possible now.
 
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gunara

gunara

Dec 6, 2012
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Days of hyping up British riders to the moon and back is long over? It's been awhile since he first showed how good he was at his age and we only had two pages. Kid is no joke and everyone keeps downplaying his potentials. Maybe it's the aliens, or maybe it's his team. But then even galacticos boy Brennan was barely talked about more than Ethan Hayter in his first year.
 
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