Teams & Riders The Remco Evenepoel is the next Eddy Merckx thread

[Dazed and Confused]

Surely we must be past the 3000m altitude, living in shed, riding a bike, Colombian advantage by now.

 

[Froome]

He has not done altitude yet, has Martinez?

The discussion about training in altitude is interesting. I don't know of altitude is good to every rider. Maybe some riders respond better to training in altitude than others.

 

[Netserk]

Surely we must be past the 3000m altitude, living in shed, riding a bike, Colombian advantage by now.

Gotta unban @Jancouver to hear the unfiltered truth about Colombians.

Wait, he isn't banned?! Damn.

 

[Sciatic]

The discussion about training in altitude is interesting. I don't know of altitude is good to every rider. Maybe some riders respond better to training in altitude than others.

Almost everyone gets an increase in hematocrit from the hypoxia at altitude, then after return to lower elevation drops gradually to previous hematocrit level over the course of two weeks. This is without adding any clinic-related programs.

 

[Froome]

Almost everyone gets an increase in hematocrit from the hypoxia at altitude, then after return to lower elevation drops gradually to previous hematocrit level over the course of two weeks. This is without adding any clinic-related programs.

Maybe the effect is not equal to everybody because riders like Remco and Pogacar will just do one altitude training camp before the Tour, and riders like roglic and Vingegaard will do 3/4 training camps. Vingegaard is at the moment in teide.

 

[Divergence]

Does not look good for your boy there. Even Rogla's gregario is stomping him.

 

[hfer07]

Does not look good for your boy there. Even Rogla's gregario is stomping him.

Yep,
Remco not being able to win against the B-Teams crew is worrying - even at this early season's time

 

[SHAD0W93]

Was he at his climbing weight at the start of the Giro?

He beat him quite comfortably at his GT weight at the Giro...

Right because a 47.8 km TT all of a sudden equals a 19.6 km TT.

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

He beat him quite comfortably at his GT weight at the Giro...

Funnily enough, they sent him significantly heavier to the Giro than the '22 Vuelta for that very reason. Their explanation was that he needed to be lighter in the '22 Vuelta because it had more short and steep climbs, compared to the Giro, which supposedly had longer and less steep climbs and this way he could benefit more from the TT's. Which again shows you the masterminds that are surrounding him at SQS. Taking the risk of losing multiple minutes in the mountains, to gain a few seconds in the TT. Also, why does Vingegaard weigh so little for the Tour? Because the Tour has even longer and less steep climbs generally speaking than the Giro. Why hasn't Visma caught on yet? They should put Vingegaard in the Tour weighing 68 or something, he will do even better in the flat TT and the extra weight doesn't really matter that much in the mountains.

 

[Berniece]

Does not look good for your boy there. Even Rogla's gregario is stomping him.

There was a time Evenepoel might have thought like this, luckily he matured and grew up

 

[bNator]

Does not look good for your boy there. Even Rogla's gregario is stomping him.

I bet Rogla went full yoda mode on training camp.

"Feel the pedals you must"

 

[Elos Anjos]

I bet Rogla went full yoda mode on training camp.

"Feel the pedals you must"

The cringe side of the force feeds on (wheelsucking) hate.

 

[Froome]

Funnily enough, they sent him significantly heavier to the Giro than the '22 Vuelta for that very reason. Their explanation was that he needed to be lighter in the '22 Vuelta because it had more short and steep climbs, compared to the Giro, which supposedly had longer and less steep climbs and this way he could benefit more from the TT's. Which again shows you the masterminds that are surrounding him at SQS. Taking the risk of losing multiple minutes in the mountains, to gain a few seconds in the TT. Also, why does Vingegaard weigh so little for the Tour? Because the Tour has even longer and less steep climbs generally speaking than the Giro. Why hasn't Visma caught on yet? They should put Vingegaard in the Tour weighing 68 or something, he will do even better in the flat TT and the extra weight doesn't really matter that much in the mountains.

Do you think the staff surrounding Remco is that bad?

 

[18-Valve. (pithy)]

Yep,
Remco not being able to win against the B-Teams crew is worrying - even at this early season's time

Still the same Evenepoel, by the looks of it. If he doesn't perform on Malhao - let's say a win or a VERY close 2nd place, I'd say a good TdF GC result is out of the question, UNLESS his mid-February form is worse than usual.

It's not only about who's the better medium mountain puncheur, Dani or Remco. No, the pace was high enough to the point that a generational GC talent with an uphill sprint should have dusted the subpar competition. The run-in to the final climb was hard.

Needless to say, this type of finish is not ideal for Kuss, who came in third.

 

[Blanco]

Right because a 47.8 km TT all of a sudden equals a 19.6 km TT.

Would you be kind and explain the difference?
Those 1-2kg less on Evenepoel would result in loss of approx. 30 sec or even more in that remaining 28.2 km if I understood correctly..?

 

[Berniece]

Still the same Evenepoel, by the looks of it. If he doesn't perform on Malhao - let's say a win or a VERY close 2nd place, I'd say a good TdF GC result is out of the question, UNLESS his mid-February form is worse than usual.

It's not only about who's the better medium mountain puncheur, Dani or Remco. No, the pace was high enough to the point that a generational GC talent with an uphill sprint should have dusted the subpar competition. The run-in to the final climb was hard.

Needless to say, this type of finish is not ideal for Kuss, who came in third.

Lol, what type of conclusions are you drawing out of a February race

 

[18-Valve. (pithy)]

Lol, what type of conclusions are you drawing out of a February race

The same conclusions any sane person would. Like I said, UNLESS his mid-February (climbing) form is worse than usual, IT LOOKS like his level hasn't gone up. For now. Malhao could be different. We only have one data point right now.

 

[Berniece]

The same conclusions any sane person would. Like I said, UNLESS his mid-February (climbing) form is worse than usual, IT LOOKS like his level hasn't gone up. For now. Malhao could be different, as we only have one data point right now.

This isn't even a difficult climb. Claiming that if he doesn't finish first or close 2nd in the last stage it's impossible for him to reach a decent GC result in the TDF is just extremely silly.

It would make way more sense to at least wait on Paris-Nice.

 

[Netserk]

Funnily enough, they sent him significantly heavier to the Giro than the '22 Vuelta for that very reason. Their explanation was that he needed to be lighter in the '22 Vuelta because it had more short and steep climbs, compared to the Giro, which supposedly had longer and less steep climbs and this way he could benefit more from the TT's. Which again shows you the masterminds that are surrounding him at SQS. Taking the risk of losing multiple minutes in the mountains, to gain a few seconds in the TT. Also, why does Vingegaard weigh so little for the Tour? Because the Tour has even longer and less steep climbs generally speaking than the Giro. Why hasn't Visma caught on yet? They should put Vingegaard in the Tour weighing 68 or something, he will do even better in the flat TT and the extra weight doesn't really matter that much in the mountains.

So given how he cracked from being too heavy in the Vuelta, he wouldn't have been able to contend for the title in the Giro as he was also too heavy there (in hindsight)?

 

[Berniece]

So given how he cracked from being too heavy in the Vuelta, he wouldn't have been able to contend for the title in the Giro as he was also too heavy there (in hindsight)?

Different type of racing, against different type of opponents. Or did you feel Roglic was as strong in the Giro as in the Vuelta?

 

[EddyMazzoleni]

The same conclusions any sane person would. Like I said, UNLESS his mid-February (climbing) form is worse than usual, IT LOOKS like his level hasn't gone up. For now. Malhao could be different. We only have one data point right now.

His 2022 climbing form was awful in the early season, then he won the Vuelta by virtue of beeing the best climber.
Also Martinez is not the last bum, he won Dauphine and finished 5th at the Giro while beeing a domestique.

 

[Eddy Evenepoel]

The same conclusions any sane person would. Like I said, UNLESS his mid-February (climbing) form is worse than usual, IT LOOKS like his level hasn't gone up. For now. Malhao could be different. We only have one data point right now.

One could also argue that yesterday was his best Foia climb.

Yes, he won it in 2020 but the climbing time was better this year, even with a harder run in to Foia and with headwin until the final 2 km. In 2020 number 10 finished 8 seconds behind.
In 2022 he was only 6th and the top 10 was on same time. The climbing time here was pretty slow.
Yesterday he got beaten by Martinez, but there was a real time gap behind him and number 10 lost 18 seconds. So just by this one data point one could argue that his level have slighlty raised, but it's of course as pointless as it is to argue that no change has happened based on the same single data point.

Malhao will be interesting. He's lost some time here the previous 2 attempts. In 2020 he was 3rd, losing 4 seconds to Lopez, and in 2020 he was 5th losing 9 seconds to Higuita. It's interesting both in terms of his level and for the race win. He needs a significant buffer from the TT if he's going to lose 9 seconds + bonus to Martinez again on Malhao.

Remcos big weakness is said to be the big mountain stages, and we won't see him race that before Dauphine. Paris-Nice and Itulzia have challenging courses, but more of these shorter (and steeper) climbs that we kind of knows he can do on good form. So I think it's hard to do good prognosis of what he's capable to do in the Tour before we've seen him on some of the bigger climbs in Dauphine.

 

[Eddy Evenepoel]

So given how he cracked from being too heavy in the Vuelta, he wouldn't have been able to contend for the title in the Giro as he was also too heavy there (in hindsight)?

I guess it would depend if he was equally "overweight" in the Giro, wouldn't it?

Just as an example:
Say if he was 3 kg "overweight" in Vuelta because the heavy focus on WC ITT and he was 1,5 km "overweight" in the Giro because they wanted him a bit stronger in the TTs the 1,5 kg difference might have a big difference on his climbing level.

 

[frisenfruitig]

We have already seen in the Vuelta he won that he can handle any kind of mountain stage, haven't we? The question isn't "can he handle short steep climbs/long climbs/multiple climbs" but rather how he stacks up against Vingegaard and Pogacar.

Personally I don't think he will be able to match either of them over 3 weeks but I'd love to be wrong on that.

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

So given how he cracked from being too heavy in the Vuelta, he wouldn't have been able to contend for the title in the Giro as he was also too heavy there (in hindsight)?

I believe he cracked in the Vuelta because they got his nutrition wrong, trying to loose weight too fast or during the Vuelta. All signs point to that imho. They sent him to the Giro with a weight they considered ideal for that race, so they didn't need to start messing around with his diet. So he would not have experienced in the Giro, the bonk he experienced in the Vuelta.

However, that does not mean i think he would have sailed through the mountainstages. Imho, it would have been a struggle for him due to his weight. But i do believe he might still have won the Giro, for two reasons. First of all, without covid the outcome of his two last stages would have been more favorable. He probably wouldn't have lost time the stage before the TT and he would have gained extra time in the TT. And two, Van Wilder lost roughly about 5 minutes since he started riding for GC and after his time gained with the long break. He is the same size and weight as Evenepoel, similar bodytype. So while i think he would have bled seconds in the last week here and there, it might have been enough with a nice buffer. I also think he would have gained time in the last TT.

But overall, i think the two GT's where they got his weight in the ballpark, were Giro '21 and Vuelta '22. They supposedly poached one of the Visma nutritionist for this year. So i'm crossing all my fingers and toes.