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

[Red Rick]

Neither Froome nor Contador would be winning any TdFs in the current era.

Neither of them would do the watts they did then in the current era.

 

[Samu Cuenca]

Jakob Fuglsang would be doing his best watts ever in every single era.

 

[kingjr]

Neither of them would do the watts they did then in the current era.

I see no reason to believe either would have been a big threat to the best cyclist we've ever seen and the only one who's been able to beat him. The level in their time was rather crappy compared to today.

 

[houtdffan]

'Impetuous, overconfident, and tactically ill-advised' - Remco Evenepoel regretting early aggression on UAE Tour climb, lost time

'Muscle damage' from intense time trial using 68-tooth chainring and broken AC led to bad day

www.cyclingnews.com

Remco admitted he rode the climb like an utter idiot. He got excited when he saw Del Toro dropped and went way too hard way too early

Basically, he did the climb as it was a 1km climb

 

[topcat]

Maybe if they put Remco in a room with AC he could teach Remco how to climb.

If they put Remco in a room with air conditioning, then Remco could teach Remco to climb.
Winning the UAE tour is like kissing your Imam. Ok you got the kiss, but it's stil your Imam.

 

[topcat]

Its getting to the point its time to face the reality boys in terms of climbing.

If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck. Im sorry.

@Lequack

 

[rghysens]

I will say this, i do believe Remco will get at least one real chance to win the Tour.
Unfortunately that don't mean he'll be able to take it. I had genuine believe in Jurgen Van Den Broeck for a legit shot at the Tour during 2011. Only for him to crash on stage 9.

Now that Seixas has won his first mtf, we don´t have to expect much flat itt´s in the tour the next 15 years. Evenepoel won´t have one real chance.

 

[Divergence]

At some point as you drop weight, performance diminishes. I think that point is different for everyone. Or do you think Froome just wanted it more than anyone else in his generation?

The entire glp1 drug revolution has pretty conclusively proven, to me, that discipline is a myth. We are slaves to our hormones and we all have a different cocktail. And even if you have all the discipline in the world, where the body flips over to catabolism may be 6% or 2.5%.

I appears Froome was doing everything he can to be as lean as possible. Even things I would not recommend, such as fasted training and drinking only sparkling water and semi starving. And still, there was no apparent performance diminishment.
In, general I have never seen a pro rider say something akin to I was too lean so I did not do well on the Alpe. (This is possible, as I wrote earlier, but one needs to be doing some radical stuff).

It has been clear that there are drugs which suppress appetite (among other things) for quite some time now, so idk if I would call it a revolution. Nevertheless, it does not prove anything.
As I wrote earlier, what is important is to fuel your training well, train well, recover well and also very important to stay focused and disciplined (not just with food but with everything else in life).
That ensures that the body operates at its leanest point without sacrificing performance.
Edit: If we speak about Remco concretely, we have seen him leaner and performing well, so his current state is not even up for debate.

 

[Berniece]

If we speak about Remco concretely, we have seen him leaner and performing well, so his current state is not even up for debate.

I don't think that has anything to do with professionalism or discipline in his case. They have always thought he needed to weigh more during spring classics.

 

[Pozzovivo]

I agree, Evenepoel is a better rider than Onley and would have better chances. But my point is that if you take Pog and Vingegaard out, then the rest of the bunch is quite similar, and race becomes more open. Factors such as luck, who has a bad day and who doesn’t, who loses time in echelons, who makes a tactical mistakes and who doesn't, who is just lucky, how do team strategies change etc. who benefits from team tactics become much more prominent.

We don’t know what the racing would look like if you took Pog and Vingegaard out. Would it be basically the same—full gas from the bottom to the top? Or would it be different, more open, maybe more tactical, with more stop-and-go attacks, different attackers, and different counterattackers?

But overall, I am in your camp. I think that Evenepoel is capable of winning the Tour. But he is not a dominant rider (like Pog, Froome or Contador), where the question is not if they win the Tour, but when. Evenepoel needs the right circumstances and some luck on his side. Maybe it happens, maybe it doesn’t.


For instance, I would say that Roglič was the best GC rider around 2019-2020—not dominant, just a little bit better than the others—but he wasted his opportunities, or maybe he just wasn’t lucky and his window of opportunity closed. Maybe Evnepoel gets his chance, maybe not.

Very fair.

 

[Karl Merckx]

Although the climb itself is much easier so winning the stage or being close is somewhat important for Remco. As for steeper and harder climbs, there he obviously has some work left to do.

if he finishes behind tobias halland johanessen and tijmen graat, it means that the problem is not the climb but remco himself...

 

[Cycling111]

But those cyclists exist. If MVDP didn't exist, Pogacar would already have all 5 Monuments. But he exists.

And Remco debuted the same year as the two who exist. Although Remco's climbing problems have been exist against many rides. It's very obvious; you can't keep denying it and thinking that because he finished third one year he'll win the Tour. There are more races where he's struggled in the mountains.

 

[Red Rick]

I see no reason to believe either would have been a big threat to the best cyclist we've ever seen and the only one who's been able to beat him. The level in their time was rather crappy compared to today.

Being better tham athletes of decades ago isnt something to give credit for. Sports naturally evolve.

I might as well argue the depth of the field is extremely weak now cause 2 guys win everything.

 

[KoopaCycling]

Well, i guess we won't see that big gear in a TT from Remco again in a stage race. I doubt it really mattered as much as he thinks it did. But if he thinks it affected him negatively, he better not use it again if only for the mental side of things.

I'm not a fan of sports people doing unhealthy stuff. So I would not recommend doing crazy stuff to get lean if it is that unhealthy for him. I understand that pro sports are probably unhealthy to begin with. But there got to be limits.

Seixas can time trial as well. if Pogacar beats him in the mountains but Seixas shows he is equal in the TT, we might see a change.

 

[Netserk]

I see no reason to believe either would have been a big threat to the best cyclist we've ever seen and the only one who's been able to beat him. The level in their time was rather crappy compared to today.

fignon would never have stood a chance against zulle and rominger too ?

 

[Divergence]

I don't think that has anything to do with professionalism or discipline in his case. They have always thought he needed to weigh more during spring classics.

Idk about that.
First of all, I would not trust the "they" if I were Remco. As I said before, most of the people in cycling are not very good when it comes to scientific deductions.
But if it is really the case that he could easily stay lean throughout the season but he intentionally pouts on weight, then it might be time for him to switch his approach

 

[Krzysztof_O]

That’s not how it works. People don’t decline simultaneously, Remco could decline earlier or later

It's true but their primes strongly overlap. Seixas has a big chance for success after Pogacar era, maybe he will be the one to beat declining Pogacar and end his reign.

 

[Berniece]

It's true but their primes strongly overlap. Seixas has a big chance for success after Pogacar era, maybe he will be the one be beat declining Pogacar and end his reign.

Who knows, he's 19 so hard to make a guess on his future development. It's easier to make a conclusion after this season when he has ridden Strade, LBL and a GT.

 

[Krzysztof_O]

Who knows, he's 19 so hard to make a guess on his future development. It's easier to make a conclusion after this season when he has ridden Strade, LBL and a GT.

Sure, Ayuso had GT top3 at the age of 19 and then stagnated. Seixas still has to show big improvement in the next 2-3 years.

 

[Netserk]

Sure, Ayuso had GT top3 at the age of 19 and then stagnated. Seixas still has to show big improvement in the next 2-3 years.

on the eye test, he seems more similar to ayuso in how physically mature he looks than pogi did in his first years. but not to the same degree as juan

 

[Berniece]

Sure, Ayuso had GT top3 at the age of 19 and then stagnated. Seixas still has to show big improvement in the next 2-3 of years.

His performance yesterday was nice, but it's hard to properly see in what shape Seixas is compared to others. Maybe he's peaking early this season. It's not like Ayuso and Almeida are at their best now, and that the race was extremely hard.

Seixas showed last year he is already subtop, with a great performance at Dauphine, UEC RR and Lombardia. Looking forward to the bigger races this year to see if he got better. Strade is in 2.5 weeks.

 

[kingjr]

fignon would never have stood a chance against zulle and rominger too ?

The 90s are useless for comparison against any era. The picture is completely distorted.

 

[Netserk]

The 90s are useless for comparison against any era. The picture is completely distorted.

today is more distorted than the 90s.

pogi and vingegaard are greater outliers than pantani and indurain were

 

[kingjr]

Being better tham athletes of decades ago isnt something to give credit for. Sports naturally evolve.

I might as well argue the depth of the field is extremely weak now cause 2 guys win everything.

It's hardly decades ago.

You might, but it's beside the point.

 

[jotafap]

It's hardly decades ago.

You might, but it's beside the point.

It may not have been decades ago, but wasn’t there a significant boom in numbers post-COVID? Yes, so his point remains valid.