The Role of TTTs in Stage Races

[Angliru]

Read Cobblestoned previous answer for this argument. Your Scarponis, Sanchezes, Cunegos and their respective teams have many months in advance to prepare for a TTT. They can definitely cut their losses if they want to.

Your post implies that these teams don't prepare for the upcoming TTT. As if they concede that doing so is futile since their opponents are so superior. This is completely ludicrous. All the preparation and training in the world won't make up for the difference in actual talent in that discipline. Using your logic if a team like Quickstep spent more time training in the mountains then they could develop into a competitive team with a chance at the gc. These teams DO prepare and train versus the clock but that's still no substitute for the dollars to recruit and pay for actual TT talent.

 

[cineteq]

Your post implies that these teams don't prepare for the upcoming TTT. As if they concede that doing so is futile since their opponents are so superior. This is completely ludicrous. All the preparation and training in the world won't make up for the difference in actual talent in that discipline. Using your logic if a team like Quickstep spent more time training in the mountains then they could develop into a competitive team with a chance at the gc. These teams DO prepare and train versus the clock but that's still no substitute for the dollars to recruit and pay for actual TT talent.

Take EE for example...do i need to say more? Read my other posts and draw your own conclusions. In short, the balance of the other stages (MTFs, ITTs, downhill finishes, cobbels, etc) + other race variables, and keeping the TTT distance reasonably short are important for this to work and not being more biased than an ITT or MTF. Definitely not 39Km like in 2009.

 

[taiwan]

Never said in a TTT. Try reading it again.

TTTs and ITs are but two possible components in a GT. All the components interplay with one another in some kind of balance, obviously. If there's too much imbalance - and I think this is Libertine's point - you have a less enjoyable race. To me this seems self-evident, not controversial.

Can you have a team time trial in a GT and still have a balanced tour? Obviously. Would you use individual time trials to help provide that balance? Almost every time. You'd probably use some other things, too, like cobbles and climbing stages. Again, doesn't seem like a controversial point.

If you weren't talking about Astana's strength in the TTT, which advantaged Contador, then you're talking about the effect the team's strength had on the rest of his race when they worked for Lance. Not much, because a weak unsupportive team could have been just as bad. Pretty irrelevant as well: I think you aknowledged that this was an exceptional situation. Not something to take a general point from.

You're pointing to a vague notion of balance, but balance has been adressed - TTTs help teams that are already advantaged, creating an imbalance in their favour (see, IDK, 2009 Tour?). Your "TTTs are part of a balanced parcours" is equivalent to "Mars bars lite tm can help weight loss as part of a calorie controlled diet", in that if the race is fair it will be despite the TTT.

 

[Cobblestoned]

I hope you realize that it is not as cut and dried as you imply. Big budget teams have a much wider array of talent to choose from to gear their teams to whatever demands the designers of the grand tours' parcours decide upon for each year. The other teams can't simply buy the best in talent in terms of TT's without losing strength in other areas. The TTT if used in a grand tour should be relatively short in length, giving an edge to those teams better at it but not putting the have-nots at such a disadvantage that all is completely lost upon it's completion.

The only thing I realize is your avatar.
But no blame to exactly that man. He takes things serious. Like his team is slowly realizing that you can improve by working hard on it, especially on the technical skills part. Using your TT bike sometimes does miracles.
You don't need talent or money for that.
Most important thing is that you try and do your best.
How should a team do a very technical TTT properly, if some riders even have problems to ride a ITT (bike) properly, start getting panic on the aerobars when the corners come, and looking like Neandertalers on bikes.
Practicing does help a lot more than you might think. Especially and exactly in TTTs.
We are talking about teams and riders on the highest level. Not some poor Conti-teams fighting against Goliath.

Have you ever thought about the reasons for teams working hard on it ?
Have you ever thought about the reasons for riders doing good in TTs ?
Even Cancellara or Martin still have to work hard on it.

But in TTTs it's all down to money, talent and, lets not forget....the moaning of Euskaltel fans.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Take EE for example...do i need to say more? Read my other posts and draw your own conclusions. In short, the balance of the other stages (MTFs, ITTs, downhill finishes, cobbels, etc) + other race variables, and keeping the TTT distance reasonably short are important for this to work and not being more biased than an ITT or MTF. Definitely not 39Km like in 2009.

EE spent quite some time last offseason working on TTs and TTTs at the Autodromo de Navarra. Movistar too, at different times. Unfortunately, there is simply a real lack of Basque time trialling talent, and Spanish in general, mostly to do with the biggest amateur and U23 cycling scenes in Spain being in the north, which has far more hilly and mountainous road races. Samuel Sánchez, of course, is not Basque, but how many good Basque time triallists can you name who are currently riding? Intxausti, Castroviejo and Herrero are the only three that come to mind. Two of them have moved on to Movistar and the third burned his bridges with the team and has disappeared into the ether.

It isn't as simple as "do the training and you will get better". Because all the while they're doing that training, the teams like Sky and Garmin who already tear them to shreds are doing the same. And what's more, the teams like Sky and Garmin can afford to buy people to supplement their time trial and keep it at that better level, whereas EE do not have that option - their budget wouldn't stretch to it even if they were to abandon the Basques-only policy.

Maybe there's a way to make a TTT part of a balanced parcours, but the current race organisers are sure doing an awful job of working it in without results being skewed by it. The only exceptions has been where it is short and in lieu of a prologue, in which case I wonder if there's any point.

 

[The Hitch]

Your post implies that these teams don't prepare for the upcoming TTT. As if they concede that doing so is futile since their opponents are so superior. This is completely ludicrous. All the preparation and training in the world won't make up for the difference in actual talent in that discipline. Using your logic if a team like Quickstep spent more time training in the mountains then they could develop into a competitive team with a chance at the gc. These teams DO prepare and train versus the clock but that's still no substitute for the dollars to recruit and pay for actual TT talent.

Take EE for example...do i need to say more? Read my other posts and draw your own conclusions. In short, the balance of the other stages (MTFs, ITTs, downhill finishes, cobbels, etc) + other race variables, and keeping the TTT distance reasonably short are important for this to work and not being more biased than an ITT or MTF. Definitely not 39Km like in 2009.

You did not respond to a thing he said. He said that teams do train for ttt's in response to your silly suggestion that they don't.

So you tell him to "read your posts" "reach your own conclusions" and then something about itt's and mountain stages

 

[cineteq]

You did not respond to a thing he said. He said that teams do train for ttt's in response to your silly suggestion that they don't.

So you tell him to "read your posts" "reach your own conclusions" and then something about itt's and mountain stages

I did, please read my numerous posts, I don't want to repeat myself anymore, sorry

 

[The Hitch]

I did, please read my numerous posts, I don't want to repeat myself anymore, sorry

Nicely done. Hope you don't mind if I use this response the next time I'm backed into a corner with no idea as to what to say.

 

[Magnus]

Such as its unfairness, its meaning that a rider's time is not a true reflection of their abilities (considering that though it is a team sport it is an INDIVIDUAL classification), its inherent bias towards those teams that are already advantaged anyway, and its encouraging of defensive, dull GC riding as the strongest teams advantaged by it are the ones that find it easiest to control the race?

All of those have been mentioned, and apart from the last they aren't as subjective as most of the arguments in favour. If something as subjective as "it looks cool" is an argument in favour, then "I don't like it" is an argument against.

The notion that some some disciplines or certain parcours entails defensive or dull riding is rather subjective as well imo (at least there is not one-to-one correspondance in all cases).

BMC did well in Les Essarts and wasn't per se "advantaged anyway" (except in ACF et al. point of view).
Sky is another team that did well in the TTT and didn't have a great mountain team.
Off course you might look at other examples that 'proofs' your point.

Clearly the result of a TTT is not only a reflection of a single rider's abilities. But neither is the result of a GT. And a single rider can influence the outcome of a TTT. As an example Vino could clearly have made sure Astana did a better job in the aforementioned giro TTT.

 

[Cobblestoned]

This is how you do it
Hats off to that man...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obTMm5mBLcg&feature=related