The Sam Bennett Discussion Thread

[Zinoviev Letter]

He can’t be overjoyed at his team support in this Vuelta. He’s super strong but the team aren’t giving him any chances.

 

[SafeBet]

He can’t be overjoyed at his team support in this Vuelta. He’s super strong but the team aren’t giving him any chances.

I haven't been following closely but any news regarding his contract situation?
It'd be a shame if he has to stay at Bora and not ride the Giro or the Tour next year + there are plenty of teams in dire need of a top sprinter.

 

[Leinster]

Didn’t they lose 2 or 3 to crashes at the start of the Vuelta? And Majka still has a gc position to work for, even if it isn’t (realistically) a podium, so you can’t expect him to pull much on a flat stage like today, with the final gc stage tomorrow. Edit; yeah, 2 abandons. Formolo and Muhlberger both crashed out, so they’re fighting on 2 fronts with 6 men.

I’d imagine they’ll be all-in for him to win on Sunday, but it’s understandable given their situation that they can’t give full support to a sprinter at the Vuelta, even if he is the best sprinter in the race.

With a bit of joined up thinking, they really ought to have had Bennett and Majka together near the front of the Guadalajara stage. Majka makes that split and suddenly he is in a podium battle.

 

[Breezy1985]

He suggested before the race (or after his first stage win, can't remember) that he'd like to have a tilt at the green Jersey comp. He also went for the intermediate sprint yesterday. I have a feeling he wants it a lot. Yesterday was great in that regard, he could have just as easily missed the break and got nothing. From early on he must have guessed it'd be hard to win the stage but he still picked up 24 points.... I suspect he made the calculation early on to get as many points as possible knowing that he's got two more chances to complete the hattrick of stages.

Assuming the break takes all the points tomorrow then Bennett would need to take all 29 points on Sunday to tie with Primoz.

Hopefully Vuelta switch the points system soon to the TdF model cause its a bit of a joke as is

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Didn’t they lose 2 or 3 to crashes at the start of the Vuelta? And Majka still has a gc position to work for, even if it isn’t (realistically) a podium, so you can’t expect him to pull much on a flat stage like today, with the final gc stage tomorrow. Edit; yeah, 2 abandons. Formolo and Muhlberger both crashed out, so they’re fighting on 2 fronts with 6 men.

I’d imagine they’ll be all-in for him to win on Sunday, but it’s understandable given their situation that they can’t give full support to a sprinter at the Vuelta, even if he is the best sprinter in the race.

With a bit of joined up thinking, they really ought to have had Bennett and Majka together near the front of the Guadalajara stage. Majka makes that split and suddenly he is in a podium battle.

It is of course difficult to support a sprinter and a GC man with a team two men short. But in this race they have supported neither in a significantly useful way. They have stages and a decent GC place thanks almost entirely to the efforts of Bennett and Majka themselves.

This isn’t because the other four are bad riders or because Bora are usually a badly drilled team. It’s just a poor showing in this race. Part of the problem is probably that Muhlberger, the most versatile guy in their race squad, was one of the early victims.

 

[Leinster]

It’s also that there have only been a handful of stages where Bennett could realistically contend. Of those, he’s won 2 and been 2nd 3 times, out of 5 chances. Which is a pretty impressive strike rate by any measure.

 

[happytramp]

It’s also that there have only been a handful of stages where Bennett could realistically contend. Of those, he’s won 2 and been 2nd 3 times, out of 5 chances. Which is a pretty impressive strike rate by any measure.

Also there's only actually been two 'flat' finishes so far. He's been more competitive than I'd imagined he would be the last couple of stages.

 

[happytramp]

If ever you needed an indication of how much bennett needs to leave Bora this vuelta has been it.. How in has he ended up with the same number of stage wins as jackobsen? Bora seem completely incapable of providing even the barest of leadout trains. He'd be as well off on a team consisting solely of himself.... That stage where he ended up on his own in the break with 6 quickstep guys, my god.

 

[tobydawq]

If ever you needed an indication of how much bennett needs to leave Bora this vuelta has been it.. How in has he ended up with the same number of stage wins as jackobsen? Bora seem completely incapable of providing even the barest of leadout trains. He'd be as well off on a team consisting solely of himself.... That stage where he ended up on his own in the break with 6 quickstep guys, my god.

They were five riders left at the end of the race and had a rider at 6th on GC. Hard to expect better support.

 

[happytramp]

They were five riders left at the end of the race and had a rider at 6th on GC. Hard to expect better support.

6th on GC versus possibly winning 4 or 5 stages? Personally I think that's utterly ridiculous.... Anyway, so they have to look after a top 10, fine. So he's behind Sagan, Ackermann and now majka despite being the most successful sprinter in the world. That's not good enough for Bennett. He deserves far better.

 

[Breezy1985]

6th on GC versus possibly winning 4 or 5 stages? Personally I think that's utterly ridiculous.... Anyway, so they have to look after a top 10, fine. So he's behind Sagan, Ackermann and now majka despite being the most successful sprinter in the world. That's not good enough for Bennett. He deserves far better.

I know they have been together for years but I feel Bennett may have outgrown Archibald as he just doesn't look quick enough to keep him in place

 

[42x16ss]

Archbold had to do too much himself, but what he did, he did well. One example - for Bennett's 2nd win Archbold had to take the front waaaaay too early (about 1.1km out) so wound up the peloton as much as possible then made sure Bennett was dropped off neatly onto Jakobsen's wheel. If you watch it again it was a really nice piece of work.

The two of them should be hitting up the Katusha/ICA amalgamation IMO. They have a stack of good support riders but only Martin and Pollitt really capable of winning anything big.

 

[42x16ss]

6th on GC versus possibly winning 4 or 5 stages? Personally I think that's utterly ridiculous.... Anyway, so they have to look after a top 10, fine. So he's behind Sagan, Ackermann and now majka despite being the most successful sprinter in the world. That's not good enough for Bennett. He deserves far better.

Bennett is not the best sprinter in the world. He's close, and worthy of the discussion, but not the best.

 

[hammerthaim]

Bennett is not the best sprinter in the world. He's close, and worthy of the discussion, but not the best.

It's hard to tell when not doing Le Tour.

 

[happytramp]

Bennett is not the best sprinter in the world. He's close, and worthy of the discussion, but not the best.

I said he's the most successful. Which he currently is. More WT wins than any other rider in the peloton.

 

[Faserr]

I still don't get it. He signed a agreement to stay at bora after knowing that he will not ride the Tour and the Giro? Why would he do that? Then he has to pay for leaving if bora agrees. That is not boras fault.
He developed pretty good at bora. I also think that his trainer Dan Lorang at Bora is a main part of his success. I think thats why he isnt extremley angry with them. The situation is really tricky for Bennett.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Bennett is not the best sprinter in the world. He's close, and worthy of the discussion, but not the best.

Maybe. He’s the best all round sprinter at the moment, meaning combined flat big bunch sprinter and uphill / hard course sprinter. In terms of big bunch sprinting alone, it’s hard to separate the very top tier from each other, Bennett, Groenewegen, Ewan, Viviani, even Ackermann. I wouldn’t feel comfortable definitively saying that any of those five is “not the best”. On the basis of this season alone, I tend to think it’s between Bennett and Ewan, but I’m far from certain about it and if you take a slightly longer view over two seasons you could argue it’s between Groenewegen and Viviani. Depending on which bits of data you place most emphasis on there’s a good case for any of them being “the best”.

One of the more remarkable things about Bennett, of course, is that he effectively does everything bar chasing down the break by himself and still wins. His peers are all in receipt of a great deal more support and in a couple of cases, Groenewegen and Ackermann notably, I’m not even sure that they have much notion of how to position themselves at all without someone doing it for them.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Well add Jakobsen to the list above (with ackermann etc), because he showd he is clearly not much lesser.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Well add Jakobsen to the list above (with ackermann etc), because he showd he is clearly not much lesser.

I agree that he’s not much lesser, but being even slightly lesser means you aren’t the best of the best right now, which is what that list was talking about. Jakobsen is the best of the very young guys, is already close to the very best and will almost certainly be on any such list soon enough.

If I had to bet on any sprinter becoming dominant in the way that a Cavendish was in say three years time, it’s Jakobsen. The rest of them aren’t going to get much faster than they are now, he probably will.

I should mention that Gaviria will probably get back in the mix too, but you can’t really put someone with his anonymous season on that kind of list now.