Teams & Riders Thibaut Pinot discussion thread

[Leinster]

Yeah, I don't deny that he is very strong and was one of the very best this year's Tour. However, that's just the story of his GT career in recent years. Being very strong, but then getting sick/suffering/having an off day/losing time on a flat stage etc. It seems like this always happens to him.

But yes, he's still not 30 yet so of course he still has some GT shots in him. Personally, I just won't count him among the top contenders anymore. Outsider? Sure.

I think I had already written him down as a perennial outsider. This year's Tour made me believe that he can possibly go one better and actually win it. I don't think I ever would have believed that before.

That said, he's probably destined never to actually win a GT. But after this year I would say he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he didn't come back and try.

 

[tobydawq]

I think I had already written him down as a perennial outsider. This year's Tour made me believe that he can possibly go one better and actually win it. I don't think I ever would have believed that before.

That said, he's probably destined never to actually win a GT. But after this year I would say he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he didn't come back and try.

I very much agree with the first part but not the second since destiny is not a real thing.

 

[Red Rick]

This Tour was crazy. It both made you think Pinot could actually do it while reinforcing the idea that he probably won't.

I think he should go for the Tour, Olympics and Worlds next year. Hope France won't go all in on Alaphilippe on those.

 

[macbindle]

This Tour was crazy. It both made you think Pinot could actually do it while reinforcing the idea that he probably won't.

How weird.

I said the same thing, got tag-team baited, and then found myself banned by you for (irony of ironies) 'baiting'.

You can apologise, in private, if you have the integrity so to do.

 

[Leinster]

I very much agree with the first part but not the second since destiny is not a real thing.

Well allow me to rephrase; Like Rick, after this year's Tour, I now believe that he CAN win the Tour. However, I still believe that he never WILL, no matter what he does, how hard he tries, how strong he and his team are or how well he prepares. I believe there will always be a handlebar to bang his knee, or a kiddie pool to explode during his time trial, or a salad cream bottle to smash his toe, or a saddle sore to force him out of the race while holding a comfortable lead with 4 stages remaining. And I will continue to believe all these things until I see him standing on the top step of the podium on the Champs.

 

[tobydawq]

Well allow me to rephrase; Like Rick, after this year's Tour, I now believe that he CAN win the Tour. However, I still believe that he never WILL, no matter what he does, how hard he tries, how strong he and his team are or how well he prepares. I believe there will always be a handlebar to bang his knee, or a kiddie pool to explode during his time trial, or a salad cream bottle to smash his toe, or a saddle sore to force him out of the race while holding a comfortable lead with 4 stages remaining. And I will continue to believe all these things until I see him standing on the top step of the podium on the Champs.

I thought you were a bit more rational than that, but okay.

 

[macbindle]

Be careful Leinster.

Tobydawg is starting up with personal insults. He did this to me, got his mates to join in, and then a complicit mod (Red Rick) banned me for 'baiting'.

Go back a few pages and you can see the whole thing.

 

[tobydawq]

Yeah, I'm a big bad baitee with a lot of kills on this forum.

Maybe you should look a little at your own business and try to figure out how your posts are likely to be perceived.

 

[RedheadDane]

Unfortunately yes. I've said it before, but I don't see him as much of a GT contender anymore, and I think he should focus more on one-day races instead. I'm sure he could challenge for a podium if he gets it all together, but the fact is we're talking about a guy who has one GT podium five years ago and since then has failed to finish 4/7 GT's he's entered.

If GTs are what he enjoys doing…
No, it doesn't make much sense to enjoy something that has caused you so much pain, but that's the thing; for being the only species that can use logic, us humans can be very illogical.

 

[macbindle]

Yeah, I'm a big bad baitee with a lot of kills on this forum.

Maybe you should look a little at your own business and try to figure out how your posts are likely to be perceived.

Here is what you have just replied to Leinster. It's a personal attack. There is no other way to describe it.

I thought you were a bit more rational than that, but okay.

Leinster...dont rise to the bait.

 

[macbindle]

I think I had already written him down as a perennial outsider. This year's Tour made me believe that he can possibly go one better and actually win it. I don't think I ever would have believed that before.

That said, he's probably destined never to actually win a GT. But after this year I would say he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he didn't come back and try.

He has abandoned more grand Tours than he has finished. I cant think of any grand tour winners in recent history with a palmares like that, which to a reasonable impartial mind would suggest that he is not going to win.

 

[tobydawq]

Okay, now I just re-read the last few pages, and I must say you should probably not refer to them if you want to portray me as the bad one here.

The past 40 days have really not made your work there age well, and you still come off like an extraordinarily unpleasant person who for some reason feels the need to stomp on Pinot and all his fans RIGHT after the biggest disappointment of his career, spewing vitriol and insane conclusions that had all been proven wrong in the preceding 14 days, and dozens of posters call you out (but apparently they are just my mates - I don't know if you imagine me writing PM's to them all: "Hey, macbindle is being unpleasant in the Pinot thread and actually making good points, but let's pretend he isn't and ridicule him instead").

Meanwhile, you also attack other people personally, like RedHeadDane whom you say cannot comprehend English that well as it is not her first language.

And now I am absolutely done talking to you.

 

[macbindle]

And you are saying Leinster is irrational...

Anyway, bye bye.

Perhaps now that you are gone the rest of us can have a dispassionate evidence-based grown up discussion about a sportsman without you and others bringing their own emotional fanboyism into it.

 

[RedheadDane]

Honestly, my biggest concern is his earlier talk about needing to win the Tour, because that's frankly not true. He's got a brilliant palmares! And I hope that when he retires - hopefully not anytime soon - and looks back at his career he won't see it as a failure, even if he never wins the Tour.

 

[macbindle]

Honestly, my biggest concern is his earlier talk about needing to win the Tour, because that's frankly not true. He's got a brilliant palmares! And I hope that when he retires - hopefully not anytime soon - and looks back at his career he won't see it as a failure, even if he never wins the Tour.

He's French, and he is probably the closest the French have got to winning their own race in recent years (barring a nascent Ala). That is some pressure on his shoulders from fans and in his head.

I got shouted down and tag-baited for saying this before but he is, in my view, mentally fragile and what I have written in the top paragraph is part of this.

In my view, this is a fatal flaw for an aspiring Tour winner and the frequent abandons are a reflection of this (and please don't start banging on about the hsmstring) Somebody earlier mentioned not believing in destiny, but the other side of the same coin is luck. People are quick to cite 'bad luck' when accounting for the favourite riders lack of success...but if you dont believe in destiny then you probably shouldn't believe in luck either.

I hope I'm allowed to hold and express views on this thread without the ugly display of bullying I experienced before.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Sad to hear he won't race again this season, but I want him to fully recover for next season. He sounds upbeat about 2020 in the team statement.

 

[Nirvana]

I know that won't happen but I still hope to see him focus on spring and fall one day races plus some one week races and only Vuelta without too much pressure for GC as GT instead of wasting another season around the Tour, he could also be one of the favourites for both Olympics and Worlds next year if he won't kill his body in France next July.

 

[yaco]

It's interesting that the two big French hopes in Bardet and Pinot have pulled the pin on their season after the TDF - My preference would be for them to do some racing to close out the season.

 

[Leinster]

It's interesting that the two big French hopes in Bardet and Pinot have pulled the pin on their season after the TDF - My preference would be for them to do some racing to close out the season.

I think if Pinot had continued in the Tour and managed to hobble around to a top sprinters place plus his Tourmalet stage win, he would have carried on with the season. But the injury did for him.

Bardet, on the other hand, probably needs to reassess his goals for 2020. Maybe get more familiar with the roads around Liege, Siena, San Sebastián and Como.

 

[Tonton]

If Slovakia goes well, this may all change. But looking at his Strava (which isn't saying much - since '17 he doesn't post all his rides) Thibaut shouldn't be in good form. The team plays it safe PR-wise, the big objective was Le Tour and we all know how it went. We'll see. AFAIC, I want a win, blood, guts before the off season...but I don't get to decide.

For the GT comments, if nothing else, this year's TdF was Pinot at his best. No reason to go to one-day races, blah-blah-blah. He dropped Bernal like a bad habit twice. He was the only one who did it. He coudda shoudda won. I somewhat understand preparing '20 right now with the OG, WRRC that should suit him, and Le Tour. ASO will want it close/entertaining/suspense-filled, so the route should be Ok for him, and if Tibopino can avoid bad luck, who knows...

 

[SHAD0W93]

Can we stop with all of this personal stuff. What one poster said one way is completely different than the what the other said.

I wonder for next year if Giro, Olympics, Vuelta, GdL might be a better program. Giro for GC, best placement at Olympics and GdL, and stages at Vuelta.

I hope he wins a Grand Tour and you never now, surprises happen.

 

[tobydawq]

If Slovakia goes well, this may all change. But looking at his Strava (which isn't saying much - since '17 he doesn't post all his rides) Thibaut shouldn't be in good form. The team plays it safe PR-wise, the big objective was Le Tour and we all know how it went. We'll see. AFAIC, I want a win, blood, guts before the off season...but I don't get to decide.

For the GT comments, if nothing else, this year's TdF was Pinot at his best. No reason to go to one-day races, blah-blah-blah. He dropped Bernal like a bad habit twice. He was the only one who did it. He coudda shoudda won. I somewhat understand preparing '20 right now with the OG, WRRC that should suit him, and Le Tour. ASO will want it close/entertaining/suspense-filled, so the route should be Ok for him, and if Tibopino can avoid bad luck, who knows...

Didn't he say his season was finished?

 

[memyselfandI]

Can we stop with all of this personal stuff. What one poster said one way is completely different than the what the other said.

I wonder for next year if Giro, Olympics, Vuelta, GdL might be a better program. Giro for GC, best placement at Olympics and GdL, and stages at Vuelta.

I hope he wins a Grand Tour and you never now, surprises happen.

+1

Sadly I think Tibopino does not have a chance to win TdF during his career. He's dug his own mental pothole around himself by saying he must win it. It cannot be like that, too much drama.

It's known working process as can be seen how the best athletes and teams handle it these days. They see performance AND tactical parts from where GT overall win is made and hone those every part up to perfection.

His personal skillset is not that good when compared against others and it's getting worse now there's turnover of younger generation that has super excellence in key skills for GC. Not that he's not trying, actually he saves much with kinda overreaching, there's much similarities between him and Pierre Latour in this habit.

Then this drama when something slightly happends, tears and drama, when in reality mesureable skills to be honed, time much more well spent, rather than crying in front of cameras.

Team does not make things easier, not a chance against modern GC teams. No purpose built team. Lack of power and trying to go for sprints or stages, well..No modern GC team, no legs means no possible to play.

So no drama really, just seen and known facts that nobody's interested.

 

[RedheadDane]

I don't think he can help it, showing how he feels. He couldn't exactly hide his amusement over Madiot's antics either… He just strikes me as a guy who feels how he feels, and no point in hiding it (which, btw, I consider a strength, not a weakness.)
Was it strictly speaking necessary to have cameras on the entire time? No... maybe not. But when we saw him abandon in tears during the stage, that was the organisers leaving a camera with him. Would it have been kinder to just leave him alone? Absolutely! However, I think we all know that was never going to happen. This is the guy who gave the French the hope that for the first time in over 30 years they could finally get a Tour winner of their own.
As for the scenes shown in the documentary, well… I suppose they could have just stopped the project (maybe not even told anyone about it, I at least didn't hear about it before they showed that bedroom scene...) but I think the whole purpose was to show the good and the bad. Not some rose-coloured glasses version.

 

[Bolder]

If you strip away his emotions -- which are fine, that's who he is -- the key point is that unless you are Tom Dumoulin, you cannot win a GT without a strong team. FdJ is not a strong Grand Tour team. Honestly I think Pinot's "skillset" is fine ... he could focus a bit more on ITT but he's far from a Quintana or Bardet in that respect. This year was a fabulous opportunity, certainly going into the Alps he was as well placed as he could have been. Who knows what would have happened if he hadn't gotten injured? My likely guess is that Ineos would have tag teamed him into submission, and if the final stage hadn't been truncated he would have been dropped on the Val Thorens climb.

Nonetheless it's interesting how polarizing he is as a rider....kind of like Porte, in a way, where there's one side that says "he's just got terrible luck" and the other side says, "he's mentally fragile." I think it's somewhere in the middle...you can avoid a lot of bad "luck" with preparation and a laser like focus on what could go wrong in any situation. And also a strong team that will form a bubble around you...