This weekends Canadian Races

[goggalor]

Woo, awesome race!

Hesjedal was overeager I think, trying brute-force it on home soil, just like Cancellara did in Mendrisio last year. Voeckler très intelligente.

Also, quite a political statement too, no? Conquering Quebec draped in la tricolore...

 

[Kwibus]

Anyhoo this race is class. Proof that the UCI giving points to races thing can work. If this wasnt pt i doubt we would have seen the high class field.

Shame Sunday wont be live on Eurosport but oh well.

Is that one more or less hilly than this?

That seriously sucks though. Gonna have to watch a french stream I guess.
Montreal is a lot harder then Quebec yeh. Longer hills!
Only the finish is low...

 

[Frosty]

Well they did most of the work bringing back the break. After that they failed kinda though. If EBH had 1 guy with him in that last group then he would've won... So yeh .. Sky could use 1 more really strong guy. A rider that's able to stay with EBH till the end. If they had 1 then EBH would have a lot more 1st places.

Tour of Britain starts this weekend. Maybe one of the guys who is there could have given him that extra bit of help?

 

[michaeld]

Is that one more or less hilly than this?

More. 200m climb. Twice as high as today. This is a similar course to the Women's world cup, '74 worlds, etc.

http://protourquebecmontreal.com/fr/gp-montreal/parcours-mtl/

 

[The Hitch]

Indeed, it was an awesome race.

The race on sunday is a lot harder.

mmm
so maybe Basso was retiring this race to have a go on sunday.

Edit: 2000

 

[Kwibus]

No, that was BMC with kaarsten Kroon on that final lap!

I meant the first break. So all the first 13 rounds Sky was pretty much pulling. Their own mistake though.

 

[maltiv]

It where 400m hills. Nothing Hagen can't handle
Do it x4 that length (Ardennes) and he's nowhere.

It's not a suprise Hagen can handle this. I mean. Boonen did some pretty neat 'climbing' in work like this also. As long as it's not too long they can use their great explosivity to hang on.

Who cares about the ardennes, the important thing is that the climbs are about the same length as in worlds this year.

 

[Kwibus]

mmm
so maybe Basso was retiring this race to have a go on sunday.

I hope that was the reason. Would be nice to see him competing for the win on Sunday.
Before the race he said that today he would help Oss and Sagan and sunday he would go for the win.
He didn't really help Sagan and Oss though...

 

[ingsve]

Anyhoo this race is class. Proof that the UCI giving points to races thing can work. If this wasnt pt i doubt we would have seen the high class field.

Shame Sunday wont be live on Eurosport but oh well.

Is that one more or less hilly than this?

The big hill on it is bigger than today, 1.8km at 8%, but the finish is flatter. The big hill comes early on each lap. Attacks on the final lap will probably be enough to stay away from any type of peloton though I doubt the peloton will even be big at that point.

 

[Descender]

Who cares about the ardennes, the important thing is that the climbs are about the same length as in worlds this year.

Nah.

The first climb in the Worlds only is about the same gradient as the Cote de Montagne today but 1km long instead of 350m.

 

[theyoungest]

Who cares about the ardennes, the important thing is that the climbs are about the same length as in worlds this year.

I'm starting to wonder why the hell Gesink won't go to the Worlds. He's still the best shot at a podium place for the Dutch.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

It's also a tactical mistake by them which they make over and over and over. Since they refuse to go in breakaways (breakaways are so last year, right?) they always have to be the team chasing. So today they used everyone except from Edvald to reel back the first breakaway, and then obviously Edvald wasn't going to get any help whatsoever in the final.

Steve Cummings was as many breaks in the Giro as anybody bar Jérôme Pineau.

 

[velosiped]

Well they did most of the work bringing back the break. After that they failed kinda though. If EBH had 1 guy with him in that last group then he would've won... So yeh .. Sky could 1 extra really strong guy. A rider that's able to stay with EBH till the end. If they had 1 then EBH would have a lot more 1st places.

It has been like this all season long.
Flecha had a good cobble-campaign solely on his own.
Slow leadout probably made them loose Vattenfall by 2 inches.
Eneco was definatly lost because none was there to catch Martin and Morenhout.
This race was lost because not one peasant managed to hang by the last km's.
Something got to be wrong with team management.
Riders with ambitions has to stay away from these amateurs!

 

[Moondance]

Yep very nice too.

Though i hope the mods dont pin me as the raison detre (for) all this increased swearing since i appealed against it.

I could make a comment about doing something with moderators for fun, and getting a green card while I'm at it... But we'd better not joke about such things

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Who cares about the ardennes, the important thing is that the climbs are about the same length as in worlds this year.

Was there ANY question at all Hagen could handle the worlds course this year then???

That is new to me. If Hagen is ever going to find a tailor made course, it's this year.
A shame his team is sh.t and that the main opponents are attackers, like Gilbert and Pozzato. So he is going to either have to react to attacks himself or hope Spain gambles on Freire (who's not even certain yet)

Tactically it's not easy. The course is perfect for Hagen. Who could ever doubt that.

 

[The Hitch]

I could make a comment about doing something with moderators for fun, and getting a green card while I'm at it... But we'd better not joke about such things

lol

i didnt get it at first but i think i do now. The original phrase involves the word "communists" rather than "moderators" right?

 

[auscyclefan94]

Was there ANY question at all Hagen could handle the worlds course this year then???

That is new to me. If Hagen is ever going to find a tailor made course, it's this year.
A shame his team is sh.t and that the main opponents are attackers, like Gilbert and Pozzato. So he is going to either have to react to attacks himself or hope Spain gambles on Freire (who's not even certain yet)

Tactically it's not easy. The course is perfect for Hagen. Who could ever doubt that.

Length of race could be a factor and I have not seen the profile but Melbourne/Geelong has some very steep pitches on those climbs which EBH may struggle with.

 

[ingsve]

It where 400m hills. Nothing Hagen can't handle
Do it x4 that length (Ardennes) and he's nowhere.

It's not a suprise Hagen can handle this. I mean. Boonen did some pretty neat 'climbing' in work like this also. As long as it's not too long they can use their great explosivity to hang on.

Well, the final climb to the finish was 1.2 km though only at 3%. It was hard enough to give the thougher riders a shot rather than any type of pure sprinter. I'm not implying that EBH is going to win LBL or anything only that given the type of riders that was there it was well done by him to also be there.

 

[Moondance]

lol

i didnt get it at first but i think i do now. The original phrase involves the word "communists" rather than "moderators" right?

Most defintely.

 

[The Hitch]

my feed died in final straight just like ballan. That idiot couldn't sprint for "poo". Why didn't he just hit em with an attack!!!

This comment seemed different to me when i first read it

 

[The Hitch]

Most defintely.

Nicely done. Made me work to get it. Subtle and funny.

 

[hatcher]

It has been like this all season long.
Flecha had a good cobble-campaign solely on his own.
Slow leadout probably made them loose Vattenfall by 2 inches.
Eneco was definatly lost because none was there to catch Martin and Morenhout.
This race was lost because not one peasant managed to hang by the last km's.
Something got to be wrong with team management.
Riders with ambitions has to stay away from these amateurs!

Utter nonsense.

They were criticised in the cobble races for doing too much for Flecha, now apparently they did nothing.

EBH lost Vattenfall because Farrar was faster. He was going off the same leadout speed.

Eneco was lost because EBH decided to sit-up, rather than carry on with Martin and Morenhout.

This race was lost because EBH and others didn't react, and then left their kicks too late waiting for others. And for the record, Sky did have a 2nd man up there helping to pull back the Gesink group. I have no earthly idea what more you can expect a team to do for EBH.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

This race was better than the entire Tour of California even with my bias for Marc de Maar...

Canada > USA in cool races, and they are PT!

 

[The Hitch]

. I have no earthly idea what more you can expect a team to do for EBH.

Worlds 2010
Milan San Remo
Ronde van Vlaanderin
Paris Roubaix

do i need to go on?

 

[Moondance]

Worlds 2010
Milan San Remo
Ronde van Vlaanderin
Paris Roubaix

do i need to go on?

Please... No way TGBM will lose any of those.

Better invest in more victories for Eddy Boss in Poland and Benelux