- Aug 6, 2010
- 6,874
- 6,189
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Re:
When I watched this race live I was as annoyed by Gallopin's tactics as much as most (well not as annoyed as Flo
) Contador supporters were. However, when taking on board all of the circumstances and possibilities, I believe that Tony did the right thing, regardless if from his perspective he was riding to help a friend (Thomas). Wellens was the likely winner of the sprint against Contador and Porte, this is true, but the key aspect in all of this is that during all of the last 15 kms, it was pretty touch and go as to whether or not the second group would have caught the three leaders (with or without the help of Sky and Gallopin), even though in the end, they didn't quite make it. And to have that group bridge to them (without Gallopin) would have significantly reduced the chances of Wellens (and his team) winning the stage. Gallopin's efforts were a key to bringing the Sky duo back (Thomas probably wasn't all that strong); if he hadn't worked then they wouldn't have made it. It would have been too late if the second group had bridged across with only a km or two to go to then say to Tony, "start working", as the third group probably would have been 10-20 seconds in arrears, and Wellens would have had to outsprint a far greater number of riders. Lotto were not to know that the three leaders would just hold on. Perhaps at least one of the three might have hit the wall and resulted in a sudden erasing of their minor advantage. Even if Wellens was telling the team that he could keep taking pulls, how were they to know if Contador or Porte were about to go into the red zone?
The front three needed one more helper with them as it turned out. If Majka had someone held on then that would have made the difference, but it was his enormous effort that got Alberto the gap near the top of Eze in the first place.
Publicus said:
When I watched this race live I was as annoyed by Gallopin's tactics as much as most (well not as annoyed as Flo
) Contador supporters were. However, when taking on board all of the circumstances and possibilities, I believe that Tony did the right thing, regardless if from his perspective he was riding to help a friend (Thomas). Wellens was the likely winner of the sprint against Contador and Porte, this is true, but the key aspect in all of this is that during all of the last 15 kms, it was pretty touch and go as to whether or not the second group would have caught the three leaders (with or without the help of Sky and Gallopin), even though in the end, they didn't quite make it. And to have that group bridge to them (without Gallopin) would have significantly reduced the chances of Wellens (and his team) winning the stage. Gallopin's efforts were a key to bringing the Sky duo back (Thomas probably wasn't all that strong); if he hadn't worked then they wouldn't have made it. It would have been too late if the second group had bridged across with only a km or two to go to then say to Tony, "start working", as the third group probably would have been 10-20 seconds in arrears, and Wellens would have had to outsprint a far greater number of riders. Lotto were not to know that the three leaders would just hold on. Perhaps at least one of the three might have hit the wall and resulted in a sudden erasing of their minor advantage. Even if Wellens was telling the team that he could keep taking pulls, how were they to know if Contador or Porte were about to go into the red zone? The front three needed one more helper with them as it turned out. If Majka had someone held on then that would have made the difference, but it was his enormous effort that got Alberto the gap near the top of Eze in the first place.
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