Teams & Riders Vincenzo Nibali discussion thread

[bambino]

Re: Nibali discussion thread

@Jspear:

This is where we disagree, and I made that same point about Contador: these guys are proven winners, greats, not entertainers. Fun to watch? Yes. But for a rider of his stature, winning is everything. "When not in perfect form", he may win one or even two stages, but finish 5th-8th in the GC: that's rubbish for a guy who won all three GTs. Two stage wins are not offsetting a mediocre GT placing IMO, when you look at the record.

Leave on top. Many riders don't get the chance to leave on their own terms. Nibali has an opportunity to do so after no less than the anniversary Giro. My advice to Vincenzo: make it your only priority, win and say ciao. Make your exit greater than all greats, including Vino .

He thinks he has four more good years ahead. I just hope Slongo will get it right this Giro and then we'll see.

I think he had to change the # of good years because of Rio and the mis-fortune there. With Olympic gold in his palmares after last year, he would only focus peaking to Worlds this and next year with a goal of leaving the sport as the winner of all GT's, Classic, Monument, Olympics and Worlds. Now he needs to continue until Tokyo

 

[Brullnux]

Decent start, 10th on the first MTF of the year is something he hasn't managed since 2012. Last year he finished 8th on the second, before smashing Oman and would've probably won Tirenno-Adriatico had they not cancelled the only hard stage for no reason. Then of course it all went wrong between April and May, and nobody really knows why, but this is still a good sign. Even in 2013 he had a meh start to the year.

 

[HelloDolly]

He will win the Giro in 2017 ... that is my predictation . In the end he has everything on his side

 

[bassano]

Re:

He will win the Giro in 2017 ... that is my predictation . In the end he has everything on his side

It would be nice but he have to show better performance then last year, and Bahrain is not as good as Astana which helped him a lot last year

 

[Brullnux]

Re: Re:

He will win the Giro in 2017 ... that is my predictation . In the end he has everything on his side

It would be nice but he have to show better performance then last year, and Bahrain is not as good as Astana which helped him a lot last year

The weird thing is that Nibali seemed better in Tirreno and Oman than on a couple of stages of the Giro. Even on Stage 20 he wasn't that strong.

 

[Mr.White]

Re: Re:

He will win the Giro in 2017 ... that is my predictation . In the end he has everything on his side

It would be nice but he have to show better performance then last year, and Bahrain is not as good as Astana which helped him a lot last year

The weird thing is that Nibali seemed better in Tirreno and Oman than on a couple of stages of the Giro. Even on Stage 20 he wasn't that strong.

Really? Where in Tirreno? And in Oman, bar Badret, he outclimbed all bona fide climbers, Fuglsang, Dumoulin, Rui Costa, Kudus, George Bennett and EBH! While on stage 20 he beat only the entire Giro field and sealed the overall victory... To me it's clear where he was stronger

 

[May0maniac]

On stage 2 of Tirreno - Adriatico when he finished 6th on an easy uphill finish ahead of guys like GvA, Benoot, Kwaitkowski and Ulissi and on the 2nd stage in Oman when he finished 2nd on a similar finish ahead of GvA, if Nibali's great on a short, easy climb and beats the puncheurs and classic specialists he has to be in peak shape. Maybe he also worked a lot on his explosiveness because of the Olympic RR, who knows.

 

[Brullnux]

Re: Re:

He will win the Giro in 2017 ... that is my predictation . In the end he has everything on his side

It would be nice but he have to show better performance then last year, and Bahrain is not as good as Astana which helped him a lot last year

The weird thing is that Nibali seemed better in Tirreno and Oman than on a couple of stages of the Giro. Even on Stage 20 he wasn't that strong.

Really? Where in Tirreno? And in Oman, bar Badret, he outclimbed all bona fide climbers, Fuglsang, Dumoulin, Rui Costa, Kudus, George Bennett and EBH! While on stage 20 he beat only the entire Giro field and sealed the overall victory... To me it's clear where he was stronger

No I agree he was stronger in the last stage of the Giro than in early season races, but in a couple of stages (13, 15, 5) he looked really bad. I think the misunderstanding came through how I phrased it, and the sentences came one after another. My point was that he still wasn't that strong on Stage 20, despite sealing the overall, as he faded really badly at the end. iirc he only had like a 20 second gap maximum to Uran and Bala despite dropping them on the penultimate climb.

 

[King Boonen]

Just bumping up the thread for the greatest GT rider of the current era. Hopefully he can add another this year and maybe a monument.

 

[Irondan]

Re:

Just bumping up the thread for the greatest GT rider of the current era. Hopefully he can add another this year and maybe a monument.

I'm not sure he's the "greatest GT rider of the current era" but he's exciting to watch race and definitely in that conversation, also one of my two favorite riders!

I think he can take the Giro this year..

 

[Jspear]

Re: Re:

Just bumping up the thread for the greatest GT rider of the current era. Hopefully he can add another this year and maybe a monument.

I'm not sure he's the "greatest GT rider of the current era" but he's exciting to watch race and definitely in that conversation, also one of my two favorite riders!

I think he can take the Giro this year..

I want to believe that, it's just Quintana's a problem. I'll be rooting big time for Nibali, but if I was betting I'd have to go with Quintana.

 

[Irondan]

Re: Re:

Just bumping up the thread for the greatest GT rider of the current era. Hopefully he can add another this year and maybe a monument.

I'm not sure he's the "greatest GT rider of the current era" but he's exciting to watch race and definitely in that conversation, also one of my two favorite riders!

I think he can take the Giro this year..

I want to believe that, it's just Quintana's a problem. I'll be rooting big time for Nibali, but if I was betting I'd have to go with Quintana.

Quintana has to choose a race to peak on though, which I'm guessing will be the Tour, he can't peak for both races (I hope!).

 

[manolo57]

Quintana could win the Giro even without peaking for it... if there were not 67 km of ITT.

So let's see, but I'm nearly sure Quintana will be at a very high level at the Giro, trying to keep his shape until the Tour thanks to his incredible stamina.

 

[Irondan]

Re:

Quintana could win the Giro even without peaking for it... if there were not 67 km of ITT.

So let's see, but I'm nearly sure Quintana will be at a very high level at the Giro, trying to keep his shape until the Tour thanks to his incredible stamina.

Okie dokie...

 

[spiritualride]

Re:

Just bumping up the thread for the greatest GT rider of the current era. Hopefully he can add another this year and maybe a monument.

Other day I watched that 2014 TDF cobbles stage... incredible stuff. Does anyone know why everyone thought Nibali would perform poorly in that stage? Even at the end, the commentary and all the posters here were writing him off, saying he would lose minutes in the mountains to all the other GC contenders. But before the stage everyone thought he would perform badly on the cobbles... why?

 

[Sciocco]

Re: Re:

Just bumping up the thread for the greatest GT rider of the current era. Hopefully he can add another this year and maybe a monument.

Other day I watched that 2014 TDF cobbles stage... incredible stuff. Does anyone know why everyone thought Nibali would perform poorly in that stage? Even at the end, the commentary and all the posters here were writing him off, saying he would lose minutes in the mountains to all the other GC contenders. But before the stage everyone thought he would perform badly on the cobbles... why?

I feel like he had very little cobble experience prior so nobody would've guessed he would boss it that much plus his teammate was BEYOND helpful.

 

[King Boonen]

Re: Re:

Just bumping up the thread for the greatest GT rider of the current era. Hopefully he can add another this year and maybe a monument.

Other day I watched that 2014 TDF cobbles stage... incredible stuff. Does anyone know why everyone thought Nibali would perform poorly in that stage? Even at the end, the commentary and all the posters here were writing him off, saying he would lose minutes in the mountains to all the other GC contenders. But before the stage everyone thought he would perform badly on the cobbles... why?

People love to write off Nibali. He's won 4 GTs, top 3 in 4 others, won a Monument, top 3 in 2 others including MSR and a whole host of other results yet people still always say he's lucky, or he only won because someone else wasn't there.

For the cobbles I believe he came out and said he'd never ridden pavé before recon for the stage and as usual people wrote him off. What followed was one of the best performances you'll see from a GC rider in a very, very long time. Yes, Westra and Fuglsang were brilliant but 3rd on the stage, riding away from a group containing Cancellara and Sagan, sticking over 2 minutes on his rivals, chasing Boom on that last section. Epic stuff.

 

[Irondan]

Re: Re:

Just bumping up the thread for the greatest GT rider of the current era. Hopefully he can add another this year and maybe a monument.

Other day I watched that 2014 TDF cobbles stage... incredible stuff. Does anyone know why everyone thought Nibali would perform poorly in that stage? Even at the end, the commentary and all the posters here were writing him off, saying he would lose minutes in the mountains to all the other GC contenders. But before the stage everyone thought he would perform badly on the cobbles... why?

People love to write off Nibali. He's won 4 GTs, top 3 in 4 others, won a Monument, top 3 in 2 others including MSR and a whole host of other results yet people still always say he's lucky, or he only won because someone else wasn't there.

For the cobbles I believe he came out and said he'd never ridden pavé before recon for the stage and as usual people wrote him off. What followed was one of the best performances you'll see from a GC rider in a very, very long time. Yes, Westra and Fuglsang were brilliant but 3rd on the stage, riding away from a group containing Cancellara and Sagan, sticking over 2 minutes on his rivals, chasing Boom on that last section. Epic stuff.

Not to mention the most epic 'come from behind' win in recent Grand Tour history in last years Giro. Sure Kruijswijk had to crash out for it to work but that's all part of riding the race. You have to finish!

Nibs was 4:43 behind the leader in fourth place after stage 18 and won the race in stages 19 and 20. Unheard of in the modern peloton, and truly epic. Yet I read comment after comment of people trying to minimize that accomplishment.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re: Re:

Nibs was 4:43 behind the leader in fourth place after stage 18 and won the race in stages 19 and 20. Unheard of in the modern peloton, and truly epic. Yet I read comment after comment of people trying to minimize that accomplishment.

Don't forget he was "only" 1:43 behind Chaves still a very impressive feat

 

[Irondan]

Re: Re:

Nibs was 4:43 behind the leader in fourth place after stage 18 and won the race in stages 19 and 20. Unheard of in the modern peloton, and truly epic. Yet I read comment after comment of people trying to minimize that accomplishment.

Don't forget he was "only" 1:43 behind Chaves still a very impressive feat

Agreed!

Too bad for Chavez though, I really like him. His days of glory are surely ahead.

 

[yaco]

People forget that when Orica split up the peleton with 2 climbs to go in stage 19, that Nibali couldn't go with the initial acceleration of Chaves and Kruuswilk - Nibali managed to claw his way back up to their wheels.

 

[Gigs_98]

Re: Nibali discussion thread

Yeah, I think one of the main reasons why he could do this comeback was his will power. When Kruijswijk crashed Nibali noticed that he had the chance of his life and gave 110% to silence all his critics.
Still I must say that Nibalis palmares doesn't really resemble his ability as a cyclist, but I'm not saying he is simply lucky. What makes Nibali so strong is because he is a born champion. Yeah, he only won the giro because Kruijswijk crashed, but 90% of all gc rider wouldn't have attacked on the descent in the first place. Yeah, he might have lost the tour 2014 without Contador crashing out but let's face the facts, Contador would have needed to be in the shape of his life to gain 2 minutes 30 on Nibali because the Italian attacked on wet cobbles, where no other gc contender would have attacked. He won il Lombardia because he took huge risks when he noticed that he couldn't win by attacking uphill and he won Tirreno Adriatico 2013 because he kept on attacking froome even when the high mountains were already over.
Winning because you are strong makes you a good cyclist, but in my opinion winning when you aren't the strongest is what makes you a legend. And thats what Nibali does very often.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Nibali was 1:43 behind

it's not an impressive feat to make up even 15 minutes when somebody crashes into a wall, so don't count Kruijswijk

 

[Irondan]

Re:

Nibali was 1:43 behind

it's not an impressive feat to make up even 15 minutes when somebody crashes into a wall, so don't count Kruijswijk

Yes, that's already been covered. I'm not so sure you read the previous comments.

Cheers

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re: Re:

Nibs was 4:43 behind the leader in fourth place after stage 18 and won the race in stages 19 and 20. Unheard of in the modern peloton, and truly epic. Yet I read comment after comment of people trying to minimize that accomplishment.

Don't forget he was "only" 1:43 behind Chaves still a very impressive feat

I think we all know what transpired. The impressive thing about Nibali was the desire and will to win, even tho it looked bleak, he basically eliminated Kruijswijk and then ate Chaves for breakfast.

Not really surprising tho that you and especially Dekker Tifosi still are trying to downplay the win