Teams & Riders Vincenzo Nibali discussion thread

[rick james]

Re:

Yes, it is. Froome lost over 2 minutes on Formigal; in his best ever year he lost a minute on the Alpe d'Huez and needed Richie to take an illegal feed for him else he'd have lost more. In 2015 he completely capitulated the last two days, losing just under 2 minutes in that time.

Context please? he was ill in the 3rd week in 2015, ill and still won

 

[Brullnux]

Re: Re:

Yes, it is. Froome lost over 2 minutes on Formigal; in his best ever year he lost a minute on the Alpe d'Huez and needed Richie to take an illegal feed for him else he'd have lost more. In 2015 he completely capitulated the last two days, losing just under 2 minutes in that time.

Context please? he was ill in the 3rd week in 2015, ill and still won

And Nibali was ill in the second week of the 2016 Giro, et cetera et cetera

 

[bambino]

Re:

Yes, it is. Froome lost over 2 minutes on Formigal; in his best ever year he lost a minute on the Alpe d'Huez and needed Richie to take an illegal feed for him else he'd have lost more. In 2015 he completely capitulated the last two days, losing just under 2 minutes in that time.

No it isn't, except with accidents and illness. You realize your examples above does not count even close to the deficit you speculated earlier? Froome has never lost that amount of time to anyone in single GT since he peaked.

Or let's say it this way... everything is possible, but the probability of what you described is somewhere in the range of 1-5%.

And I'm Nibali fan btw.

 

[Brullnux]

Re: Re:

Yes, it is. Froome lost over 2 minutes on Formigal; in his best ever year he lost a minute on the Alpe d'Huez and needed Richie to take an illegal feed for him else he'd have lost more. In 2015 he completely capitulated the last two days, losing just under 2 minutes in that time.

No it isn't, except with accidents and illness. You realize your examples above does not count even close to the deficit you speculated earlier? Froome has never lost that amount of time to anyone in single GT since he peaked.

Or let's say it this way... everything is possible, but the probability of what you described is somewhere in the range of 1-5%.

And I'm Nibali fan btw.

Yeah, unlikely but possible. Unfeasible would be coming from 2 minutes down at the end of the first week.

 

[Rollthedice]

Froome did a Ventoux 2013 type of acceleration on Comella and together with Chavez they produced stratosferic Watts for 11 minutes. He looks skinnier than TdF Froome, if that is even possible. If he keeps his form throughout 3 weeks, with a 40k TT, normally no rider on this planet is able to snatch the overall from him. Fortunately, during 3 weeks, a race offers unexpected opportunities and Vuelta is not as predictable as TdF. The master of the unexpected is in the race and he has already surprised twice so I am still confident.

 

[Gigs_98]

I agree. There is no point in speculating if anyone can beat Froome if we assume that Froome doesn't fade towards the end of the vuelta. That attack was absolutely insane. Chaves could stay with him but I doubt Chaves himself could have attacked like that himself and ofc there is a TT which is in Froome's favor.
However if Froome fades (and I don't think thats extremely unlikely) he can lose big chunks of time, since that has happened before. I don't care what he says about illness. Every time a rider is weak there are excuses like that. Do you think Contador will be back at his best next week and climb together with Froome, since he is only that weak because he ate something bad? Thats the official version but everyone with a brain knows, thats not gonna happen.

 

[Rollthedice]

The logical evolution is that, as the race progresses Froome and the other guys coming from Le Tour will start to fade and Nibali will get better, that's also Slongo's assumption and he has some knowledge. But of course with the alien, you don't really know.

 

[portugal11]

This froome looks the one we saw in the 2012 vuelta. Very strong in the beginning of the race and he started to run out of gas in the beggining of second week

 

[rick james]

Re:

Froome did a Ventoux 2013 type of acceleration on Comella and together with Chavez they produced stratosferic Watts for 11 minutes. He looks skinnier than TdF Froome, if that is even possible. If he keeps his form throughout 3 weeks, with a 40k TT, normally no rider on this planet is able to snatch the overall from him. Fortunately, during 3 weeks, a race offers unexpected opportunities and Vuelta is not as predictable as TdF. The master of the unexpected is in the race and he has already surprised twice so I am still confident.

Please, calm down

 

[Rollthedice]

Re: Re:

Nibali will lose around 20 seconds tomorrow I reckon. Ideally he'll lose less than 1 minute in the whole of the first week but 1:30 to 2 is more likely. If he's within 2 minutes then it is still possible, outside becomes very unlikely unless Froome (and Chaves, Aru and Bardet) fades immensely.

20 sec. to whom? It's a climb with 6.5% average with a few ramps and the finish downhill. He'll be fine.

It's closer to 10%, and doesn't finish downhill. According to the La Vuelta profile it's 330m in 3.4km.

I am a bit confused, in the official roadbook it says:

ERMITA DE STA. LUCÍA
Km 175,7. Desnivel 330 m.
Ascenso 3,4 km. Porcentaje 4,2%

then there is the profile, hence what I said about the descent:

But apparently the finish is uphill as you said.

 

[portugal11]

Re: Re:

Froome did a Ventoux 2013 type of acceleration on Comella and together with Chavez they produced stratosferic Watts for 11 minutes. He looks skinnier than TdF Froome, if that is even possible. If he keeps his form throughout 3 weeks, with a 40k TT, normally no rider on this planet is able to snatch the overall from him. Fortunately, during 3 weeks, a race offers unexpected opportunities and Vuelta is not as predictable as TdF. The master of the unexpected is in the race and he has already surprised twice so I am still confident.

Please, calm down

Yeah, not even close... this attack is way more similar to the one froome.did in the 2014 dauphine. In his ventoux attack is wasn't out of the saddle

 

[Taxus4a]

I agree. There is no point in speculating if anyone can beat Froome if we assume that Froome doesn't fade towards the end of the vuelta. That attack was absolutely insane. Chaves could stay with him but I doubt Chaves himself could have attacked like that himself and ofc there is a TT which is in Froome's favor.
However if Froome fades (and I don't think thats extremely unlikely) he can lose big chunks of time, since that has happened before. I don't care what he says about illness. Every time a rider is weak there are excuses like that. Do you think Contador will be back at his best next week and climb together with Froome, since he is only that weak because he ate something bad? Thats the official version but everyone with a brain knows, thats not gonna happen.

Angliru is a kind of climb no very good for Froome, anyway if he is the strongest he will put time to anyone, but seriously someone is thinking Froome will fade at the end of La Vuelta? He came here last year after to go to Rio for the Olimpics, both ITT and route, and without taking so seriously as this year to win la Vuelta ad he put big time to anyone in the last ITT and he was very strong in Aitana, although not enough to drop a very strong Quintana. This year he is supossed to be stronger than las year, especially at the end.

Chaves is a pure climber and he should be better then him in Angliru, but Froome has Logroño ITT to put him 2 minutes or even 4, becouse Froome is a complete rider. Niai could do good in both scenarios, but Froome is just an stronger rider than Nibali. Anyway Nibali is a difficult rival and he has his optons becouse he knows how to take advantage of his oportunities and he has that necessary instint, and he uses to take risk.

 

[Brullnux]

Re: Re:

Nibali will lose around 20 seconds tomorrow I reckon. Ideally he'll lose less than 1 minute in the whole of the first week but 1:30 to 2 is more likely. If he's within 2 minutes then it is still possible, outside becomes very unlikely unless Froome (and Chaves, Aru and Bardet) fades immensely.

20 sec. to whom? It's a climb with 6.5% average with a few ramps and the finish downhill. He'll be fine.

It's closer to 10%, and doesn't finish downhill. According to the La Vuelta profile it's 330m in 3.4km.

I am a bit confused, in the official roadbook it says:

ERMITA DE STA. LUCÍA
Km 175,7. Desnivel 330 m.
Ascenso 3,4 km. Porcentaje 4,2%

then there is the profile, hence what I said about the descent:

But apparently the finish is uphill as you said.

I haven't seen the roadbook or looked up the climb, I only looked at the last km and profile, apologies. From thos there is 330m in 3.4km, but I know that Vuelta profiles especially concerning climbs can be very misleading. So I was almost certainly wrong, but I shift the blame to ASO

I was going off this, but it definitely isn't 4.2%. I stand by it being closer to 10%.

 

[Rollthedice]

Yes, it is around 3k closer to 10%, brutal.

 

[Brullnux]

How are la Vuelta this useless are giving details

 

[Robert5091]

Last climb tomorrow - Wednesday stage 5
http://www.cyclingstage.com/vuelta-2017-route/stage-5-spain-route-2017/
At 3.4 kilometres, the hill is averaging 9.7%. At almost 15%, the first part is steepest, while the final 1,600 metres go up at 5%.

Froome might well go for more bonus seconds - sprint is only 15 km from the finish too. Nibs needs to suck Froome's wheel.

 

[Tonton]

Angliru is where I would see Vinnie be asphyxiated. He's explosive, the upcoming finish is comparable to a PDBF, and on a good day, he won it. Vicenzo needs to avoid the over-aggressive riding though. In the Blockhaus, it backfired. He likes to be flashy, but he must pick his battles.

 

[Climbing]

Yep, today is going to be hard, this should favor Chaves, Bardet and Aru.
Probably Froome as well, when in this form he does well everywhere, though super steep isn't his main thing.

 

[bambino]

Re:

Yep, today is going to be hard, this should favor Chaves, Bardet and Aru.
Probably Froome as well, when in this form he does well everywhere, though super steep isn't his main thing.

Indeed, don't see Froome being the animator today given even the recent past in really steep finishes. But of course with that guy, you'll never know. The climb will apparently go to +15% gradients pretty early on which probably eliminates any benefits of the train.

 

[SafeBet]

Nibali only needs a teammate to help him start this last hill close to the front. If he's in the first 10 positions of the group I can't see him losing more than 20 seconds to the winner.
Froome's acceleration on Comella was amazing, but he didn't really sustain it. Chaves stayed on his wheel and Bardet/Aru were 5 seconds behind on top of the climb. Absolutely not comparable to the one on Ventoux.

 

[Singer01]

What would be considered a good result for Nibali in relation to Froome today? <10-15 seconds? The problem is if he loses time here he probably also loses it on Saturday/Sunday.

 

[Climbing]

Well, he’s pretty much expected to lose time on those ramps in the first week.
Though, not necessarily from Froome, though he showed very good legs.

 

[Gigs_98]

Every time a rider is weak there are excuses like that. Do you think Contador will be back at his best next week and climb together with Froome, since he is only that weak because he ate something bad? Thats the official version but everyone with a brain knows, thats not gonna happen.

Just want to mention that I officially don't have a brain

 

[portugal11]

He will lose a minute in xorret de cati.

 

[Red Rick]

Every time a rider is weak there are excuses like that. Do you think Contador will be back at his best next week and climb together with Froome, since he is only that weak because he ate something bad? Thats the official version but everyone with a brain knows, thats not gonna happen.

Just want to mention that I officially don't have a brain

I guess it was a no-brainer?