Vincenzo Nibali

[Benotti69]

Re: Re:

And let's not underestimate the cast of characters in Astana:

Vino: VINO4EVER
Martinelli: Possibly the dirtiest DS in history (it is insane that he is still in sport)
Nibali: Long rumored Ferrari client
Scarponi: Proven Ferrari AND Puerto client

And the cast of Orica, Movistar and Rabobank 2.0 are so much cleaner?

Yes, I would argue that Martinelli is by far the dirtiest ds in the history of the sport.

I would say Martinelli is no different from Bruyneel, Unzue, Lefevre, Saronni and Saiz.

I'll go with this:
Martinelli, Unzue, Lefevre...with Martinelli being the most successful of the 3.

Getting caught bumps you down a level. And Saronni hasnt been at the top for almost a decade now.

Getting caught and staying in the sport bumps you up a level, imo. I don't much care for who wins as that is not yardstick to judge the level of dirtiness of any team. To stay in the sport, at a high level for that length of time takes real hard 'cesspit knowledge'.

 

[sniper]

Re: Re:

...
Getting caught and staying in the sport bumps you up a level, imo. I don't much care for who wins as that is not yardstick to judge the level of dirtiness of any team. To stay in the sport, at a high level for that length of time takes real hard 'cesspit knowledge'.

not much to add to the discussion, but i disagree with the bolded.
i would argue there's a pretty strong positive correlation between success of a team and dirtiness of a team and/or manager.

Sports success (East Germany in the 70s; Spain in the 90s; Britain in the 2000s) traditionally correlates with dirtiness. And in cycling I guess it's pretty much the same.

So while success is not the only yardstick, imo it's certainly a yardstick.

 

[luckyboy]

I don't particularly think Nibali is clean but I don't think this comeback was anything crazy or alien.

Chaves sounded like he had a cold for a few days, and then we had confirmation that he was suffering from bronchitis, while we found out that Nibali was ill before the MTT - it's feasible that he had recovered after a few days.
If Nibali didn't catch out Kruijswijk on the Agnello then I think we wouldn't be talking about anything now - the Kruijswijk we saw the previous days would be on Nibali's wheel for the final stages.

 

[Zypherov]

Re: Re:

thanks for the detail, valv.piti.
So would you agree that headings like
- "Vincenzo Nibali surges back from the dead to win the Giro d'Italia for a second time"
- "Nibali pulls off a Giro d'Italia resurrection"
- "Nibali Takes Giro Lead in Huge Comeback"
are a bit over the top?

Forget the headlines - go back and read the Giro threads 'above' the clinic, before the last two mountain stages.

Everyone here had him dead and buried. Everyone. Someone even started a thread asking 'who's the 4th best GT rider, now that Nibali is finished.'

Obviously there's hyperbole in opinion as well as headline, but many people here have good knowledge of the sport. Were people that deceived about his form?

Same arguments still apply. Nobody figured Kruijswijk wanted to make snow angels or that Valverde can't breathe above 2000m or that Chaves was going to suffer like he did. Nibali was out of contention assuming the others didn't falter, but they did and Nibali took advantage of it at the right time.

Kruijswijk, Chaves and Valverde did indeed falter. Its highly likely that Kruijswijk would of kept his good form going if it were not for the misfortune of that crash and it would of been a close run battle between him and Nibali in the end. Chaves and Valverde could not follow the wheel of Nibali on the last of the mountain stages.

 

[Benotti69]

Re: Re:

...
Getting caught and staying in the sport bumps you up a level, imo. I don't much care for who wins as that is not yardstick to judge the level of dirtiness of any team. To stay in the sport, at a high level for that length of time takes real hard 'cesspit knowledge'.

not much to add to the discussion, but i disagree with the bolded.
i would argue there's a pretty strong positive correlation between success of a team and dirtiness of a team and/or manager.

Sports success (East Germany in the 70s; Spain in the 90s; Britain in the 2000s) traditionally correlates with dirtiness. And in cycling I guess it's pretty much the same.

So while success is not the only yardstick, imo it's certainly a yardstick.

In doping terms, i dont think that guarantees success. Being big buddies with UCI President and brown nosing ASO is what gets big victories. So while wins is a Yardstick by which to measure, just not in doping terms. Then add to the mix, motors, who got a pass to use them while other teams got warned off...hard to see in a cesspit.

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re:

thanks for the detail, valv.piti.
So would you agree that headings like
- "Vincenzo Nibali surges back from the dead to win the Giro d'Italia for a second time"
- "Nibali pulls off a Giro d'Italia resurrection"
- "Nibali Takes Giro Lead in Huge Comeback"
are a bit over the top?

Yes, most definitely. He had 2 'off days' which Vincenzo and the team explained by gastro issues. I don't know if thats true, but thats their explanation and it doesn't seem way off considering his level on the previous days was just fine.

Imo, this was more a victory due to Krujswijk's crash and Chaves getting sick/not recovering as well as Nibali. He certainly seemed like another man on Risoul, tho, but I don't say out of the ordinary

 

[Nick C.]

He did, but he didn't come back from 4 minutes down, Kruijswijk's crash made that a moot point. From that point on he had under two minutes to make up to Chaves and under 30 seconds on Valverde (who was already dropped). Sastre made up more time in 2008. I would saw Angrilu in the 2011 Vuelta, but I think that race had no mountain stages after the second week. did Horner make up a similar deficit in a few stages in whatever year he won the Vuelta.

 

[thehog]

Re: Re:

thanks for the detail, valv.piti.
So would you agree that headings like
- "Vincenzo Nibali surges back from the dead to win the Giro d'Italia for a second time"
- "Nibali pulls off a Giro d'Italia resurrection"
- "Nibali Takes Giro Lead in Huge Comeback"
are a bit over the top?

Yes, most definitely. He had 2 'off days' which Vincenzo and the team explained by gastro issues. I don't know if thats true, but thats their explanation and it doesn't seem way off considering his level on the previous days was just fine.

Imo, this was more a victory due to Krujswijk's crash and Chaves getting sick/not recovering as well as Nibali. He certainly seemed like another man on Risoul, tho, but I don't say out of the ordinary

To borrow from a popular political quote;

"Elections are not won but lost"....

I sense that the others lost the Giro more than Nibali winning it.

 

[The Hegelian]

Ah well - as I mentioned in my first very post on this topic, I think all the rational arguments for Nibali's win are quite plausible.

Until you remember Aru (+Astana per se in the Giro) in '15. Until you consider Vino et al.

Looked like such an obvious blood bag + whatever else; I'm super surprised to hear The Clinic defending it on the basis that "the team explained it as....."

I eagerly await the same quiet charity extended to Sky and Froome in the tdf.

 

[Savant12]

On their own, Nibali's performances in the last mountain stages are not spectacular but it's where he magically found some form having fixed his "crank" and "illness" problems. He was very consistent throughout the start then just seemed to implode form wise as he's often done in the past. Then the whole "sick or not sick" idea bandied around by him and his camp to justify his form loss. If he had intestinal problems I would have expected him to lose a hell of a lot more time than he did a la Landa. But somehow, he skipped the recovery phase and went straight to blasting up mountains with seemingly little effort expended other than some tears.

 

[The Hitch]

On their own, Nibali's performances in the last mountain stages are not spectacular but it's where he magically found some form having fixed his "crank" and "illness" problems. He was very consistent throughout the start then just seemed to implode form wise as he's often done in the past. Then the whole "sick or not sick" idea bandied around by him and his camp to justify his form loss. If he had intestinal problems I would have expected him to lose a hell of a lot more time than he did a la Landa. But somehow, he skipped the recovery phase and went straight to blasting up mountains with seemingly little effort expended other than some tears.

But if Nibali is dirty, how are some other riders absolutely destroying him in other gts clean?

 

[sniper]

On their own, Nibali's performances in the last mountain stages are not spectacular but it's where he magically found some form having fixed his "crank" and "illness" problems. He was very consistent throughout the start then just seemed to implode form wise as he's often done in the past. Then the whole "sick or not sick" idea bandied around by him and his camp to justify his form loss. If he had intestinal problems I would have expected him to lose a hell of a lot more time than he did a la Landa. But somehow, he skipped the recovery phase and went straight to blasting up mountains with seemingly little effort expended other than some tears.

But if Nibali is dirty, how are some other riders absolutely destroying him in other gts clean?

b...b...but..the passport doesn't allow him to dope hard, and so his doping advantage is only minimal, and that advantage turns into a disadvantage as he now thinks he can train less and drink more coffee.
The marginal benefit of doping is no match for the aggregation of clean gains.

 

[Savant12]

On their own, Nibali's performances in the last mountain stages are not spectacular but it's where he magically found some form having fixed his "crank" and "illness" problems. He was very consistent throughout the start then just seemed to implode form wise as he's often done in the past. Then the whole "sick or not sick" idea bandied around by him and his camp to justify his form loss. If he had intestinal problems I would have expected him to lose a hell of a lot more time than he did a la Landa. But somehow, he skipped the recovery phase and went straight to blasting up mountains with seemingly little effort expended other than some tears.

But if Nibali is dirty, how are some other riders absolutely destroying him in other gts clean?

Where did anybody in the Nibali thread bring up talk of other clean riders?

 

[Gregga]

The Secret Pro doesn't like Nibali's code of honor http://cyclingtips.com/2016/06/the-secret-pro-nibali-the-giro-ditalia-and-the-importance-of-respect/

 

[saganftw]

in case Nibali it just a different spin on "the engine was always there",isnt it funny how all these riders get sick before transformation? poor Landa needs a better doctor for next GT to make his illness strong enough to make an excuse but not too strong to send him home

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re:

The Secret Pro doesn't like Nibali's code of honor http://cyclingtips.com/2016/06/the-secret-pro-nibali-the-giro-ditalia-and-the-importance-of-respect/

I stopped reading when he stated that Nibali 'attacking' after Crashbrijs' crash was out of order. Oh please, what a douche.

 

[jens_attacks]

Henderson the crybaby, what a guy wow

 

[Flat Out]

I wish we were still in th real old days, when people could not give a @@@@ about crashes, mechanicals and other excuse and were simply riding hard whenever it was possible. Honouring the race, not the leader. I am sick tired of the 'wait for', neutralizations and blablabla. In the past, racers were attacking at fueling points. It was great racing. Not the edulcorated 'please can i go now' stuff of today...

 

[budegan]

Re: Re:

The Secret Pro doesn't like Nibali's code of honor http://cyclingtips.com/2016/06/the-secret-pro-nibali-the-giro-ditalia-and-the-importance-of-respect/

I stopped reading when he stated that Nibali 'attacking' after Crashbrijs' crash was out of order. Oh please, what a douche.

Do we know who the secret pro is?

Or is it um, secret?

 

[IzzyStradlin]

Re:

in case Nibali it just a different spin on "the engine was always there",isnt it funny how all these riders get sick before transformation? poor Landa needs a better doctor for next GT to make his illness strong enough to make an excuse but not too strong to send him home

Remember when nibs went from like 60th in Poland (i think???) and everyone saying he looked terrible on the bike to winning the vuelta a few weeks later?

He's pulled this off before.

 

[Brullnux]

Is it still Hendo because he didn't ride the Giro, or Paris-Nice or Omloop, which this guy said he raced.

 

[Irondan]

Re: Re:

The Secret Pro doesn't like Nibali's code of honor http://cyclingtips.com/2016/06/the-secret-pro-nibali-the-giro-ditalia-and-the-importance-of-respect/

I stopped reading when he stated that Nibali 'attacking' after Crashbrijs' crash was out of order. Oh please, what a douche.

Do we know who the secret pro is?

Or is it um, secret?

Nope.

Nobody knows for sure, although a lot of people suspect it's Simon Gerrans.

 

[Brullnux]

Does it change quite often? I mean in 2013 he was all for Nibali and Vino, now not so much.

 

[Night Rider]

Re:

Henderson the crybaby, what a guy wow

Greg Henderson is not 'the' TSP. TSP is almost certainly not actually one particular rider now but a collection of a few riders comments and perspectives.

TSP as one rider ended in the year it started. Go back and find the first real break in the articles and the new 'writers' started after that.

It's actually a disgrace the hypocrisy in these articles and that he actually continues on with them. #cashcow #clickbait

 

[CheckMyPecs]

What does TSP whining about Nibali racing down the descent have to do with doping anyway?