Vuelta a España - Stage 16: Gijón - Cotobello 181.4 km

[Mellow Velo]

Nibali will take more like 3 minutes, from Mosquera and possibly Rodriguez, too, IMO.
Danielson should do well out of the ITT, as should Lulu.

On the subject of Alpe D'Huez v the Zoncolan.
IMO, the Alpe is vastly overrated, because of it's legendary Tour status.

All through today's commentary, Sean Kelly and Harmon were talking about today's gradients being "easy", for the power boys, rather than the out and out climbers.
Yet, all 3 had average gradients in excess of the Alpe. Neither is the Alpe that long. What adds to the Alpe's difficulty are the hairpins.
The Zoncolan is considerably harder than the Alpe, again, IMO.

 

[search]

I know, they aren't. He can limit the damge to real time trial specialists but he isn't as good as in his espoir years (Nibali was 3rd in the espoir worlds ITT behind Brajkovic and T.Dekker).
In fact, in 2009 and 2008 Nibali managed to lose about every head-on TT against Gesink (yup, Gesink).

However, compared to Rodriguez and Mosquera, Nibali is pretty good and should take at least 1m+. I expect even 1m30

I just had a look at the stats again and I seem to have misses some results yesterday, he had some results better than I remembered:

2005

Tour de Suisse - 36km

01. Ullrich
02. McGee +00:15
03. Rogers +00:18
.
69. Nibali +03:17

National Championship - 49,1km

01. Pinotti
02. Bruseghin +00:08
03. Cioni +00:49
04. Nibali +00:51

2006

National Championship - 38,4 km

01. Bruseghin
02. Pinotti +00:15
03. Quinziato +00:41
.
05. Nibali +01:16

World Championships - 50,8 km

01. Cancellara
02. Zabriskie +01:30
03. Vinkourov +01:50
.
16. Nibali +03:27

2007

Giro d'Italia - 43km

01. Savoldelli
02. Mazzoleni +00:36
03. Zabriskie +00:38
.
07. Nibali +01:44

National Championship - 42,8km

01. Pinotti
02. Nibali +00:02
03. Quinziato +00:27

World Championships - 44,9km

01. Cancellara
02. Bodrogi +00:52
03. Clement +00:58
.
19. Nibali +02:42

2008

Giro d'Italia - 39,4km

01. Bruseghin
02. contador +00:08
03. Klöden +00:20
.
07. Nibali +00:54

Tour de France - 53km

01. Cancellara
02. Kirchen +00:40
03. Vande Velde +00:44
.
47. Nibali +05:07

Olympic Games - 47,3km

01. Cancellara
02. Larsson +00:33
03. Leipheimer +01:10
.
14. Nibali +03:25

2009

Critérium du Dauphiné - 42,4km

01. Grabsch
02. Evans +00:07
03. Millar +00:39
.
14. Nibali +01:45

Tour de France - 40,5km

01. Contador
02. Cancellara +00:03
03. Ignatiev +00:15
.
25. Nibali +02:06

he should be better than Mosquera and Rodriguez, but I don't think he will gain enough time to win the vuelta

 

[Descender]

Nibali will take more like 3 minutes, from Mosquera and possibly Rodriguez, too, IMO.
Danielson should do well out of the ITT, as should Lulu.

On the subject of Alpe D'Huez v the Zoncolan.
IMO, the Alpe is vastly overrated, because of it's legendary Tour status.

All through today's commentary, Sean Kelly and Harmon were talking about today's gradients being "easy", for the power boys, rather than the out and out climbers.
Yet, all 3 had average gradients in excess of the Alpe. Neither is the Alpe that long. What adds to the Alpe's difficulty are the hairpins.
The Zoncolan is considerably harder than the Alpe, again, IMO.

Yes, the Alpe d'Huez is and has always been overrated. As are so many French things.

As to the climbs today, like I said San Lorenzo is a HC, that's unquestionable. Cobertoria they climbed it up the easy side, the other side (the descent today) is also a legit HC. Cotobello is a hard 1st.

 

[BroDeal]

My man Tommy D. is movin' on up to the East side. Hopefully he can still time trial. Sixth place here we come.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

In the dauphine 09 and the Olympics 08 he was beaten by Gesink, that's what I remembered, that's why I say he's good, but not super.

But definately better than Rodriguez/Mosquera

 

[Mellow Velo]

My man Tommy D. is movin' on up to the East side. Hopefully he can still time trial. Sixth place here we come.

Hah! Bro has just applied the kiss of death to Eskimo Tom's chances.

 

[Frosty]

WTF?

26 Vladimir Karpets 5.32
27 Allan Davis 5.32
28 Amets Txurruka 6.45

I never knew that Davis could climb that well?

 

[BroDeal]

Hah! Bro has just applied the kiss of death to Eskimo Tom's chances.

Your doubts have just put karma back into balance, so it's all good.

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

Strongly suspect they've mixed up his result and Dyachenko's

 

[hrotha]

Your doubts have just put karma back into balance, so it's all good.

If Tommy survived yesterday when half the forum thought he had fallen off a cliff, he should be fine from now on.

Also, Davis is great and I'm going to have a laugh at all the Aussie fans who complained about his selection for the WC!

 

[Cobblestoned]

Schleck attack today
Nearly fell asleep - thanks.

I am looking forward to see these (Spanish) mountaingoats melting in the TT.
Always entertaining.
I go with Mellow: They will lose around 3 minutes on Nibali, if he can "rest" well tomorrow

But never underestimate the effect of a "restday" to some riders.
There should be a white Porsche driving around somewhere in Spain.

 

[search]

Also, Davis is great and I'm going to have a laugh at all the Aussie fans who complained about his selection for the WC!

he definitely is, but unfortunately he doesn't transform it into success. Nobody recognizes a 27th place at a mountain stage, he should use his abilities in the mountains to gain points for the green jersey (linke Hushovd does at the Tour de France) and fight for the sprinters classification.

but therefore he needs to become more consistant in the sprints

 

[rmacek]

Hmm, Roman Kreuziger (aka The Locomotive) had crash - after the stage, on the way back down to team bus, he was hit by car (mirror), helmet broken to 2 pieces and bruised elbow and shoulder, but luckily nothing serious..

 

[Mellow Velo]

I take it all back.

2008 ITT 42.5km (flat)
1 Levi Leipheimer (USA) Astana 50.57 (50.049 km/h)

27 Robert Gesink (Ned) Rabobank 2.08
28 Ezequiel Mosquera Miguez (Spa) Xacobeo Galicia 2.09
73 Joaquin Rodriguez (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne 3.35

 

[icefire]

I take it all back.

2008 ITT 42.5km (flat)
1 Levi Leipheimer (USA) Astana 50.57 (50.049 km/h)

27 Robert Gesink (Ned) Rabobank 2.08
28 Ezequiel Mosquera Miguez (Spa) Xacobeo Galicia 2.09
73 Joaquin Rodriguez (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne 3.35

Rodríguez was supposed to help Valverde in that Vuelta, so he probably didn't go full gas then.

 

[luckyboy]

Bit late to comment here, but they really should've attacked earlier. Nibali would've cracked big time if J-Rod & Mosquera went with 3km to go.

That said, let's just hope Bola del Mundo will be a bloodbath.

 

[Escarabajo]

Excessive reliance on steep slopes is a fault of almost any formula used for measuring climb difficulty you may find on climbing databases on the web. Their formulas are arbitrary in the sense that they're not derived from any physics at all. And they're all linear with distance and quadratic with slope. Apparently they never learnt about fractional exponents.

Of course, formulas should be derived from physics, but in any case it would be hard to account for weather and pavement condition.

I didn't know that. Thanks for the information. That is strange.

FWIW, I have noticed that longer and not so steep climbs have worse results on the legs of the riders than just short steep climbs. Maybe it has to do with the energy consumption in a period of time. Now if we combine a steep climb with a long climb, then we have a monster ("The Giant of Provence, Ventoux"). If that is the case, some of the GT contenders will explode in Bola de Mundo.

 

[El Pistolero]

Bit late to comment here, but they really should've attacked earlier. Nibali would've cracked big time if J-Rod & Mosquera went with 3km to go.

That said, let's just hope Bola del Mundo will be a bloodbath.

That's assuming they had the legs to attack more early. If they had they would've surely followed Schleck.

 

[Viskovitz]

Oh i see now
Couldnt get Madline kronplatz alpe etc.

Ventoux - 380
Tourmalet - 342

Stelvio 348
Mortirolo 474
Angliru- 516


But the king. Obviously

Zoncolan 586

Edit. You beat me to it.

Shouldnt have spent so much time looking how to spell Kronplatz

Wow, interesting dialogue.

But Zonco isn't the King...the king comes from Colombia.

Here's the list of the hardest climbs ascended in a race, sorted by APM (and APM>300):

http://plataformarecorridosciclistas.org/2010/04/19/los-puertos-mas-duros-en-carrera/

By the way, mesouring how hard a climb is by the energy it requires (joules) it's a bit stupied. It only depends on the height difference, so La Bonaigua is just as hard as El Angliru, and that sounds...well...

 

[icefire]

That's assuming they had the legs to attack more early. If they had they would've surely followed Schleck.

My guess (from the riders words after the stage) is that nobody attacked because Kreuziger was still there and nobody thought that Nibali was at his limit. Like Dani Navarro and Alberto in Avoriaz last July. We've just seen a TdF stage today

 

[La Pandera]

Bit late to comment here, but they really should've attacked earlier. Nibali would've cracked big time if J-Rod & Mosquera went with 3km to go.

That said, let's just hope Bola del Mundo will be a bloodbath.

From what I read from one of the riders(I think it was Frank Schleck), Kreuziger's tempo was such that it discouraged everyone from attacking. Schleck says that in his opinion Kreuziger was the strongest rider on that stage. I guess that was true until he ran out gas and Mosquera, Schleck and Sastre noticed the lag in the tempo. That is likely what prompted their attacks. From what I read Kreuziger was hurting everybody up to that point.

 

[blaxland]

WTF?

26 Vladimir Karpets 5.32
27 Allan Davis 5.32
28 Amets Txurruka 6.45

I never knew that Davis could climb that well?

Here comes the world championships...to all those who said the Aussie team is ****........lets wait and see.

 

[roundabout]

From what I read from one of the riders(I think it was Frank Schleck), Kreuziger's tempo was such that it discouraged everyone from attacking. Schleck says that in his opinion Kreuziger was the strongest rider on that stage. I guess that was true until he ran out gas and Mosquera, Schleck and Sastre noticed the lag in the tempo. That is likely what prompted their attacks. From what I read Kreuziger was hurting everybody up to that point.

Read? Maybe you should have watched the stage. Schleck went pretty much from the bottom of Cotobello. Danielson and Sastre 2 riders who in this race have shown to be not at the level of Mosquera and Rodriguez in the mountains were able to get away and hang on ahead for quite a while.

If Schleck playing his game with Sastre was able to keep the gap to a "charging" Kreuziger behind the pace couldn't have been that brutal.

Mosquera didn't have it. Rodriguez is not a rider who can successfully attack from more than 2 kilometers out on the climb.

 

[The Hitch]

Read? Maybe you should have watched the stage. Schleck went pretty much from the bottom of Cotobello. Danielson and Sastre 2 riders who in this race have shown to be not at the level of Mosquera and Rodriguez in the mountains were able to get away and hang on ahead for quite a while.

If Schleck playing his game with Sastre was able to keep the gap to a "charging" Kreuziger behind the pace couldn't have been that brutal.

Mosquera didn't have it. Rodriguez is not a rider who can successfully attack from more than 2 kilometers out on the climb.

+ the gap at the foot of the climb from Nieve to the heads of state was 2 minutes.

EVen though Nieve, having been in a break for 70 km, and not being a gc climber was all on his lonesome, he kept the gap between 1 30 and 2 mins for most of the climb. Nibali came in 1 56 behind Nieve. If Kreuziger was charging how comes a Euski domestique, with every disadvantage was able to match him the whole way?

 

[hrotha]

I just don't think anyone's feeling too well at the moment.