Vuelta Stage 17: Villadiego - Los Machucos (180.5 km)

[deValtos]

The race was always on, people just love to convince themselves the race is over and ruin their own enjoyment for some strange reason. :lol:

Psyched for Aqua Blue, well deserved win.

Should be a great showdown on the Angliru now! I don't know what will happen in the next 2 days though.

 

[movingtarget]

Re:

Chaves lost 5.52 !

Orica's tactics didn't make a lot of sense.

 

[Lexman]

Meintjes saved his 14th place !

 

[ice&fire]

Re:

Bad weather and a fading shape and Froomey is gone, damn I hope it will be cold and rainy the last couple of days, then Im pretty sure Nibali will win this. This wasn't a one day thing.

No rain expected tomorrow. Some chance on Friday. Almost sure on Saturday

 

[Escarabajo]

Re:

Great last climb. Lopez confirms muritos isn't his thing again, I wonder how well he will fare on Angliru since that basically is a continued murito. I think very well tho.

Not sure if we can tell from today. It looks more like a combination of being the first real GT and fading a little after a big effort the second week.

 

[movingtarget]

Re:

Meintjes saved his 14th place !

I didn't hear his name called once.

 

[Escarabajo]

Re: Re:

Chaves lost 5.52 !

Orica's tactics didn't make a lot of sense.

I didn't watch completely. What did they do?

Thanks.

 

[RedheadDane]

GC top-10 claiming it was Antonio Nibali in second... :lol:
That would be a surprise.

 

[bob.a.feet]

Chaves out of the top 10

 

[Eclipse]

Re:

The race was always on, people just love to convince themselves the race is over and ruin their own enjoyment for some strange reason. :lol:

People have just been burned too many times thinking that someone might be coming back at Froome to get their hopes up too much haha

 

[Escarabajo]

Wow Chaves.

 

[Lexman]

Re: Re:

Chaves lost 5.52 !

Orica's tactics didn't make a lot of sense.

I didn't watch completely. What did they do?

Thanks.

they put Cort in the Bod and then chased after the Bod, on the Alisas climb yates and chaves attacked but where reeled in then he lost almost 6 minutes on the last climb...

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re: Re:

Great last climb. Lopez confirms muritos isn't his thing again, I wonder how well he will fare on Angliru since that basically is a continued murito. I think very well tho.

Not sure if we can tell from today. It looks more like a combination of being the first real GT and fading a little after a big effort the second week.

Yes we can. Did you watch the first week? He has been the best on real mountains, by far I might add, but was extremely mediocre in the first week and in godlike shape he still lost 40 seconds or something to Contador today. It isn't possible to explain his performances differently.

 

[ice&fire]

Re: Re:

Great last climb. Lopez confirms muritos isn't his thing again, I wonder how well he will fare on Angliru since that basically is a continued murito. I think very well tho.

Not sure if we can tell from today. It looks more like a combination of being the first real GT and fading a little after a big effort the second week.

He wasn't great in the muritos of first week

 

[Arredondo]

Re: Re:

Great last climb. Lopez confirms muritos isn't his thing again, I wonder how well he will fare on Angliru since that basically is a continued murito. I think very well tho.

Not sure if we can tell from today. It looks more like a combination of being the first real GT and fading a little after a big effort the second week.

Yes we can. Did you watch the first week? He has been the best on real mountains, by far I might add, but was extremely mediocre in the first week and in godlike shape he still lost 40 seconds or something to Contador today. It isn't possible to explain his performances differently.

Lopez is a diesel. He prefers long climbs. He's more of a Quintana then a Chaves.

 

[StryderHells]

Re: Re:

Chaves lost 5.52 !

Orica's tactics didn't make a lot of sense.

I didn't watch completely. What did they do?

Thanks.

they put Cort in the Bod and then chased after the Bod, on the Alisas climb yates and chaves attacked but where reeled in then he lost almost 6 minutes on the last climb...

But then they sent Haig out to link up with Cort but he couldn't bridge to the front of the race, I wonder if Chaves was plan A today or if they were just after the stage win.

 

[carton]

Re:

Looks like Froome went too deep yesterday.

Lol.

Chapeau, Denifl.

Having Contador as a theat might liven up affairs before Angrilu, even though he should really tip those TV cameramen.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have ourselves a race.

 

[movingtarget]

Re: Re:

Chaves lost 5.52 !

Orica's tactics didn't make a lot of sense.

I didn't watch completely. What did they do?

Thanks.

They attacked early with Yates and Chaves and then sent Haig up the road to chase the breakaway. The extra work would not have helped Chaves after yesterday but his race is done anyway. Haig had a pretty good ride.

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Great last climb. Lopez confirms muritos isn't his thing again, I wonder how well he will fare on Angliru since that basically is a continued murito. I think very well tho.

Angliru is steep but more consistent so he should be fine

Not really

I would say it is compared to the climb we watched today, that thing was like steps over that short a distance, yeah the Angliru does ramp up and drop off but when you combine it with the start of it I reckon it's more consistent. I have personally ridden either so will have to wait until I do one day then I'll get back to you

Yeah, the first part of Angliru is more consistent for sure, but the last 6km are really up and down. They've even named each of the seven steepest sections, most of which are >20%. I guess the main difference between Angliru and Machucos is that Machucos has flattish and downhill recovery sections in between the steep bits. The recovery sections in the last 6km of Angliru are at about 11%. Also Angliru peaks at 23% for any reasonable length of time, compared with 26% for Machucos, which is a fairly big difference I guess.

I've never ridden Machucos either, but have climbed Angliru about 10 times now (it's part of my job!), and it's definitely irregular in the second half.

I do agree that it could suit Lopez more though, but because of the length. Angliru is a signifiantly longer climb in terms of how long it takes, so suits pure high mountain climbers more than Machucos. And it comes immediately on the back of two toughish climbs.

 

[movingtarget]

Re: Re:

Chaves lost 5.52 !

Orica's tactics didn't make a lot of sense.

I didn't watch completely. What did they do?

Thanks.

they put Cort in the Bod and then chased after the Bod, on the Alisas climb yates and chaves attacked but where reeled in then he lost almost 6 minutes on the last climb...

But then they sent Haig out to link up with Cort but he couldn't bridge to the front of the race, I wonder if Chaves was plan A today or if they were just after the stage win.

Just the stage i think.

 

[Pantani_lives]

The terrible thing is that Nibali wasn't that good either. He couldn't drop Zakarin. Imagine if he had been able to stay with Contador today...

Now I think Team Sky will still win, and it will be one of those could-have-been cases.

And still no Spanish stage win...

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re: Re:

Great last climb. Lopez confirms muritos isn't his thing again, I wonder how well he will fare on Angliru since that basically is a continued murito. I think very well tho.

Not sure if we can tell from today. It looks more like a combination of being the first real GT and fading a little after a big effort the second week.

Yes we can. Did you watch the first week? He has been the best on real mountains, by far I might add, but was extremely mediocre in the first week and in godlike shape he still lost 40 seconds or something to Contador today. It isn't possible to explain his performances differently.

Lopez is a diesel. He prefers long climbs. He's more of a Quintana then a Chaves.

Indeed, but even Quintana seems to be much better on such climbs than Lopez actually is. In shape Quintana is still very much one of the best in the world, Lopez isn't.

 

[SKSemtex]

Well well well. Shark has bitten. He smells the blood. The game is on.
This going to be a hell of a week for Froome.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

It's been a weirdly successful season for Aqua Blue. Weird because while they haven't won loads of little races as strong PCT teams sometimes do, they have taken more big wins than any other PCT team. And weird because the riders who have taken those wins haven't been the expected winners, Nordhaug and Howard, both of whom have been MIA, but a pair of former IAM climbing domestiques.

They were a bit of a left field wildcard, but they've certainly earned it now. It will be tricky though to get a wildcard to the Giro or Tour next year though. They've basically got nothing from RCS all season, while there will be five French PCT outfits fighting for ASO's wildcards.

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Indeed, but even Quintana seems to be much better on such climbs than Lopez actually is. In shape Quintana is still very much one of the best in the world, Lopez isn't.

I think that's a bit harsh; Lopez wasn't that bad today though. He did still finish 3rd; beating all the GC guys except Contador and putting 40 seconds into Froome. TT probably took more out of him than the other guys with a lot more GTs under their belts.