Was the Giro 2009 route a good one or not?

[Eshnar]

I think it's time to give an own thread to this subject.
Personally I didn't like it... Two early and easy stages in the dolomites, only one mountain stage with more than two hard climbs (the stage to Monte Petrano), the stage to Blockhaus too short, the final MTF too weak. The only good points were the awesome ITT and the balance between the three weeks.
What do you think?

 

[airstream]

Which side of the Blockhause they did? It looked visually like something sort of 15k, 6% av.

 

[Eshnar]

Which side of the Blockhause they did? It looked visually like something sort of 15k, 6% av.

They did the side they were supposed to climb, but stopped way before the top.

 

[jens_attacks]

it was one of those bad routes which no one remembers because the action was just too good.
average route,awesome giro.

 

[roundabout]

It's kinda awesome that a good climb like Vesuvio get's called weak.

 

[Eshnar]

It's kinda awesome that a good climb like Vesuvio get's called weak.

Then let me clarify it.
When I say "The final MTF was weak" I mean the Vesuvio stage, as a whole, was weak. The Vesuvio was the only serious climb of the day. A stage like that cannot decide a whole Giro (and it didn't, indeed). Vesuvio in itself is a good climb but it's not a Zoncolan, which could provide more gaps in the same kind of stage.

 

[airstream]

They did the side they were supposed to climb, but stopped way before the top.

Oho! Did they really finish on altitude 2064m or even lower? In 2006 Passo Lanciano seemed to be a difficult climb, in 2009 I didn't even notice the Blockhaus included it. Menchov rode as a tank. Pretty weird stage.

 

[Eshnar]

Oho! Did they really finish on altitude 2064m or even lower? In 2006 Passo Lanciano seemed to be a difficult climb, in 2009 I didn't even notice the Blockhaus included it. Menchov rode as a tank. Pretty weird stage.

They stopped at 1631m, 5.5 kms before the top.

 

[Eshnar]

As for the Passo Lanciano, in 2006 they climbed a harder side of it.

 

[Descender]

Yeah it was good enough.

 

[Kvinto]

the Giro 2009 was pretty balanced for me, some mountain stages should have been tougher but generally it was a good edition despite that a wrong man won

 

[craig1985]

I liked the Sestri Levante to Riomaggiore TT, we need more of those in GT's, yes it was nearly 61km, but it was hard enough that the peloton had to use their road bikes with clip on aero bars. It was hard enough that Spartacus didn't even bother with it and abandoned the race.

Cadel or Tony Martin fans would probably agree with me

 

[Mellow Velo]

It was certainly good, when first announced.
However, route changes, the top lopped off a major mountain stage, a neutralized finish and, icing on the cake, a completely neutralized stage, places it into the meh catagory, imo.

 

[jens_attacks]

yeah but the milano kermesse was a stupid idea anyway.and very dangerous,cars everywhere on the road.

 

[Parrulo]

i loved the long itt but the route overall wasn't very good.

 

[La Pandera]

The route got criticised by people at the time for not including the zoncolan or the passo del mortirolo but i did enjoy the agressive riding by sastre with his two wins. What i didnt like was armstrong just coming back out of nowhere with a chip on his shoulder after 4 years off the bike and neutalise bar one lap of the criterium style stage around milan. This was his first participation in the giro and he was going around like he owned the peloton.

Well speaking of Sastre and Armstrong, it was poetic justice that Armstrong, while supposedly at the service of Leipheimer, leaves Levi to try to bridge to the elite group of contenders that includes Sastre and seconds after Armstrong makes contact Sastre attacks, immediately dropping Armstrong leaving him to skulk back to his domestique duties that he shouldn't have abandoned in the first place. Sheer poetry considering his derogatory comments regarding Sastre and the rest of the competitors in the 2008 Tour.

 

[will10]

A route that was good enough to entice some great racing.

 

[roundabout]

Racing itself was fine, route could have been more challenging, mainly mountain stages.

 

[scullster46]

I thought it was a good route, but it was different than the recent editions. It was tailored a bit to Di luca, with multiple punchy finishes. They did a really good job at evening out the stages, so there were never long periods of time without gc action. I actually think that was the best part about it. It really showed how time bonuses can make a race more interesting.

 

[jens_attacks]

It was tailored a bit to Di luca, with multiple punchy finishes.

besides the long itt

 

[gregrowlerson]

I voted for awesome.

I never watched the race itself eek, so I am going off stage 17 as to what was originally planned, not the fact that they only finished 2/3 of the way up the climb.

Repeating what others have said, I think that the one weakness was that there was only one real multiple mountain stage (16). But one more and it would have been truly awesome

And some of those early stages are just terrific.