What did this Giro teach us?

[on3m@n@rmy]

- That courses with all the hard stages at the end lead to conservative (e.g. boring) racing for 2.7 weeks.

Giro confirms this: IT'S HARD

Cav, I think, said the Giro is hard b/c of the parcours, but the Tour is hard b/c of the racing. So maybe the Tour has a bit more probability for better racing... even though that is no guarantee.

 

[Red Rick]

hushovd actually makes 2 million a yera at bmc. but then again bmc areone big joke

I should show BMC i can ride over 20km/h. Maybe i can get a 100k contract

 

[trevim]

That team sizes need to be reduced

This is a pretty good point.

As alternative, put the Mortirolo before the main climbs in order to isolate the leaders.

 

[trevim]

About Hushovd, he may be overpaid but anyone who judges him for his Giro performance is clearly wrong. If he was in form he would have contend for a few stages.

 

[trevim]

1 - Giro sucked, was like a TDF clone..
2 - Italians get old and get worse. They need more than Nibali now...
3 - Are there any climbers left who can attack 6/7km from the top and continue accelerating? Or ar these times gone?

This is quite interesting indeed. Who are the prospects?

Ulissi I guess, he seems to have that mentality
Cappechi maybe?
I should say I was very impressed by Damiano Caruso.
Mr. Moser? Or he is more of a classics guy?
Brambilla is quite young right?

Who else?

 

[LaFlorecita]

This is quite interesting indeed. Who are the prospects?

Ulissi I guess, he seems to have that mentality
Cappechi maybe?
I should say I was very impressed by Damiano Caruso.
Mr. Moser? Or he is more of a classics guy?
Brambilla is quite young right?

Who else?

Is Ulissi ever going to be a GC rider though?

 

[trevim]

Is Ulissi ever going to be a GC rider though?

I don't know. I justed listed some of the young guns I could remember that have shown a bit of climbing potential.

About Ulissi, I see him more as a classics rider but he has won a stage in the 3rd week, and maybe he can develop as a GC rider.

 

[jens_attacks]

that i love watching pro cycling even when they ride like crrap for three weeks...

 

[norwegian]

The Giro taught us that to many on the forum are extremely negative to what most of road racing really consists of. I really don`t understand why they bother to watch. There should be a "Cycling Reader Digest" with only the highlights for them.

 

[Havetts]

that i love watching pro cycling even when they ride like crrap for three weeks...

Wise words by Jens, which I can easily agree with .

 

[SafeBet]

This is quite interesting indeed. Who are the prospects?

Ulissi I guess, he seems to have that mentality
Cappechi maybe?
I should say I was very impressed by Damiano Caruso.
Mr. Moser? Or he is more of a classics guy?
Brambilla is quite young right?

Who else?

I was discussing the issue with some other italian fans on a forum. There's clearly a huge generational gap.

Among the ones you mentioned:
- Capecchi seems the longer shot;
- Caruso did very good (and should get the chance to ride his own race in the Vuelta). I question his TT skills though;
- Ulissi has the talent but lacks everything else atm.
- Brambilla is indeed quite young and has improved a lot from last year, but still is way behind some other riders his age (the two colombians, kruijswijk). We need to see more from him to understand if he can be a GT contender.

Moser is a whole different beast. He's pure class and just 21 years old. I'd guess he's more of a classics rider but who knows?

Others to mention: probably Felline. He was in the top30 both on Stelvio and in the final TT. He's shown good recovery and he's 22.

Aru and Cattaneo are still too unproven to tell.

 

[Coramoor]

That teams suck at scouting. They kept thinking that Hesjedal would blow himself up when he has never done that in his career on the climbs despite several very notable top 10s in his career in big races, especially in the 3rd week. He has always ridden within himself. If you look at the 2010 tour I believe. He rode up the Tourmalet, into 4th, despite dropping off between the 10th and 15th place. The reason being is that he never actually went beyond his limit trying to follow and a lot of other riders did.

If you look at Stage 20 of this years giro. You all kept saying that Scarponi should've attacked from further out. Hesjedal was within 2 seconds of him at the line and he wasn't fading where as Scarponi was blown from the acceleration. Scarponi blew himself up trying to attack Hesjedal away in stage 19 and he was completely wrecked once he crossed the line. He simply didn't have enough power to ride away from Ryder for a long enough distance to get the time he needed. Basso had nothing, Rodriguez, I really have no idea, I don't know if he can sustain his accelerations for 3 or 4km although I seriously doubt it.

People are certainly right in saying that the people riding for 9th place probably could've made it more interesting by being more aggressive but even then the italian strategy was flawed. They were riding for Ryder to lose not for themselves to win, which is terrible and generally boring

Also in terms of TT, People on here were seriously underestimating Ryder's TT ability. He only lost 57 seconds on Contador in the one race where he was really riding to defend his position. Rodriguez lost 4 minutes and dropped behind him. Good to see that Rodriguez has improved a lot though

 

[Havetts]

Regarding young talents, what has happened to Battaglin this Giro? If I remember correctly he is a huge talent that still has to prosper

 

[greenedge]

Felline also came 2nd to Ventoso in a sprint stage so he has a bit of everything.

 

[SafeBet]

Regarding young talents, what has happened to Battaglin this Giro? If I remember correctly he is a huge talent that still has to prosper

Gotta say I'm a bit disappointed. There were a couple of stages very suited for him. But it was his first Giro and he managed to finish it, we'll see how it does rest of the season.

Felline also came 2nd to Ventoso in a sprint stage so he has a bit of everything.

Very true.
I didn't think he could TT that well to be honest. He was better than Boaro and close to Malori.

And he won Giro dell'Appennino just a month and a half ago.

 

[trevim]

Yeah Felline caught my eye too. Very classy rider. And a better climber than I expected.

 

[The Hitch]

2010 says hi

No it does not.

Unlike you i actually did think my post through before i posted it.

Truly deserving of a Horner facepalm.

 

[Havetts]

Truly deserving of a Horner facepalm.

"Horner facepalm"?

We all know its Capt. Picard!

 

[Parrulo]

No it does not.

Unlike you i actually did think my post through before i posted it.

Truly deserving of a Horner facepalm.

an 8.4k time trial on the first stage. looks like a prologue to me, but let me guess it's like 4 meters to long to be classified as a prologue. . . . really deserving of the "horner" facepalm

 

[The Hitch]

an 8.4k time trial on the first stage. looks like a prologue to me, but let me guess it's like 4 meters to long to be classified as a prologue. . . . really deserving of the "horner" facepalm

I said there have been no time trials in 6 years (hence that 2010 was not a prologue - a fact) and you tried to prove me wrong, and failed.

I understand that some may see a facepalm as harsh but a fail is a fail, and a facepalm may push you into looking things up before being so quick to jump on people and come out looking silly, in the future.

Im only looking out for your own good

 

[austy37]

I didn't read the whole thing but did anyone mention orca greenedge?
I learnt not too get too excited about GE and GC.
Oh well, that's what yyu get for being a newbie.....cycling is haaaard.

 

[ElChingon]

I didn't read the whole thing but did anyone mention orca greenedge?
I learnt not too get too excited about GE and GC.
Oh well, that's what yyu get for being a newbie.....cycling is haaaard.

Agh, don't worry, just read up some on the past history (don't use this forum for that!) and see what is what so next time you can make a wiser choice or know how excited to get about so and so.

 

[greenedge]

GE were quite solid in their first GT. Two 2nd places for Goss and a first place. Vaitkus also came 3rd on a stage.
They were just screwed up by Goss crashing/ abondaning, Cav in good form and Bobridge not going as well as usual in the ITT's.

 

[Tigerion]

This years Giro was better without him. It would have been a slaughter. Again. In fact the only way to keep the GC interesting with him in the race is to knock him over several times in the first half of the race.

I'm with you on this one, going into the last couple of stages it still wasn't clear who the winner would be. last year it was already wrapped up and just a matter of if he felt like putting another nail in the coffin and totally burying them or if he was happy just to win

 

[VO2 Max]

Agree that Contador's absence was a key thing, but not so much his absence from this GT as from the next one. Probably he wouldn't have ridden the Giro anyway, but with him missing the TdF you now have so many riders thinking it's the best chance they could ever get to win the Tour so they skip the Giro and we're left a weak field. You can't believe Nibali doesn't want to win a Giro asap, and he probably would have won this one easily enough, but he wants the Tour. Menchov. The young Dutch and Belgian guys (except TdG and Slagter ofc). And if Contador wasn't on the verge of suspension he would have missed last year's Giro, been full strength at the Tour, so you'd probably have had Cadel Evans on the start in Denmark still looking for his first Grand Tour.

We knew it was a weak field before the start and so it turned out to be. One guy is a lot stronger than everyone else in stage racing at the moment, and he casts a long shadow even when he's not at events.