• The Cycling News forum is looking to add some volunteer moderators with Red Rick's recent retirement. If you're interested in helping keep our discussions on track, send a direct message to @SHaines here on the forum, or use the Contact Us form to message the Community Team.

    In the meanwhile, please use the Report option if you see a post that doesn't fit within the forum rules.

    Thanks!

Whatever happened to...?

Page 3 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
Lövkvist was part of that HTC squad that flattered to deceive. With the team's history, definitely if they had been a GC-targeted team rather than a sprint team they'd have attracted a lot more attention in another part of the forum than they did. Even allowing for the injuries to explain away Gerdemann, you've still got Peter Velits going from winning GT 47km flat TTs and finishing on the podium to complete anonymity and retirement aged 31; Matt Goss going from durable sprinter and potential classics man extraordinaire to retiring at 29 and barely being able to finish a race on the continental circuit (though we also know personal demons played a large part for him); and hell, even some of the people that did do well post-HTC like Boasson Hagen and van Garderen haven't quite hit the heights forecast for them based on their showings in Bob Stapleton's Misery Express.

Maybe it's a bit of the opposite. Riding for HTC they got more hype (shudders) than their performances warranted. At least I never thought that Tejay was going to be super duper great and he had a pretty decent career apart from the last couple of years.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sandisfan
Lövkvist was part of that HTC squad that flattered to deceive. With the team's history, definitely if they had been a GC-targeted team rather than a sprint team they'd have attracted a lot more attention in another part of the forum than they did. Even allowing for the injuries to explain away Gerdemann, you've still got Peter Velits going from winning GT 47km flat TTs and finishing on the podium to complete anonymity and retirement aged 31; Matt Goss going from durable sprinter and potential classics man extraordinaire to retiring at 29 and barely being able to finish a race on the continental circuit (though we also know personal demons played a large part for him); and hell, even some of the people that did do well post-HTC like Boasson Hagen and van Garderen haven't quite hit the heights forecast for them based on their showings in Bob Stapleton's Misery Express.

Velits was weirder than that though. He wasn’t great on HTC then no good afterwards. He wasn’t particularly notable in HTC either, bar one superb Vuelta out of nowhere.
 
Lövkvist was part of that HTC squad that flattered to deceive. With the team's history, definitely if they had been a GC-targeted team rather than a sprint team they'd have attracted a lot more attention in another part of the forum than they did. Even allowing for the injuries to explain away Gerdemann, you've still got Peter Velits going from winning GT 47km flat TTs and finishing on the podium to complete anonymity and retirement aged 31; Matt Goss going from durable sprinter and potential classics man extraordinaire to retiring at 29 and barely being able to finish a race on the continental circuit (though we also know personal demons played a large part for him); and hell, even some of the people that did do well post-HTC like Boasson Hagen and van Garderen haven't quite hit the heights forecast for them based on their showings in Bob Stapleton's Misery Express.
Fantastic post! HTC was ... interesting
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sandisfan
Not an answer; but he only caught your eyes at the 2018 Worlds? What about his spring campaign that year?

As for what happened... I think I read something about overtraining.
Definitely. He opened the classics season by winning Omloop (solo attack in the last kms), then 4th in Flanders and win in the Amstel at the top of that. On the Worlds he attacked before the last lap iirc and held on the front for a very long time and was caught just on that final steep ramp. After 2018 season everyone started to see a serious classic contender in Valgren, but in 2019 classics he was nowhere close to his previous results, he disappeared completely.
 
Markus Fothen, he looked like a possible future quality GC rider. After he won the U23 ITT WC in 2003 he had a strong Giro 2005 (12th place) and a good Tdf 2006 where he almost won the white jersey and came in 14th. After that it went downhill, apart from a couple of decent showings in smaller stage races. His last GTs he didnt manage to finish under the top 100 anymore. I think I read smth about some kind of infection he had at one point. I dont know if thats the reason or the doping history at Team Gerolsteiner.
 
Whatever happened to Julian Arredondo, the little Colombian who for a few months in 2014 was one of the best climbers in the world?

He won Langkawi in 2013 and got Trek contract for 2014. Won 2 stages in Argentina, won at Rifugio Panarotta in the giro and dominated mountains classification.

Never got any results after that and disappeared whilst at Nippo in 2017
 
Whatever happened to Julian Arredondo, the little Colombian who for a few months in 2014 was one of the best climbers in the world?

He won Langkawi in 2013 and got Trek contract for 2014. Won 2 stages in Argentina, won at Rifugio Panarotta in the giro and dominated mountains classification.

Never got any results after that and disappeared whilst at Nippo in 2017

 
Leopold Konig. Top 10ed all GTs and was the Czech hope after his breakthrough in the Tour of 2013. Rode a pretty good Vuelta as a dom for Froome until that Formigal stage in 2016 and afterwards nothing. Bora signed him for three years and at the end even Ralph Denk didn’t know if he retired or not.
The last thing I heard was that he nowadays is involved in organizing races and that an illness has forced him to take a break. He himself does not state that his career has ended but he said in an interview that he can only do very light cycling. As to what the illness exactly is, he gave no answer and claimed that even doctors do not really know. He just said its not the back which he had a lot of problems with during his career.
 
Maybe I'm talking about wrong cyclists because they're still competing at relatively high level, but I once thought Mezgec and Lobato would be somekind of Colbrelli type of sprinters, and at around his level, too. Sbaragli fared better but I thought he never really had chances with the teams he's in, for years. Also Pelucchi once looked at least good enough to be in the next tier after the very best and never came close again. They make me think Rojas is either lucky, really good, or know what he's doing to stay "important" for so long.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sandisfan
Maybe I'm talking about wrong cyclists because they're still competing at relatively high level, but I once thought Mezgec and Lobato would be somekind of Colbrelli type of sprinters, and at around his level, too. Sbaragli fared better but I thought he never really had chances with the teams he's in, for years. Also Pelucchi once looked at least good enough to be in the next tier after the very best and never came close again. They make me think Rojas is either lucky, really good, or know what he's doing to stay "important" for so long.
Rojas is pretty underrated, he did really well to remodel himself into the rouleur/road captain role he does today.

I think he looked at Cav/Greipel/Farrar and saw the likes of Sagan/Matthews/Kittel coming through and realised sprint wins weren't coming easily any time soon for him
 

TRENDING THREADS