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Who had the best season in the last 20 years?

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Who had the best season in the last 20 years?

  • Gilbert 2011

    Votes: 47 46.1%
  • Cipollini 2002

    Votes: 2 2.0%
  • Cavendish 2009

    Votes: 5 4.9%
  • Pantani 1998

    Votes: 26 25.5%
  • Cancellara 2008

    Votes: 3 2.9%
  • Boonen 2005

    Votes: 6 5.9%
  • Petacchi 2003 or 2004

    Votes: 1 1.0%
  • Contador 2008

    Votes: 8 7.8%
  • Zabel 2001

    Votes: 4 3.9%

  • Total voters
    102
Re: Re:

Netserk said:
Valv.Piti said:
I'd like to know the number of time trials won by Cancellara and Martin and also how they have fared against each other. I don't really want to dig that up, but all I know is this:

Cancellara has 4 WCs against Martin's 4
Cancellara has 2 Olympics against Tony's 0
Cancellara has 6 time trials in Tour de France against Martin's 4


Thats a pretty convincing case for Cancellara IMO. Also, and this is obviously biased, but I think Cancellara has showcased a bigger level of dominance in the discipline than Martin has throughout his career. I specifically remember Cancellara immense display in Tour de Suisse in 2009.
As I wrote earlier, Cancellara was primarily a prologue specialist. He only won 1 long ITT in the Tour, and that was only because of favorable weather.

I mean, it is well known that the wind shifted for later starters, but the closest later starter was Wiggins and he lost 3:30 to him. There is no way he won that TT because of the wind shift.
 
Re:

Netserk said:
Menchov had even worse conditions. It's absolutely probable that he would have beaten Cancellara if they started close to each other.

If you cut 4 minutes from Andy's time, and you should cut a bit more because his position was worse than Menchov, this implies he almost beats Grabsch on a 1 hour flat TT. I don't think that the effect of wind was even close to 4 minutes in 1 hour.
 
The problem is you are beginning to cook with recovery as well now, that has obviously never been his strong suit. I don't ever think there has been a better time trialist in the world for prologues and short time trials and I would also take a peak Canc over peak Martin on a long one. But not at the end of the hardest bike race in the world.

Cancellara basically destroyed Wiggo outside of 2012 also, lets just say that was an extraordinary year.
 
Re:

Valv.Piti said:
The problem is you are beginning to cook with recovery as well now, that has obviously never been his strong suit. I don't ever think there has been a better time trialist in the world for prologues and short time trials and I would also take a peak Canc over peak Martin on a long one. But not at the end of the hardest bike race in the world.

Cancellara basically destroyed Wiggo outside of 2012 also, lets just say that was an extraordinary year.

Boardman was better than him in prologues, he was way worse at everything else though.

Also, if you ask who is the best TT rider in this century, I would immediately say Lance. He was simply insane considering his worst TT is being 3rd apart from 1 prologue in 2003 in that 7 years.
 
While i voted Pantani, it should be pointed out that the Giro Tour double gets far more credit now, than it did in 98. In 98 it was the 3rd time it had been done in 7 years, and the 9th time it had been done in the previous 28.
 
Re:

Singer01 said:
While i voted Pantani, it should be pointed out that the Giro Tour double gets far more credit now, than it did in 98. In 98 it was the 3rd time it had been done in 7 years, and the 9th time it had been done in the previous 28.

The 2 previous times in that 7 years were by Indurain, who was an exception on many levels.

I do agree that nobody this time in 1998 would have said "there won't be another Giro/Tour double for at least another 20 years."

And it does have to be remembered that Pantani's Tour win was against a <ahem> depleted field. Though he did beat Ullrich, his most likely toughest competition.
 
But before Indurain it had also been done in 1987 by someone who wasn't comparably dominant. And then Hinault had also done it in 1985 and 1982. It was a great achievement, of course, but a perfectly realistic one, unlike nowadays when people debate whether it's even possible at all.
 
Re:

hrotha said:
But before Indurain it had also been done in 1987 by someone who wasn't comparably dominant. And then Hinault had also done it in 1985 and 1982. It was a great achievement, of course, but a perfectly realistic one, unlike nowadays when people debate whether it's even possible at all.
Not to mention just how close Fignon was (twice!).
 
I have no idea why Froome's 2013 is not in Poll

Wins Oman with stage win and destroying closest rivals Contador and Nibali on Green Mountain
T-A 2nd, takes a stage win deroyin rivals on stage
Criterium Intl win plus stage win destroying everyone
Romandie win including great uphill prologue win
Dauphine - win plus stage win plus attempt to get teamate a stage win

Then the tour, two dominant stage MTF stage wins
2md on flat ITT just behind then worlds premium ITT man and winning hilly ITT
When isolated by team stays with primary rivals

Basically totally dominant in every stage race from February to July (with excption of T-A where arguably only second best)
 
Jan 13, 2014
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Re:

del1962 said:
I have no idea why Froome's 2013 is not in Poll

Wins Oman with stage win and destroying closest rivals Contador and Nibali on Green Mountain
T-A 2nd, takes a stage win deroyin rivals on stage
Criterium Intl win plus stage win destroying everyone
Romandie win including great uphill prologue win
Dauphine - win plus stage win plus attempt to get teamate a stage win

Then the tour, two dominant stage MTF stage wins
2md on flat ITT just behind then worlds premium ITT man and winning hilly ITT
When isolated by team stays with primary rivals

Basically totally dominant in every stage race from February to July (with excption of T-A where arguably only second best)
+10
 
Oman, Critérium International and a 2nd at Tirreno don't count for much when the bar is necessarily as high as in this thread. Froome's 2013 season was very good, of course, but Wiggins's 2012 season was better and it isn't in the poll either because the competition here is so high. There's only two GT GC seasons included, and both had GT doubles.
 
Re: Re:

Netserk said:
hrotha said:
But before Indurain it had also been done in 1987 by someone who wasn't comparably dominant. And then Hinault had also done it in 1985 and 1982. It was a great achievement, of course, but a perfectly realistic one, unlike nowadays when people debate whether it's even possible at all.
Not to mention just how close Fignon was (twice!).
That has been while the Giro still went until mid June hasn't it? Pantani is the only one that archived the double with the 5 weeks gap between the Giro and the Tour IMHO.
 
Re: Re:

staubsauger said:
Netserk said:
hrotha said:
But before Indurain it had also been done in 1987 by someone who wasn't comparably dominant. And then Hinault had also done it in 1985 and 1982. It was a great achievement, of course, but a perfectly realistic one, unlike nowadays when people debate whether it's even possible at all.
Not to mention just how close Fignon was (twice!).
That has been while the Giro still went until mid June hasn't it? Pantani is the only one that archived the double with the 5 weeks gap between the Giro and the Tour IMHO.
This. Game, set, and match.

Really.
 
Sep 6, 2016
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A few quick thoughts: 1) It is certifiably absurd to claim that Cancellara was not the best TTer in the world for a period of time.
2) It is immensely difficult to compare GT riders to classics riders. The last time a rider won consecutive GTs in a year (Giro-Tour or Tour Vuelta) was obviously Pantani, that's remarkable. But I voted Boonen due to all of the randomness that can ruin a one day race for a rider.
 
Re:

del1962 said:
I have no idea why Froome's 2013 is not in Poll

Wins Oman with stage win and destroying closest rivals Contador and Nibali on Green Mountain
T-A 2nd, takes a stage win deroyin rivals on stage
Criterium Intl win plus stage win destroying everyone
Romandie win including great uphill prologue win
Dauphine - win plus stage win plus attempt to get teamate a stage win

Then the tour, two dominant stage MTF stage wins
2md on flat ITT just behind then worlds premium ITT man and winning hilly ITT
When isolated by team stays with primary rivals

Basically totally dominant in every stage race from February to July (with excption of T-A where arguably only second best)

Because we have 2 seasons in the poll where riders achieved the GT double, both arguably better seasons then Froome's. If we include Froome, then we should also include Contador's 2009 and Wiggins 2012, and maybe even Contador 2011 and 2014. Froome's 2013 was a great season, but I don't think it can challenge Pantani's 1998 and 2008 from Contador.
 
Petacchi 2003 is probably the best sprinter season- 6 Giro, 4 TDF, 5 Vuelta out of his 48 total GT stages.
Pantani double is the best but there are too many asterisks in that era.
Nowadays the focus is on reduced weight which also hampers recovery and retraining after a GT. So it is difficult to be competitive and probably the double is not feasible
 

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