Who will win 2013 GIRO?

[Parrulo]

If he does the Giro? Why is this still a question?

selective quoting much? i also think he will do the giro but instead of getting into this silly bickering over who is right and who is wrong i just cover both options even the unlikely one, like i say in comas on the post you quoted, and make every1 happy.

 

[airstream]

I had to walk right into my screen to see, but is that sastre in your avatar?

Yes, Carlos is the greatest rider ever I think.

Well, let's reason realistically. 50km flat TT. How much can Wiggins gain? Imo, not less than 2'30. How that's possible to get back this on relatively sloping but Tre Cime ascents - I don't see this happening. All the more so, Nibali is quite doubtful uphill attacker.

 

[SafeBet]

I hope he uses the Vuelta to prepare for worlds, the Cadel Evans and Alejandro Valverde way.

He will.
Florence WC will probably be his best shot at the rainbow. Ever.

 

[the asian]

He will.
Florence WC will probably be his best shot at the rainbow. Ever.

Ponferrada also suits him well.

Anyway nibali will be keen to win WC on home soil, so I'm pretty sure he'll do Giro and Vuelta.

Doing the Vuelta is better prep than riding the Canadian and US races.

 

[18-Valve. (pithy)]

In my view, such a point is based on 2 myths:
1. Giro is always only steep climbs which is not the case for the next year's edition;
2. Nibali is a great climber as for steep climbs while Wiggins is not.
Froome rather played a controle role on the Peyresourde. Do you really think Wiggins wouldn't have caught Nibali in case there hadn't been Froome?

Purito? How? The man has no experiece to build the raced based on his own attacking capacitites. In addition, his team will me much weaker than Sky. Objectively Purito needs a few solo raid in order to win. A climber who's able to hang other's wheel and a climber who conducts the race himself and attacks are like 2 different genres. I don't see how Rodriguez can win, if Nibali and Wiggins demonstrate their customary level.

1. I don't subscribe to the myth that climbs have to be ridiculously steep to break the time trial specialists. The Giro will have plenty of hard climbs, weather permitting. I can't think of a recent GT that had more hard climbs over 1800 m.a.s.l. Everyone complains about the lenght of the mountain stages, but I don't think it matters that much. It will be incredibly tough.


2. No, I don't think Wiggins would have caught him on the climb itself, but the gap wouldn't have been huge. I think it was more significant that he would have lost time on La Toussuire, a climb that suited him even better. That stage was more difficult and was raced much harder, though. In my opinion, Froome, Pinot, Nibali, VDB and Rolland were all stronger than Wiggins in that stage.

Don't let that long ITT fool you. It's an atypical one and it's also balanced by three hard mountain stages and a couple "easy" ones, too. No "raids" will be necessary to take back a couple minutes. There will be plenty of opportunties to take back time.

3. I don't even know if Purito starts, but if he does then he'll certainly be a favorite as he's arguably a better climber than the both of them.

 

[maxmartin]

Yes, Carlos is the greatest rider ever I think.

Well, let's reason realistically. 50km flat TT. How much can Wiggins gain? Imo, not less than 2'30. How that's possible to get back this on relatively sloping but Tre Cime ascents - I don't see this happening. All the more so, Nibali is quite doubtful uphill attacker.

you are assuming Wiggins can have the 2012 Tour form, under current big cycling trend, i don't see that happening.

 

[airstream]

you are assuming Wiggins can have the 2012 Tour form, under current big cycling trend, i don't see that happening.

2'30 is rather an indicator of worse shape, but such a TT is not Nibali's territory whatsoever. He will lose a lot. Sky will have the strongest team of climbers and they will parch any movements on the climbs like in the 2011 Vuelta.

 

[Waterloo Sunrise]

Wiggins will likely do an Evans and tank after hitting his career/lifetime goal and struggling to motivate himself to the same level the next year.

But he is much more sensible than Cadel to shift focus and give himself an outside chance of maintaining motivation.

 

[Oliver]

His GT performances just aren't very consistent over 3 weeks.

LOL

Tour 2012 3th
Giro 2011 2th
Vuelta 2011 7th
Giro 2010 3th
Vuelta 2010 1th

Not consistent? Yeah right

Giro 2013, i voted for Nibali but i think it will be very difficult against Sky (Wiggins)

 

[airstream]

LOL

Tour 2012 3th
Giro 2011 2th
Vuelta 2011 7th
Giro 2010 3th
Vuelta 2010 1th

Not consistent? Yeah right

Giro 2013, i voted for Nibali but i think it will be very difficult against Sky (Wiggins)

inconsistent during all 3 weeks is not inconsisten in the GTs

 

[Waterloo Sunrise]

For a guy who can't attack and is inconsistent during the race, it's remarkable how consistently he delivers a good result.

 

[BlenJones2]

Im backing Wiggins. Yeah he won't have froome to pace him in the final 5k of mountains but henao and uran are getting stronger and they may have Cataldo for support in the mountains. People arguing that Nibali is better in the steep mountains just have to look at the 2011 Vuelta stage where Wiggins beat Nibali on the Angliru despite cracking. Rodriguez will take time out of wiggins especially with time bonuses but Wiggins will easily take that time back and more in the ITT's

 

[airstream]

Nibali was glowing at Angliru back then. He was completely out of the game. Anyways, he rode Zoncolan stunningly in 2011, though. But it's very hard to imagine him attacking and ramming 12% Tre Cime section alone.

 

[Parrulo]

Im backing Wiggins. Yeah he won't have froome to pace him in the final 5k of mountains but henao and uran are getting stronger and they may have Cataldo for support in the mountains. People arguing that Nibali is better in the steep mountains just have to look at the 2011 Vuelta stage where Wiggins beat Nibali on the Angliru despite cracking. Rodriguez will take time out of wiggins especially with time bonuses but Wiggins will easily take that time back and more in the ITT's

ya cus that had nothing to do with the fact that nibali completely missed his peak for the vuelta

but i guess wiggins going so slow that caused a moto to crash on the angliru is more impressive then nibali on the mortirolo and the bola in 2010 and the zoncolan in 2011 simply because he is wiggins

 

[Parrulo]

1. I don't subscribe to the myth that climbs have to be ridiculously steep to break the time trial specialists. The Giro will have plenty of hard climbs, weather permitting. I can't think of a recent GT that had more hard climbs over 1800 m.a.s.l. Everyone complains about the lenght of the mountain stages, but I don't think it matters that much. It will be incredibly tough.


2. No, I don't think Wiggins would have caught him on the climb itself, but the gap wouldn't have been huge. I think it was more significant that he would have lost time on La Toussuire, a climb that suited him even better. That stage was more difficult and was raced much harder, though. In my opinion, Froome, Pinot, Nibali, VDB and Rolland were all stronger than Wiggins in that stage.

Don't let that long ITT fool you. It's an atypical one and it's also balanced by three hard mountain stages and a couple "easy" ones, too. No "raids" will be necessary to take back a couple minutes. There will be plenty of opportunties to take back time.

3. I don't even know if Purito starts, but if he does then he'll certainly be a favorite as he's arguably a better climber than the both of them.

i completely agree with you, without froome wiggins would have lost time on la toussuire and Peyresourde on la toussuire if froome hadn't resurged from the death wiggins would have probably lost a lot of time as it was still 7k from the top and wiggins was alone with a group of 4 working with eachother already 20 seconds ahead of him, and on Peyresourde froome cracked a little just before the top and even wiggins himself was going completely full gas just to follow nibali's wheel.

ofc not having froome wouldn't have changed the winner of the tour taking into account wiggins performance on the time trials but it would certainly be a much tougher ride for him.

and like you said comparing the 2012 tour mountain stages to the 2013 giro ones is not even possible, and it's not because of the gradient.the giro mountains are higher, tougher, in more quantity and better placed then anything the 2012 tour had to offer and unless the colombians push wiggins with a rope if he cracks there is nothing they can do to save him.

 

[airstream]

ya cus that had nothing to do with the fact that nibali completely missed his peak for the vuelta

to a large extent it relates to wiggins too.

 

[del1962]

Where Wiggans and Nibali have both been up there in the GC race the only time I can recollect Nibali taking time out of wiggins was when Wiggins was done over by Astana in 2009 and Nibali was just following the wheel, even then most of the time taken out was with Nibali riding with another rider on the descent and Wiggins descending on his own.

 

[Parrulo]

Where Wiggans and Nibali have both been up there in the GC race the only time I can recollect Nibali taking time out of wiggins was when Wiggins was done over by Astana in 2009 and Nibali was just following the wheel, even then most of the time taken out was with Nibali riding with another rider on the descent and Wiggins descending on his own.

you mean nibali taking time on wiggins on a mountain stage? just every mountain stage of the 2009 tour cept arcalis i guess.

follow wheels? you mean just like wiggins did over the col du rome and de la colombiere following VDV's wheel?

 

[BlenJones2]

The 2009 tour was quite a while ago now and wiggins seems to be a much more solid rider than he was then.

 

[BlenJones2]

I'll also be interested to see if De Gendt can do anything next year or whether he'll be marked in order to prevent him taking another flyer like on the Stelvio.

 

[cineteq]

selective quoting much? i also think he will do the giro but instead of getting into this silly bickering over who is right and who is wrong i just cover both options even the unlikely one, like i say in comas on the post you quoted, and make every1 happy.

After the Eshnar and Hitch's Purito affair, you understood that nothing is written in stone. Attaboy!

 

[airstream]

1. I don't subscribe to the myth that climbs have to be ridiculously steep to break the time trial specialists. The Giro will have plenty of hard climbs, weather permitting. I can't think of a recent GT that had more hard climbs over 1800 m.a.s.l. Everyone complains about the lenght of the mountain stages, but I don't think it matters that much. It will be incredibly tough.

This medal has its reverse side. With a strong team, so called climbers can be thrown away on usual 6-7% av. climbs as it happened on Farrapona or memorable Toussuire

[quote[No, I don't think Wiggins would have caught him on the climb itself, but the gap wouldn't have been huge. I think it was more significant that he would have lost time on La Toussuire, a climb that suited him even better. That stage was more difficult and was raced much harder, though. In my opinion, Froome, Pinot, Nibali, VDB and Rolland were all stronger than Wiggins in that stage.

In any event Nibali would of gained nothing on that stage because in fact the Peyresourde descent is 400-500 meter straights downward. As for La Toussuire, yeh, it's very likely. Though, what's the use of hypothetical strength? Schleck was the strongest at Plateau de Beille and maybe even by far strongest with a null result. There was an interesting detail on Toussuire. The gap between Nibali's group and the peloton was about 15-20 seconds, but there was a 1km shelf and the breakaway was almost instantly caught. Wiggins made that pull.

Don't let that long ITT fool you. It's an atypical one and it's also balanced by three hard mountain stages and a couple "easy" ones, too. No "raids" will be necessary to take back a couple minutes. There will be plenty of opportunties to take back time.

We've seen many miracles in cycling, but a 50k flat time trial is an exercise from which it's difficult to expect big surprises. Purito and Nibali will break up on blown flat. Afterall, races show TT decide more than climbs for the last 5 years at least cos we have less and less attackers among gt riders. Do you see any teams that can bring squads comparable to Sky?

 

[theyoungest]

I'll also be interested to see if De Gendt can do anything next year or whether he'll be marked in order to prevent him taking another flyer like on the Stelvio.

De Gendt won't ride the Giro next year.

Maybe having seen the parcours of both Giro and Tour he'll change his mind, but I doubt it.

 

[del1962]

you mean nibali taking time on wiggins on a mountain stage? just every mountain stage of the 2009 tour cept arcalis i guess.

follow wheels? you mean just like wiggins did over the col du rome and de la colombiere following VDV's wheel?

2009 Stage 7 - Wiggins takes 10 seconds out of Nibali
Stage 15 - Nibali takes 3 seconds on wiggins
Stage 17 Where Wiggins gets done over by Astana Nibali 49 seconds working with Astana member mainly on descent.
Stage 19 Wiggins thakes over 1 1/2 minutes out of Nibali
Stage 20 Nibalis takes 5 seconds out of wiggins

So apart from the stage where BW got done over by Astana, Nibali has only taken 5 seconds or less out of wiggins on any stage of 2009 TDF, while wiggins takes far greater time out of Nibali.

 

[airstream]

you mean nibali taking time on wiggins on a mountain stage? just every mountain stage of the 2009 tour cept arcalis i guess.

follow wheels? you mean just like wiggins did over the col du rome and de la colombiere following VDV's wheel?

No. VdV towed only 2-3km after first 4 guys had gone off.