Ryo Hazuki said:
wiggins would've never won the giro this year. not enough itt and purito >>>>>>>>>>>> wiggins any day and even he couldn't defeat hesjedal in the end and then there was de gendt and his show, that wiggins could've never followed either as he sucks too much in downhil too
the most important problem wiggins will face is 3 or 4 back to back mountainstages. he always sucked in more than 2 back to back mountainstages. same problem nibali has for instance. the giro seperates the climbers from the wannabees
wow ryo i was about to post this myself.
hitch where in my post did i mention nibali? and if you want to talk nibali, just like ryo said his problem never was the type of mountain but what mountain he had the day before.
don't believe me? then allow me to provide evidence:
tour de france 09:
stage 15 to verbier: 3rd 1:03 behind contador and 20 seconds behind andy
stage 16 Bourg-Saint-Maurice: same time as the big favorites, was on the important move caused by the schlecks but when andy's pace setting dropped frank just as they caught voight from the break, andy decided to have voight work instead of push on which allowed both frank and armstrong to get back and then a bunch more riders on the downhill.
stage 17 to Le Grand-Bornand: cracked at the bottom of the col du romme when the group was still like 10+ man strong just as the schlecks start attacking managed to catch a paced by VDV wiggins and armstrong a couple k before the top. then attacks on the descent as is caught straight away as soon as they start to climb the col de colombiere. he then follows wiggins and armstrong up the climb and tried to follow armstrong when he attacked 1k from the top. he managed to catch armstong on the descent finishing same time with him and almost an entire minute ahead of wiggins who struggled a lot on what was the only proper mountain stage of that tour and the best mountain stage the tour had in a while in terms of design.
stage 18 annecy itt: average ride losing 21 seconds on andy schleck.
see the pattern? at the second day of proper effort in a short time both nibali and wiggins cracked with nibali being the better natural climber of the 2 eventually handling the situation better despite starting much worse.
giro 2010:
stage 14 to asolo: win, caused the selection up the climb one of the best performances of his career.
stage 15 to zoncolan the following day: cracked mightily, finished a whole 3 minutes down on basso and 2 on evans despite being stronger then evans the previous day.
stage 16 to plan de corones: rest day in btw so he is back on the game and gains time on both basso and scarponi.
stage 19 to aprica: was strong, not super but clearly the third strongest a tier bellow basso and scarponi. basso clearly had to ease off a couple k from the top of the mortirolo not to drop him which is clear by the fact that they stop gaining time on vino/sastre/gadret. he still was extremely useful to basso guiding him on the descent and pushing up aprica which he still did very well.
stage 20 to tonale: cracked a bit on the ascent to tonale after evans attack losing 30 seconds to evens and 20 scarponi/basso.
once again make it 2 days in a row and he struggles.
vuelta 2010 on the typical vuelta triffecta:
good on penã cabarga and the following day on lagos but awful on the third day to cotobello.
some improvement as he handled the second day very well but was really awful on cotobello and would have lost the vuelta there had mosquera been more aggressive there like frank schleck was.
giro 2011:
good on gloss and on the zoncolan, cracked the following day on gardeccia but managed to cut his losses pretty well despite everything. a rest day later and he is second on the itt behind contador so he is back on the game.
he then gains time on scarponi on Macugnaga but struggles a lot the next day on finestre and loses his second place there.
i would say he showed some improvement btw 2010 and 2011.
tour 2012:
was very consistent all race cept on Peyragudes when he cracked bit which he blamed on an injury getting worse but i will call BS and say it was just his trademark bad day.
well that was long wasn't? what i was really trying to say? ya right the type of mountain isn't the problem, recovery and consistency are.
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