Worst line up for the Giro

[just some guy]

Seems a bit of a battle here.

Sometimes a team with no leaders end up doing really really well - ie Quickstep last year at the Tour.

probable team Sky - Dario David Cioni, Morris Possoni, Davide Appollonio, Thomas Lövkvist, Michael Barry, Kjell Carlstrom, Lars Petter Nordhaug and Russell Downing and Pete Kennaugh

Dropped Serge Pauwels , can´t think of a good reason to do this unless ....

BMC BALLAN Alessandro Ballen *, Chad Beyer, Mathias Frank, Martin Kohler, Alexander Kristoff, Mauro Santambrogio*, Johan Tschopp, Danilo Wyss, Simon Zahner

* not riding to be replaced due to clinic issues

So who are they going to replace these 2 ? anyone else got any ideas.

These are my 2 but in saying that I think one of these teams will go hard at the Mountains points

 

[Ferminal]

Re: BMC

It seems they don't want to send anyone from their Tour "A" Team.

Is Kroon fit? They could just through him in to get 1-2 weeks of racing in his legs.

Louder and Murphy are potential fillers.

Otherwise they may as well throw Roe and Eijssen to the wolves.

 

[just some guy]

Re: BMC

It seems they don't want to send anyone from their Tour "A" Team.

Is Kroon fit? They could just through him in to get 1-2 weeks of racing in his legs.

Louder and Murphy are potential fillers.

Otherwise they may as well throw Roe and Eijssen to the wolves.

I was thinking alone the same lines. I have a feeling that Frank and Tschopp will go hard at the mountains points so have Roe and Eijssen to climb (pun intended ) into breaks collect points until the pace goes up and their young legs explode.

 

[ISDfan]

No doubt BMC has worst line up for the Giro .

 

[auscyclefan94]

With Ballan and Santamborgio, BMC aren't the worst. AG2R and Aqua e Sapone are prwetty average across the board. After Mauro and Ale have been pulled they probably are the worst. That doesn't mean they won't come away with a stage win or two.

 

[Ryo Hazuki]

by far the worst has to be lotto and euskaltel other than anton

 

[Mellow Velo]

I've said it before. As far as GTs are concerned, a lot of PT teams aren't fit for purpose.
Whether there are enough 3 week racers around is questionable, but that's neither here nor there, when 18 teams get pre-selected.

BMC are one of the worst culprits and the shower that they are now forced to send, should not be there.
However, from the outset, OPL stand out as being totally unworthy of a Giro spot.

Sky's line up looks stellar, compared to them.

 

[auscyclefan94]

I presume Schaer and Louder will fill the sports of ballan and Santambrogio. At least with BMC, their riders can contend for the win in some stages. I think Leopard Trek's is also quite weak.

 

[Sasquatch]

BMC's team is clearly the worst. They have no one who can finish on the podium in any of the stages, let alone win.

At least with Sky's team they have someone capable of a top 10. Lovkvist.

I think the best battle will be team lantern rouge. There are a couple of teams that can battle for that place with BMC but I would give it to BMC at this stage. I will be surprised if 6 of those BMC riders finish the Giro. Kristoff definitely won't finish. I have doubts over Wyss, Zahner, Beyer and the two that BMC bring in.

 

[greenedge]

Leopard's is bad now with no Bennati. It's not so bad but is 2nd tier, just like every other team's. And i can't see them doing anything with the riders they have with their DS's. BMC, have options. Euskatel might win but no one knows their domestiques however. OPL suck badly. Rabobank have one of the worst teams too.

Best teams, AG, SBS, Katusha, Liquigas, Geox Lampre????

 

[jens_attacks]

I presume Schaer and Louder will fill the sports of ballan and Santambrogio.

unbelievable...what the hell is phonak thinking?teaching morality lessons?let them ride or don't even bother go to italy.
lots of bad teams by the way,too many.

 

[Sasquatch]

Leopard's is bad now with no Bennati. It's not so bad but is 2nd tier, just like every other team's. And i can't see them doing anything with the riders they have with their DS's. BMC, have options. Euskatel might win and noone knows their domestiques however. OPL suck badly. Rabobank have one of the worst teams too.

Best teams, AG, SBS, Katusha, Liquigas, Lampre????

Yeah there are about 4 or 5 teams that are seriously going to struggle and are making up the numbers.

Geox team is the best by far.

 

[auscyclefan94]

Enough with the Phonak crap. Lets call Astana - Liberty Seguros, Movistar - Banesto, Radioshack - US postal, Quickstep - mapei, Saxo bank - CSC, Geox - Saunier Duval.

 

[jens_attacks]

Enough with the Phonak cra. Lets call Astana - Liberty Seguros, Movistar - Banesto, Radioshack - US postal, Quickstep - mapei, Saxo bank - CSC, Geox - Saunier Duval.

lol that's fine by me.those were better teams anyway.these guys today are just pus.sies who are so dumb,they don't even change their phone cards.

 

[Ryo Hazuki]

Leopard's is bad now with no Bennati. It's not so bad but is 2nd tier, just like every other team's. And i can't see them doing anything with the riders they have with their DS's. BMC, have options. Euskatel might win and noone knows their domestiques however. OPL suck badly. Rabobank have one of the worst teams too.

Best teams, AG, SBS, Katusha, Liquigas, Lampre????

this is a mountain giro and for that I think these teams will be strongest in order:

androni
lampre
astana
geox


imo liquigas has a relatively bad team. other than szmyd and maybe capecchi and somewhat salerno no guys that can do well/ok in mountains

 

[auscyclefan94]

Without Bos, Rabobank doesn't look overly strong either.

 

[ingsve]

Even with the weak line ups that some of these teams are showing are there really any teams that are left out that could muster a better squad for the Giro?

The french teams are probably the best overall teams that aren't invited and they could perhaps have comparable teams but they are in the same position as many of the PT teams in that they would save their best riders for the Tour instead.

 

[Sylvester]

Although I'm a big Euskaltel fan, I must admit Sesma (probably one of the weakest riders on any World Tour team, go check his results), Cazaux and Aramendia are simply not the best of GT domestiques (they're young, though, there is plenty of room for improvement, but Sesma does not even stand a chance of finishing inside the time limit). Azanza has finished the Tour once, I reckon he'll be able to finish this Giro too. I bet the commentators won't name him even once. Oroz and Isasi are very good riders, but they won't get results. Minguez is a talent to watch, he might surprise in the mountains although it's more likely he will not deliver just yet.

But Nieve and Anton are in great shape and will do very well.

As for Lotto: De Clercq, even in good form, won't finish (why on earth is he being selected for this hard Giro, he only started cycling three years ago); Blythe, Veikkanen, Lodewyck, Dockx and Lang will probably not be noticed at all (maybe Blythe can podium a sprint stage, but I doubt it). Kaisen will be in a lot of breakaways; De Greef is a little underrated, but I can't see him do any better than top 30. Bakelants can win a stage for them, he's a great rider. A weak team to say the least, but overall slightly better than BMC's, I think.

 

[PCutter]

Re BMC...where's Brent Brookwalter this year? Im not suggesting he could do something GC wise, but maybe if he looked after himself could top 5 the final TT. Not much, but maybe the best BMC could hope for.

But generally, some very weak looking teams here. RCS may have shot themselves in the foot by scaring off even the Tour A-team domestiques, not just the A-team GC guys. Hopefully the weak teams at least let rip with random break away assaults.

 

[just some guy]

Re BMC...where's Brent Brookwalter this year? Im not suggesting he could do something GC wise, but maybe if he looked after himself could top 5 the final TT. Not much, but maybe the best BMC could hope for.

But generally, some very weak looking teams here. RCS may have shot themselves in the foot by scaring off even the Tour A-team domestiques, not just the A-team GC guys. Hopefully the weak teams at least let rip with random break away assaults.

Re BB getting over a collarbone and getting ready for Cali

Another problem is the US teams wanting to send stronger teams to Cali sponsors and all that.

 

[Sasquatch]

Enough with the Phonak crap. Lets call Astana - Liberty Seguros, Movistar - Banesto, Radioshack - US postal, Quickstep - mapei, Saxo bank - CSC, Geox - Saunier Duval.

Technically speaking, the difference between some of those teams to BMC are:

Phonak guys still control BMC minus Floyd Landis.
Astana's Liberty Seguros guys aren't around anymore controlling the team.

Don't know about the others but definitely Astana is reborn but BMC are the same old Phonak.

Anyone care to shed light on the other management at that time comparable with the management now of some teams?

 

[Sparta]

People are moaning about some of the teams but by definition only 10 teams max are going to have riders finish in the top 10 and allthough I admit there may be more than capable of it but there aren't that many consistent top 10 GT riders in the peleton. If your saving your best 1 or 2 for the tour then what else are you going to send to make yourself worthy of such an epic race. The only other option is a top sprinter which HTC are doing but its not really a sprinters race. Leopard and Rabo tried but theirs both got injured.

An option is to go against the uci and cut the number of teams but I don't see a problem with having some teams there. Rabo have some decent riders just no top GC contender - if they animate the race they will be well worth their inclusion. Sae with some of the other teams. i don't think its an issue of disrespect its just they are having to spread their riders quite thinly.

 

[Barrus]

Without Bos, Rabobank doesn't look overly strong either.

The thing with Rabobank, to me, is that I can't really judge them too harshly. This is mainly because of last year when they also came up with a line up that looked terrible. But thjey had 3 guys in the top 20, 2 of them young Dutch riders and really animated a lot of the races with most of the time at least 1 rider in the break and most often 2 or 3 guys pretty high up there in the mountain stages. Even though they did not have a great line up, they did provide for some inspired racing and this year they are again sending quite a few young guys that really want to prove themselves, so I think they will be able to show something, perhaps not win anything, but at least try to provide for some great racing

 

[Sparta]

The thing with Rabobank, to me, is that I can't really judge them too harshly. This is mainly because of last year when they also came up with a line up that looked terrible. But thjey had 3 guys in the top 20, 2 of them young Dutch riders and really animated a lot of the races with most of the time at least 1 rider in the break and most often 2 or 3 guys pretty high up there in the mountain stages. Even though they did not have a great line up, they did provide for some inspired racing and this year they are again sending quite a few young guys that really want to prove themselves, so I think they will be able to show something, perhaps not win anything, but at least try to provide for some great racing

Definitely agree with this. Krujswijk, Slagte and Weening all have the potential for top 20. That isn't terrible in my opinion.

 

[jens_attacks]

lol that's fine by me.those were better teams anyway.these guys today are just pus.sies who are so dumb,they don't even change their phone cards.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/gaz...es-evidence-from-mantova-doping-investigation

exactly what i said.professional riders with millions of dollars in their bank accounts and still acting like fuccin amateurs,talking on the phone about their medecines and shiit.it's career over for ballan and at least another 5 good riders.why?because they're not too smart.