Your favourite riders!

[Akuryo]

Re: Re:

Probably the best rider never to win the WC?

De Vlaeminck, Ocana, Poulidor, Bartoli, Godefroot, Kelly, Cancellara, Bartali .....

So many great riders who never wore the rainbow jersey

None of those guys would have the palmares they have now in the current era though. Cancellara I can somewhat understand but Valverde was much more versatile.

Why not? Genuinely curious on this

Because this is a time where pretty much everyone is specialized in certain aspects (climbs, cobbles, sprints) and you barely see riders that are good at everything anymore. I don't believe that a guy like Merckx would even come close to the palmares he managed to get back in the day. It's just not possible anymore

Exactly. Look at nowadays "jack of all traits" like Kwiatkowski. Sure, they win races but they are nowhere near what Merckx did. Back in the day a guy like Kwiatkowski would have won every race he entered but now? He gets his 3-5 wins a season.

 

[Mr.White]

Re: Re:

Probably the best rider never to win the WC?

De Vlaeminck, Ocana, Poulidor, Bartoli, Godefroot, Kelly, Cancellara, Bartali .....

So many great riders who never wore the rainbow jersey

De Vlaeminck, Bartali, Kelly clearly better than Valverde. Others, debatable...

 

[Bardamu]

Re: Re:

Valverde
Quintana
Nibali
Dumoulin
Wellens
Sagan
Chavez

You really ought to be more specific.
Though, for Quintana, Nibali, and Sagan I assume you mean the "main brother"...



(Also, don't let Ruudz0r see this post.)

:lol: Its weird though right? Especially in this topic people who are fan of him and still spell his name wrong.

Haha forgive me, I won't do it again.

 

[Echoes]

Re: Re:

Because this is a time where pretty much everyone is specialized in certain aspects (climbs, cobbles, sprints) and you barely see riders that are good at everything anymore. I don't believe that a guy like Merckx would even come close to the palmares he managed to get back in the day. It's just not possible anymore

And yet he would still be among the top3 best riders of the current peloton for sure. The idea that oldtimers would be totally outclassed by the contemporary riders is just ridiculous. I've already said it here but on a home trainer Merckx could hit around 455w in an hour without ventilo. In recent years only Cancellara or now perhaps Tom Dumoulin could do that.

In 1970 Merckx won Paris-Roubaix with an average speed of 41.644kmh. It was on the new Roubaix route (without the Carrefour de l'Arbre but with the Forest and the infamous section of Nomain, now asphalted). Stormy weather. A normal steel bikes without the current aero wheels. It should be conceded that the first two hours were by tail-wind. In 2010, Fabian Cancellara, in dry conditions, with a modern 2kg-lighter bike, some would say with a hidden motor and with rebuilt cobbles, "only" hit 39.325kmh while Tom Boonen in 2009 (considered his finest performance) only hit 41.342kmh.

The reason why the current peloton seems so specialised (and yet, less specialised that in the noughties!) is that the race routes are now much less homogeneous that they were in Merckx's days. Back then the Walloon Arrow ended in Charleroi with the Mur de Thuin as decider. The Mur de Thuin is a Flemish Ardenne type of climb with cobbles. In recent years Boonen and Cancellara should've been top favourite every year to win the Arrow instead of Joaquim Rodriguez or Dan Martin. That would have been quite different. Besides, the Grand Tour are an awful lot more climber-friendly with little ITT's and a lot of Mountain Top Finishes, with very steep slopes, would've been a killer for complete riders such as Merckx or nowadays Dumoulin. In those days, Torriani and Goddet every year made the routes harder and steeper in the mountains while there were a lot less ITT distance in the Merckx era than in the Hinault one. Yet back then it was not enough. Nowadays with aberrations like the Zoncolan or the Angliru or whatever, for sure, Merckx would be dropped any day but that's just a matter of route, not evolution.

Then there are other factors like better roads, shorter distances and what we may not talk about. Globalization and training evolution are also factors but overrated in my opinion.

 

[RedheadDane]

Re:

My favourite riders. Unfortunately no Purito anymore

longish post...

Funny, I'd think a guy like - say - Arredondo would be pretty high on your list.

 

[frisenfruitig]

Re: Re:

Probably the best rider never to win the WC?

De Vlaeminck, Ocana, Poulidor, Bartoli, Godefroot, Kelly, Cancellara, Bartali .....

So many great riders who never wore the rainbow jersey

De Vlaeminck, Bartali, Kelly clearly better than Valverde. Others, debatable...

I disagree. I think if you were to drop a guy like Valverde/Sagan/Cancellara in those eras they would be able to get the same palmares, perhaps even better. I also think it's quite silly to see riders of the current era being compared to guys like Merckx as if that is a fair comparison. He wouldn't have been better than guys like Sagan or Valverde imo. It's just speculation of course.

 

[May0maniac]

Re: Re:

Because this is a time where pretty much everyone is specialized in certain aspects (climbs, cobbles, sprints) and you barely see riders that are good at everything anymore. I don't believe that a guy like Merckx would even come close to the palmares he managed to get back in the day. It's just not possible anymore

And yet he would still be among the top3 best riders of the current peloton for sure. The idea that oldtimers would be totally outclassed by the contemporary riders is just ridiculous. I've already said it here but on a home trainer Merckx could hit around 455w in an hour without ventilo. In recent years only Cancellara or now perhaps Tom Dumoulin could do that.

In 1970 Merckx won Paris-Roubaix with an average speed of 41.644kmh. It was on the new Roubaix route (without the Carrefour de l'Arbre but with the Forest and the infamous section of Nomain, now asphalted). Stormy weather. A normal steel bikes without the current aero wheels. It should be conceded that the first two hours were by tail-wind. In 2010, Fabian Cancellara, in dry conditions, with a modern 2kg-lighter bike, some would say with a hidden motor and with rebuilt cobbles, "only" hit 39.325kmh while Tom Boonen in 2009 (considered his finest performance) only hit 41.342kmh.

The reason why the current peloton seems so specialised (and yet, less specialised that in the noughties!) is that the race routes are now much less homogeneous that they were in Merckx's days. Back then the Walloon Arrow ended in Charleroi with the Mur de Thuin as decider. The Mur de Thuin is a Flemish Ardenne type of climb with cobbles. In recent years Boonen and Cancellara should've been top favourite every year to win the Arrow instead of Joaquim Rodriguez or Dan Martin. That would have been quite different. Besides, the Grand Tour are an awful lot more climber-friendly with little ITT's and a lot of Mountain Top Finishes, with very steep slopes, would've been a killer for complete riders such as Merckx or nowadays Dumoulin. In those days, Torriani and Goddet every year made the routes harder and steeper in the mountains while there were a lot less ITT distance in the Merckx era than in the Hinault one. Yet back then it was not enough. Nowadays with aberrations like the Zoncolan or the Angliru or whatever, for sure, Merckx would be dropped any day but that's just a matter of route, not evolution.

Then there are other factors like better roads, shorter distances and what we may not talk about. Globalization and training evolution are also factors but overrated in my opinion.

Great post, I have to agree with you, If I remember correctly at least 4 of Eddie's Giro wins (if not all of them) came on routes that had less km of ITT than the 2015 Giro.
With the bikes and the gearing that they had back in the day you could make a claim that Tre Cime and Mont du Chat were pretty much the Zoncolan and Angliru of the 60ies/70ies.

 

[Valv.Piti]

I agree, its overall a good post, but its funny how he doesn't even acknowledges Valverde as a rider and instead refers to Dan Martin re the point about Fléche Wallone.

Also, I don't know exactly how much Dumoulin weights, but if he has a FTP of 455 he will win the Giro without too much trouble. Thats 7 w/kg on a one hour climb for 65 kg (say, Stelvio from Prato - pretty insane VAM....) and 6,5 w/kg for 70 kg. The only ones who can reach that kind of wattage/FTP is absolute peak time trial Cancellara, say, 2009 (when Contador still beat him in a TT, lol) and maybe Tony Martin at his absolute best whenever that was. And Eddie, as far as I am concerned, weighed in at a fair amount under those two riders, at least Cancellara.

Would appreciate to be corrected on what they exactly weigh in at, Im not expert on that, but Dumoulin is listed at 69 on PCS so I thought it was natural to assume he would be around 66-67 kg now.

 

[GuyIncognito]

If we're comparing modern riders to Merckx, I would personally go with the comparison Chris Boardman's trainer (I forget his name) made:

Boardman in 2000 went at the hour record with modern nutrition, modern training methods, the entire year's training geared towards that one day and perfect pacing. Merckx did it at the end of riding a whole year of track, then early season road racs, then classics, then grand tours, then worlds and more classics, tired and winding down, without any modern advances in training, and without any pacing because he wanted to beat the records for fastest 10km and 20km and ended up blowing up after half an hour and losing time.

Boardman beat Merckx by 0.01km

The riders of the present aren't naturally more talented. They have access to more developed science, that's the extent of it. Any freak today would be a freak back then and vice versa.

I agree, its overall a good post, but its funny how he doesn't even acknowledges Valverde as a rider and instead refers to Dan Martin re the point about Fléche Wallone.

Also, I don't know exactly how much Dumoulin weights, but if he has a FTP of 455 he will win the Giro without too much trouble. Thats 7 w/kg on a one hour climb for 65 kg (say, Stelvio from Prato - pretty insane VAM....) and 6,5 w/kg for 70 kg. The only ones who can reach that kind of wattage/FTP is absolute peak time trial Cancellara, say, 2009 (when Contador still beat him in a TT, lol) and maybe Tony Martin at his absolute best whenever that was. And Eddie, as far as I am concerned, weighed in at a fair amount under those two riders, at least Cancellara.

Would appreciate to be corrected on what they exactly weigh in at, Im not expert on that, but Dumoulin is listed at 69 on PCS so I thought it was natural to assume he would be around 66-67 kg now.

A tip. Don't trust any weight or height on PCS. Go to the teams' websites. On PCS you'll commonly find measures that are wrong by 20cm/20kg.

 

[Red Rick]

Re:

If we're comparing modern riders to Merckx, I would personally go with the comparison Chris Boardman's trainer (I forget his name) made:

Boardman in 2000 went at the hour record with modern nutrition, modern training methods, the entire year's training geared towards that one day and perfect pacing. Merckx did it at the end of riding a whole year of track, then early season road racs, then classics, then grand tours, then worlds and more classics, tired and winding down, without any modern advances in training, and without any pacing because he wanted to beat the records for fastest 10km and 20km and ended up blowing up after half an hour and losing time.

Boardman beat Merckx by 0.01km

The riders of the present aren't naturally more talented. They have access to more developed science, that's the extent of it. Any freak today would be a freak back then and vice versa.

I agree, its overall a good post, but its funny how he doesn't even acknowledges Valverde as a rider and instead refers to Dan Martin re the point about Fléche Wallone.

Also, I don't know exactly how much Dumoulin weights, but if he has a FTP of 455 he will win the Giro without too much trouble. Thats 7 w/kg on a one hour climb for 65 kg (say, Stelvio from Prato - pretty insane VAM....) and 6,5 w/kg for 70 kg. The only ones who can reach that kind of wattage/FTP is absolute peak time trial Cancellara, say, 2009 (when Contador still beat him in a TT, lol) and maybe Tony Martin at his absolute best whenever that was. And Eddie, as far as I am concerned, weighed in at a fair amount under those two riders, at least Cancellara.

Would appreciate to be corrected on what they exactly weigh in at, Im not expert on that, but Dumoulin is listed at 69 on PCS so I thought it was natural to assume he would be around 66-67 kg now.

A tip. Don't trust any weight or height on PCS. Go to the teams' websites. On PCS you'll commonly find measures that are wrong by 20cm/20kg.

Boardman rode in Manchester. Merckx in Mexico-city

 

[Echoes]

Boardman rode indoors and Merckx outdoors. Indoors racing also enhances air penetration.

Tom Dumoulin weighs 71kg according to L'Équipe.

I haven't seen the Arrow in a long time, so I named names that crossed my mind but it's pretty logical that I'd ignore a rider that for reasons we may not talk about here is no longer a rider. It's not funny, it's being true to a principle.

 

[RedheadDane]

Last time I checked Valverde was definitely still a rider.

 

[Echoes]

All his results are crosses. It's not because the moderation does not entitle us to say why that the reality changes. There are facts. That rider should never enter into a discussion "who's the best" even on this section...

 

[Valv.Piti]

Boardman rode indoors and Merckx outdoors. Indoors racing also enhances air penetration.

Tom Dumoulin weighs 71kg according to L'Équipe.

I haven't seen the Arrow in a long time, so I named names that crossed my mind but it's pretty logical that I'd ignore a rider that for reasons we may not talk about here is no longer a rider. It's not funny, it's being true to a principle.

Hmm, 71 kg seems a bit too much for him considering he seriously targets GT's now.

 

[frisenfruitig]

All his results are crosses. It's not because the moderation does not entitle us to say why that the reality changes. There are facts. That rider should never enter into a discussion "who's the best" even on this section...

That is like, your opinion man. Not everyone is as gullible

 

[RedheadDane]

All his results are crosses. It's not because the moderation does not entitle us to say why that the reality changes. There are facts. That rider should never enter into a discussion "who's the best" even on this section...

Funny, I've seen several quite new and still standing results from Valverde.
Why do you hate the guy so much, did he steal your breakfast? He's still racing, and he's still winning, and he's still got fans.

 

[Echoes]

Funny, I've seen several quite new and still standing results from Valverde.
Why do you hate the guy so much, did he steal your breakfast? He's still racing, and he's still winning, and he's still got fans.

It might not seem so, RHD but I don't feel any hate towards the guy at all, I assure you. In his early years, I rather liked him, not more than that (yes, I am that old, apparently ) but than happened what happened. I've had the reasoning about other riders with the same "past". If I had treated Valverde differently than those riders, anyone here would rightly have considered me a hypocrite. I'd rather be considered gullible (though I don't see what gullibility has to do with this) than a hypocrite. In previous threads like this one, I named Enrico Franzoi who really was a favourite rider of mine but for him too happened what happened in the meantime. Valverde was entitled to come back and for a WT team on top of that, still "winning" but a guy like Aurélien Duval hadn't had that chance. No WT teams, ProConti Teams, nor any top cyclocross teams wanted to contract him anymore despite a way more benign offence. Where's justice? He's got fans but as I said those fans don't care about ethics.

I could say more but I'm afraid I'd be banned if I did...

 

[RedheadDane]

Why have that reasoning about any rider? Valverde is still a rider. He still rides, and he'll continue riding for at least two more seasons. Saying that he isn't a rider anymore isn't just silly, it's inaccurate.

 

[Tonton]

Yes, please, let's not cross THAT line .

 

[Echoes]

You know very well that I am not entitled to say why on this section. You want to get me banned?

 

[Tonton]

You know very well that I am not entitled to say why on this section. You want to get me banned?

No one wants you to be banned Echoes. Thank you for your many contributions and very thoughtful and educated takes . I don't always agree with you, but this time I do 100%. Cheers .

 

[RedheadDane]

Just say something like "I, for clinicey related reasons, chose to ignore him."
You can't say that he isn't a rider anymore when he clearly is. After all, pretty impressive for someone who isn't a rider to go into a 70k solo break.

 

[Tonton]

Re:

Just say something like "I, for clinicey related reasons, chose to ignore him."
You can't say that he isn't a rider anymore when he clearly is. After all, pretty impressive for someone who isn't a rider to go into a 70k solo break.

There's no doubt that Valverde is great. No one can take that away, although on the other hand, I understand the "reservations". Aside from Sagan, he's the only rider who could win all the monuments...and he can win or podium every GC...et caetera...

By the way, what is he doing these days? I'm not used to Valverde-free weeks...what a slacker .

 

[RedheadDane]

My point was that stating Valverde isn't a rider anymore is just wrong. You might wish he wasn't, but the fact of the matter is that he still is.
It would be just as stating that Cancellara is still a rider.

 

[Arredondo]

Re: Re:

Probably the best rider never to win the WC?

De Vlaeminck, Ocana, Poulidor, Bartoli, Godefroot, Kelly, Cancellara, Bartali .....

So many great riders who never wore the rainbow jersey

De Vlaeminck, Bartali, Kelly clearly better than Valverde. Others, debatable...

I only said great riders who have never won the rainbow jersey

But don't underestimate Poulidor. He also won a GT (Vuelta), classics (MSR, Fleche Wallone), stage races (2x Paris-Nice, 2x Dauphine, 5x Criterium International, which was a big race back then). And because the amount of podiums are important for a guy like Valverde (you said it multiple time yourself, the consistency also makes him one the best riders of his generation), you also shouldnt underestimate the fact Poulidor reached the podium of the Tour 8 (!) times.

But at the end, you can't really compare riders from totally different generations