Dauphiné prologue (spoilers)

afx237vi

Coverage on BES has started 15 minutes early :shock: Miraculous.

Vladimir Efimkin fastest so far.

campagchris

Aaagh I toyed between him and grivko,but will he win "we shall see"
can anyone topple him "we shall see"tapping the side of his nose,had to turn the sound down.

what a finale

afx237vi

Well that was great coverage, all 25 minutes of it. If it had started on time it would have been 10!

Good ride by Levi to win. Hushovd (that's Hush-O-V-D) second and Valverde 3rd.

campagchris

I was pleasantly surprised when I switched on,and very good end to it.Valverde went well :shock:
Evans has been suffering with tendonitis apparently.

blazing_saddles

Obviously by riding a lousey Giro, Leipheimer was in fact getting properly prepared for a more important event. :roll:
No wonder there is so much sceptism with results.

Slow Downcp

afx237vi wrote:

Well that was great coverage, all 25 minutes of it. If it had started on time it would have been 10!

Good ride by Levi to win. Hushovd (that's Hush-O-V-D) second and Valverde 3rd.

I switched on just in time to see it going off :evil:

NJK

Blazing Saddles wrote:

Obviously by riding a lousey Giro, Leipheimer was in fact getting properly prepared for a more important event. :roll:
No wonder there is so much sceptism with results.

To win that prologue surely you have to be on form, something that LL wasn't during the last week of the Giro, and now he wins, new blood perhaps.

iainf72

What the heck happened to Horse Boy Hincapie?

Are we starting to see how decidely average he is without a program or did he have a problem?

Kléber

?

...there's a big question mark here. One week he's 18th in the Giro's final TT, finishing behind the likes of Alexsander Serov and Michael Blaudzun. Today he's coming in ahead of Hushovd. This is exactly the sort of thing that makes me cynical. I want to believe it's just rest but we'll see...

thamacdaddy

To be fair he finished the giro which was tough he would have to have some kind of form to do that, he was commenting on the mountain time trial he felt he was getting in better form but that he wouldn't push his final week.

And there was a bit of a difference between the distances and profile of the Giro TTs and This 6km beast of a TT today.....

I don't doubt maybe you guys are bang on you seem to know all this stuff and how dodgy it all looks inside out but I wasn't overly alarmed at the fact he did a good ride on a short course following the Giro.

How many of the other favourites are using this as a tour warm up as opposed to LL who gets a nice break after this?

iainf72

Kléber wrote:

?

...there's a big question mark here. One week he's 18th in the Giro's final TT, finishing behind the likes of Alexsander Serov and Michael Blaudzun. Today he's coming in ahead of Hushovd. This is exactly the sort of thing that makes me cynical. I want to believe it's just rest but we'll see...

He obviously backed off in the Giro. Why kill yourself when it's not going to make much difference overall, especially if you know you're doing the Dauphine?

Anyway, Cadel's main mountain helper is right on track

132 Yaroslav Popovych (Ukr) Silence-Lotto

micron

hey, Contador 'won the Giro at 80%' so Leiposuction should easily win this prologue...

I particularly enjoyed Duffer's girlish scream when Leipo went fastest.

blazing_saddles

I look forward to the Astana train leading out Leipheimer, as he sprint's to victory in tomorrow's flat stage. :roll:
Someone is taking the mickey. That course was 5 km sprinter's run in and the mountain man beats them all, most by over 10 seconds.
Never mind easing off by the Giro's final ITT. Remember, this guy was racing in Georgia, so was race ready, but had the SAME TIME as Gilberto Simoni in the first ITT at the Giro.

Of course, any cynicism towards Bruyneel's lads is totally misplaced.
Lucky his doesn't ride for LPR or Navigare.

moray_gub

Blazing Saddles wrote:

I look forward to the Astana train leading out Leipheimer, as he sprint's to victory in tomorrow's flat stage. :roll:
Someone is taking the mickey. That course was 5 km sprinter's run in and the mountain man beats them all, most by over 10 seconds.
Never mind easing off by the Giro's final ITT. Remember, this guy was racing in Georgia, so was race ready, but had the SAME TIME as Gilberto Simoni in the first ITT at the Giro.

Of course, any cynicism towards Bruyneel's lads is totally misplaced.
Lucky his doesn't ride for LPR or Navigare.

I could understand your cynicism if that had been like Heras in the 2005 Vuelta but the guys palmares backs up a performance like that.

cheers
MG

blazing_saddles

Moray Gub wrote:

I could understand your cynicism if that had been like Heras in the 2005 Vuelta but the guys palmares backs up a performance like that.

cheers
MG

I agree. He has the palmares.
It's only his form of the last 3 weeks that doesn't. Off course, if he soft tapped throught the Giro for the whole race, then, there's no reason he shouldn't have been so dominent, yesterday. I love the thought of riding a grand Tour in preparation for his season's main objective; a Tour warm-up race.

However, if he did this, the Astana didn't know about the Giro theory gets blown out of the water.
In order for Levi to take it easy, they must have known exactly how ready Bertie was.
Supposedly, he was in much better racing nick, than the Spaniard, yet he never really made an effort. Dropping back in the early stages and doing exactly the same, even on the crucial stage 20.

Cumulonimbus

iainf72 wrote:

Kléber wrote:

?

...there's a big question mark here. One week he's 18th in the Giro's final TT, finishing behind the likes of Alexsander Serov and Michael Blaudzun. Today he's coming in ahead of Hushovd. This is exactly the sort of thing that makes me cynical. I want to believe it's just rest but we'll see...

He obviously backed off in the Giro. Why kill yourself when it's not going to make much difference overall, especially if you know you're doing the Dauphine?

If he had cycled faster in the Giro then he may have been able to help Contador. However, maybe he was getting dropped that early that there was no point as he would not be much help to AC if he did stay with the leaders. On the penultimate stage mountain stage he lost 25 minutes but that was the one where Kloden and Colom were both at the front. In that situation then maybe is best for him to ride easy to the finish, he could have been needed the next day. As to his position in the final tt - he may have been tired from the whole race and most of the people who did good tt times had been in the autobus on the previous days. Makes you wonder why he wouldnt have backed off completely though. He did come second last year but on that occasion he only beat Valverde by a couple of seconds.

flattythehurdler

Or maybe he's been better prepared for this one. Would seem to back up the genuinely late Giro call for astana, and the fact that bertie is a fine cyclist regardless of preparation.

campagchris

His main goal was the Dauphine and heres his explanation.


"I hadn't done races of the level of the Giro, that's why I wasn't that strong in Italy. But Alberto (Contador) was incredible and I've tried to help him to win. In doing so, I've done a lot of training during three weeks. I have recovered well from the Giro."
With no Tour de France coming up for him, Leipheimer doesn't have the dilemma of whether or not to hold back in the Dauphiné. "The Dauphiné has always been part of my plan for this year," he added. "I've always liked this race. It's a mini-Tour de France. It's a long way to go till the end of the race on Sunday. We've only done 5km. But I'm in good shape, there's no reason I cannot win it again

Bronzie

I can't believe amongst all this finger pointing at Leipheimer (a well known strong rider in flat time trials) that nobody has mentioned Valverde's surprising 3rd place - since when has he been a prologue rider?

RichN95.

Bronzie wrote:

I can't believe amongst all this finger pointing at Leipheimer (a well known strong rider in flat time trials) that nobody has mentioned Valverde's surprising 3rd place - since when has he been a prologue rider?

He's a pretty decent prologue rider - it's the longer TTs he struggles with. He came 5th in the DL prologue last year and 7th the year before. He was 5th in the 2006 Tour prologue.

blazing_saddles

So Levi statements says, the level of races I've competed in are worse prep than lying on a beach in Spain. Lie being the operative word.
You can't have it both ways.
This all boils down to Astana knowing they would be at the Giro since March.
If this were the accepted fact, I wouldn't have an issue with either rider's performance.
Yet, they continue to spin and if they lie about these things........

Anyhow, he's in better nick than the T of C prologue, where Cancellara and a few others pipped him.
We all know what happened next.

Oh, and as for prologues, last year's Tour result is interesting:-
26 Levi Leipheimer (USA) Discovery Channel Pro Cycling Team 0.40
27 Denis Menchov (Rus) Rabobank
28 Thor Hushovd (Nor) Crédit Agricole 0.41
29 Tomas Vaitkus (Ltu) Discovery Channel Pro Cycling Team 0.42
30 Filippo Pozzato (Ita) Liquigas 0.43
31 Markus Fothen (Ger) Gerolsteiner
32 Alejandro Valverde Belmonte (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne

So, exactly the same order as yesterday, just a long way down.

moray_gub

Blazing Saddles wrote:

So Levi statements says, the level of races I've competed in are worse prep than lying on a beach in Spain. Lie being the operative word.
You can't have it both ways.
This all boils down to Astana knowing they would be at the Giro since March.
If this were the accepted fact, I wouldn't have an issue with either rider's performance.
Yet, they continue to spin and if they lie about these things........


[/i].

Or alternatively (and certainly more plausible) Bertie is pure and simply an outstanding rider and to be honest who really gives a monkeys how long they knew they were in the Giro.


cheers
MG

sing_for_absolution

Ah who cares. Remember it's june and not too long until the Tour. There's going to be a scandal inevitably 'leaked' and riders will get busted.

blazing_saddles

A lot of folks when the news broke and again, when it looked as if he might get blown out on the climbs and they were looking for excuses.

He'd agree with your assessment of his abilities.

moray_gub

Blazing Saddles wrote:

A lot of folks when the news broke and again, when it looked as if he might get blown out on the climbs and they were looking for excuses.

He'd agree with your assessment of his abilities.

But they said at the very start that he was not in the best of shape long before he got blown out of the climbs or didnt as it happened .Btw he would be right to agree with my assessment of his abilities

cheers
MG

drenkrom

Some people are so blinded by team affiliations it's scary. You know what we call suffering in the mountains like a dog for a week, resting a week and then ripping it on the bike? No, not dodgy business. Not a transfusion either. It's called physiological adaptation.

I figured anyone who'd ever trained to ride a bike would know that...

By your reasoning, Thor must be on a hell of a program. Two weeks ago he couldn't climb the Mortirolo with the 15 top guys of the hilliest GT of the year, and now he's getting a good result in a prologue. :roll:

moray_gub

drenkrom wrote:

Some people are so blinded by team affiliations it's scary. :roll:

Yea i know what you mean sometimes i ask myself if its professional cycling we are discussing here or some evil black magic occult such is the strength of bad feeling towards certain teams.

cheers
MG

Cumulonimbus

Bronzie wrote:

I can't believe amongst all this finger pointing at Leipheimer (a well known strong rider in flat time trials) that nobody has mentioned Valverde's surprising 3rd place - since when has he been a prologue rider?

As per my earlier post, Valverde did better in last year's tt

blazing_saddles

drenkrom wrote:

By your reasoning, Thor must be on a hell of a program. Two weeks ago he couldn't climb the Mortirolo with the 15 top guys of the hilliest GT of the year, and now he's getting a good result in a prologue. :roll:

It would have been some magic trick, if he had, since he wasn't there. :oops:
Thor was winning a brace of stages at the Vuelta a Catalunya.

You are both correct, team affiliation can be blinding.
It appears that only certain teams, riders
and events generate the vast majority of forum debate.
Others are either considered unworthy of recognition, unknown
or get dismissed as dopers etc..