Yates on beating Armstrong

iainf72
iainf72 Posts: 15,784
edited January 2010 in Pro race
I'm loving how he's still considered THE guy to beat in these kind of articles

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/others ... trong.html?

Lance wasn't bad downhill but I would've never considered him one of the best?
Fckin' Quintana … that creep can roll, man.
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Comments

  • secretsqirrel
    secretsqirrel Posts: 2,041
    how you never shaved your legs during competition because the hair growing back would expend energy

    WTF???
  • calvjones
    calvjones Posts: 3,850
    So... avoid ice cream and corner with your leg against the top tube. Yep, really getting to the heart of the Yates-LA relationship there then.

    And as for the idea LA is the quickest descender apart from Fab :roll: Somebody needs to sit that guy down with a video of Il Falco or even Sammy Sanchez

    Puff pieces like this are the reason that there's a fair bit of ambivalence about Sky I think.
    ___________________

    Strava is not Zen.
  • DaveyL
    DaveyL Posts: 5,167
    "Win the Alpe d'Huez stage and you always win the Tour" ???

    I think that's only been done 3 times....
    Le Blaireau (1)
  • calvjones
    calvjones Posts: 3,850
    DaveyL wrote:
    "Win the Alpe d'Huez stage and you always win the Tour" ???

    I think that's only been done 3 times....

    Yeah, there are many who effectively won the tour on the Alpe, but not by winning the stage there. Although LA has done it, Coppi maybe? Who else? Was the Hinault-leMond love-in on Hue, and who was given the stage?
    ___________________

    Strava is not Zen.
  • DaveyL
    DaveyL Posts: 5,167
    Coppi (1952), Armstrong (2001) and Sastre (2008).

    Armstrong won an ITT in 2004 and I guess Lemond came pretty close in 1986 but the stage went to Monsieur Le Blaireau!
    Le Blaireau (1)
  • dulldave
    dulldave Posts: 949
    calvjones wrote:
    Who else?

    Keep thinking. It'll come :lol:
    Scottish and British...and a bit French
  • calvjones
    calvjones Posts: 3,850
    dulldave wrote:
    calvjones wrote:
    Who else?

    Keep thinking. It'll come :lol:


    :oops:

    I can be forgiven about not remembering whether Hinault or Greg won by a tyre when I was in school. No excuse for Carlos though..

    he's just so darn forgettable!
    ___________________

    Strava is not Zen.
  • Moomaloid
    Moomaloid Posts: 2,040
    It really does upset me that a hero of mine when i was a kid talks complete tosh so often...
  • iainf72
    iainf72 Posts: 15,784
    SecretSqirrel wrote:
    how you never shaved your legs during competition because the hair growing back would expend energy

    WTF???

    I know about this one - Tis true. You must not shave (and not just legs) on an important day on the bike or it'll sap your strength.

    I wonder if Yates told him not to sleep with a window open too?
    Fckin' Quintana … that creep can roll, man.
  • afx237vi
    afx237vi Posts: 12,630
    How to pick your line like a downhill skier. Relax and commit totally. Otherwise just sit up and cruise, there can be no halfway house. Watch the photographers' motorbikes ahead of you, see how far they lean into a corner and take your cue from them. They are the best in the business.

    Hmm, don't cyclists and motorbike pilots take different lines through the bends on downhills? I might be wrong...

    That stuff about the air conitioning and leg shaving is what we use to make fun of the French, dammit! We have inner chimps and happy ants, they have five jerseys on during their summer training rides and avoid the soft bits in bread rolls. Which is more scientific, eh?
  • moray_gub
    moray_gub Posts: 3,328
    calvjones wrote:
    So... avoid ice cream and corner with your leg against the top tube. Yep, really getting to the heart of the Yates-LA relationship there then.

    And as for the idea LA is the quickest descender apart from Fab :roll: Somebody needs to sit that guy down with a video of Il Falco or even Sammy Sanchez

    Magnus Backstedt often makes the point that these guys you mention are normally at the head of races so get more focus on their downhill skills but according to him there are guys in the autobus who are just as good as them.
    Gasping - but somehow still alive !
  • ultimobici
    ultimobici Posts: 44
    In his day, Yates was renowned as one of the best descenders in the business. Add in the fact that his ride of choice then was an RC30 and the motorcycle tip makes sense. He isn't referring to their lines, rather the amount of lean possible.
  • disgruntledgoat
    disgruntledgoat Posts: 8,957
    ultimobici wrote:
    In his day, Yates was renowned as one of the best descenders in the business. Add in the fact that his ride of choice then was an RC30 and the motorcycle tip makes sense. He isn't referring to their lines, rather the amount of lean possible.

    Wouldn't the rather marked difference in mass, weight distribution, wheel size, tyre width and the ability to use the motorbikes rather more powerful brakes and throttle to get out of trouble make the comparison rather useless though?
    "In many ways, my story was that of a raging, Christ-like figure who hauled himself off the cross, looked up at the Romans with blood in his eyes and said 'My turn, sock cookers'"

    @gietvangent
  • graeme_s-2
    graeme_s-2 Posts: 3,382
    disgruntledgoat wrote:
    Wouldn't the rather marked difference in mass, weight distribution, wheel size, tyre width and the ability to use the motorbikes rather more powerful brakes and throttle to get out of trouble make the comparison rather useless though?

    If you know how far the motorcyclists lean over for a corner of a given tightness, then you can adjust how far you lean based on that. You don't need to lean over the same amount as them, just use it as an indicator as to how tight the corner is.
  • pedro118118
    pedro118118 Posts: 1,102
    What a tediously dull article................the newspaper piece that is, not Yates. Although come to think of it, he is equally tedious.
  • calvjones
    calvjones Posts: 3,850
    Moray Gub wrote:
    calvjones wrote:
    So... avoid ice cream and corner with your leg against the top tube. Yep, really getting to the heart of the Yates-LA relationship there then.

    And as for the idea LA is the quickest descender apart from Fab :roll: Somebody needs to sit that guy down with a video of Il Falco or even Sammy Sanchez

    Magnus Backstedt often makes the point that these guys you mention are normally at the head of races so get more focus on their downhill skills but according to him there are guys in the autobus who are just as good as them.

    Yeah, I'm sure there are. I guess there's a more important point that only guys like Sammy Sanchez, Savo & the sprinters need such skills to win/survive whereas LA would be an imbecile to take risks on a descent in a GT he's going to win in an ITT anyway.

    However, I still think the claim LA is/was the 2nd best in the peloton has far more to do with Yates' ego (...and I taught him that!) than it does actual ability.
    ___________________

    Strava is not Zen.
  • pedro118118
    pedro118118 Posts: 1,102
    Armstrong's reputation as a descender/bike handler par excellence was born out of the impromptu cyclo-cross to avoid the Beloki crash en route to Gap in 2003 (?!). I'm sure he's a decent descender and can hold his own, but really - is there no end to this sycophancy? Why doesn't Yates just go the whole hog and admit to the need for Kryptonite.
  • le_patron
    le_patron Posts: 494
    pedro118118 wrote:
    What a tediously dull article................

    Agree – that article is so rubbish, it’s not worth even discussing, best we ignore it.
  • godihatehills
    godihatehills Posts: 237
    as for his comments on quickest descents Im fairly sure he knows whos quick and whos not (even if he doesnt give an honest opinion in the article) wasnt he the man behind il falcos giro win? given his work with CSC he'll know about Cancellara no?
  • pedro118118
    pedro118118 Posts: 1,102
    I don't need Yates (or anyone for that matter) to take a page in a newspaper and state the bleedin' obvious. I mean, anyone with even a vague interest in bike racing knows that Armstrong is calculating and has a high pain tolerence, Fab descends like a stone and Contador can climb like a goat. As for his 'insider' guide (zen and the art of descending) that if you want to know how to go fast down hill then watch a down hill skier or a motorbike racer................is he for real?! I have a tip for him. Perhaps he may want to create a tasty meal..........can I point him in the direction of a food market, a butcher/fishmonger and recipe book - it's amazing what you can do when you apply yourself.............garbage.
  • Tom Butcher
    Tom Butcher Posts: 3,830
    It's a bit of a nothing article so I wouldn't take anything in it as Yates' definitive views.

    Just how good Armstrong is as a descender I don't know but it's certainly a strength - in fact his bike handling is first class and over the years has helped him win Tours. Look at how rarely he's caught up in crashes - was watching the 99 tour on DVD and Zulle is pretty much out of it on day 3 with his crash on the Passage de Gois - if Armstrong had gone down and Zulle stayed up we'd likely have had a different winner.
    it's a hard life if you don't weaken.
  • intothe12
    intothe12 Posts: 190
    I have never believed a word out of SY's mouth....he was a bad old school pick for Team SKy.
  • pedro118118
    pedro118118 Posts: 1,102
    Remember seeing Yates, who was a guest on Eurosport's coverage of one of the big races last year. I think James Richardson was presenting and he had a really hard time getting anything useful from Yates, who had all the body language of someone suffering from serious withdrawl simptoms. It was very odd/uncomfortable viewing.
  • disgruntledgoat
    disgruntledgoat Posts: 8,957
    The bit with him on Overcoming is a bit uncomfortable too... Riis telling him about Jiminez dead at 28 from a Cocaine overdose in a clinic where he was being treated for depression, brother-in-law of their joint leader

    Yates looks over his paper goes "That's a really sad story", and back to the letters page.

    Like something out of Spinal Tap.
    "In many ways, my story was that of a raging, Christ-like figure who hauled himself off the cross, looked up at the Romans with blood in his eyes and said 'My turn, sock cookers'"

    @gietvangent
  • stagehopper
    stagehopper Posts: 1,593
    This sounds a bit more like the usual Yates:

    http://ow.ly/16mCmO

    Sky off to ‘dream start,’ says Yates
    by VeloNews.com
    January 18, 2010
    Agence France Presse

    Team Sky on Monday hailed a “dream” debut on the professional cycling tour as it strives to produce Britain’s first-ever Tour de France winner. Team manager Sean Yates said the one-two finish in Sunday’s Cancer Council Healthline Classic in Adelaide, a 51km prelude to the Tour Down Under, endorsed the big-budget outfit’s stringent preparations.

    “It’s a dream start. Obviously we don’t want to get carried away. Yesterday was yesterday, it was a 50-kilometer criterium, we had a plan and we did what we did to win it,” he told AFP.

    “Tomorrow will be another day, a different scenario, a different type of race. We know it won’t be the same. We’ll try again to work as a unit and do the best we can.

    “Yesterday the best we could do won us the race, tomorrow it might not. The day after it might not, Tour de France it might not. But you can’t do better than to give it 100 percent.”

    Sky’s riders reeled in American legend Lance Armstrong (RadioShack) and fellow Tour de France winner Oscar Pereiro (HTC-Columbia) with three laps to go before outstripping HTC-Columbia’s sprint specialist André Greipel on the home straight. New Zealand’s Greg Henderson took the win followed by Australian teammate Chris Sutton, with Germany’s Greipel third.


    Yates said it was too early to know whether Sky would be in a position to challenge for this year’s Tour.

    “We’ve got Bradley Wiggins in the team and last year he got fourth place so in theory we should be able to repeat that if not better,” Yates said. “But theory’s one thing, reality’s another. The aim is for our riders to give it what they’ve got and if that’s not good enough to win us the race, there’s nothing we can do.”
    @stagehopper
  • Monty Dog
    Monty Dog Posts: 20,614
    Second faster descender....

    as well as:
    Never tested positive...
    Most tested athlete....
    Highest pain threshold...
    Don't have a TUE..

    My BS meter has gone clean off the scale! Yates is old school / bad school and casts a shadow on Sky, particularly with his previous team associations, none who are paragons of cleanliness
    Make mine an Italian, with Campagnolo on the side..
  • dennisn
    dennisn Posts: 10,601
    Monty Dog wrote:
    Yates is old school / bad school and casts a shadow on Sky, particularly with his previous team associations, none who are paragons of cleanliness

    Oh h*ll. I'm old school, had some dubious previous associations, and sure wasn't, or am now, a paragon of cleanliness, but I'm not a bad person. Well, that last remark is just an opinion, of course.
  • DaveyL
    DaveyL Posts: 5,167
    You're old school? Dennis, you're from the school they tore down to *build* the old school. I bet you still use toe-clips.
    Le Blaireau (1)
  • dennisn
    dennisn Posts: 10,601
    DaveyL wrote:
    You're old school? Dennis, you're from the school they tore down to *build* the old school. I bet you still use toe-clips.

    No, but still have a set of Suntour Superbe Pro pedals(great pedal) and clips hanging on my pegboard, ready to go, when they make their comeback. And for some strange reason I believe that "down the road" pedal makers, having sold just about all the clip less pedals they can sell, will come up with a reason to go back to toe clip style, updated of course, so they can outfit a whole new generation of cyclists and make some more money. Sort of a conspiracy theory.
  • pinerellopaul
    pinerellopaul Posts: 48
    getting off subject slightly but
    dont knock toeclips and straps went to a talk last week on someone who competed and finished the RAAM and they did a load of testing with different pedal types and in the end went with toeclips as found to be the most comfortable and less likely to suffer from hotfoot with

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