T of Cal

B3rnieMac

LOL @ the profile for this stage at the moment. absolutely pan flat and featureless for about the last 60%. will be surprised if they can stay awake...

RichN95.

That was a strong sprint there by Swift. He's starting to look the real deal. I wonder if they'll consider taking him to the Tour?

wicked

RichN95 wrote:

That was a strong sprint there by Swift. He's starting to look the real deal. I wonder if they'll consider taking him to the Tour?

His name is already on the long list.

camerone

Good scalps there.

Abdoujaparov

That was quality. I do like watching a good lead out train gunning it around a tight crit circuit. Sky dominated that and swift finished it off nicely. Great to see him coming through.

Anonymous

Boodiful!

rebs

Impressed with Dowsett tanking a massive turn to maintain position also.

Good to see Sky nailing the sprints recently. They are not longer in a mad panic to get to the front with 5/6km to go.

thamacdaddy

They also seemed to hold of HTC twice. At 1.5km you could see one HTC rider (overhead) had been split from the front of his train and there was a little bit of hustle from sky to keep their train intact, he looked behind for his train, realised he was split and moved off to the left. Goss and sagan basically had to take the Sky train.

Thor mustn't be happy with that one. He wasn't even sprinting by 300m, must have felt totally out of position.

cougie

Thor must have had a mechanical. When a jellybelly rider stopped for a wheel change off the moto - Thor flashed past. So he'd have had a bit of a chase to get back up there.

Fantastic win for Sky and Swift.

inkyfingers

Another good result for Ben Swift....5 wins this season now and starting to look like a serious contender for regular wins in the sprints.

Shame there's no PTP for this as I had a feeling that Ben Swift would win today!

(Edited as thats actually his 5th win this season).

frenchfighter

Some serious sprinters there got beaten:

1 Ben Swift (GBr) Sky Procycling 2:47:12
2 Peter Sagan (Svk) Liquigas-Cannondale
3 Matthew Harley Goss (Aus) HTC-Highroad
4 Keven Lacombe (Can) Team Spidertech Powered By C10
5 Juan José Haedo (Arg) Saxo Bank Sungard
6 Alejandro Alberto Borrajo (Arg) Jamis - Sutter Home
7 Thor Hushovd (Nor) Team Garmin-Cervelo
8 Taylor Phinney (USA) BMC Racing Team
9 Oscar Freire Gomez (Spa) Rabobank Cycling Team
10 Shawn Milne (USA) Kenda/5-hour Energy Pro Cycling presented by Geargrinder
11 Gregory Henderson (NZl) Sky Procycling
12 Alex Candelario (USA) Kelly Benefit Strategies - OptumHealth
13 Robert Förster (Ger) Unitedhealthcare PrCycling
14 Michael Matthews (Aus) Rabobank Cycling Team

cogidubnus

any video highlights of the finish?

Cleat Eastwood

Cogidubnus wrote:

any video highlights of the finish?

Here you go

cogidubnus

thankyou kindly

Forgot to look on there. Doh!

Pross

That Corney bloke must be devestated that his man can't even win when he isn't 'babysitting' Cav

Some decent sprinting talent coming out of the UK now, hopefully we can get a full team for the worlds!

mroli

Without Swift, Sky would be having a poor season I reckon.

cougie

He's certainly doing well for them. He's a better sprinter than they had in Henderson last year ?

squired

Given how Swift seems to be developing, would Sky bother with attempting to sign Cav for next season?

The great thing is that Swift hasn't just managed some wins this season, but wins in high-level races. Hopefully he will manage to bag another win before the race finishes at the weekend.

rickyrider

mroli wrote:

Without Swift, Sky would be having a poor season I reckon.

It's certainly true that a bit like last season, when you get to the really big races, they still haven't got the results yet. Need one or two really big hitters still. It'll be interesting to see how they go through the rest of the season, but looking at how the Giro is panning out already, can people really see them doing much at the tour or the vuelta?

rick_chasey

rickyrider wrote:

mroli wrote:

Without Swift, Sky would be having a poor season I reckon.

It's certainly true that a bit like last season, when you get to the really big races, they still haven't got the results yet. Need one or two really big hitters still. It'll be interesting to see how they go through the rest of the season, but looking at how the Giro is panning out already, can people really see them doing much at the tour or the vuelta?

I thought sky did well during the flat classics....

thamacdaddy

mroli wrote:

Without Swift, Sky would be having a poor season I reckon.

Perhaps in terms of results but then again no matter what the competition, classics or tour, Sky have been all over the front of the races. There have been some great rides from Sky riders this year so far. Hayman and Flecha in the classics did well, Gerrans gave it a showing at Amstell, Thomas was up there early season and we are still only at May.

It's a little harsh to say it's would be a poor season without swift. Plus I don't know about you but while swift finished it off yesterday and showed some great speed I do think it was a team effort from sky. I might be a fan but I also think their approach this season is much better to last season and there are far more teams who have had a poorer start to 2011.

deejay

greasedscotsman wrote:

Not sure I'd want to race on roads like this...

Memories of the Ardennes of past years.

I've been there with that exact picture but the white stuff on the roads was not quite as thick (marginal) until the races had past.

I've seen girls crashing into bushes in the Fleche Wallonne because of the cold they couldn't grip the bars to turn.
The men came through an hour later.

rickyrider

Rick Chasey wrote:

rickyrider wrote:

mroli wrote:

Without Swift, Sky would be having a poor season I reckon.

It's certainly true that a bit like last season, when you get to the really big races, they still haven't got the results yet. Need one or two really big hitters still. It'll be interesting to see how they go through the rest of the season, but looking at how the Giro is panning out already, can people really see them doing much at the tour or the vuelta?

I thought sky did well during the flat classics....

I guess they did, although CN seemed to think the classics season wasn't great for them- http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/win ... g-classics

I happen to think this is a bit harsh to be honest, and Sky do seem to be much more on it this year compared to last. Their presence is certainly very noticable in many of the races they are in. I wasn't meaning to be overly critical at all, and my comment above is perhaps a bit silly given that we are only 1 week into 9 weeks of GT racing!

rick_chasey

rickyrider wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

rickyrider wrote:

mroli wrote:

Without Swift, Sky would be having a poor season I reckon.

It's certainly true that a bit like last season, when you get to the really big races, they still haven't got the results yet. Need one or two really big hitters still. It'll be interesting to see how they go through the rest of the season, but looking at how the Giro is panning out already, can people really see them doing much at the tour or the vuelta?

I thought sky did well during the flat classics....

I guess they did, although CN seemed to think the classics season wasn't great for them- http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/win ... g-classics

I happen to think this is a bit harsh to be honest, and Sky do seem to be much more on it this year compared to last. Their presence is certainly very noticable in many of the races they are in. I wasn't meaning to be overly critical at all, and my comment above is perhaps a bit silly given that we are only 1 week into 9 weeks of GT racing!

They won Kuurne, were in the winning break (of 2) in Dwars Door and Het Volk, and were represented well in the Flanders finale. Thomas was the one keeping it all exciting.

I'd say it's a good showing.

squired

Sky have good one day riders, but are lacking when it comes to stage races. Although I'm not expecting much from them in the Grand Tours other than maybe one or two stage wins, they have possibilities in races like the ENECO Tour. EBH will presumably pick up some decent results after July, much like last year, assuming he is fit. If Michael Rogers gets fit he will hopefully do something before then end of the season as well.

BarryBonds

dam fell asleep missed it

was watching ITV4 possibly the worst commentary ive ever sat through. In fact it was so bad it was good at times

wrong identification of riders and even teams

stupid statements were brilliant

at a 90deg turn " aha change of direction, perhaps the wind will come from a different direction too"

weve only had one turn on this road so far right after 2 turns within 2 minutes of each other

at least the leaky gas is muted a little but matty this matty that

pah i think ill go and ride my bike

BarryBonds

2 hours warm up ten minute crit

TOC is like getting a big box at christmas and finding theres nothing in it. After a while your expectations are lowered and you just cant be a rsed to open the present. Whats the point just say thanks and get back to the sprouts

mroli

I would agree that Sky appear to be a more relaxed team this year and that they have been more visible on the front of races. I would also agree that Swift appears to be a real sprinting talent and that Thomas has come on too. But I would also say that a combination of illness and injury (EBH and Mick Rogers), lack of something (Wiggins) and slightly uninspiring/disappointing signings (Knees, Hunt, Uran, Zandio) haven't helped. Apolliono seems a nailed on 5/6th for every sprint - but that is a little "meh".

If you look at the riders roster - there seem to be a lot of riders in there that you don't feel really inspired by and there is still no GT leader really - Lofkvist is having a tough time at the Giro, I don't think anyone feels that Wiggins will blow the tour away.

Maybe I'm being too harsh - and the comment above about only being 1 week into 9 of GT racing is a good one, but look at the visibility of say Omega Pharma Lotto in the Giro so far and compare that to Sky who have a big Italian market.

greasedscotsman

deejay wrote:

Memories of the Ardennes of past years.

I've been there with that exact picture but the white stuff on the roads was not quite as thick (marginal) until the races had past.

I've seen girls crashing into bushes in the Fleche Wallonne because of the cold they couldn't grip the bars to turn.
The men came through an hour later.

OK, so I'm trying to find pictures from the Fleche Wallonne your talking about, guessing it was '99? And I Google throws up a photo of Thomas Dekker in his pants! :shock:



Anyway the photo I originally posted reminds me of this...



But then I think the problem in California was ice, not so much the snow.

inkyfingers

I think Sky are doing OK, especially considering that two guys who would have been expected to pick up some serious results by now (EBH and Rogers) have both had injuries and or illness.

I have two real critiscisms of them...1. The lack of showing from Wiggins (Paris Nice excepted), which is something that even the team managers have mentioned. 2. The fact that I haven't seen a Sky rider in any of the breaks at the Giro. Hopefully now that Lofkvist is pretty much out of the running in the Giro we will see them trying to get guys like Downing into the breaks as I really think this is their best shot of some glory there.