Yellow & Green 2012

pat1cp

Can it be done ?

Not sure myself.

The whole dynamic of the peloton is going to change. I don't think SKY will chase things down with the same conviction as HTC did and maybe have a game of chicken with some of the other sprinters teams, a bit of looking at each other, which will reduce Cavendish's chances.

The leaked route probably suits Brad, along with other good TT's, but he'll need some help.

Interesting times I reckon. My prediction.........GT will feature alot.

LeicesterLad

Judgeing from the leaked route, Cavendish is on course to take 14 stage wins in the tour next year.

Pokerface

Nope. There's no way Evans is going to win BOTH Yellow and Green next year.

yourpaceormine

Actually next year's tour will henceforth be known as the British Tour. Cav will win 14 stages. The podium will be Froome, Wiggins, EBH (an honorary Brit). It is all part of Pat 's cunning plan to get professional cycling into the untamed/heathen parts of the world. Beijing this year, Birmingham next.




I must point out I am not picking on Birmingham, its just happens to be alliterative with Beijing

rebs

I'l happily pick on the brummys if you are going to wuss out from doing so! :P

prawny

Oi! :twisted:

rick_chasey

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/others ... rival.html

The telegraph offer their opinion on the matter.

prawny

I thought the question was whether one rider can get yellow and green?

If it's Just Sky going for both then why not, I'm sure they could, but really, I think Cav's got bigger things on his plate next summer, He's got one green jersey and could again in 2013 but he's not got an Olympic gold medal and I don't think Rio is that flat

ddraver

yourpaceormine wrote:

Actually next year's tour will henceforth be known as the British Tour. Cav will win 14 stages. The podium will be Froome, Wiggins, EBH (an honorary Brit). It is all part of Pat 's cunning plan to get professional cycling into the untamed/heathen parts of the world. Beijing this year, Birmingham next

We need to get a British corner on a climb, no one will take is seriously until we have a corner!

rick_chasey

ddraver wrote:

yourpaceormine wrote:

Actually next year's tour will henceforth be known as the British Tour. Cav will win 14 stages. The podium will be Froome, Wiggins, EBH (an honorary Brit). It is all part of Pat 's cunning plan to get professional cycling into the untamed/heathen parts of the world. Beijing this year, Birmingham next

We need to get a British corner on a climb, no one will take is seriously until we have a corner!

[Dutch accent] Erm, security. This man wants something else than Heineken [/Dutch accent]

ddraver

I'm at a loss to think what our cheesy song would be though....

rick_chasey

ddraver wrote:

I'm at a loss to think what our cheesy song would be though....

Is this the way to Amerillo?


With associated walking on the spot moves.

Tom BB

I'm pretty sure that at team as strong as Sky would be capable of winning Green and Yellow-I'm just not really sure it will happen with Wiggo as their GC man. Bertie, Evans and possibly Wiggo would be my podium next year. Hopefully Cav will take the Green jersey.

ddraver

Oooh, not bad! It's American though...

If we get a Scottish GC/KoM rider we could do 500 miles...

rick_chasey

walking 500 miles isn't really in the spirit of the Tour though.

Hmmm.. Will give this some thought.

rick_chasey

Agadoo?


*runs and hides*

squired

The interesting thing is trying to work out the 9 that would be in the team. Obvious candidates include:

Wiggins
EBH
Cav
Eisel
Thomas
Froome
Uran
Porte
Flecha
Rogers
Lovkvist
Siutsou

Having said that, there aren't many domestiques there. I guess Sky will be doing a huge juggling act in 2012 to keep everyone happy. As to whether they can win both yellow and green, I guess part of the problem will be whether other teams leave them to chase breaks. If anything Sky need to hold their nerve and risk missing a couple of sprint opportunities to put pressure on other teams to help. If they become the Cav train they will not only risk their GC chances, but they will also find themselves quickly waving goodbye to major talents like EBH (who is above Cav in the World Tour rankings).

phreak

I'm not sure Cav will even go after the green jersey next year. The Olympic road race comes pretty soon after the Tour ends so it wouldn't surprise me to see him try and pillage some wins in the first week and then drop out before the end. This would give him some nice legs for the Olympics whilst leaving Wiggins with team-mates for when the race gets tough.

Crankbrother

You guys all seem to think that the Olympics is the big goal for next year ... I doubt it is ... Cav has records to beat in a world bigger than Good Old Blighty ...

shinyhelmut

Send EBH in the breakaways, GreenEdge chase the breakaway down and Cav sprints for the stage. GreenEdge don't chase and EBH has a pretty good shot at winning from a small break. What could possibly go wrong.....

john_kline

Rick Chasey wrote:

ddraver wrote:

I'm at a loss to think what our cheesy song would be though....

Is this the way to Amerillo?


With associated walking on the spot moves.

Vindaloo - Fat Les

ddraver

Crankbrother wrote:

You guys all seem to think that the Olympics is the big goal for next year ... I doubt it is ... Cav has records to beat in a world bigger than Good Old Blighty ...

Agreed really - The olympics has never been a "monument" of cycling has it...That said, winning Gold on the Mall in London olympics would be pretty cool!

Vindaloo is a good shout John, like it!!

greasedscotsman

ShinyHelmut wrote:

Send EBH in the breakaways, GreenEdge chase the breakaway down and Cav sprints for the stage. GreenEdge don't chase and EBH has a pretty good shot at winning from a small break. What could possibly go wrong.....

EBH misses the break?

ddraver

There's an argument that Cav could only be beaten by Goss or Renshaw for a lot of the recent tours, both of which were HTC anyway, I don't think people, particuarly Green Edge, will be able to the pull the "we ve got no chance in a bunch sprint, so we re not going to bother pulling" trick that Garmin, Lampre (Hushovd and Pettachi, is that right?) and others have been pulling the last few years

rick_chasey

ddraver wrote:

There's an argument that Cav could only be beaten by Goss or Renshaw for a lot of the recent tours, both of which were HTC anyway, I don't think people, particuarly Green Edge, will be able to the pull the "we ve got no chance in a bunch sprint, so we re not going to bother pulling" trick that Garmin, Lampre (Hushovd and Pettachi, is that right?) and others have been pulling the last few years

Sky & Brailsford don't come across as the type of team to play poker.

See the Worlds as a classic example.

pedro118118

I don't see why Sky should have to do all the pulling. There are sprinters on other teams, who will genuinely fancy their chances - inc Renshaw, Goss, Greipel, Kittell, Boss etc. Sky will do their share, but won't be the same machine HTC were. As G has said, with Wiggo, the best the team can hope to do is keep him safe and delivery him to the bottom of the final climb in good shape.........after that it's up to him. The Vuelta was very unusual, in that he had Froome by his side, even when the going got really tough. Personally, I don't see Froome reaching those heights again.

SLX01

Crankbrother wrote:

You guys all seem to think that the Olympics is the big goal for next year ... I doubt it is ... Cav has records to beat in a world bigger than Good Old Blighty ...

He also has sponsors to please, a Gold in the first 2012 Olympics event would get more press coverage to Joe Public than a green jersey most average members of the public couldn't tell a green jersey from a pink one.

Richj

SLX01 wrote:

Crankbrother wrote:

You guys all seem to think that the Olympics is the big goal for next year ... I doubt it is ... Cav has records to beat in a world bigger than Good Old Blighty ...

He also has sponsors to please, a Gold in the first 2012 Olympics event would get more press coverage to Joe Public than a green jersey most average members of the public couldn't tell a green jersey from a pink one.

It would be first gold, but opening days of the Olympics are all about the swimming, a GB gold in the cycling would be news for a few hours if the swimmers do their stuff and then take over (media coverage).

I dunno maybe I am under-estimating the impact of the Olympics in London.

ddraver

Rick Chasey wrote:

ddraver wrote:

There's an argument that Cav could only be beaten by Goss or Renshaw for a lot of the recent tours, both of which were HTC anyway, I don't think people, particuarly Green Edge, will be able to the pull the "we ve got no chance in a bunch sprint, so we re not going to bother pulling" trick that Garmin, Lampre (Hushovd and Pettachi, is that right?) and others have been pulling the last few years

Sky & Brailsford don't come across as the type of team to play poker.

See the Worlds as a classic example.

True dat - but for 3 weeks?

rick_chasey

ddraver wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

ddraver wrote:

There's an argument that Cav could only be beaten by Goss or Renshaw for a lot of the recent tours, both of which were HTC anyway, I don't think people, particuarly Green Edge, will be able to the pull the "we ve got no chance in a bunch sprint, so we re not going to bother pulling" trick that Garmin, Lampre (Hushovd and Pettachi, is that right?) and others have been pulling the last few years

Sky & Brailsford don't come across as the type of team to play poker.

See the Worlds as a classic example.

True dat - but for 3 weeks?

I didn't think he'd do it for 260km, but he did, so I wouldn't put it past him.

Think Bruyneel style, but then caring about a sprinter too.

pedro118118

It was always slightly different with US Postal........they had absolute faith that, if they rode the competition to exhaustion, that LA would destroy them on the final climb and gain time. It was a simple tactic. Wiggo is never going to do that, so I just can't see Sky being a similar animal - they need to diversify. In fact, once Wiggo crashed out of the Tour, the other Sky riders (especially EBH) stepped up and acheived big success.