Team Sky ride . . . pants!
Comments
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iainf72 wrote:Roger de Vlaeminck: "Boonen won against 3rd cat riders. Nobody gave him any competition. Boring race for non-Belgians"
So there you have it - Sounds like they may as well have had woman in the race.
Did he actually say that?
Christ he's a journo's dream. No wonder he gets good press now.0 -
Fckin' Quintana … that creep can roll, man.0
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iainf72 wrote:
He did, apart from the apparent misogynistic comment, which was yours?0 -
iainf72 wrote:Roger de Vlaeminck: "Boonen won against 3rd cat riders. Nobody gave him any competition. Boring race for non-Belgians"
So there you have it - Sounds like they may as well have had woman in the race.
Ouch.
Though he's right of course. He won against Merckx and Moser.Warning No formatter is installed for the format0 -
No tA Doctor wrote:iainf72 wrote:Roger de Vlaeminck: "Boonen won against 3rd cat riders. Nobody gave him any competition. Boring race for non-Belgians"
So there you have it - Sounds like they may as well have had woman in the race.
Ouch.
Though he's right of course. He won against Merckx and Moser.
In a sh!tty little sprint though
(at least, the one I saw).. 0 -
Rick Chasey wrote:
that's allright then!
Boonen certainly was head and shoulders above the rest. Fabulous ride, he delivered exactly what one would've expected of the man. The others were caught napping and the chase was lousy.0 -
Should his win have an asterix against it due to absence of Cancellara?“New York has the haircuts, London has the trousers, but Belfast has the reason!0
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TailWindHome wrote:Should his win have an asterix against it due to absence of Cancellara?
No, but it doesn't get the de Vlaeminck seal of approval.
He also says in the same comment that there's nothing Boonen could do about it.0 -
Rick Chasey wrote:TailWindHome wrote:Should his win have an asterix against it due to absence of Cancellara?
No, but it doesn't get the de Vlaeminck seal of approval.
He also says in the same comment that there's nothing Boonen could do about it.
A Vlaeminck approval would've indeed involved a chase by a howling wolf pack...
I had honestly expected more action from Flecha, Pozzato and Ballan, but still had my money on Boonen. Whether that makes the competition third-rate is something that only Vlaeminck is qualified to comment on ;-)0 -
De Vlaeminck is the worst kind of 'back in my day' retired sportsmen. When he was winning PR and RVV were parochial races with barely a non-Belgian in sight. In the ten years that he and Merckx were winning 80% of the top tens in those races were Belgian. Only two non-Belgians stood on the Roubaix podium.
By contrast, in his years doing the race, Boonen has seen winners from Sweden, Switzerland and Australia and podium from Spain, GB, Norway, Russia, USA as well as the more traditional Italy, France and Holland.
It's much more competitive these days. Some of these old guys are a bit overrated, not least by themselves.Twitter: @RichN950 -
RichN95 wrote:De Vlaeminck is the worst kind of 'back in my day' retired sportsmen. When he was winning PR and RVV were parochial races with barely a non-Belgian in sight. In the ten years that he and Merckx were winning 80% of the top tens in those races were Belgian. Only two non-Belgians stood on the Roubaix podium.
By contrast, in his years doing the race, Boonen has seen winners from Sweden, Switzerland and Australia and podium from Spain, GB, Norway, Russia, USA as well as the more traditional Italy, France and Holland.
It's much more competitive these days. Some of these old guys are a bit overrated, not least by themselves.
There's a joke de Vlaeminck twitter account which spends most of the time saying stuff prefixed by "In my time..."
Usually things like "in my time, we had to ride 500km to the start line".0 -
RichN95 wrote:De Vlaeminck is the worst kind of 'back in my day' retired sportsmen. When he was winning PR and RVV were parochial races with barely a non-Belgian in sight. In the ten years that he and Merckx were winning 80% of the top tens in those races were Belgian. Only two non-Belgians stood on the Roubaix podium.
By contrast, in his years doing the race, Boonen has seen winners from Sweden, Switzerland and Australia and podium from Spain, GB, Norway, Russia, USA as well as the more traditional Italy, France and Holland.
It's much more competitive these days. Some of these old guys are a bit overrated, not least by themselves.
I would have thought this was partly outweighed by the fact (erm, possible fact!) that cycling in the traditional countries was more popular back then. Put it this way, Boonen and De Vlaeminck are both big fishes in reasonable sized ponds, Boonen's pond is just more exotic.
I may well be wrong though!You live and learn. At any rate, you live0 -
RichN95 wrote:De Vlaeminck is the worst kind of 'back in my day' retired sportsmen. When he was winning PR and RVV were parochial races with barely a non-Belgian in sight. In the ten years that he and Merckx were winning 80% of the top tens in those races were Belgian. Only two non-Belgians stood on the Roubaix podium.
By contrast, in his years doing the race, Boonen has seen winners from Sweden, Switzerland and Australia and podium from Spain, GB, Norway, Russia, USA as well as the more traditional Italy, France and Holland.
It's much more competitive these days. Some of these old guys are a bit overrated, not least by themselves.
I agree with the first part. However, to say that it is more competitive when more nationalities are involved does not entirely agree with me. Whether it was an international scene or national scene in de Vlaeminck's days does nothing to take away from the achievement of winning PR four times over. If anything, if you have seen the PR races that de Vlaeminck rode back in the days they look a lot more competitive than what we've seen this weekend - never mind the bikes they rode or the state of the 'roads' that made winning much more of a challenge than just physique alone. For instance, compare the solo effort of sunday versus a small bunch up the road fighting it out in the last 50 metres back in the days when de Vlaeminck won.0 -
At the end of the day, pro cyclists are soft these days! Helmets, a choice of gears, synthetic chamois, jerseys made of technical materials, no Bordeaux–Paris, not having to fix their bikes themselves.
It's just not the same!!You live and learn. At any rate, you live0 -
RichN95 wrote:ddraver wrote:I'm sorry Rich - Next race we ll all just say nothing for the whole race then everyone can have one post saying Congratulations to the winner. Gosh, that ll be so fun!
But every race thread becomes Sky bashing (at least they got four riders there - where were the BMC superteam?).
The story of this race wasn't their shortcomings, it was the sight of the most successful cobbles rider in history at the very top of his game. And no-one seems to want to recognise that.
These are my thoughts exactly. The difference in the skill of Boonen riding the cobbles, compared to the chasers, was huge. He was primarily on the crown of the roads the whole time, while the others were messing about on the sides, or the grass or changing positions all the time. Hayman and Stannard were obviously knackered, EBH wasnt on form (neither was he at Flanders at the end) and Flecha was returning from a hand injury. Boonen was not only clearly the best on the cobbles, but is in top form.0 -
Look, when a guy unexpectedly goes solo from 50km out, it's natural to look at the chasers.
Sky had the numbers, so we get to criticise sky tactics.
We can criticise the other teams, but that's a short lived affair - their legs were rubbish and couldn't even make the same selection the sky guys did.
When someone wins AGAINST the grain of common cycling tactical sense, you take aim at the tactics.0 -
RichN95 wrote:De Vlaeminck is the worst kind of 'back in my day' retired sportsmen. When he was winning PR and RVV were parochial races with barely a non-Belgian in sight. In the ten years that he and Merckx were winning 80% of the top tens in those races were Belgian. Only two non-Belgians stood on the Roubaix podium.
By contrast, in his years doing the race, Boonen has seen winners from Sweden, Switzerland and Australia and podium from Spain, GB, Norway, Russia, USA as well as the more traditional Italy, France and Holland.
It's much more competitive these days. Some of these old guys are a bit overrated, not least by themselves.
Err... which ten years do you want to look at? If you're taking 68-77 inclusive (the ten season PR streak), then Belgians won 6 MSRs, 6 Giro di Lombardias and all but one LBLs. In ten years a massive 9 monuments out of a possible 30 that weren't cobbled went to "The rest of the world". The Belgians also took 8 of the RVVs (Dutch riders took two).
So cobbled: Belgium 18 -2 RoTW
Non cobbled: Belgium 21 - 9 RoTW
Total: Belgium 39 - 11 RoTW
That doesn't look to me like a case of Belgians bossing a parochial race, it looks like Belgians completely dominating the classics as a whole.
And after a productive browse on Wikipedia...
Milan - Torino
Belgium 4 - 6 RoTW (Italy...)
Gent - Wevelgem
Belgium 8 - 2 RoTW
Amstel Gold
Belgium 7 - 3 RoTW
La Flèche Wallonne
Belgium 8 - 2 RoTW
The Bordeaux - Paris freak show
Belgium 8 - 2 RoTW
Züri-Metzgete
Belgium 8 - 2 RoTW
Omloop Het Nieuwsblad
Belgium 10 - 0 RoTW (I'll give you this one as parochial though)
Paris - Tours
Belgium 7 - 3 RoTW
You're right about Vlaeminck being an honoury member of Monty Python's four Yorkshiremen though.Warning No formatter is installed for the format0 -
They may also have picked up the odd Grand Tour in that time as well....Warning No formatter is installed for the format0
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I think you only need to look Terpstra's face in the photo that was taken as he was dropped to see how hard it was to even hold Boonen's wheel, never mind chase him down once a gap had been established. Wasn't there a quote from one of the riders who was in the group when Boonen attacked who said Boonen just rode him clean off his wheel and there wasn't a thing he could do about it?0
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Graeme_S wrote:I think you only need to look Terpstra's face in the photo that was taken as he was dropped to see how hard it was to even hold Boonen's wheel, never mind chase him down once a gap had been established. Wasn't there a quote from one of the riders who was in the group when Boonen attacked who said Boonen just rode him clean off his wheel and there wasn't a thing he could do about it?
Vansummeren.
In fairness to Terpstra - he'd only just put in a massive effort to get to the group.0 -
Rick Chasey wrote:Look, when a guy unexpectedly goes solo from 50km out, it's natural to look at the chasers.
Sky had the numbers, so we get to criticise sky tactics.
We can criticise the other teams, but that's a short lived affair - their legs were rubbish and couldn't even make the same selection the sky guys did.
When someone wins AGAINST the grain of common cycling tactical sense, you take aim at the tactics.
Yes i see your point, but i also think that while there may have been tactical naivety to start with, they didnt then have the skill or legs to bring it back, or anyone to do any work with. I did think that when there were 4 sky riders in the break that it would get brought back, but then i guess it is similar to when Cancellara went and was never seen again.0 -
MrTapir wrote:Rick Chasey wrote:Look, when a guy unexpectedly goes solo from 50km out, it's natural to look at the chasers.
Sky had the numbers, so we get to criticise sky tactics.
We can criticise the other teams, but that's a short lived affair - their legs were rubbish and couldn't even make the same selection the sky guys did.
When someone wins AGAINST the grain of common cycling tactical sense, you take aim at the tactics.
Yes i see your point, but i also think that while there may have been tactical naivety to start with, they didnt then have the skill or legs to bring it back, or anyone to do any work with. I did think that when there were 4 sky riders in the break that it would get brought back, but then i guess it is similar to when Cancellara went and was never seen again.
We expect it from Cancellara though.
He's one of the best TTers we've ever seen, he's fast on the flat over pretty much any distance with the exception of perhaps 200m.
If anyone is built to solo 50km it's him.
Boonen, a chap who has never as a pro done well in TTs, a chap who's biggest weapon is his sprint - that's a different story.
Now, obviously, Boonen was more or less unbeatable yesterday. But he took the riskiest and toughest route - and sky weren't able to capitalise, despite putting themselves in the driving seat, through tactical naivety and poor legs - ergo a poor show.0 -
RichN95 wrote:De Vlaeminck is the worst kind of 'back in my day' retired sportsmen. When he was winning PR and RVV were parochial races with barely a non-Belgian in sight. In the ten years that he and Merckx were winning 80% of the top tens in those races were Belgian. Only two non-Belgians stood on the Roubaix podium.
By contrast, in his years doing the race, Boonen has seen winners from Sweden, Switzerland and Australia and podium from Spain, GB, Norway, Russia, USA as well as the more traditional Italy, France and Holland.
It's much more competitive these days. Some of these old guys are a bit overrated, not least by themselves.
And forgot to add that of course Paris-Roubaix is a -i'm sure you know- French event, not a Belgian one...
Edit: removed Chasey's quote...0 -
skylla wrote:RichN95 wrote:De Vlaeminck is the worst kind of 'back in my day' retired sportsmen. When he was winning PR and RVV were parochial races with barely a non-Belgian in sight. In the ten years that he and Merckx were winning 80% of the top tens in those races were Belgian. Only two non-Belgians stood on the Roubaix podium.
By contrast, in his years doing the race, Boonen has seen winners from Sweden, Switzerland and Australia and podium from Spain, GB, Norway, Russia, USA as well as the more traditional Italy, France and Holland.
It's much more competitive these days. Some of these old guys are a bit overrated, not least by themselves.
And forgot to add that of course Paris-Roubaix is a -i'm sure you know- French event, not a Belgian one...
Edit: removed Chasey's quote...
And the London Marathon is a British event. It doesn't stop the locals being p1ss poor quality (the used to be lots of great British runners when there weren't any Kenyans)Twitter: @RichN950 -
Somewhat perversely, given Sky didn't have the legs after all they might have been better off letting a couple of their guys just drop off the back. At least the other teams would have had to contribute then (assuming they wouldn't just dick about riding for 2nd place, which would also have been a possibility), possibly to better effect than Sky were able to.
I think though that all told the cobbles - and the crosswinds on the day - put a huge limit on what benefit a team can get out of putting someone up front. In PR, more than most races, you have to ride your own race. Boonen did the damage on the cobbles.Warning No formatter is installed for the format0 -
Rick Chasey wrote:Now, obviously, Boonen was more or less unbeatable yesterday. But he took the riskiest and toughest route - and sky weren't able to capitalise, despite putting themselves in the driving seat, through tactical naivety and poor legs - ergo a poor show.
This
Sky got their arses handed to them.
That's not Sky bashing. That's just a fact.“New York has the haircuts, London has the trousers, but Belfast has the reason!0 -
RichN95 wrote:skylla wrote:RichN95 wrote:De Vlaeminck is the worst kind of 'back in my day' retired sportsmen. When he was winning PR and RVV were parochial races with barely a non-Belgian in sight. In the ten years that he and Merckx were winning 80% of the top tens in those races were Belgian. Only two non-Belgians stood on the Roubaix podium.
By contrast, in his years doing the race, Boonen has seen winners from Sweden, Switzerland and Australia and podium from Spain, GB, Norway, Russia, USA as well as the more traditional Italy, France and Holland.
It's much more competitive these days. Some of these old guys are a bit overrated, not least by themselves.
And forgot to add that of course Paris-Roubaix is a -i'm sure you know- French event, not a Belgian one...
Edit: removed Chasey's quote...
And the London Marathon is a British event. It doesn't stop the locals being p1ss poor quality (the used to be lots of great British runners when there weren't any Kenyans)
What about the fact that Belgians were smashing up every other race on the calendar at the time? See my sadly neglected post on page 4....
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iainf72 wrote:Roger de Vlaeminck: "Boonen won against 3rd cat riders. Nobody gave him any competition. Boring race for non-Belgians"
So there you have it - Sounds like they may as well have had woman in the race.
:shock:
:twisted:--
Burls Ti Tourer for Tarmac, Saracen aluminium full suss for trails0
