Dauphine 2012 Spoiler

jonginge

Wowser! Nibali lost 3:30 today. Would have expected better.

Gazzetta67

JonGinge wrote:

Wowser! Nibali lost 3:30 today. Would have expected better.

Not an excuse, but his bottle fell out the cage after 5kms....would not fancy riding at 100% for another 48kms without a drink. he`s not raced much since Liege...another one nearing form i suspect

Crankbrother

Harmon is becoming a complete pr!ck 4 weeks earlier than expected ...

'i'm talking about Wiggins because he's in yellow' ... Yes David, that is true ... But it's the irritating snide know it all voice you use when you think he's going to win ... At least Duffers wore his heart on his sleeve and made no apologies ...

Hopefully Wiggins will crash out of the TdF again (sorry to say it but it promptly shut Harmon up last year) ... Oh, and Vino to win a stage at le Tour and take yellow just to rub it in ...

Otherwise ... A decent days TT'ing ...

iainf72

Gazzetta67 wrote:

JonGinge wrote:

Wowser! Nibali lost 3:30 today. Would have expected better.

Not an excuse, but his bottle fell out the cage after 5kms....would not fancy riding at 100% for another 48kms without a drink. he`s not raced much since Liege...another one nearing form i suspect

That was Evans. Unless the same thing happened to Nibs.

Nibs did the Tour of California

LeicesterLad

iainf72 wrote:

Gazzetta67 wrote:

JonGinge wrote:

Wowser! Nibali lost 3:30 today. Would have expected better.

Not an excuse, but his bottle fell out the cage after 5kms....would not fancy riding at 100% for another 48kms without a drink. he`s not raced much since Liege...another one nearing form i suspect

That was Evans. Unless the same thing happened to Nibs.

Nibs did the Tour of California

Couldn't he have got another at the Feed station?

cycling5280

inseine wrote:

Whatever happens at least Wiggins hasn't hidden away all year preparing for the Tour. Great to see him riding, and winning. It's not all about the Tour!

I agree. Wiggins has been riding like a true champion taking on races and winning them even with the Tour being his #1 objective. Although I'm one of the critics that thinks he might be peaking too soon for the Tour I do think he'll put up a good fight. It's hard to see him carrying this incredible form until July 22.

iainf72

How many races does a True Champion [tm] do before the Tour?

Answer : 5

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/wiggins ... philosophy?

inkyfingers

His new "race less/win more" regime is still a million miles better than 2010, when with the exception of the Giro prologue he pretty much soft pedalled the whole early season, and then still flunked the Tour. In fact he was top 10 in that Giro after getting into that big break, but then sat up in the big mountains to "prepare for July".

He'll never please everybody, but he's winning me over more and more.

Gazzetta67

iainf72 wrote:

Gazzetta67 wrote:

JonGinge wrote:

Wowser! Nibali lost 3:30 today. Would have expected better.

Not an excuse, but his bottle fell out the cage after 5kms....would not fancy riding at 100% for another 48kms without a drink. he`s not raced much since Liege...another one nearing form i suspect

That was Evans. Unless the same thing happened to Nibs.

Nibs did the Tour of California

Think you should take a trip to specsavers...Nibali's bottle fell out going over the traffic calming bump....yes i know he rode the TOC but he sat on and rode for sagan...so again he`s not done much or should i draw you a picture ???

mididoctors

wiggins isn't dull

iainf72

Gazzetta67 wrote:

Think you should take a trip to specsavers...Nibali's bottle fell out going over the traffic calming bump....yes i know he rode the TOC but he sat on and rode for sagan...so again he`s not done much or should i draw you a picture ???

If you could, that would be helpful.

I didn't watch most of it - But Evans bottle coming off was widely reported. Which is why I qualified it with "unless the same thing happened to Nibs"

Why's he not performing? Because like AToC, it's a training race.

Gazzetta67

Calm down Iain i was being a tad sarky...naw really !!!! - Nibali was flying at Tirreno and Liege but seems to have took his foot of the gas to train for the tour...looking forward to see Leekygas & Sky in the tour and see who sets the most ridiculous speed on the climbs

smithy21

Turfle wrote:

Because Evans wasn't at 80%. He's not at his peak, but he's giving it his all.

He's not at his peak yet can hold off the peloton, tow two riders to the line and still win. Fair enough.

FWIW I don't think Wiggins is doing things too differently to Cuddles last year. He won Paris Nice and Romandie. Evans won TA and Romandie last year.

LangerDan

iainf72 wrote:

How many races does a True Champion [tm] do before the Tour?

Answer : 5

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/wiggins ... philosophy?

The key to the Tour appears to be to race the Dauphine, but not win it. Going back to 2004, the winner of the Tour never finished better than second,, but as low as 60th (Flandis) or 20th (Sastre) in the Dauphine. LAs wins in both events in 2002 and 2003 temporarily disproves this theory, but then we are back on track with Big Mig being the only other winner of both events in the past 20 years.

knedlicky

LeicesterLad wrote:

frosty99 wrote:

Do the race organisers provide the yellow skinsuit or do sky? I know how the jerseys work in normal stages but the Sky livery down the side of his shorts didn't look printed on and I imagine sizing in skinsuits is pretty vital!

Wiggins said he was dissapointed to be in Yellow before the TT as it meant he couldn't wear his team issue skinsuit...so i guess it's provided by the race organisers?

Wiggins was disappointed to be in yellow because his secret was given away.
He rides TTs with straps across his lower back and his behind to help stabilize his pelvis and lower spine. Under a black Sky suit these straps wouldn’t show, but under the yellow suit he wore, they did.
Now everyone else who doesn’t ride fairly rigid will try the same idea, or maybe in fact everyone will try it to see what advantages it might bring.

These sort of stabilising straps around the pelvis are sometimes used in other sports where the action and tension involved creates a misbalance across the body, e.g. archery.
Also, Asics running tights with ‘core balance’ technology are supposed to do something similar, and are therefore useful for runners and triathletes whose body movements are a bit like as if they are made of rubber. A lot of efficiency is lost if you are too waggley.

In Wiggins case, it might be the Sky team felt he moved around too much on the saddle and they wanted to ‘stiffen’ him up.
When I think about it, perhaps Wiggins has always looked more ‘wiggley’ than most other top TT-ers.

inkyfingers

knedlicky wrote:

LeicesterLad wrote:

frosty99 wrote:

Do the race organisers provide the yellow skinsuit or do sky? I know how the jerseys work in normal stages but the Sky livery down the side of his shorts didn't look printed on and I imagine sizing in skinsuits is pretty vital!

Wiggins said he was dissapointed to be in Yellow before the TT as it meant he couldn't wear his team issue skinsuit...so i guess it's provided by the race organisers?

Wiggins was disappointed to be in yellow because his secret was given away.
He rides TTs with straps across his lower back and his behind to help stabilize his pelvis and lower spine. Under a black Sky suit these straps wouldn’t show, but under the yellow suit he wore, they did.
Now everyone else who doesn’t ride fairly rigid will try the same idea, or maybe in fact everyone will try it to see what advantages it might bring.

These sort of stabilising straps around the pelvis are sometimes used in other sports where the action and tension involved creates a misbalance across the body, e.g. archery.
Also, Asics running tights with ‘core balance’ technology are supposed to do something similar, and are therefore useful for runners and triathletes whose body movements are a bit like as if they are made of rubber. A lot of efficiency is lost if you are too waggley.

In Wiggins case, it might be the Sky team felt he moved around too much on the saddle and they wanted to ‘stiffen’ him up.
When I think about it, perhaps Wiggins has always looked more ‘wiggley’ than most other top TT-ers.

Do you really think that none of the other teams are aware that such technologies exist?

jonginge

Pretty sure he was using them last year. I recall them being visible through the white GB TT champs skinsuit at the vuelta

knedlicky

inkyfingers wrote:

Do you really think that none of the other teams are aware that such technologies exist?

I’m sure the physiotherapists in each team know the importance of core stabilisation in sport, and in fact anyway for everybody.
And that the physios make the team do the appropriate exercises as part of their general condition training (like the exercises are part of my winter training programme).

But I can’t actually remember seeing before a professional cyclist in a race with straps to stabilize the pelvis. Or hearing of them being worn in a cycling event.

Maybe there was no 'secret' in a technology sense, but Wiggins just didn't want people to know?

dan_cup

knedlicky wrote:

Wiggins was disappointed to be in yellow because his secret was given away.
He rides TTs with straps across his lower back and his behind to help stabilize his pelvis and lower spine. Under a black Sky suit these straps wouldn’t show, but under the yellow suit he wore, they did.
Now everyone else who doesn’t ride fairly rigid will try the same idea, or maybe in fact everyone will try it to see what advantages it might bring.

These sort of stabilising straps around the pelvis are sometimes used in other sports where the action and tension involved creates a misbalance across the body, e.g. archery.
Also, Asics running tights with ‘core balance’ technology are supposed to do something similar, and are therefore useful for runners and triathletes whose body movements are a bit like as if they are made of rubber. A lot of efficiency is lost if you are too waggley.

In Wiggins case, it might be the Sky team felt he moved around too much on the saddle and they wanted to ‘stiffen’ him up.
When I think about it, perhaps Wiggins has always looked more ‘wiggley’ than most other top TT-ers.

His straps were visable when he did TT in yellow for Paris-Nice so cant imagine they saw anything new.

Cant understand all the Wiggins bashing mind, although im no pro just a casual cyclist/viewer

RichN95.

There's been a lot of talk around the cycling internet today about peaking and what riders can do at what times, backed up with past results.

But most of the peaks and troughs of the last 20 years have been inextricably linked to doping programs. Now if, as I believe, doping has been greatly reduced and clean riders are prospering, it's hard to tell what can and can't be done and the past correlations lose meaning.

mididoctors

LangerDan wrote:

iainf72 wrote:

How many races does a True Champion [tm] do before the Tour?

Answer : 5

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/wiggins ... philosophy?

The key to the Tour appears to be to race the Dauphine, but not win it. Going back to 2004, the winner of the Tour never finished better than second,, but as low as 60th (Flandis) or 20th (Sastre) in the Dauphine. LAs wins in both events in 2002 and 2003 temporarily disproves this theory, but then we are back on track with Big Mig being the only other winner of both events in the past 20 years.

Look guys

I dont know whether wiggins has peaked too soon or not


However.... I am somewhat UNDERWHELMED by analysis from all quarters covering all positions that use a single race as a guide without considering what other preparation riders did outside of that race before and after.

perhaps winning the dauphine is bad/good for the tour for certain riders depending on what training/ racing they did earlier in the year?

YMMV and TMMV

truly

moray_gub

LangerDan wrote:

DNF-Crash / 13th / DNS / 9th / 37th / 12th / 100th / DNF - Mononucleosis / 1st / 1st

- Where the previous 10 winners of the Dauphine finished (or didn't finish) in that year's TdF

There might have been something to see in that if any of those winners in the last dozen years (other than Lance) actually had a chance of winning the Tour.........Moreau, Landaluze and Brakovic........come on ! For what its worth BW has as good a chance as he will ever have of winning the Tour but he needs a lot of things to go his way........no crashes for a start !

Yellow Peril

Turfle wrote:

Yeah, even if his Tour challenge goes kaput, he'll still have had a much more successful couple of years than many of us would ever have predicted for him.

On the contrary many forumites predicted Brad's ability to win one week tours a couple of years ago when he was flaking in the Grand Tours. He has indeed become a powerful one week tourist and we know he can finish high on GC in the big one. However, making that jump to the top of the podium in that race is a different ball game altogether. Ask Evans.

blazing_saddles

iainf72 wrote:

Gazzetta67 wrote:

JonGinge wrote:

Wowser! Nibali lost 3:30 today. Would have expected better.

Not an excuse, but his bottle fell out the cage after 5kms....would not fancy riding at 100% for another 48kms without a drink. he`s not raced much since Liege...another one nearing form i suspect

That was Evans. Unless the same thing happened to Nibs.

Nibs did the Tour of California

As Gazetta already pointed out, Nibs lost his bottle after 3kms.
However, I did read somewhere that the ITT was the stage he was going to make the big effort for, because he
wanted to see where he stood in relation to the main TTers. If so, not so.
Now, if I could only find where I read this..............

iainf72

So there will be no coverage of the Grand Colombier today as the broadcast only starts after they have finished it.

And before anyone starts ranting about Eurosport, you should blame France 3 for that.

LeicesterLad

iainf72 wrote:

So there will be no coverage of the Grand Colombier today as the broadcast only starts after they have finished it.

And before anyone starts ranting about Eurosport, you should blame France 3 for that.

Yeah I blame France 3 for missing the Colombier, I blame Eurosport for missing the whole stage and showing Womens Tennis instead*




*probably.

iainf72

It's live on ES2 with beach football on before it, so you can put your rage back in the suitcase

frenchfighter

iainf72 wrote:

That was Evans. Unless the same thing happened to Nibs.

Yep, happened to both,

rick_chasey

Tankink as ever, showing he's not a world beater:

Bij t bekijken van de tussentijden vd tijdrit van gisteren kom ik tot de conclusie dat de tijdrit voor mij 35km te lang was. #Veeeltelang.

"Been looking at the split times for the TT yesterday, and I've come to the conclusion that the time trial was 35km too long for me. #fartoolong"

LeicesterLad

iainf72 wrote:

It's live on ES2 with beach football on before it, so you can put your rage back in the suitcase

Surely beach football will take presidence, if it runs over we are screwed.