Olympic road race tactics

ilovebigwig

So presumably all countries will be looking to stop Britain controlling this easily and handing Cav the gold, so how are they going to do it? Forcing it on Box Hill or launching a break away on the way back in? It's very flat.

With the relatively random mix of abilties and nations, will some guys manage to split the peloton with crazy early breaks?

Thoughts?

rick_chasey

It's definitely complicated.

The Belgians seem to think Box Hill 9 times will be hard enough to drop Cavendish - and they will certainly aim to do that - though I don't think they've seen it with the new surface. Rode up it on Sunday and it easily makes it a tooth or two easier.

Ultimately all other nations know bringing Cavendish to the line means they will lose, so you'd imagine they'd do all they can to drop him.

Riders like Freire, Rojas, Sagan, maybe even Hushovd and EBH are more likely to survive than Cavendish - and plenty of nations will be working hard to drop Cavendish.

What can the Brits do? Well controlling a race from start to finish like they did in the last worlds will be difficult since the teams are so much smaller. The question is whether they decided to try and set an OK pace up box hill - which is quite narrow - in the hope that deters too many big attacks and keeps Cav in play, or they hold it all back untill the run in and use all 4 riders to bury themselves to get the break back.

Of course, they could throw someone up the road, but that doesn't seem a very Sky tactic.

bompington

Rick Chasey wrote:

box hill - which is quite narrow

There's an idea - get to the front early and ride 5 abreast across the road?

rick_chasey

bompington wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

box hill - which is quite narrow

There's an idea - get to the front early and ride 5 abreast across the road?

Well yeah.

Why not?

ddraver

I Dunnno - The Aussies (Goss), Germans (Greipel, Kittle), French (Feillu), Americans (Farrar) and Italians (Ferrari, Appollioioio (?) adn so on) all have sprinters that can give Cav a damn good run so I thoink there will be a few people trying to make it a Sprint...

It will be interesting if Sk...erm...TeamGB try and boss it or let Green Ed...erm...Austraila ride?

andyp

There are three medals on offer, lest we forget.

rick_chasey

andyp wrote:

There are three medals on offer, lest we forget.

For sure. Do you think that changes that much?

It makes breaks of 3 in the finale much more dangerous sure, but I don't think that will incentivise a team live with bringing Cav to the finish line in the first group if they can help it.

It's an interesting course, in the sense it has that hint of the balance between sprinters and not just like M-SR. I wonder if it'll play out that way.

inkyfingers

andyp wrote:

There are three medals on offer, lest we forget.

Winner
First Loser
Second Loser

Anybody riding will anything other than gold in mind doesn't deserve to win.

ilovebigwig

Rick Chasey wrote:

andyp wrote:

There are three medals on offer, lest we forget.

For sure. Do you think that changes that much?

It makes breaks of 3 in the finale much more dangerous sure, but I don't think that will incentivise a team live with bringing Cav to the finish line in the first group if they can help it.

It's an interesting course, in the sense it has that hint of the balance between sprinters and not just like M-SR. I wonder if it'll play out that way.

I think Cav's performance last week was an effort to get ready for this type of course, but what about Boonen, isn't he going to Poland specifically to get ready for this? I just think it is a long stretch home from Box Hill with narrow poor surfaces with a broken peloton, and a decent break could have a good chance. I haven't seen the other squads though apart from the US so not sure what the make up will be like. Obviously having the max amount in Team GB (I think 5 is the max?) will be a benefit, and Millar will leave his arse on the road to prove his committment to this.

Monty Dog

Cav was up with the front of the pack over La Redoute on the Ster ZLM Tour at the weekend, a far tougher challenge than Box Hill - seems he's lost some weight. With the new road surface, expect that whilst we'll see a few speculative break-aways, I expect on the main the peleton will be riding tempo up Box Hill, rolling along on the big ring. Of course, we could get a multi-nation breakaway like Atlanta or Sydney where three riders (team-mates / buddies) from different countries get away and their respective team-mates work together to close it down? Anyone fancy a BMC 1-2-3?

edhornby

given that it's max 5 riders and one of them has to be wiggins (who will have to hold off to a certain extent to save for the ITT) the lone break patroling option (Ben Swift?) is less likely as you end up with 2 leutenants plus cav to pull back a break - it has the potential to be a fascinating race

ilovebigwig

Could we see Eurovision style alliances? The British isolated whilst the French and Germans cosy it up near the front whilst throwing tenners at the Spanish and Italians?

rick_chasey

Monty Dog wrote:

Cav was up with the front of the pack over La Redoute on the Ster ZLM Tour at the weekend, a far tougher challenge than Box Hill - seems he's lost some weight. With the new road surface, expect that whilst we'll see a few speculative break-aways, I expect on the main the peloton will be riding tempo up Box Hill, rolling along on the big ring. Of course, we could get a multi-nation breakaway like Atlanta or Sydney where three riders (team-mates / buddies) from different countries get away and their respective team-mates work together to close it down? Anyone fancy a BMC 1-2-3?

As I said in the other thread - Cav doing well up a hill in the Ster ZLM Tour doesn't say much.

Also, I can't imagine the peloton will ride all 9 ascents at tempo. What makes it attractive to teams making it hard is that it's a reasonably small loop without much time for recovery.

If you get dropped on ascent 7, you're going to be long gone after ascent 9.

rick_chasey

During the test event there was some noticeable thinning of the peloton just from one ascent of the hill.

Also, given that that loop is quite narrow - an untimely crash can have a big effect - just like it did in the test event (Boonen got caught behind a split in the peloton due to a crash).

ilovebigwig

Agreed, I really do not think this will play simply into GBs hands. Given the mixed ability that will be on show I think a crash is inevitable and sudden splits too.

inkyfingers

It's quite a long run in though, from the last ascent of Box Hill to the finishing line (not sure of the actual distance).

If it splits up on the climbs then it's either going to need to be a decent sized group, a seriously strong group or just the "right" group (i.e. so some of the stronger teams won't chase) if it's going to stay away. Let's say that a group containing Gilbert, Sagan and Freire went away on the climb and got a minutes advantage you'd still have some strong teams like GB, Germany and Australia all wanting to chase them down again.

I think we'll see fireworks on the last couple of climbs of Box Hill but that it will come back together a bit on the run in.

rick_chasey

I'm not so sure it will...

It's not quite Gent Wevelgem.

Also (local knowledge, natch ) it's most likely to be a tailwind on the way into the finish.

inkyfingers

Rick Chasey wrote:

I'm not so sure it will...

It's not quite Gent Wevelgem.

Also (local knowledge, natch ) it's most likely to be a tailwind on the way into the finish.

Poor old GW, the ISO standard for chipper comparisons!

I am ashamed to admit that I have never ridden up Box Hill so don't actually know how difficult it really is, but it looks like the kind of hill where you'll see 15 guys go off the back each time round, not the sort of place we'll see big accelerations.

All I know is that some amateur was on here a few days ago boasting about how he'd dropped all his cake run buddies on it, so it can't be that hard can it?

rick_chasey

inkyfingers wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

I'm not so sure it will...

It's not quite Gent Wevelgem.

Also (local knowledge, natch ) it's most likely to be a tailwind on the way into the finish.

Poor old GW, the ISO standard for chipper comparisons!

I am ashamed to admit that I have never ridden up Box Hill so don't actually know how difficult it really is, but it looks like the kind of hill where you'll see 15 guys go off the back each time round, not the sort of place we'll see big accelerations.

All I know is that some amateur was on here a few days ago boasting about how he'd dropped all his cake run buddies on it, so it can't be that hard can it?

Not all, and you're right, it's not that hard.

Best describe it (in pro-cycling terms) as a better surfaced, less wind-y Poggio. Similar gradient, similar length.

The GW comparision is relevant because of the long flat run in after the significant hill of the day :P.

inkyfingers

You're no fun Chasey.

I've heard the Poggio comparison before, the hard bit to call is that when they go up the Poggio in MSR they go pretty much flat out because it's right at the finish, if they went over it 9 times how would they race over it the previous 8 times...and how would they race if the Poggio was 30KM from the finish? I don't know really, just pondering when I should be working.

andyp

The difficulty of the Poggio comes from it being raced with 280 kms in the legs, not the gradient.

9 ascents of Box Hill should see a selection made, but I personally I think that selection will be a large-ish group of around 60 riders. The run in favours a larger group as it's generally on wide, open roads and any break will be in sight for a lot of the time.

Le Commentateur

ilovebigwig wrote:

Could we see Eurovision style alliances? The British isolated whilst the French and Germans cosy it up near the front whilst throwing tenners at the Spanish and Italians?

Trade team alliances more likely, e.g. Sydney road race.

Yellow Peril

Who is going to sacrifice themselves on Box Hill? I think (other than an early break which may be leading before they hit the hill) there will be an entente cordial as most teams would sooner go for death or glory somewhere on the final 30km run in than spend themselves on the repeat climb.

ilovebigwig

The Spanish could have a run at it I think.

Turfle

There will be countless attacks over the last few ascents of Box Hill that GB will have little chance of controlling it, but I think enough nations will have sprint in the back of their mind as a good tactic for their team.

Of course we've got to see at the Tour how Cav's new found climbing legs, and newly lost sprinting legs are going.

Swifty is a good insurance policy if they use him that way. He can get over most climbs with the best of them, so shouldn't have much trouble.

Yellow Peril

I'd like to see some initiative from GB and see them fire someone off the front earlyish doors. That way the others will have to do the chasing and Cav etc can sit back and enjoy the tow.

I wouldn't be surprised if someone goes from the gun like McAuley did in the Commonwealth Games

Jez mon

Yellow Peril wrote:

Who is going to sacrifice themselves on Box Hill? I think (other than an early break which may be leading before they hit the hill) there will be an entente cordial as most teams would sooner go for death or glory somewhere on the final 30km run in than spend themselves on the repeat climb.

Not sure...but surely a fair few minnow nations will want to put in a few attacks...I don't think that they'll get away, but, I think the tempo required to chase them down will be the difficult part.

Ultimately, any piece of road, if ridden hard enough, can be selective, and if it's on an incline then even better.

I think there may be some riders who underestimate the hill, when ridden nine times, at tempo. It's narrow, so if people start losing the wheel in front, than those behind are going to get into trouble.

I think it might be an OK race, I'm actually fairly excited for it.

Le Commentateur

Fairly sure that a break of no-hopers will get away at Staple Lane — 51.24881, -0.4822 — and will be gradually reeled back during the laps of Box Hill.

ocdupalais

I can just hear the sound of laughing foreigners mixing with the noise of Cav fans up and down the country slapping their foreheads shouting "d'oh!" should he get over the climbs only to then lose the sprint.

He'll certainly need to bag a few early Tour stages to prevent too many questions being asked of him in the run up to London - he'll have enough on his plate.

cal_stewart

or sandbag it.

chrisday

Well, Cav's just given the nearest I've heard yet to an admission he's going balls out for Olympics and will let TdF suffer. Makes sense to me.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cycling/18508991
(Towards bottom of inevitable BBC cycling/drugs angle article)