Brutal new top-finish in Vuelta 2013

victorponf

Haza Llana, brutal new top-finish in Vuelta 2013 (profile included)

http://www.revistadesdelacuneta.com/ten ... rchivo0554

Richmond Racer

The Vuelta organisers should be running circuses really. Rumour mill is also 12 summit finishes, 2 more than the 10 this year.

inkyfingers

Definitely a danger of having too much of a good thing, remember the 2011 Giro?

I suppose it's their way of guaranteeing that a Spaniard wins. They need to be careful though, this years Vuelta was a good one but something tells me that Contador will revert to his old format next year and race hard up till the Tour then put his feet up.

frenchfighter

Thanks for posting. Lovely views and a great road surface.

It is one of the longest climbs that I can remember to have been included in a race.

Very exposed too which will be murder if it is windy.

Richmond Racer

http://velonews.competitor.com/2012/11/ ... ion_265570

salsiccia1

It looks fantastic, but one of those in a GT is enough. Some of the stuff in this year's Vuelta was too much.

Abdoujaparov

Wow. Toughest climb to ever feature in a GT? Looks like a cracker - tough 5km section near the bottom to start the selection early.

thomthom

What don't they get? It was exellent for the first 2-4 stages. When we hit the 8th steep finish it was like watching a sprint stage - just much worse.

Talking about sprint stages... When you keep creating routes like these that is when Degenkolb wins 5 stages. And everyone with just little knowledge know that John - being a fast man, mind you - shouldn't be able to win 5 stages in a GT.

Richmond Racer

ThomThom wrote:

What don't they get? It was exellent for the first 2-4 stages. When we hit the 8th steep finish it was like watching a sprint stage - just much worse.

Talking about sprint stages... When you keep creating routes like these that is when Degenkolb wins 5 stages. And everyone with just little knowledge know that John - being a fast man, mind you - shouldn't be able to win 5 stages in a GT.

I'm with you. The organisers are in the same mindset groove that Zomegnan got into (as Inky says, remember the '11 Giro). They think that more really is more. It'll head back to the days of the non-Spanish riders looking for the closest airports to the locations of the last stage before a rest day; Tier 1 sprinters will rule out the Vuelta even more than last year; and the Vuelta will truly cement its place as an also-ran to the Giro and the Tour - unless you're Spanish.

sherer

plus all these brutal stages one after the other is used as part of the reason why cyclists have to keep taking drugs.

thomthom

These stages aren't brutal, though. The Vuelta didn't have one brutal stage. Riding over 5 big mountains in 6 hours is kind of brutal. Riding 180 km of flat and 5 km of 18% isn't brutal.

Richmond Racer

ThomThom wrote:

These stages aren't brutal, though. The Vuelta didn't have one brutal stage. Riding over 5 big mountains in 6 hours is kind of brutal. Riding 180 km of flat and 5 km of 18% isn't brutal.

Stages which end in some riders having to wheel their bikes across the finish seems brutal enough.

thomthom

I know what I would prefer looking at the two stage designs. That's for sure.

Tom Butcher

The Vuelta was the best grand tour of 2013 so I'll wait and see whether a similar parcours is going to ruin the 2014 race.

edit - yeah yeah I'm from the future - I mean 2012 and 2013 !

LeicesterLad

People who thought this years Vuelta route was poor are on crack surely? The 2012 Tour route was one of the dullest ever but because it's called 'the Tour de France' people strangely do not seem to notice.

inkyfingers

LeicesterLad wrote:

People who thought this years Vuelta route was poor are on crack surely? The 2012 Tour route was one of the dullest ever but because it's called 'the Tour de France' people strangely do not seem to notice.

Don't see anybody saying the Vuelta route was poor LL. It was a great race, but it did feature a lot of very similar stages, fairly flat then a mental finish, like this ______/ (wow, you can tell I work in design)!

After a while I a bit felt like I was watching the Fleche Wallone over and over again. They just need to make sure it has some variety, after all, the stage where the race was won wasn't a particularly tough one.

The main reason the Vuelta was good was because you had a couple of very well matched riders, who had a real ding dong battle throughout the race. Sadly, due to the lack of Contador, Schleck and a fully fit Evans you just didn't have that in the Tour. The tour route was pretty poor, but it would still have been a better race if it had been close like the Vuelta was.

mike6

I agree with the theory that the Vuelta was designed to produce a Spanish winner last year, and 2013 looks like even more of the same.
I can see the Spanish race slipping into deep obscurity, as all but the best specialist climbers vote with there feet.

thomthom

LeicesterLad wrote:

People who thought this years Vuelta route was poor are on crack surely? The 2012 Tour route was one of the dullest ever but because it's called 'the Tour de France' people strangely do not seem to notice.

When did we say that the Tour was better? It wasn't. It was awful. And the Giro wasn't very entertaining either. The Vuelta was 10 minutes of action every day with the same outcome bar 1-2 stages. You could literally turn on tour tv 10 minutes before the end and miss absolutely nothing. Is that the way you want the coverage of cycling to be in the future?

The 2012 season was saved by the classics - as it often is.

Abdoujaparov

ThomThom wrote:

LeicesterLad wrote:

People who thought this years Vuelta route was poor are on crack surely? The 2012 Tour route was one of the dullest ever but because it's called 'the Tour de France' people strangely do not seem to notice.

When did we say that the Tour was better? It wasn't. It was awful. And the Giro wasn't very entertaining either. The Vuelta was 10 minutes of action every day with the same outcome bar 1-2 stages. You could literally turn on tour tv 10 minutes before the end and miss absolutely nothing. Is that the way you want the coverage of cycling to be in the future?

The 2012 season was saved by the classics - as it often is.

Can't remember the classics being all that this year. Not like I can remember too much, but in terms of the monuments, I seem to remember LBL had a pretty good edition, PR was boring but impressive, Flanders was a bit dull, Sanremo had a great last ten minutes and who knows what happened at Lombardia (satellite TV issues). Don't get me wrong, I prefer one dayers to GTs (like most cycling fans), but they were hardly vintage. The Vuelta was pretty good all in all - although Rodriguez's dominance in the uphill sprints got a little samey after a while. But then he didn't win on quite a special day of racing (much as i hate Contador).

In any case, you write all this in the context of of what looks like a great mountain to add to the Vuelta. The riders make the race and all that, but that little hillock looks pretty decent to me. Fair play to the organisers for using it

mroli

I don't think the Tour was boring. I think the riders were. A fully competitive Schleck and Evans would have made it far more interesting, Nibs did what he could, but it needed teams taking it to Sky and no-one dared.

I think that the Vuelta started well, but then it was just as boring as the Tour. Instead of Sky grinding it out, you just waited for J Rod/Alberto/Piti to pop out at the end and sprint up a very steep slope (or Degenkolb to sprint).

By all means put a couple of circus climbs in, but mix it up a little. A little bit for everyone perhaps?

sonny73

That looks like a great climb, really savage. Look forward to seeing that. Nice that is kicks up so badly early on in the climb, which will really sort them out.