E3 Prijs Vlaanderen - *Spoilers*

specialgueststar

how the hell 1 vs Sagan Thomas Chava and Oss???

Turfle

And back to a minute.

frenchfighter

One thing I want to know is why the two riders from QS dropped off from the Chavanel group. If they didn't have the legs fair enough otherwise a bad tactical decision.

above_the_cows

Those children look thoroughly miserable.

pitchshifter

Oss for the sprint for second? Seem to remember him being pretty quick.

ddraver

Ok, so the hot hockey girl I have a bit of a thing for is a massive Canc fan it seems....

specialgueststar

is he on tubs? which?

above_the_cows

ddraver wrote:

Ok, so the hot hockey girl I have a bit of a thing for is a massive Canc fan it seems....

How does she feel about Algeria?

ddraver

Of Course Haussler will sprint for the minor places. It's his one talent!!! :P

HHG does nt know yet (I don't know her at all well...)

ddraver

SpecialGuestStar wrote:

is he on tubs? which?

Wild Guess at Dugast from the look...and the whole thing about Dugast and cobbles

Good to see he wobbles his shoulders when he's knackered too, makes me feel a little better....

above_the_cows

ddraver wrote:

Of Course Haussler will sprint for the minor places. It's his one talent!!! :P

HHG does nt know yet (I don't know her at all well...)

Well now's your chance See if she wants to dissect the race with you.

frenchfighter

Go on, kiss the luck locket.

rozzer32

Above The Cows wrote:

rozzer32 wrote:

Graeme_S wrote:

LeicesterLad wrote:

What choice do they have though? They all need to start chasing or they are screwed anyway?

If your options are doing nothing and have Cancellara win, or slog your guts out and have Sagan win, which would you go for?

Or maybe they could try and win the race themselves. Too many riders are happy with a top 5 finish. What happened to all or nothing? I'd say only Fabian has the balls in the pro peloton to try and win a race by himself which we are seeing today. In the chase group they're are 5 riders from 5 different teams. They need to work together but they're all happy to try and get a top 5. No one really wants to do a turn. Shame really.

But isn't that the beauty of bike racing? It depends who is in the group. The group composition is everything. If the group was made up of good rouleurs but none having a noticeable turn of speed then they may ride, but when you have someone in the group who is almost guaranteed to beat you in the sprint then I can understand the psychology behind why you might not drag that person into contention for the win.

I don't think it's the beauty of bike racing. I think it's totally boring. Oh Fabian has a minute with 25 Kms to go and now one is working behind, time to go paint the shed. It's like F1 when Vettel leads into the first corner, might as well switch off the tv. What I can understand is that all they care about is getting World Tour points so they're over the moon with a top 5. The second group isn't getting caught by the peloton so what have they got to lose by chasing?

ddraver

huh...Oss has gone...

Gee v Sagan interesting

ddraver

or not as it turns out...

Boonen takes EBH...

frenchfighter

Can't wait for the photos. So classy.

Turfle

I didn't see anyone soft-pedaling behind, it's just really really hard to catch Cancellara when he's in this form.

DeadCalm

Well that was a tedious and extremely disappointing last 30kms.

LeicesterLad

RichN95 wrote:

LeicesterLad wrote:

Graeme_S wrote:

LeicesterLad wrote:

What choice do they have though? They all need to start chasing or they are screwed anyway?

If your options are doing nothing and have Cancellara win, or slog your guts out and have Sagan win, which would you go for?

If there was even the slightest chance of my winning by slogging my guts out and then Sagan having an off day, mechanical, crash then I would 100% slog to the finish. People either want to win or they don't.

But if you pull Sagan to the finish, next time he'll just sit in and wait for you to do it again. And then again, and again.

But there would still always be that 5% chance you pull off the win, compared to the 0% if you just sit up and give up.

iainf72

DeadCalm wrote:

Well that was a tedious and extremely disappointing last 30kms.

But outstanding 30km's before that. Sometimes how it goes in one dayers.

Turfle

LeicesterLad wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

LeicesterLad wrote:

Graeme_S wrote:

LeicesterLad wrote:

What choice do they have though? They all need to start chasing or they are screwed anyway?

If your options are doing nothing and have Cancellara win, or slog your guts out and have Sagan win, which would you go for?

If there was even the slightest chance of my winning by slogging my guts out and then Sagan having an off day, mechanical, crash then I would 100% slog to the finish. People either want to win or they don't.

But if you pull Sagan to the finish, next time he'll just sit in and wait for you to do it again. And then again, and again.

But there would still always be that 5% chance you pull off the win, compared to the 0% if you just sit up and give up.

But the argument is you'll increase that 5% next time by taking a 0% this time.

DeadCalm

iainf72 wrote:

DeadCalm wrote:

Well that was a tedious and extremely disappointing last 30kms.

But outstanding 30km's before that. Sometimes how it goes in one dayers.

Fair point.

nevman

Sky/Cannondale pact starting-could be of interest later in the year.

RonB

Not sure its confirmed but Sagan 2nd, Oss 3rd?

Edit -

1 Fabian Cancellara (Swi) RadioShack Leopard
2 Peter Sagan (Svk) Cannondale Pro Cycling
3 Daniel Oss (Ita) BMC Racing Team
4 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Sky Procycling
5 Sebastian Langeveld (Ned) Orica-GreenEdge
6 Sylvain Chavanel (Fra) Omega Pharma-Quick Step
7 Tom Boonen (Bel) Omega Pharma-Quick Step
8 Luca Paolini (Ita) Katusha
9 Edvald Boasson Hagen (Nor) Sky Procycling
10 Sébastien Turgot (Fra) Team Europcar

rozzer32

Turfle wrote:

I didn't see anyone soft-pedaling behind, it's just really really hard to catch Cancellara when he's in this form.

Sagan was flicking his elbow a number of times and no one came through, they didn't want to work.

Macaloon

@ saganstolemyicecream <--- very well played handle-wise. Up there with menchov'sstablisers

rozzer32

rozzer32 wrote:

Turfle wrote:

I didn't see anyone soft-pedaling behind, it's just really really hard to catch Cancellara when he's in this form.

Sagan was ******* his elbow a number of times and no one came through, they didn't want to work.

hmmm it's edited out flick-ing

above_the_cows

rozzer32 wrote:

Above The Cows wrote:

rozzer32 wrote:

Graeme_S wrote:

LeicesterLad wrote:

What choice do they have though? They all need to start chasing or they are screwed anyway?

If your options are doing nothing and have Cancellara win, or slog your guts out and have Sagan win, which would you go for?

Or maybe they could try and win the race themselves. Too many riders are happy with a top 5 finish. What happened to all or nothing? I'd say only Fabian has the balls in the pro peloton to try and win a race by himself which we are seeing today. In the chase group they're are 5 riders from 5 different teams. They need to work together but they're all happy to try and get a top 5. No one really wants to do a turn. Shame really.

But isn't that the beauty of bike racing? It depends who is in the group. The group composition is everything. If the group was made up of good rouleurs but none having a noticeable turn of speed then they may ride, but when you have someone in the group who is almost guaranteed to beat you in the sprint then I can understand the psychology behind why you might not drag that person into contention for the win.

I don't think it's the beauty of bike racing. I think it's totally boring. Oh Fabian has a minute with 25 Kms to go and now one is working behind, time to go paint the shed. It's like F1 when Vettel leads into the first corner, might as well switch off the tv. What I can understand is that all they care about is getting World Tour points so they're over the moon with a top 5. The second group isn't getting caught by the peloton so what have they got to lose by chasing?

Well we'll have to disagree. I don't think it has anything specifically to do with Cancellara up the road, it happens in lots of other contexts too. For me the games of 'risk' that go on as different riders make calculations about whether or not they want to help another rider to victory is what makes it so interesting. It is as much about tactics as it is about brawn. I can see how some might see winning as being everything but I see the race as more nuanced, riders assessing their chances in the specific context (race, form, upcoming calendar etc), deciding whether they're willing to kill themselves in order to hand someone else a victory.

But then I know that I'm psychologically prone to making decisions based on a defensive realism.

frenchfighter

Demonstration on how you solidify True Champion status.

andyp

ddraver wrote:

SpecialGuestStar wrote:

is he on tubs? which?

Wild Guess at Dugast from the look...and the whole thing about Dugast and cobbles

More likely to be FMB Paris-Roubaix's;

http://www.fm-boyaux.fr/rubrique.php?id ... t2avorogj7