How good is Chris Froome?

andyp

She's a proper South African though, isn't she? Par for the course in my experience. :twisted:

RonB

or Neath

m.r.m.

Cath Wiggins seems quite unlikeable. There was a tweet from a photographer wearing national champ bands that he got as a gift from Adam Blythe or some champion. Just a dude enjoying life. In comes Mrs. Wiggins to scold him for wearing bands he didn't earn. May be in line with cycling's unwritten rules. Seems like a complete dickish move in life though to me.

Michelle Froome probably should just relax about it. By now people should understand how the internet works. :roll:
There is no need to sweat this small stuff!

curium

silvergrenade wrote:

hypster wrote:

OCDuPalais wrote:

[Of course - but my previous comment was a response to the complaint that power meters (and the evil Team Sky who rely on them so heavily to kill off all exciting attacks) detract from racing; and the idea that Froome is somehow dependent on his in order to race.
If, as you assert, all pros were so supremely able to assess their performance throughout a race then there'd be no demand or claimed need for power meters.

How do you know that Sky rely so heavily on power meters? It's pure conjecture.

1. Woet Poels said in an interview during the 2016 TdF that whenever attacks go off the front, they pick up the pace after estimating the time and then calculating the Watts required to bring that rider back....
2. Froome has written in his book how he obsesses about the need to look at all of his data while many pros in the peloton have gone onto say that they ride on feel and maybe just heart rate monitor.
3. Contador this Vuelta said that Froome was in difficulty and he started staring at his power meter and recovered a little bit to go off again at which point he had to let Froomes wheel go.

There are so many instances where the cycling world has talked about their excessive use of powermeters.

What counts as excessive use of a power-meter? Seems to me that Sky make good use of their power-meters.

All the other riders have them too so it stands to reason that they are not using them to their full potential, or maybe they just aren't as good as Chris Froome and Team Sky?

Either way, is not Team Sky's fault or concern.

Richmond Racer 2

dish_dash wrote:

I'd forgotten that I follow Michelle Froome on twitter until she launched her catty posts after that photo came out... she's been quiet for months.

Chris may be nice and polite, his wife isn't.

Oh she's a nasty piece of work. She occasionally 'shuts down' her twitter account, but then scans tweets looking for tweets about her or Fenton, and then pops back on and slides into DMs. Bonkers, as TWH says.

No_Ta_Doctor

The most bonkers thing about this whole affair was that she actually had a reasonable point - don't try and judge rider health from a pic where they look a bit skinny. It was especially underlined with the content of the article (I only read the bit before the paywall) where he talks about his body fat % and how he'd underperformed when he'd been trying to keep his weight further down.

Unfortunately, instead of just pointing this out, she went out with one of the most offensive tweets I've seen in a while, pure personal attack. Completely bonkers, there was an easy win and a productive and useful discussion open.

silvergrenade

curium wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

hypster wrote:

OCDuPalais wrote:

[Of course - but my previous comment was a response to the complaint that power meters (and the evil Team Sky who rely on them so heavily to kill off all exciting attacks) detract from racing; and the idea that Froome is somehow dependent on his in order to race.
If, as you assert, all pros were so supremely able to assess their performance throughout a race then there'd be no demand or claimed need for power meters.

How do you know that Sky rely so heavily on power meters? It's pure conjecture.

1. Woet Poels said in an interview during the 2016 TdF that whenever attacks go off the front, they pick up the pace after estimating the time and then calculating the Watts required to bring that rider back....
2. Froome has written in his book how he obsesses about the need to look at all of his data while many pros in the peloton have gone onto say that they ride on feel and maybe just heart rate monitor.
3. Contador this Vuelta said that Froome was in difficulty and he started staring at his power meter and recovered a little bit to go off again at which point he had to let Froomes wheel go.

There are so many instances where the cycling world has talked about their excessive use of powermeters.

What counts as excessive use of a power-meter? Seems to me that Sky make good use of their power-meters.

All the other riders have them too so it stands to reason that they are not using them to their full potential, or maybe they just aren't as good as Chris Froome and Team Sky?

Either way, is not Team Sky's fault or concern.

On screen there is probably power, hr, time, cadence and a real time W' balance reading. The latter indicates how much hi intensity work (in kilojoules) he can put out above his threshold (critical Power) Watts. The harder you go, ie the more you exceed the CP, the quicker the expenditure of the w' balance. Exhaustion occurs near zero balance if the parameter values CP and W' are well defined. In pros, they probably are.

Yoyoing would fit this guess fairly well. Abstain from attacking and responding early on and ride just at CP. Then switch on the afterburners and go for it once the others have expended their capacity AND you can be sure to withstand the effort to the line.

Needless to say that real time W' balance is a race killer metric. Should be banned. heck, computers should be banned.

I agree that its not Team Sky's concern but as viewers of cycling it should be our concern. No?

iainf72

silvergrenade wrote:

Needless to say that real time W' balance is a race killer metric. Should be banned. heck, computers should be banned.

I agree that its not Team Sky's concern but as viewers of cycling it should be our concern. No?

When gears first came out, they should be banned. Hell, Desgrange did keep them banned for some time

Heart rate monitors also ruined racing apparently.

Disk wheels, tri bars etc etc. All the same.

We all get into cycling because of the legs as well as head aspect. Using data is just part of the head, but ultimately having some technology on your handlebars telling you how many watts you're chucking out isn't going to give you magic power.

silvergrenade

iainf72 wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

Needless to say that real time W' balance is a race killer metric. Should be banned. heck, computers should be banned.

I agree that its not Team Sky's concern but as viewers of cycling it should be our concern. No?

When gears first came out, they should be banned. Hell, Desgrange did keep them banned for some time

Heart rate monitors also ruined racing apparently.

Disk wheels, tri bars etc etc. All the same.

We all get into cycling because of the legs as well as head aspect. Using data is just part of the head, but ultimately having some technology on your handlebars telling you how many watts you're chucking out isn't going to give you magic power.

Good wheels made them faster, more aero. Thats all fine.
What I imply is that powermeters should be banned from competition just like Tennis players cant get assistance from coaches or maybe F1 where radio comm between the pit and the driver has been reduced to only important matters.
Cycling should be made more exciting. Use of powermeters is reducing that experience.
They should give us radio comm between DS and riders.

r0bh

silvergrenade wrote:

Cycling should be made more exciting. Use of powermeters is reducing that experience.

What evidence do you have for this assertion?

bobmcstuff

silvergrenade wrote:

On screen there is probably power, hr, time, cadence and a real time W' balance reading. The latter indicates how much hi intensity work (in kilojoules) he can put out above his threshold (critical Power) Watts. The harder you go, ie the more you exceed the CP, the quicker the expenditure of the w' balance. Exhaustion occurs near zero balance if the parameter values CP and W' are well defined. In pros, they probably are.

I am having difficulty believing that W' would be all that much use at the end of a 3 week grand tour, because that would require a level of knowledge of how the rider's body would react over 3 weeks which would be almost impossible to get (i.e., how much kJ reserve he might have after 3 weeks of hard racing). Critical power might be very well defined at the start of the race, possibly it would work in lab conditions or maybe even one day races, but I'm struggling with the idea it would be all that much use over a grand tour.

W' is in interesting metric and there is a bit of literature on it but I have not seen much about pros using it. Unless you have?

iainf72

silvergrenade wrote:

They should give us radio comm between DS and riders.

Every time they have it's been really boring. Just like the journos in cars have reported.

dish_dash

iainf72 wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

They should give us radio comm between DS and riders.

Every time they have it's been really boring. Just like the journos in cars have reported.

I dunno, from the backstage pass last year I quite enjoyed the scenes of the Sheriff talking to Chavez in Spanish...

RichN95.

iainf72 wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

They should give us radio comm between DS and riders.

Every time they have it's been really boring. Just like the journos in cars have reported.

That's probably why we should hear it. So people would realise that it is boring and any tactical stuff is generally stating the bleeding obvious.

silvergrenade

r0bh wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

Cycling should be made more exciting. Use of powermeters is reducing that experience.

What evidence do you have for this assertion?

Just a general observation. No evidence. Majority of people who've been following cycling for years would agree.

Richmond Racer 2

"move up!"

"cheese or pickle?"

"move up!"

etc etc

silvergrenade

RichN95 wrote:

iainf72 wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

They should give us radio comm between DS and riders.

Every time they have it's been really boring. Just like the journos in cars have reported.

That's probably why we should hear it. So people would realise that it is boring and any tactical stuff is generally stating the bleeding obvious.

IMO it wont be boring. Whatever little evidence we have of radio comm has been very positive.
Anyway, it was one of the many things UCI/ASO can do to make it more interesting.
I'd like to hear about peoples suggestions too on how it can be made so..

awavey

bobmcstuff wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

On screen there is probably power, hr, time, cadence and a real time W' balance reading. The latter indicates how much hi intensity work (in kilojoules) he can put out above his threshold (critical Power) Watts. The harder you go, ie the more you exceed the CP, the quicker the expenditure of the w' balance. Exhaustion occurs near zero balance if the parameter values CP and W' are well defined. In pros, they probably are.

I am having difficulty believing that W' would be all that much use at the end of a 3 week grand tour, because that would require a level of knowledge of how the rider's body would react over 3 weeks which would be almost impossible to get (i.e., how much kJ reserve he might have after 3 weeks of hard racing). Critical power might be very well defined at the start of the race, possibly it would work in lab conditions or maybe even one day races, but I'm struggling with the idea it would be all that much use over a grand tour.

W' is in interesting metric and there is a bit of literature on it but I have not seen much about pros using it. Unless you have?

sure Cav has said they use it to work out how sprinters get over the mountain stages inside the time cut, they know if they chuck out x many Watts over y many hours theyll finish in time, and that obviously does change during a stage.

iainf72

silvergrenade wrote:

IMO it wont be boring. Whatever little evidence we have of radio comm has been very positive.
Anyway, it was one of the many things UCI/ASO can do to make it more interesting.
I'd like to hear about peoples suggestions too on how it can be made so..

Ok. Been watching pro cycling for 31 years. To recapture the excitement of that era I suggest the following

- Limiting TV coverage to 30 minutes per stage for grand Tours
- Single day races should get around 30 seconds on transworld sport
- Newspapers should carry a small column, or just results of classics.
- Delay most results a week to a month after the actual races

Following cycling is a lot like being a music fan. Rarely is a whole album great, but the peaks make up for the fact a lot of it is meh.

Both the Vuelta and Giro had some great racing this year and they were full of power meters.

tangled_metal

I used to watch the TDF on the half hour highlights as I got home from school. I would watch the live programme at the weekend occasionally. It was boring apart from a small part of it, say half an hour.

That was decades ago with early days of lemonde, Fignon, etc. I'm sure it's all changed now right?

burnthesheep

silvergrenade wrote:

curium wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

hypster wrote:

OCDuPalais wrote:

[Of course - but my previous comment was a response to the complaint that power meters (and the evil Team Sky who rely on them so heavily to kill off all exciting attacks) detract from racing; and the idea that Froome is somehow dependent on his in order to race.
If, as you assert, all pros were so supremely able to assess their performance throughout a race then there'd be no demand or claimed need for power meters.

How do you know that Sky rely so heavily on power meters? It's pure conjecture.

1. Woet Poels said in an interview during the 2016 TdF that whenever attacks go off the front, they pick up the pace after estimating the time and then calculating the Watts required to bring that rider back....
2. Froome has written in his book how he obsesses about the need to look at all of his data while many pros in the peloton have gone onto say that they ride on feel and maybe just heart rate monitor.
3. Contador this Vuelta said that Froome was in difficulty and he started staring at his power meter and recovered a little bit to go off again at which point he had to let Froomes wheel go.

There are so many instances where the cycling world has talked about their excessive use of powermeters.

What counts as excessive use of a power-meter? Seems to me that Sky make good use of their power-meters.

All the other riders have them too so it stands to reason that they are not using them to their full potential, or maybe they just aren't as good as Chris Froome and Team Sky?

Either way, is not Team Sky's fault or concern.

On screen there is probably power, hr, time, cadence and a real time W' balance reading. The latter indicates how much hi intensity work (in kilojoules) he can put out above his threshold (critical Power) Watts. The harder you go, ie the more you exceed the CP, the quicker the expenditure of the w' balance. Exhaustion occurs near zero balance if the parameter values CP and W' are well defined. In pros, they probably are.

Yoyoing would fit this guess fairly well. Abstain from attacking and responding early on and ride just at CP. Then switch on the afterburners and go for it once the others have expended their capacity AND you can be sure to withstand the effort to the line.

Needless to say that real time W' balance is a race killer metric. Should be banned. heck, computers should be banned.

I agree that its not Team Sky's concern but as viewers of cycling it should be our concern. No?

Whoa, I imagined such a thing existed but that's neat! I bet my W' balance runs out pretty quick. First hill blasted......time to go home for a beer.

StillGoing

silvergrenade wrote:

r0bh wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

Cycling should be made more exciting. Use of powermeters is reducing that experience.

What evidence do you have for this assertion?

Just a general observation. No evidence. Majority of people who've been following cycling for years would agree.

And you base that assumption on exactly what evidence?

mamba80

iainf72 wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

IMO it wont be boring. Whatever little evidence we have of radio comm has been very positive.
Anyway, it was one of the many things UCI/ASO can do to make it more interesting.
I'd like to hear about peoples suggestions too on how it can be made so..

Ok. Been watching pro cycling for 31 years. To recapture the excitement of that era I suggest the following

- Limiting TV coverage to 30 minutes per stage for grand Tours
- Single day races should get around 30 seconds on transworld sport
- Newspapers should carry a small column, or just results of classics.
- Delay most results a week to a month after the actual races

Following cycling is a lot like being a music fan. Rarely is a whole album great, but the peaks make up for the fact a lot of it is meh.

Both the Vuelta and Giro had some great racing this year and they were full of power meters.

be good to see the display output on our tv screens, power speed the lot, similar to FI

fwiw i loved coming home and watching tdf on telly as a kid, me an my mate were transfixed, probably because we didnt know what we were watching and no internet forum told us how crap it had been.....

No_Ta_Doctor

Can we stop all this rubbish about power meters? This is a thread about how good Chris Froome is, not how racing is all shit and has been ruined and it should be like it was back when I remember jumpers for goalposts...


Anyway, I have a definitive answer for the original question of this thread:

Not as good as Tom Pidcock.

keef_zip

No tA Doctor wrote:

Can we stop all this rubbish about power meters? This is a thread about how good Chris Froome is, not how racing is all shoot and has been ruined and it should be like it was back when I remember jumpers for goalposts...


Anyway, I have a definitive answer for the original question of this thread:

Not as good as Tom Pidcock.

I think you mean...

Not as good as Tom Pidcock might end up being once his career is finished.

tailwindhome

keef_zip wrote:

Not as good as Tom Pidcock might end up being once his career is finished.

In this discussion I'm afraid there's always the Kenyan elephant in the room.

keef_zip

TailWindHome wrote:

keef_zip wrote:

Not as good as Tom Pidcock might end up being once his career is finished.

In this discussion I'm afraid there's always the Kenyan elephant in the room.

Why so? The comparison is between the riders, not about their heritage.

silvergrenade

philthy3 wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

r0bh wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

Cycling should be made more exciting. Use of powermeters is reducing that experience.

What evidence do you have for this assertion?

Just a general observation. No evidence. Majority of people who've been following cycling for years would agree.

And you base that assumption on exactly what evidence?

RC Skills 1/10^1000000000000000.
Such statements bring nothing to a conversation. Nothing. Zero. Zilch.
My fault I responded to the first one. And now the second one. Shoot me. :P

r0bh

silvergrenade wrote:

philthy3 wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

r0bh wrote:

silvergrenade wrote:

Cycling should be made more exciting. Use of powermeters is reducing that experience.

What evidence do you have for this assertion?

Just a general observation. No evidence. Majority of people who've been following cycling for years would agree.

And you base that assumption on exactly what evidence?

RC Skills 1/10^1000000000000000.
Such statements bring nothing to a conversation. Nothing. Zero. Zilch.
My fault I responded to the first one. And now the second one. Shoot me. :P

Making sweeping statements projecting your thoughts onto the majority bring nothing to the conversation either.

tangled_metal

To the original question. He's good, very good. In fact he's 4 TDF and one Vuelta good. Doesn't that count for anything in this discussion?

How many GT wins do you have? Compare him to yourself. He's in another league of talent for sure.