Liege-Bastogne-Liege 2017 - Spoilers

lettingthedaysgoby

He made that look easy.

Plus he's giving all of the winners money to Scarponi's family.

A class act all round.

andyp

I don't know how teams think they can beat Valverde if their tactics suit him more than their own riders. Only Wellens and Cannondale come out of that with any real credit, other than Valverde himself of course, at least they tried to split it up.

kingstongraham

RichN95 wrote:

KingstonGraham wrote:

How ever does he do it?

He just seems to know how to time his efforts in the last 500m in this and Flèche. Just experience really.

And he's recovered so well between all the races too.

Vino'sGhost

KingstonGraham wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

KingstonGraham wrote:

How ever does he do it?

He just seems to know how to time his efforts in the last 500m in this and Flèche. Just experience really.

And he's recovered so well between all the races too.

What are you insinuating?

milton50

So so easy. He's like a vintage wine, getting better with age.

blazing_saddles

RichN95 wrote:

KingstonGraham wrote:

How ever does he do it?

He just seems to know how to time his efforts in the last 500m in this and Flèche. Just experience really.

He is everything that Tim Wellens isn't.

This finish has to go if the race is going to be saved from it's Groundhog Day.

ducknumber1

Vino'sGhost wrote:

or that tdf finish in leeds

Assuming that should be Sheffield?

thegibdog

I think a 5 page spoiler thread with

andyp wrote:

Valverde starts as favourite, and will be challenged by the likes of Martin, Kwiatkowski

in the first post speaks volumes about this monument.

I think it's fair to say that it could probably do with a bit of a shake-up.

sherer

thegibdog wrote:

I think a 5 page spoiler thread with

andyp wrote:

Valverde starts as favourite, and will be challenged by the likes of Martin, Kwiatkowski

in the first post speaks volumes about this monument.

I think it's fair to say that it could probably do with a bit of a shake-up.

It's the riders that make the race. If it's that obvious that valverde will win they need to attack and isolate him sooner. He did no work all day until the final 1k. See Kwai and Milan he made Sagan do the work and beat him

rick_chasey

Anyway, 2011 - Gilbert's in fine form. He's won the last 3 races, and is one for the 4th in a row at Liege - the biggie.

only when Bakelandts comes down for dinner he sees Gilbert looking surprisingly relaxed. So relaxed in fact, he can't help but notice Gilbert knocking back a bottle of Duvel.

If ya think the booze is holding you back...it probably isn't.

rick_chasey

sherer wrote:

It's the riders that make the race.

No. Riders have some agency in the confines of the geography of the route.

ocdupalais

sherer wrote:

thegibdog wrote:

I think a 5 page spoiler thread with

andyp wrote:

Valverde starts as favourite, and will be challenged by the likes of Martin, Kwiatkowski

in the first post speaks volumes about this monument.

I think it's fair to say that it could probably do with a bit of a shake-up.

It's the riders that make the race. If it's that obvious that valverde will win they need to attack and isolate him sooner. He did no work all day until the final 1k. See Kwai and Milan he made Sagan do the work and beat him

But then how much work did GVA, or Albasini, or Dan Martin... or Kwiatkowski do (over and above the usual demands of very hilly 260km)? It's great that GVA rode this (and a shame that Gilbert didn't - and for that matter, Sagan), because after a full-on Spring, with riders doing a variety of different race programmes, I think we saw today who's the best rider in the world right now.

the article don

Interesting factoid on Eurosport today is that Valverde is only 2 wins shy of Mercx's total in Ardennes classics. And he looks like he's got a fair bit left in him too. Plus he could be heard saying "Scarponi" at the end. Pantomime baddie to some but I can't help liking the guy.

graeme_s-2

the article don wrote:

Interesting factoid on Eurosport today is that Valverde is only 2 wins shy of Mercx's total in Ardennes classics..

I thought they were saying that before he won LBL yesterday. So it's 1 win shy now. They also said he was on the same number of Ardenne podium appearances as Merckx, but he'll have exceeded that tally yesterday.

I don't particularly like him, but he is undoubtedly a phenomenal rider, and donating his winnings to Scarponi's family is very kind.

inseine

the article don wrote:

Interesting factoid on Eurosport today is that Valverde is only 2 wins shy of Mercx's total in Ardennes classics. And he looks like he's got a fair bit left in him too. Plus he could be heard saying "Scarponi" at the end. Pantomime baddie to some but I can't help liking the guy.

Shame his past has tainted him, insome peoples eyes, because he's one of the greats.

Vino'sGhost

ducknumber1 wrote:

Vino'sGhost wrote:

or that tdf finish in leeds

Assuming that should be Sheffield?

HA yes Thank you :oops:

timoid.

That was so easy for Valverde. Can't really fault Martin, he might have had a better chance if Yates hadn't chased so hard.

As others have said, the course needs looking at. Top three far too predictable.

specialgueststar

Timoid. wrote:

That was so easy for Valverde. Can't really fault Martin, he might have had a better chance if Yates hadn't chased so hard.

As others have said, the course needs looking at. Top three far too predictable.

Not so predictable but Valverde is a phenomenal talent - you can't change a race just because a rider is something special!

Plenty of others ready tot ake it next year .

I was interested watching Izagirre and Bardet who approach it more as a climb and Valverde as an uphill sprint - I like it as you've got a mix of climbers and (super) puncheurs

look at 3 seconds

3 KWIATKOWSKI MichalT
4MATTHEWS Michael
5 IZAGIRRE Ion
6 BARDET Romain
7ALBASINI Michael

and at 7 seconds

8YATES Adam
9WOODS Michael
10MAJKA Rafał
11VAN AVERMAET Greg
12POZZOVIVO Domenico
13HENAOSergio Luis

Richmond Racer 2

oh Piti is special alright

RichN95.

SpecialGuestStar wrote:

Not so predictable but Valverde is a phenomenal talent - you can't change a race just because a rider is something special!

In general I find that if Valverde has won a race then that race has been pretty boring. It's not that the podium is predictable that's the problem, but that the podium finishers were mostly invisible throughout the race until the last 500m.

TheBigBean

I thought the race wasn't too bad. Maybe my expectations have been managed by some recent dull editions though.

Also, the argument that Valverde didn't do any work isn't really relevant as his team did lots of work.

RichN95.

TheBigBean wrote:

Also, the argument that Valverde didn't do any work isn't really relevant as his team did lots of work.

Yes. But for high status races, we like to see the stars carve out their own chances at least a little bit.

milton50

Personally I've always been of the belief that organisers should not change a race/event purely to make it harder for a specific person to win. That goes for any sport.

If the race is becoming boring per se then that's different.

RichN95.

Milton50 wrote:

Personally I've always been of the belief that organisers should not change a race/event purely to make it harder for a specific person to win. That goes for any sport.

If the race is becoming boring per se then that's different.

It's not about any individual. It's more that if the route is the same for a long period of time, then a best way to win emerges. So then the big teams buy up the riders that best satisfy that way and get a team to best neutralise variations. And we get homogenised tactics and predictable racing.

rick_chasey

Despite the difficulty, ultimately it's not selective enough.

Too many riders left in the fray towards the end, which keeps the whole race shut until too late.

Also, uphill finish means those who are good uphill have no incentive to make a do-or-die approach on the climb before the finish (since the final climb is the finish).

rick_chasey

More broadly, I think that the increase in speed in the peloton and the shrinking of the difference between the fastest and the slowest, has meant that the traditional gradient isn't enough to really separate the riders, especially in one day races.

Interestingly, races like Flanders continue to be selective, but that's because of the other factor - narrow roads.

By going from large-to-small roads all the time, Flanders creates a massive sprint/fight for the turn off into the small road, at which point, anyone caught 20 or 30 riders behind is significantly compromised, to the point where the race could be lost.

I don't think it's a coincidence that races that continue to seek out more and more narrow/difficult roads are the ones that more recently have seen more selective races.

rick_chasey

Ironically, although the '90s and '00s saw a decent progress in terms of professionalisation which ultimately ought to bring the worst and best closer together in terms of performance, because doping wasn't available to literally anyone - only those good enough to warrant it (see all those examples of being considered good enough to get on the team's program), that in itself caused enough differentiation within the peloton to make it more selective.

So, you would guess, that the doping hid the shrinking of the gap between worse and best, and we're now seeing that in these types of races, where the width of the road was never a factor in differentiating.

TheBigBean

Those that would benefit most from a selective race don't tend to ride it though.

milton50

Rick Chasey wrote:

Despite the difficulty, ultimately it's not selective enough.

That's odd though isn't it? I mean, I completely take your point about narrow roads but we're talking about a 260km race with almost 5,000m of climbing.

You could argue that Liege is more selective than Milan San Remo. It's just that people have accepted MSR as a sprinter's classic.

rick_chasey

Milton50 wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

Despite the difficulty, ultimately it's not selective enough.

That's odd though isn't it? I mean, I completely take your point about narrow roads but we're talking about a 260km race with almost 5,000m of climbing.

You could argue that Liege is more selective than Milan San Remo. It's just that people have accepted MSR as a sprinter's classic.

MSR isn't selective.

There's an annual debate on whether it should be more selective (by, say, adding Le Maine) or accept it isn't and have it as a 'sprinter's classic'.

I define selective as how often small groups of only the strongest remain.

Flanders, Roubaix, rarely see groups of more than 5 arrive at the finish line together for the win. Same with that semi classic Lombardi even.

If you ignore the final hill, liege regularly sees 20 odd riders arrive at the base together.