Hope he resolves whatever is going on and does what makes him happy.
Amazing to think it’s not that many years ago we thought we’d have a longish period of him dominating sprints.
There's a story that the famous test pilot Eric "Winkle" Brown used to tell about his record for flying the most carrier landings of any pilot in history. The US military had rather a thing for setting new records, and fancied taking this one for themselves. An ace pilot was selected and ordered to do nothing but take off and land for as long as it took. Apparently he managed to get about halfway before the inevitable nervous collapse.
I've always felt there was something similar about Kittel in relationship to Cavendish. There was a period of a year or two where he was clearly better than the Cavendish he was racing, and a lot of hype about how he could eclipse him, but it always seemed to me to underestimate quite how staggeringly successful Cavendish had been during his own imperial phase. It just seems to me that Kittel was always being asked - and expected - to chase an impossible target, and I never got the impression he was comfortable with falling short. Maybe I'm wrong. Hopefully the time away helps him get back to his best, and if not then his palmares are hardly to be sniffed at - he went toe to toe with the best sprinters of his generation (and in the case of Cavendish potentially the greatest pure sprinter of all time) and held his own.
Quittel hasn't got his head right - never has really. Can't suffer, and can't understand that, even if you're throwing down 2000 watts in a sprint, sometimes you don't win.
Hope he gets his head sorted and comes back - in full flow he is absolutely devastating to watch
Fat chopper. Some racing. Some testing. Some crashing.
Specialising in Git Daaahns and Cafs. Norvern Munkey/Transplanted Laaandoner.
Be cool if he did make a comeback. Hard at 30 thou.
"If I was a 38 year old man, I definitely wouldn't be riding a bright yellow bike with Hello Kitty disc wheels, put it that way. What we're witnessing here is the world's most high profile mid-life crisis" Afx237vi Mon Jul 20, 2009 2:43 pm
Posts
Amazing to think it’s not that many years ago we thought we’d have a longish period of him dominating sprints.
He’s 30 now. I suspect he might be done as a top level sprinter.
I hope he gets well. Whatever it is.
Bless him, good luck to you Marcel
- @ddraver
Hard road back from this.
Voodoo Bizango - 2014 - Dead - Hit by a car
Vitus Sentier VRS - 2017
What German super team?
TBF I've not been keeping up with the movements over the last few months, I didn't notice Tony Martin leaving.
Voodoo Bizango - 2014 - Dead - Hit by a car
Vitus Sentier VRS - 2017
There's a story that the famous test pilot Eric "Winkle" Brown used to tell about his record for flying the most carrier landings of any pilot in history. The US military had rather a thing for setting new records, and fancied taking this one for themselves. An ace pilot was selected and ordered to do nothing but take off and land for as long as it took. Apparently he managed to get about halfway before the inevitable nervous collapse.
I've always felt there was something similar about Kittel in relationship to Cavendish. There was a period of a year or two where he was clearly better than the Cavendish he was racing, and a lot of hype about how he could eclipse him, but it always seemed to me to underestimate quite how staggeringly successful Cavendish had been during his own imperial phase. It just seems to me that Kittel was always being asked - and expected - to chase an impossible target, and I never got the impression he was comfortable with falling short. Maybe I'm wrong. Hopefully the time away helps him get back to his best, and if not then his palmares are hardly to be sniffed at - he went toe to toe with the best sprinters of his generation (and in the case of Cavendish potentially the greatest pure sprinter of all time) and held his own.
Hope he gets his head sorted and comes back - in full flow he is absolutely devastating to watch
Specialising in Git Daaahns and Cafs. Norvern Munkey/Transplanted Laaandoner.