S*** Small Races 2024
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Not good news on the Cav front.
He’s abandoned Milan-Torino.
Told a reporter he was feeling crook.
"Science is a tool for cheaters". An anonymous French PE teacher.0 -
Bettiol wins Milan-Torino with a 30km solo attack.
All very Bettiol - one to look out for this spring again.
Alas, he did it wearing what looks like basically a TT helmet and full aero kit. Or, as my father would describe it, "looking like a twat".
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Absolutely chaotic finish to Nokere Koerse with Merlier spoiling yet another: it has to be Sep moment. Looks like the 3 breakaway riders spent most of their energy rubber necking to see who was still upright.
Kopecky absolutely destroyed the field in Knocker Koerse.
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Cake is just weakness entering the body0 -
The best Ineos could manage was 25th place with Viviani. Both Hayters were nowhere.
It’s early days I know, but I sense it’s going to be a rather barren season.
"Science is a tool for cheaters". An anonymous French PE teacher.0 -
Ethan had a dig a few Ks out but the whole race hinged on whether you were in front of or behind the 2 crashes.
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Cake is just weakness entering the body1 -
Didn’t Ethan go down in the crash that left only about 10 riders at the front. It looked like he was reasonably well placed till the Quickstep rider brought everyone down.
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Was anyone expecting anything from either of the Hayters? Ethan doesn't like the fight for positioning that characterises the Belgian spring one dayers, and Leo is a GC rider.
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Well he’d been up the front, off the front then on the deck.
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Just onto the 4th of 12 cobbled sectors at GP de Denain, 66km left, with a 5 rider break. Main bunch split in two and some muddy, slippery pave in places.
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Kung trying to cross the 4.5 minute gap solo (has about 1 minute on the peloton). Seems an odd move
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Looked like the chase might just get back to the break, just under a minute with around 11km to go. Kung slides out on the front and the entire chase group of 10 or so crash behind bar one who went onto the grass. Chaos! Down to two at the front now.
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Steimle from Q36.5 takes it from his breakaway companion Desal after being away for about 180km. A third rider from the break got caught with around 400m to go by the chasing group of 4 that got up quickest after the comedy pile up 11km out. Van Gestal held off De Lie for third on the line.
interesting watch, it was looking touch and go whether the break would get caught until around 20km to go when the 9 chasers started pulling them back quickly. Then Kung slid out at the front of the chase taking down 7 of the other 8 with the lead below 1 minute and 11km remaining. The last 1km was like a slow bike race but the chaser ran out of road and Desal had no answer when Steimle jumped with 300m to go.
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Cheers @Pross , that's a proper race report there.
Warning No formatter is installed for the format0 -
Not sure if this is going to work, gif of the chasing group crash.
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Did the Lotto rider at the end keep it up?
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Yeah but then waited eventually for De Lie
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Catalunya S1 entertaining final.. last 5 k
"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 pm0 -
I guess Pog has Catalunya on his bucket list dance card for this year.
Nearly caught up with the late solo breakaway of Schultz to finish 2nd in stage 1.
Good finish for Williams in 3rd too.
Crash for Bernal in the last KM
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Cake is just weakness entering the body0 -
UCI rules allow teams to field riders from their development teams in non-WT races.
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The first of the big mountain stages in Catalunya, today.
"Science is a tool for cheaters". An anonymous French PE teacher.1 -
Looks a filthy day in Catalonia
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Pog wins by over 80 seconds from Landa and Vlasov. Coverage on YouTube stream was badly affected by the weather.
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🥱
"Unfortunately these days a lot of people don’t understand the real quality of a bike" Ernesto Colnago0 -
Stage 3 is another big mountain stage. Hopefully, the weather will be kinder, so that we get better coverage than today.
"Science is a tool for cheaters". An anonymous French PE teacher.1 -
Is it just me that's wondering if Pog's chosen this race for the 2000m altitude summits?
Long climbs + altitude are supposedly a weakness V Vingegaard
Warning No formatter is installed for the format0 -
I think he's just picking off the World Tour races until he's won them all. I'd expect him to show up at Itzulia next year.
There's an element of heavyweight boxing about how the big hitters aren't racing against eachother ahead of the Tour. I wonder if it's thrashed out by the team principals at the start of the season or if it's down to the cost of race appearance fees?
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Cake is just weakness entering the body0 -
I wonder if it's just chance - nowadays the rider's calendars are decided a long way in advance as they need to prepare all the training, altitude camps etc around them.
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There are quite a few world class climbers who lost a packet: I guess we might see who were saving themselves for some potential break action today - and who were genuinely dropped. Some of the time gaps are already pretty big: I know Pogacar is something else, but is there a lot of illness going around?
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Two other races of interest today. Stage 2 of Coppi e Bartali could quite possible determine the outcome of the GC, as the riders face a lumpy circuit and uphill finish.
The men take to the Belgian roads, as De Panne is also today. Every time this race now comes around, I find myself wondering why on Earth they didn't keep the traditional first stage, with it's climbs and cobbles. Instead, with decent weather forecast, we will most likely see another crash fest bunch sprint.
"Science is a tool for cheaters". An anonymous French PE teacher.1
