tigger
Über Member
34 secs maybe?! Think my link was buffering!
Volta Ciclista a Catalunya, 18-24 March 2013 [spoilers]
- Thread starter smutchin
- Start date
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BrumJim
Forum Stalwart (won't take the hint and leave...)
- Location
- Selly Oak, Birmingham
That boy was climbing like a mountain goat today.
There'll be shouting and cheering in the pubs and clubs of Birmingham tonight...
(Suffering March Mclaren withdrawl symptoms).
There'll be shouting and cheering in the pubs and clubs of Birmingham tonight...
(Suffering March Mclaren withdrawl symptoms).
OP
OP
smutchin
Cat 6 Racer
- Location
- The Red Enclave
A touch of Sean Kelly about that ride. He's Irish all right.
OP
OP
smutchin
Cat 6 Racer
- Location
- The Red Enclave
"As a child Nairo Quintana lived at 3000m above sea level and rode to school 16km in the valley below. He'd ride back up every day on his MTB"
https://twitter.com/inrng/statuses/314790651537526784
Strathlubnaig
Guru
- Location
- Alberta
Just watched that stage, what a fantastic ride from Dan Martin, chapeau to him, great effort. The catch up attempt from Rodriguez and Quintana was also a fine effort. Great to see Garmin-Sharp take the stage and the jersey, for now.
Flying_Monkey
Recyclist
- Location
- Odawa
Haven't had time to watch this yet, but it sounds like it was a humdinger. And it's about time Martin won something big. Can he hold on to it?
Interesting point.... the peloton was chasing the break in earnest when Valverde crashed. The peloton waited for him causing the gap to grow - Martin should buy Valverde a beer!
Not to take anything away from a splendid ride, hopefully he can build on this success for the GTs!
Not to take anything away from a splendid ride, hopefully he can build on this success for the GTs!
Flying_Monkey
Recyclist
- Location
- Odawa
Great ride by Martin. Quintana just showed some tactical naivity and perhaps just didn't quite have the legs at the end. He should have attacked earlier and gone for it harder. The worst thing for him wasn't not catching Martin, but not being able to decisively escape Purito. But then, that's a difficult thing to do. But this really isn't finished yet. We still have some potential for the order to shift.
It looked like a lovely ride from Martin. I haven't seen how he broke from the group, but from the stats Vaughters retweeted (W/kg 5.48, average speed 22.3kph IIRC) suggests he paced the whole climb very well and the others just let him get that little bit too far ahead.
gotta say im a bit disappointed with katusha and movistar. surely rodriguez and quintana would back themselves to be able to get away from brad, so why arent there teams working for wins?
they seem to just ride the sky train, if i was rodriguez and i knew i had brads number up at the top id send some of my boys to the front to push it on, they had one bloke near the end but that wasnt enough, that should have been rodriguez in the leaders jersey he had legs left at the end and could have squeezed 10 seconds at worst out of martin if his team worked harder.
just seems everyone vs sky(same at olympics where no one else worked and let vino get a gold without too much fuss) have sky frightened people that much?
i can understand it being different if froome ( a top climmber) was riding but brad is very much one speed and is always gonna get beaten to the line.
they seem to just ride the sky train, if i was rodriguez and i knew i had brads number up at the top id send some of my boys to the front to push it on, they had one bloke near the end but that wasnt enough, that should have been rodriguez in the leaders jersey he had legs left at the end and could have squeezed 10 seconds at worst out of martin if his team worked harder.
just seems everyone vs sky(same at olympics where no one else worked and let vino get a gold without too much fuss) have sky frightened people that much?
i can understand it being different if froome ( a top climmber) was riding but brad is very much one speed and is always gonna get beaten to the line.
jdtate101
Ex-Fatman
- Location
- Boring Birmingham
JRod, Contador, Quintana and Valverde are all punchy riders and do reasonably well on high tempo long drags, but those sort of climbs are where SKY and Brad are really strong. Keeping a high wattage speed over such a long time just drives those other guys into the floor meaning they cant explode out. It's a fairly effective tactic, but doesn't always work, and the best way to counter it is to do what Dan Martin did and hit out early with vigour. The problem that some of the teams seem to be having with the SKY tactic is that they do leave it too late, and by then have lost most of their domestiques and energy.
I've been quite impressed by Brad, he certainly seems up for it right now, and is putting some attacks in not just sitting in the bunch, but mixing it up. The attack on the descent the other day was just inspired, and he had a really good dig on stage 3, which just destroyed the peloton (apart from the usual suspects).
Both the Giro and the Tour should be really good this year
I've been quite impressed by Brad, he certainly seems up for it right now, and is putting some attacks in not just sitting in the bunch, but mixing it up. The attack on the descent the other day was just inspired, and he had a really good dig on stage 3, which just destroyed the peloton (apart from the usual suspects).
Both the Giro and the Tour should be really good this year
OP
OP
smutchin
Cat 6 Racer
- Location
- The Red Enclave
I think they were all counting on Sky yesterday to reel Dan Martin in, but Sky had a bad day (maybe letting Pate go in the break wasn't such a great idea). Katusha did eventually take up the chase when they realised Sky weren't going to do the job for them, but they left it too late. Gesink and Van Den Broeck were canny to attack when they did - they obviously realised sooner than Katusha that Sky were done for. Neither was able to take it all the way but both gained time on Brad. Movistar didn't really have the numbers left to do anything as a team after Valverde and Capecchi crashed out, especially with Herrada already up the road.
fair point, perhaps im just wearing my sky coloured lenses today.....
i like that martin/van der b/gessink all went after the win. just disappointing really, im not sure theres a more exciting site in the mountains than rodriguez digging in for a win him and contador are aggressive and can make it stick. maybe it was a shrewd move and rodriguez knows he can put martin to the sword today, and leave wiggo sky et al off the back somewhere????
