Pro Cycling Discussion 2016

Great descent by Jon Izaguirre, I turned on just as they were reaching the last summit and the commentators seemed to be suggesting he'd struggle to stay with Nibali and Pantano as they were much better descenders. Turns out that wasn't quite right.

Happy to see Froome make it safely across the line, here's hoping he stays out of trouble tomorrow and secures his third title. Overall very well done to Team Sky, probably a bit boring for fans of any other team though.
 
Not a fan of any team but just like seeing good racing which I guess makes me a non-Sky fan. They did what they came to do but **** me what an awful race. Sky suffocated all the other mountain stages and today no-one wanted to take any risks with the end in sight and little to be gained. Froome never looked in trouble the whole race.

Thomas didn't look to even be going that hard on the Joux Plane so disappointing not to see someone try something.
 
One More Solo said:
Not a fan of any team but just like seeing good racing which I guess makes me a non-Sky fan. They did what they came to do but **** me what an awful race. Sky suffocated all the other mountain stages and today no-one wanted to take any risks with the end in sight and little to be gained. Froome never looked in trouble the whole race.

Thomas didn't look to even be going that hard on the Joux Plane so disappointing not to see someone try something.
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As much as sky made the race boring, all the other teams did nothing to put them in trouble. Today's stage everyone just felt like they'd stay in position. Disappointing from a fans perspective but like any other sport they'll do what they can to win. Which today was not a lot.
 
One More Solo said:
Not a fan of any team but just like seeing good racing which I guess makes me a non-Sky fan. They did what they came to do but **** me what an awful race. Sky suffocated all the other mountain stages and today no-one wanted to take any risks with the end in sight and little to be gained. Froome never looked in trouble the whole race.

Thomas didn't look to even be going that hard on the Joux Plane so disappointing not to see someone try something.
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None of which is the fault of team sky. If bmc havent had messed about with tejay and van avermaet early on in the race and just got on with supporting porte they may have done much better. If Movistar worked a bit more as a team to support Quintana rather than messing about in breakaways....

I can't hwlp but think that teams make it easy for Team Sky in some respects due to their tactics.
 
physichull said:
Oh....and what was the point of team Cannondale Drapac? Tgey did naff all the whole race.
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Rolland had an early crash but would have targeted top 10 otherwise.

Shifted to trying to get a stage but Rolland had another big stack.

The other riders didnt really have the caliber of others in the breaks that went up the road. When you have guys like Costa, Nibali et al in the breaks it's tough for up and coming riders to make something of it.

They had a try with Uran in the Giro this year but didn't come to much. I think they are a good team, obviously budget is tiny compared to other teams.

A lot of teams didn't get much this year, I think it just shows the strength of a few. Lotto Jumbo, Trek, FDJ, Cofidis.

Astana and Movistar for all their strength were disappointingly.

IAM had a good tour, extra motivation trying to get yourself a contract for next year.
 
Well done to Greipel for the win, it didn't feel quite as dramatic as some years but I guess that might be partly due to no Cavendish this time reducing my interest a bit. I did enjoy Luke Rowe and Wout Pouls deciding to liven things up a bit with around 20km to go when they went to the breakaway group but it never really looked like doing anything much, I think they were just messing around at that point.

I was pleased to see Chris Froome made it home without incident, a relatively undramatic win in the end but impressive in its own way for the understated way that Team Sky controlled things so comprehensively - albeit helped by the fact that other teams didn't seem to want to really attack them.
 
physichull said:
None of which is the fault of team sky. If bmc havent had messed about with tejay and van avermaet early on in the race and just got on with supporting porte they may have done much better. If Movistar worked a bit more as a team to support Quintana rather than messing about in breakaways....

I can't hwlp but think that teams make it easy for Team Sky in some respects due to their tactics.
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Porte was the only rider who looked to have the form to challenge Froome, but even so Froome looked pretty comfortable on his wheel when Porte attacked at Finhaut-Emosson. It was a poor call by BMC to lead with TVG rather than Porte, but - even if Porte hadn't lost his 2 minutes from the puncture early on - there's no way he could have made beaten Froome IMO.

Interesting that Froome did very very little in the mountains this year aside from defending - the bulk of his time gains were from the TTs, the descent of the Tourmalet and the break with Sagan. I wonder if this was a deliberate PR strategy given the scrutiny over his MTF wins.

Ultimately, I don't think it comes down to tactics. Riders didn't attack because they weren't able to, not because they were unwilling. If Sky are sustaining a pace that is right on the limit physically, it's impossible to attack. A solo rider is fighting the wind, gravity and paying for the effort of the initial burst to get away. How many times did riders clip off the front of the GC group only for Poels/Landa/Nieve to steadily reel them back in? It ultimately meant Froome only had to chase down one attack himself in the whole Tour (Porte at Finhaut-Emosson).

The only way to pick up time would have been attacking in the final 1-2km to pick up a handful of seconds, a bit like Dan Martin was doing in the Dauphine. The problem there is those seconds are a bit pointless when you then get smashed in the TTs.
 
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