Did you keep the bet alive or cash out early?
Pro Cycling 2020 **Giro d'Italia 2020 **
- Thread starter RedFish
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
It’ll be quite the party in Carrick tomorrow!
Get out of here with your negativity, fecking hell.Pogacar’s glow will be seen from the International Space Station tonight, I bet! His performance today makes Froome and Wiggins seem somewhat believable.
First guy since Merckx to win Yellow, Polka and White jerseys in the same Tour.(The White jersey wasn’t a thing in Merckx’s first win, apparently, even though he’d have qualified for it, but he took Green as well to make up for it. Talk about complete dominance.)
Hopefully his old man tell his room at work to go home for the night, would make my night very easy.
Do you genuinely find today’s events credible?
fecking bonkers. Love a mountain TT(not often I feel the pros look genuinely KNACKERED like us amateurs) - that was Lance trashing up Alpe d'Huez level brutal.
That was something else 
Can't say I've really bought into the Jumbo-Visma hype (Jumbo is a Dutch supermarket chain I hate with a passion) and I had some family members who were a little too happy about their victory before they actually won it, so well done Pogacar! Though what I read from the experts analysing Roglic, he wasn't even that bad today, yet 1 minute 56 behind is a hell of a lot slower. Very spectacular ending all things considered, what an achievement for the young Slovenian.
Can't say I've really bought into the Jumbo-Visma hype (Jumbo is a Dutch supermarket chain I hate with a passion) and I had some family members who were a little too happy about their victory before they actually won it, so well done Pogacar! Though what I read from the experts analysing Roglic, he wasn't even that bad today, yet 1 minute 56 behind is a hell of a lot slower. Very spectacular ending all things considered, what an achievement for the young Slovenian.
Amusing to see Jumbo-Visma end up totally empty handed bar two stage wins for all their dominance.
The Roglic/Pogacar difference in this final time trial is still crazy. How are they basically tugged together and equally strong on all the previous mountains (Peyresourde was an exception as I think JV let him go because they thought they don't have to worry) yet on this final mountain Roglic loses 1:30 in a 6km ascent?
The Roglic/Pogacar difference in this final time trial is still crazy. How are they basically tugged together and equally strong on all the previous mountains (Peyresourde was an exception as I think JV let him go because they thought they don't have to worry) yet on this final mountain Roglic loses 1:30 in a 6km ascent?
Roglic didn't ride badly at all - Pogacar's ride was simply astonishing. He trashed everyone, not just Roglic. If you had given Roglic 35s within of Dumoulin beforehand, you'd bite the hand off, though was slightly favourite over him due to the hill finale. But I'd suggest he lost a fair chunk of that 35s due to the panic of knowing it was slipping from him to a supernatural performance.
This is why you'll find a lot saying that they should ban power meters(won't happen).... mountain TT are probably done quite heavily on pure feel, though still somewhat calculated. I wouldn't be surprised if Pogacar probably set a new FTP today.... while Roglic and Dumoulin probably didn't set new levels. The gradient makes it harder to completely manage your output - but not so much when actually in the race as not many will go into the red on an actual climb for too long.
His emotion after winning the stage last week showed what it meant to him and there should be more to come for him.
I’ve really enjoyed watching a number of Irish riders over the years, Dan Martin (I know he was born in a Brum but has an Irish mother), Nicholas Roche, and the recently retired Philip Deignan to name a few.
What a ride. No words.
Innocent until proven guilty. I enjoy cycling for what it is and I can’t stand the “wow that’s an amazing performance he most be doping” attitude like some people and yourself have. Just don’t watch if you’re that sceptical about amazing performances.
You can be amazed and sceptical. They are not mutually exclusive of one another, e.g. I am both amazed and hugely sceptical about statistics like these:
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Throw in absolutely alien ITT performances on top of god-like climbing numbers and you’ve got yourself a Grade-A case of incredibility. Pogacar needed to gain roughly 1.5 seconds per kilometre yesterday on Roglic to wipe out the latter’s lead (which many felt was simply inconceivable) but not only does he do that, he actually gains 3.0 seconds per kilometre! Three seconds! Per kilometre. EVERY KILOMETRE!
It’s absolutely mental.
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But during the Tour the doping allegations have been mostly against TVJ. Is the story now that they're clean and Pogacar is the dirty one, or that they're all dirty but Pogacar from a low performing team just has access to better drugs?
Of course this ride was insane, but if we take the view that sports (or cycling specifically if that's the take) are generally quite dirty, then taking individual performances as indications of doping is a bit weird, because surely Pogacar is not the only one on the juice if that's the case. He absolutely crushed the field today, but out of 20 days this is the only time he did. The only time except today that he gained on Roglic before this was because Roglic allowed him to do so.
This is a Tour where Richie Porte gets third, 3:30 behind. Lopez was really close until he had to ride tempo. Uran was close until a couple of days ago.
Roglic could have gained more time earlier in the Tour. You could tell he was riding within himself -in second gear almost. Still, I don’t think anyone foresaw what happened in this remarkable ITT
If there was a year to cheat it’s probably this year with the labs time being taken up with a much more vital issue.
Slovenia at the top of the World. Kudos.
Anywhere in life, except in cycling.
And on twitter.
I cashed out, never thought something like that would happen. Disgusted
Did the problem with Zeeman and UCI had something to do with Roglic? A very subdued performance after convincgly leading Le Tour throughout all the mountain stages.
Tbf, while I think that the top guys are still on some juice, I don't think that Pogacars performance yesterday was some sort of unrealistic superhuman feat.
Minute gaps in an hour long time trial are nothing unusual at all, throw in the fact that 95% of the field hat nothing to ride for, so I think a lot of guys were just coasting. The only guys to proper try were the top 10 and if you take Roglic out of the equation these results don't look unreasonable, we all knew before that Pogacar is a great time trialist and has been the best climber this tour so taking 1:20 out of a not 100% Dumoulin and a 35year old Richie Porte is not outrageous.
It really looks like Roglic simply choked. Probably finally had a bad day but also psychologically looked rattled. Lanteren Rouge said it quite accurately yesterday on his podcast: If you told someone before the tour that Roglic would have to beat Richie Porte by 20 second in an hour long time trial to win the tour everyone would've said that's a doable thing. Yet he finished 30 seconds behind him and had guys doing the ascent split faster than him that really shouldn't be faster (think his ascent split was just 12th best or something).
So a tragic choke, gotta feel for him (although he seems quite boring) but still amusing to see Jumbo-Vismas faces at the end.
Minute gaps in an hour long time trial are nothing unusual at all, throw in the fact that 95% of the field hat nothing to ride for, so I think a lot of guys were just coasting. The only guys to proper try were the top 10 and if you take Roglic out of the equation these results don't look unreasonable, we all knew before that Pogacar is a great time trialist and has been the best climber this tour so taking 1:20 out of a not 100% Dumoulin and a 35year old Richie Porte is not outrageous.
It really looks like Roglic simply choked. Probably finally had a bad day but also psychologically looked rattled. Lanteren Rouge said it quite accurately yesterday on his podcast: If you told someone before the tour that Roglic would have to beat Richie Porte by 20 second in an hour long time trial to win the tour everyone would've said that's a doable thing. Yet he finished 30 seconds behind him and had guys doing the ascent split faster than him that really shouldn't be faster (think his ascent split was just 12th best or something).
So a tragic choke, gotta feel for him (although he seems quite boring) but still amusing to see Jumbo-Vismas faces at the end.
It’s a big swing, but if you read some of the Roglic and Jumbo interviews, it’s clear that Roglic choked spectacularly yesterday.
Did he, though? Roglic’s time-trial was 5th best of the day. It’s below par for what he may have expected of himself, but GC winners have produced worse ITTs before and emerged relatively unscathed. Roglic lost two whole minutes to his direct rival whilst himself producing a Top 5 ITT. It’s unheard of in a sport decorated with implausible results.
That’s why people are asking questions and pronouncing their scepticism.
The lesson from this is if you have a much better team than the rest of the field, you should attack in mountain stages and make sure your opponents are far behind going into time trial.
Considering Jumbo-Visma's superiority and Pogačar's relative loneliness in mountain stages, Roglič will be disappointed he had a lead of less than a minute after Alps and Pyrénées.
Credit to Pogačar though, historic achievement.
Considering Jumbo-Visma's superiority and Pogačar's relative loneliness in mountain stages, Roglič will be disappointed he had a lead of less than a minute after Alps and Pyrénées.
Credit to Pogačar though, historic achievement.
Based on what he said I would say so, Roglic openly saying he didn’t push enough and Van Aert saying that he looked different than usual on his bike.
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Oh feck.
Particularly when you built your team for mountain stages. Ironically despite the fact that there was a lot of mountain stages this Tour edition was interesting due to the green jersey with Bora and DQS playing games and trying to outwit each others.
It's a bit of both - Roglic choked and Pogacar's performance was incredible
Here is the breakdown of the stage
Preliminary times - 14.4k
| # | Rider | Time |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cavagna | 16.57 |
| 2 | Dumoulin | 17.09,24 |
| 3 | Pogačar | 17.14 |
| 4 | Asgreen | 17.14 |
| 5 | Roglič | 17.27,53 |
| 6 | van Aert | 17.36,97 |
| 7 | Laporte | 17.38 |
| 8 | Caruso | 17.38,67 |
| 9 | Juul-Jensen | 17.39 |
| 10 | de la Cruz | 17.4 |
Preliminary times - 30.3k
| # | Rider | Time |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dumoulin | 39.43,90 |
| 2 | Pogačar | 39.44,41 |
| 3 | Cavagna | 40.01 |
| 4 | Roglič | 40.20,80 |
| 5 | Caruso | 40.32,92 |
| 6 | van Aert | 40.34,40 |
| 7 | Porte | 40.44,49 |
| 8 | de la Cruz | 40.55 |
| 9 | Asgreen | 40.56 |
| 10 | Urán | 41.14,86 |
Preliminary times - 33.6k
| # | Rider | Time |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pogačar | 49.15,99 |
| 2 | Dumoulin | 50.03,23 |
| 3 | Porte | 50.21,04 |
| 4 | van Aert | 50.30,36 |
| 5 | Cavagna | 50.36 |
| 6 | Roglič | 50.37,03 |
| 7 | Caruso | 51.02,18 |
| 8 | de la Cruz | 51.20 |
| 9 | Urán | 51.33,08 |
| 10 | Mas | 51.43,70 |
Preliminary times | T2-Finish
| # | Rider | Time |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pogačar | 16.10,80 |
| 2 | Porte | 16.32,39 |
| 3 | van Aert | 16.52,45 |
| 4 | Mas | 17.00,41 |
| 5 | Bilbao | 17.15,49 |
| 6 | Martínez | 17.19,76 |
| 7 | Carapaz | 17.22,89 |
| 8 | Landa | 17.23,41 |
| 9 | Soler | 17.24,68 |
| 10 | Barguil | 17.27,18 |
Couple of points - Roglič starts choking early - he's lost 13 seconds on the first 14km, and the gap grows to 36 seconds after 30 kilometers. As this is all flat it seems a lot. By the time they've switched bikes and are climbing, the time gap at 33.6km mark has grown to 82 seconds (and it's game over!) and then on the final climb segment Roglic doesn't even crack top 10. You could see live that Roglic had a disastrous bike switch, the push was too long (he could have gotten a penalty for that), and when he starts climbing his cadence seemed too high and power too low. Helmet was off. Just felt bad for him, he know he lost the Tour and he seemed like a deer in headlights.
Pogačar's numbers on the other hand were insane. He hit every mark, executed perfectly (too perfectly?) and his performance was one for the ages. People are claiming that Wiggins did 6.7w/kg on that climb in 2012 Bardet 6.6w/kg in 2017 while drafting whereas Pogacar did close to 7w/kg but I can't verify or disprove those claims. Obviously on a TT you're riding all out start to finish as opposed to a stage then headwind/tailwind, temperature all those things can have an affect.
My opinion on the stage is summed up by Neal Rogers below:
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Yeah, it's easy to be sceptical about this one. Cyclists don't tend to peak so early, and Pogacar didn't just beat an imploding Roglic, but also Dumoulin and everyone else.
Btw, was Van Aert known to be so all-round? Didn't know he could do TT this well also.
Btw, was Van Aert known to be so all-round? Didn't know he could do TT this well also.
Well you got 3-1 right? Still not a bad return on a quick bet.
I just saw a portion of the sprint finish today. Great work by Sam Bennett. A great day for him and his team, his family and the whole country really.
Congrats to Pogacar and the tour organizers too.
A lot were concerned about this race taking place safely in September but it seemed to have worked out.
Congrats to Pogacar and the tour organizers too.
A lot were concerned about this race taking place safely in September but it seemed to have worked out.
Yeah definitely, that was known long before this Tour. He won the TT in the Dauphine last year and was Belgian TT champion ahead of the likes of Campenaerts, Evenepoel, Lampaert, Frison and De Gendt last year, all great TT themselves.
This week's program includes the Belgian championship tomorrow, then the Worlds TT on Friday and the Worlds Championship on Sunday. Bring it on
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Yeah, probably with Jamaica style doping. Good stuff!
He even beat Tony Martin to win a prologue back in 2016 at the age of 21. Just 6km I think, but his ability was evident even then. Same year Tony Martin would win the TT world championship for the fourth time, so he was in good form.Yeah definitely, that was known long before this Tour. He won the TT in the Dauphine last year and was Belgian TT champion ahead of the likes of Campenaerts, Evenepoel, Lampaert, Frison and De Gendt last year, all great TT themselves.
This week's program includes the Belgian championship tomorrow, then the Worlds TT on Friday and the Worlds Championship on Sunday. Bring it on
Van Aert is a puncheur, you could loosely compare him to Cancellara. So yes TT is a discipline that he is supposed to be very good at. The only surprising thing about him is that he holds his own on hills like Alaphillipe which is why they are particularly good in Classics. On a side note I can't wait for Van der Poel switch to the road.
Yeah definitely, that was known long before this Tour. He won the TT in the Dauphine last year and was Belgian TT champion ahead of the likes of Campenaerts, Evenepoel, Lampaert, Frison and De Gendt last year, all great TT themselves.
This week's program includes the Belgian championship tomorrow, then the Worlds TT on Friday and the Worlds Championship on Sunday. Bring it on
Wow, impressive! Thanks.