2022 Giro d'Italia

[Vader]

I never thought I'd live to see the day when one of the Yates brothers won a TT.

I still have memories of him collapsing in the 3rd week of the Giro, with Froome doing a Landis to win the race. I will never bank on a Yates overall win, after 2 stages, ever again.

 

[eth-dog]

I never thought I'd live to see the day when one of the Yates brothers won a TT.

I still have memories of him collapsing in the 3rd week of the Giro, with Froome doing a Landis to win the race. I will never bank on a Yates overall win, after 2 stages, ever again.

That's the second one he's won.

 

[Vader]

That's the second one he's won.

I'm still shocked.

Granted, there weren't any TT specialists in the race (think Ganna, Dennis)... but even so. He's definitely improved his TT riding from the early days of his career. Full credit to him for identifying a weakness, and working hard to improve it - to the point where he's demonstrably competent in this discipline.

 

[eth-dog]

I'm still shocked.

Granted, there weren't any TT specialists in the race (think Ganna, Dennis)... but even so. He's definitely improved his TT riding from the early days of his career. Full credit to him for identifying a weakness, and working hard to improve it - to the point where he's demonstrably competent in this discipline.

He wants to win Grand Tours, it's an area you have to be competent in.

 

[Vader]

He wants to win Grand Tours, it's an area you have to be competent in.

Try telling that to Romain Bardet.

 

[eth-dog]

Try telling that to Romain Bardet.

Bardet can do a good TT. It's just that the gap between his best and worst is still way too big

 

[Orange Agent]

Equipment and body position are the biggest factors in TT's. BEX have moved to a separate apparel company for skin suits over their usual team kit supplier. But it seems not too many WT teams are happy riding Bianchi bikes.

 

[yaco55]

It's no surprise that Yates won the ITT when you consider his close 5th in Paris Nice on a very similar parcours - He finished behind Van Aert, Roglic, Dennis and Kung.

I am interested to see Ewan's top end speed today in stage three - His top end power was not there at the Tour of Turkey, even though he won two stages.

 

[eth-dog]

Terrible stage. So boring

 

[eth-dog]

What were Lotto Soudal doing? Like, Caleb is clearly the quickest of the bunch, all they needed to do is get him in the mix and then let him free wheel. They didn't and Cav won as a result. Horrible tactics by them.

Tomorrow we might see the breakaway win. I think this is one De Gendt, Calmejane, Taarame, Zabel (for KOM stuff) and Knox might target as well as the usual EOLO, Drone Hopper-Androni and Bardiani riders. It'd be in Bike Exchange's best interests to let them go and take pink.

In a perfect world they'd be planning to take it stage 9. If Knox got it, perfect for BEX. Quickstep will be up front for stages 4 and 5 anyway, so they'll defend it well, and he's one that probably holds his own on stage 7, 8 shouldn't be one that's too hard to retain the jersey and then stage 9 is the one where you go for the lead.

 

[eth-dog]

Also, how the hell is this not even a Cat 4 climb?

 

[Orange Agent]

What were Lotto Soudal doing? Like, Caleb is clearly the quickest of the bunch, all they needed to do is get him in the mix and then let him free wheel. They didn't and Cav won as a result. Horrible tactics by them.

He has a shocking lead out. Not sure he would want to see out his contract here when you look at the lead out Intermache have built for Kristoff who is miles slower than Caleb.

 

[eth-dog]

He has a shocking lead out. Not sure he would want to see out his contract here when you look at the lead out Intermache have built for Kristoff who is miles slower than Caleb.

They don't have the budget to absorb his contract. Maybe to Alpecin-Fenix if Phillipsen leaves?

 

[Orange Agent]

They don't have the budget to absorb his contract. Maybe to Alpecin-Fenix if Phillipsen leaves?

If he is about winning he should do what Cav did and beg LeFev for a spot at Quickstep. Morkov must be the best lead out man Cav has ever had but to hold a sprint for 300m suggests his legs are as strong as ever. To speculate, this is not the first sprint this year that Cav has won like this, I think he is easily his teams best sprinter and that means he should be on the TDF team. This would mean Jakobson would probably leave and Cav retires, then enter Ewan on the best team for him. Probably 1000/1 shot of happening but anyway.

 

[eth-dog]

If he is about winning he should do what Cav did and beg LeFev for a spot at Quickstep. Morkov must be the best lead out man Cav has ever had but to hold a sprint for 300m suggests his legs are as strong as ever. To speculate, this is not the first sprint this year that Cav has won like this, I think he is easily his teams best sprinter and that means he should be on the TDF team. This would mean Jakobson would probably leave and Cav retires, then enter Ewan on the best team for him. Probably 1000/1 shot of happening but anyway.

Probably wait another year if he wants QS. 2023 at Lotto Soudal (who really are a mess) and then go when Jakobsen is OOC that year.

Very interested to see how he does against Bennett, Jakobsen, Phillipson, Bol, Groenewegen and Van Aert at the Tour. That's a strong sprinters group.

 

[yaco55]

Jakobsen is the fastest closely followed by Ewan - Viewing the final of stage three suggests the sprints will be shared around at the Giro - Expect Ewan to have another crack at getting Mezgec to be his lead-out for the fifth consecutive year - I'd like to see BEX get Hamilton into the break for stage four to check out his form.

 

[eth-dog]

If you told Bike Exchange that Ineos and Bahrain would control the break all day, they wouldn't have to do any chasing, the Maglia Rosa would end up with Trek Segafredo and that both Howson and Hamilton would stay with the leaders most of the way up the Etna, they would have broken land speed record for signing up.

Absolutely perfect day for them.

 

[Vader]

Did they get pictures back? I gave up at 12:30 (AEST), after they'd been showing Keenan/Renshaw/Mackenzie for 45 minutes, having lost the feed from Italy.

I turned it on, and heard Dave Mackenzie... and groaned. Has the man ever had an original thought, in his entire life? Everything is "yes, you're right", or "I was about to say that" (he wasn't), or expanding on something that Keenan has said. Not once does he make an original point, or start the discussion. He comes across as a really nice bloke, who you'd love to have a beer with - but as a commentator he's just awful.

The first 3 stages were soooo much better, with Bridie & Gerrans filling the chairs alongside Keenan. Listening to them is an absolute pleasure.

 

[Vader]

Looks like they got the pictures back with the leaders at 21km from the finish line. It seems I will have ~35 minutes of "highlights" to watch after all.

 

[eth-dog]

The big ****er in the middle of the stage makes tonights stage very interesting. If the break has been established by then, they need to really push themselves up the climb because the teams of the sprinters won't want to go hard up that and waste energy for the final sprint (if it comes to that), especially if a couple of them get dropped on the climb.

 

[Orange Agent]

heck, should of watched this from the start. Ewan won't get back. Cav maybe but he will have nobody left for a sprint train.

 

[eth-dog]

Lotto stuffed up with their tactics early.

 

[eth-dog]

And they've sat up

 

[eth-dog]

It was always gonna be Demare or Gaviria once Cav and Ewan were dropped. Good win from Demare

 

[eth-dog]

Okay, so what am I supposed to do now? It's not even midnight!