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Even though there has been a lot of random breakaway winners I feel as though the books have been very sharp this race.
After the plethora of breakaway wins so far watch for the gc riders to be priced up as short as they've been all race for tomorrows stage. |
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Should have gone with Gesink at 13's as it turned out! Short for me though. I picked up 4th and 6th might have picked up an e/w to get my money back on Bennett although knowing my luck it'll only be 3 places.
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Today's stage might be a bit short for a break? and the final climb may not be selective enough for Quintana and Froome. Valverde and Chavrz look decent value to me.
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who knows how Movistar will approach this though?
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brilliant stage yesterday
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Sky have imploded after a tough day on the front yesterday
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Movistar get lucky
I'm a little surprised the other teams in the break are helping Tinkoff and Movistar so much. |
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anti-climactic in the end
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poor form Sky
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goes to show it's not always the strongest rider
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WTF is Froome playing at.
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Quintana 1.08
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value
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Contador. lol
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Gutsy Chavez. The strongest today
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Safest bet was to lay Contador for the stage win
Tour of Britain should be good |
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Punching the air when beating Quintana by inches the other day looked ridiculous......looks even worse now.
He had a day today that other great riders regularly have , little or no help from team mates , SKY team leaders spoilt by the depth of their squad and budget. |
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cant disagree.
Really surprised by the no show from Sky. Kwiatkowski would of been useful today, or Landa. Personally I don't like seeing the race won like that but that's bike racing. Froome should of just followed Quintana, who had obviously preplanned the move with Contador. He should of been able to rely on his team though given their depth and budget. |
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sixtwosix • September 4, 2016 4:36 PM BST
Punching the air when beating Quintana by inches the other day looked ridiculous How should of he celebrated winning a gt stage? |
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cant help but feel we got robbed of one of the most epic mano a mano grand tour battles of recent times
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It's like Sky were food poisoned or something. They couldn't of been that tired from yesterday, there were riders in the break yesterday who were in the move again today.
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nice win by Brambilla
15/1 I believe. 3rd favourite for the stage. |
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Looks like Quintana and Contador attacked Froome after he was caught up behind a crash very early in the stage.
Dont know what Cannondale was doing in the break yesterday. Their top rider on GC lost time to two of his closest rivals who were in the break. They really should of taken a sit and forced Movistar and Tinkov to do a most of the pace making as those teams had the most riders in the break and way more to gain than anyone else. That way they would of had an easier ride and been in contention for the stage win. Then with their riders in the 2nd group (where their highest placed rider was) they could of contributed to the chase and actually put time into a tired Contador and Quintana who would of had to do more work in the breakaway. I did see their team has Spanish DS's though. So all they really got out of it is one of their riders moves from 12th to 10th in the GC. They got nowhere near the stage win while having multiple riders in the break and their highest placed rider lost time to multiple riders near him on the GC after being one of the strongest on the day (3rd home out of the peleton). |
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what.. some teams had live pictures and others didn't!
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reminds me of when Quintana won his Giro. When he attacked on a decent that most thought was neutralised.
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not to mention the other riders who were the sole representatives from their team in the break who for some reason were contributing with the pace making. They might as well of had Movistar and Tinkov jerseys on. They couldn't of seriously been thinking of the stage win with Quintana and Contador in the break. Fair play to Brambilla though who recognised the score pretty early when it was apparent Quintana was doing minimal work in the break.
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I laugh at the people/writers saying "why was Astana working in the peleton just to defend Scarponi's 10th position on GC?" He's going well at the moment and was second home out of the peleton behind Chavez. If they had of caught the break there is every chance he would have moved up to 5th or 6th, he definitely would have taken time back on Contador and he also would of been in with a big chance of a stage win.
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it all would of been moot anyway if the rest of Team Sky didn't inexplicably disappear.
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would have been hard work for Froome for the rest of the race if all his team mates were eliminated missing the time limit.
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If Scarponi was in such a good form, why was he the worst of all gc contenders stage 14?
And why should Quintana work, if Team sky was in the same Position yesterday, they would have done exactly the same, people like koenig would have done the work till the final climb and Froome would have attacked. Are you British? You argue very blinkered, everybody who helps froome is very smart and in Topform and everybody who helps Quintana is a traitor and braindead stupid. |
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Astana worked because Sky asked them very nicely. They (Sky) had no option really - it's up to the DS to pull whatever strings he can in those circumstances
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Astana worked because they hate Tinkov is my reading of it. Not sure we'll ever find out what really happened but I'm pretty sure this isn't an isolated incident.
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dom888 • September 5, 2016 4:11 PM BST
If Scarponi was in such a good form, why was he the worst of all gc contenders stage 14? Scarponi was the 2nd rider to finish out of the peleton behind Chavez. Looks like he was on a good day, hey? If they had of caught the break he probably would of put time into all those riders near him on GC including Contador. For me Astana had more of a reason to ride than Cannondale or the other teams in the break. Sure, it's up to the teams and riders to decide how they race but to me that was slightly unusual. |
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If Cannondale had of ridden for their best placed GC rider the stage could of turned out very differently. They had 2 riders contributing in the break and 3 or 4 riders back in the peleton (incl. their
top rider on GC) who weren't contributing to the chase. If the break had of been caught before the final climb Quintana and Contador would of been at a big disadvantage. |
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dom888 • September 5, 2016 4:11 PM BST
And why should Quintana work, if Team sky was in the same Position yesterday, they would have done exactly the same, people like koenig would have done the work till the final climb and Froome would have attacked. Are you British? You argue very blinkered, everybody who helps froome is very smart and in Topform and everybody who helps Quintana is a traitor and braindead stupid. You are right. Why would Quintana work when when all the other riders from other teams in the break were prepared to work. He was smart not to work in the break because if the peleton caught them he would risk losing time as he would of been more fatigued compared to them. If the other riders in the break had any sense they would of forced Movistar and Tinkov to do more work and burn through their domestiques quicker which would of forced Quintana and Contador to do more work themselves before the foot of the final climb. In any case I can guarantee you If Froome and Sky were in the same position as Movistar were on stage 15 everyone in the break would of been looking at Sky to do all the pace making and Froome would of been forced to ride on the front of the group if he wanted to maintain the gap to the chasing peleton. No way in the world in that situation would Froome get a free ride in the break all the way to the bottom of the final climb like Quintana did. I'm not saying Quintana cheated or anything just that things aligned for him perfectly and he got very lucky on that stage. Not saying he wouldn't of won the Vuelta anyway but we'll never know. |
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bb66 • September 5, 2016 4:02 PM BST
would have been hard work for Froome for the rest of the race if all his team mates were eliminated missing the time limit. True. Would of made for some interesting racing with over half the peleton being sent home with a 1/3 of the race still to go. Not sure the sponsors would have been too impressed though. I think they made the correct decision there. |
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anyway onto stage 17
To me this was going to be the most decisive stage along with the TT still remaining in the race. Before what happened on stage 15 I was thinking 50% chance for a breakaway win and 50% chance of a Froome Quintana battle for the stage win with the edge going to Quintana. Now I think the break is more like a 75% chance to succeed. I see Froome is favourite in the market but I think now that the race is gone he couldn't care less. If he goes for the stage Quintana will glue himself to his wheel and mug him in the final km. Maybe if Movistar sense Froome is fading they might try to set it up for Valverde but I think their happy with the status quo and will ride conservatively. Contador could take a blood bag on the rest day and look to do something on the steep sections but I think he'll have one eye on the upcoming TT. I think the winner will come from the break. If it comes down to the gc riders I think Quintana will win. |
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final climb 4.2km @ 12.5% !
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