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Cycling thread

Brave from JV today - had to do something despite knowing he didn't have the condition for it. Did look like he was asking some questions for a bit, but no. Against the power of Pog, there can be no victory.

Remco is riding brilliantly in context. Another era he wins the Tour, just not this one.
 

spectateur said:
Are we comparing as if it was an ITT.
Pog was following wheels until the last 5km.
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7.2w/kg normalized on sea level
He's not even tired.
He was following the wheel of a rider that had the best climb of his life...

Look at the times. The riders in green are clean. The riders in white are all known doping-sinners.

But what really does my head in, is Pogacar's form since the Strade Bianchi (another win with an 81-km solo) until now. That's unheard of. He's dominating every race he's starting.
 

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FrenchDarrenBent said:
7.2w/kg normalized on sea level
He's not even tired.
He was following the wheel of a rider that had the best climb of his life...

Look at the times. The riders in green are clean. The riders in white are all known doping-sinners.

But what really does my head in, is Pogacar's form since the Strade Bianchi (another win with an 81-km solo) until now. That's unheard of. He's dominating every race he's starting.
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You could say its a return to the Hinault days of the best riders being the best in all races, but then you had Fignon, Lemond, and to a lesser extent Kelly and Moser all doing the same. Now it's pretty much just Pogacar who can climb better than the climbers, tt better than the testers, ride cobbles better than the classics men, and even sprint as well as the sprinters. It's insane. Bernal has said he's pushing higher numbers than when he won the Tour, yet he's not in the same post code. The last few years have been the likes of which I've never seen before, and it's incredible how complicit everyone is. You do wonder if Pogacar keeps winning everything whether lesser teams will speak up.
 

Bruce Wayne said:
You could say its a return to the Hinault days of the best riders being the best in all races, but then you had Fignon, Lemond, and to a lesser extent Kelly and Moser all doing the same. Now it's pretty much just Pogacar who can climb better than the climbers, tt better than the testers, ride cobbles better than the classics men, and even sprint as well as the sprinters. It's insane. Bernal has said he's pushing higher numbers than when he won the Tour, yet he's not in the same post code. The last few years have been the likes of which I've never seen before, and it's incredible how complicit everyone is. You do wonder if Pogacar keeps winning everything whether lesser teams will speak up.
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Back in the Hinault days, you had the occasional exceptional performance but Hinault never dominated in the same way. Lemond never won a monument, Kelly was probably the most rounded of them all and was an exceptional talent. But it was all in proportion.

Pog is even on his way to do better than Eddy Merckx, with 3 TDF,1 giro and 6 monuments at just 25 years. He already is on the brink of surpassing Hinault in a year or two.

But yeah, all this talk about 'better preparing', 'better nutrition', 'better equipment'. Can't imagine the bikes, prep and nutrition are that much better than in 2018 when Geraint Thomas won the tour (or indeed, Bernal in 2020, who looked like the new supertalent back then).
 
FrenchDarrenBent said:
Back in the Hinault days, you had the occasional exceptional performance but Hinault never dominated in the same way. Lemond never won a monument, Kelly was probably the most rounded of them all and was an exceptional talent. But it was all in proportion.

Pog is even on his way to do better than Eddy Merckx, with 3 TDF,1 giro and 6 monuments at just 25 years. He already is on the brink of surpassing Hinault in a year or two.

But yeah, all this talk about 'better preparing', 'better nutrition', 'better equipment'. Can't imagine the bikes, prep and nutrition are that much better than in 2018 when Geraint Thomas won the tour (or indeed, Bernal in 2020, who looked like the new supertalent back then).
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No, quite. In the Hinault era, you would get riders competing across the calendar, but it was rare to dominate in everything. You wouldn't be that surprised if he doesn't win the Olympics, the Vuelta, the Worlds, Lombardia etc. as he's showing no weaknesses at all.
 
Bruce Wayne said:
You could say its a return to the Hinault days of the best riders being the best in all races, but then you had Fignon, Lemond, and to a lesser extent Kelly and Moser all doing the same. Now it's pretty much just Pogacar who can climb better than the climbers, tt better than the testers, ride cobbles better than the classics men, and even sprint as well as the sprinters. It's insane. Bernal has said he's pushing higher numbers than when he won the Tour, yet he's not in the same post code. The last few years have been the likes of which I've never seen before, and it's incredible how complicit everyone is. You do wonder if Pogacar keeps winning everything whether lesser teams will speak up.
Click to expand...
The insanity of it argues against PEDs being decisive. Because there is no drug that can make a rider perform like Pog - unless you think there is? What might it be in terms of name / the class / the approach and why is no one else taking it?
This is a hard question to consider but is really the key to making the conversation interesting. Especially given that PED science is usually (but not always) retrospective, ie it relies on old drugs / technologies.

Lance Armstrong in a clean field would have won nothing, which is the most pernicious thing about his cheating. Whereas Pog is the greatest rider of the modern era.
 
Black Belt Jones said:
The insanity of it argues against PEDs being decisive. Because there is no drug that can make a rider perform like Pog - unless you think there is? What might it be in terms of name / the class / the approach and why is no one else taking it?
This is a hard question to consider but is really the key to making the conversation interesting. Especially given that PED science is usually (but not always) retrospective, ie it relies on old drugs / technologies.

Lance Armstrong in a clean field would have won nothing, which is the most pernicious thing about his cheating. Whereas Pog is the greatest rider of the modern era.
Click to expand...
I have no idea what's going on tbh, but it doesn't sit right. Most of the technical gains in terms of bikes seem to be around aero gains, which aren't going to be changing things too much going up hill. Heck, I'm fairly sure Pantani's bike was actually lighter than modern Tour bikes as disk brakes and electronic shifters add to weight. So when the riders today are so much faster not only on the terrain leading up to climbs (I'm sure they said on the footage that they were a couple of kmh quicker than even the fastest predicted time for the stage), and then blitz the times of known dopers that haven't been got even close to since Armstrong blew up, it doesn't sit right. I mean Sky were known for marginal gains so you'd assume they wouldn't overlook something that's causing riders to appear rocket fuelled compared to those from the Cancellara/Froome era, yet that's where we are. That Pogacar is in a Gianetti team as well doesn't help matters.

I've been watching cycling a long time and if something appears too good to be true, it usually is. Ferrari used to say that a VAM of 1500 was enough to win a Tour mountain stage. Pogacar whacked out close to 1900 yesterday.
 
You can see that from 2002 to 2015 the times have generally hovered around the 45 minute mark. Then Pogacar blows them out of the water and goes under 40 minutes. That's a "huge" leap. Are we seriously suggesting that tech and nutrition are enough to lop 15% off of the times of the best riders from a decade ago, many of whom have been busted for drugs? That doesn't seem likely to me.

2024:15,9 km@7,9%---39:50---average speed 23.95 km/h(Tadej Pogacar)-RECORD
2015:15,9 km@7,9%---45:30---average speed 20.97 km/h(Valverde-Froome-Quintana-Pinot-Van Garderen-Contador-Rolland-Nibali-Thomas)
---47:44---average speed 19.99 km/h(Joaquim Rodriguez)
2011:15,9 km@7,9%---46:20---average speed 20.59 km/h(Jelle Vanendert)
2007:15,9 km@7,9%---44:08---average speed 21.62 km/h(Contador-Rasmussen)
2004:15,9 km@7,9%---45:31---average speed 20.96 km/h(Armstrong-Basso)
2002:15,9 km@7,9%---45:55---average speed 20.78 km/h(Lance Armstrong)
1998:15,8 km@7,9%---43:20---average speed 21.88 km/h(Marco Pantani)
 

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