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Vuelta a Espana Discussion
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| Tamijo |
Posted on 05-01-2018 08:19
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 [PTM] Vuelta a Espana
Welcome to the 11 edition of Vuelta a Espana the 2nd GT of the MG season. The very first edition won by Francisco Mancebo (Saunier Duval) back in 2007, last year won by Robert Gesink (eBuddy) he will not attend this time.
Only Francisco Mancebo have won the race twice in 2007 & 2009, 2015 winner  Aleksandr Pluchkin, 2012 winner  Angel Madrazo and 2010 winner  Andy Schleck are all here trying to do the same and it is very likely one of them will.
The route:
The profile of the race have changed quite a bit since the 2016 edition. This year we have a team time trial to start the race, but no mountain time trail and the ITT is a lot shorter from 53 km last year cut down to just 39.
Given that we have 8 mountain stages (6 summit finishes) compared to 6 (5 with summit) last season, this edition should favor the pure climber over the all-rounder compared to last year.
This year we have only 3 stages to attract the best punchers compared to last year’s 6 (well…last year’s stage 4 was sort of semi-mountain, and a good punch downhill combo might do well on stage 2 this time) anyway a pure puncher with no mountain possibilities won’t find that much in this edition.
8 sprinter stages compared to 7 last season.
ROUTE:
1st week
2nd week
3rd week
Out of the 23 attending teams, two are from the 2nd MG division  Euskaltel and  Valio – DeLaval
Now let’s take a look at the overall favourites, first the three previous winner and top favourites.
Pluchkin got all it takes to win his 2nd Vuelta, the only question mark is if Nemiroff lack the team to help. Nepomnyachsniy is a fine 2nd climber but compared to other teams a weak squad in the mountains, that said Pluchkin’s individual skills makes him a top favorite to win the race. There is no reason to think he will lose any significant time in the opening TTT, the team will be fine there.
Just as Pluchkin Madrazo has overall great stage race skills, his Achilles' heel may be the acceleration, where he may have to close some gaps created by rider like Schleck. His backup is not amongst the strongest, but not too bad either with Bibby, Kruijswijk and Konrad. The team will most likely be one of the best in the opening TTT. Clearly also a top favorite.
Schleck got the climbing skill, the best accelerations of the top favorites, also other fine secondary skills and the outstanding team to back it up, König, Kirsch, Goos. his Achilles' heel is the Time Trail almost sure to lose time on stage 17 compared to most of the GC riders.
The 2017 route suits him well with relative few TT kilometers and lots on mountain, this seems to be his option to get his 2nd Vuelta win.
Right beneath the previous winner we have got 6 other candidate to claim, if not a win then a podium.
 Kritskiy might actually belong to the first group, slightly weaker climbing but with a brilliant time trail, his Achilles' heel is a very low acceleration. Team support is fine.
 Machado can climb, but he lack some resistance and recovery to be an obvious treat to the Vuelta, generally just a bit weaker than the above riders in most categories. Team support not the best but the team is strong in the TTT could give him an early edge.
 Dombrowski got more general skills than Machado, but his rather bad time trail could be costly. Strong team support.
 Velits, His climbing is good, but is it good enough on this level with also a slow acceleration ? Besides that he got all it takes including a top class support team to back him up.
 Lecuisinier, not the super top climber we have seen above, but on all other categories a fine stage racer, Team support medium.
The last climber to get a detailed presentation is  Keizer, the weakest pure climber to get a mention but also the strongest in the time trail. Overall good support skills and a fine 2nd climber in Olivier
Talking about team strength, without any top podium candidate  Aker – MOT has two top 10 candidate with additional strong backup riders, clearly amongst the team classification candidates if playing the cards right..
Stage racers/Climbers:
| Rider | M | T | Rs | Rc | A | Rider | M | T | Rs | Rc | A | | Pluchkin | 85 | 79 | 78 | 79 | 74 | Hirt | 79 | 71 | 77 | 77 | 75 | | Madrazo | 85 | 77 | 80 | 81 | 72 |  Brambilla | 79 | 70 | 73 | 76 | 63 | | Schleck | 85 | 74 | 82 | 82 | 79 | Olivier | 79 | 69 | 80 | 77 | 71 | | Kritskiy | 84 | 80 | 76 | 78 | 67 |  Arndt | 79 | 56 | 76 | 72 | 75 | | Machado | 84 | 74 | 74 | 74 | 72 |  Haig | 78 | 77 | 75 | 78 | 73 | | Dombrowski | 84 | 71 | 78 | 78 | 75 |  Faiers | 78 | 75 | 75 | 78 | 73 | | Velits | 83 | 75 | 74 | 76 | 68 |  Ablenado | 78 | 72 | 77 | 77 | 65 | | Lecuisinier | 82 | 77 | 80 | 79 | 74 | Kirsch | 78 | 71 | 73 | 75 | 67 | | Keizer | 81 | 81 | 79 | 79 | 73 | Nesset | 78 | 69 | 76 | 74 | 69 |  Abal | 81 | 77 | 77 | 76 | 73 | Giogieri | 78 | 66 | 74 | 70 | 67 | | Galta | 81 | 73 | 79 | 77 | 62 |  Vosekalns | 78 | 62 | 73 | 72 | 71 |  Monsalve | 81 | 72 | 80 | 77 | 73 |  Preidler | 78 | 58 | 77 | 76 | 69 | | Guldhammer | 81 | 71 | 75 | 74 | 76 | Nepomnyachsniy | 77 | 77 | 75 | 77 | 75 | | König | 79 | 74 | 76 | 72 | 67 | Bibby | 77 | 77 | 74 | 76 | 71 | | Van den Broeck | 79 | 73 | 71 | 70 | 67 | Goos | 77 | 76 | 75 | 76 | 73 |
Not that many hill stage on the route and most on the best punchers are also stage racer but here is a list of the best punchers.
| Rider | H | A | Res | M | | Edmondson | 78 | 76 | 72 | 69 | | Jensen | 78 | 76 | 73 | 70 | | Bellis | 78 | 75 | 71 | 68 |  Duchesne | 77 | 79 | 72 | 67 | | Guldhammer | 77 | 76 | 75 | 81 | | Machado | 77 | 72 | 74 | 84 | | Mager | 77 | 71 | 70 | 74 | | Preidler | 77 | 69 | 77 | 78 | | Zardini | 77 | 68 | 66 | 76 | | Arndt | 76 | 75 | 76 | 79 | | Konovalovas | 76 | 74 | 75 | 68 | | Monsalve | 76 | 73 | 80 | 81 | | Madrazo | 76 | 72 | 80 | 85 | | Bibby | 76 | 71 | 74 | 77 | | Olivier | 76 | 71 | 80 | 79 |
21 race day is a lot, and you won’t see the very best PT sprinters attend this Vuelta, but after all the Vuelta is the most sprinter friendly GT of the season, with 8 stages classified as flat, lot of points at stake here.
The outright favourites to fight over the points classification is:
Groenewegen, with 2nd sprinter Lovassy.
Enger without any leadout sprinter. Stauff with 2nd sprinter Schorn and maybe the best of the favorite teams to setup a train.
Ulanowski with 2nd sprinter Golovash.
Other sprinter to challenge stage wins, but less like to take the jersey is:
Aberasturi with 2nd sprinter Tolleson.
Stallaert without any leadout sprinter
Houle with 2nd sprinter McLay.
Also Liepins, Santos and Perera may surprise on the good days.
The KoM is a lot more difficult to predict, but why not try, made a list of those fighters with some mountain abilities that might attempt to fight over the KoM by getting in the breakaways and attack on the mountains. (sorted after mountain but of course can’t see this as a ranking list)
| Sprinters | S | A | F | Rs | KoM Hunters | M | A | Fig | Fla | | Groenewegen | 82 | 81 | 73 | 71 | Hirt | 79 | 75 | 73 | 69 | | Enger | 81 | 78 | 73 | 73 | Van den Broeck | 79 | 67 | 74 | 72 | | Stauff | 80 | 81 | 74 | 69 | Preidler | 78 | 69 | 73 | 68 | | Ulanowski | 80 | 77 | 73 | 66 | Faiers | 78 | 73 | 74 | 71 | | Aberasturi | 79 | 78 | 74 | 71 | Vosekalns | 78 | 71 | 81 | 66 | | Stallaert | 79 | 76 | 77 | 68 | Nepomnyachsniy | 77 | 75 | 80 | 71 | | Houle | 78 | 78 | 78 | 71 | Bonnin | 77 | 73 | 76 | 65 | | Schorn | 77 | 77 | 76 | 65 | Kruijswijk | 76 | 75 | 79 | 78 | | Liepins | 76 | 77 | 71 | 67 | Herrada | 76 | 69 | 73 | 69 | | Santos | 76 | 76 | 74 | 71 | Egger | 75 | 74 | 73 | 66 | | Tolleson | 76 | 75 | 76 | 70 | Hughes | 75 | 68 | 75 | 68 | | McLay | 75 | 76 | 71 | 70 | Parra Bustamente | 75 | 69 | 73 | 69 | | Perera | 75 | 76 | 68 | 70 | Chevrier | 75 | 67 | 77 | 65 | | Lovassy | 75 | 75 | 67 | 68 | Izagirre | 75 | 63 | 76 | 68 |
Already mentioned some teams that may do well in the TTT, hard to make a list but here is a list of those expected to do well in the ITT.
| Rider | ITT | Rider | ITT | Rider | ITT | Rider | ITT | | Zmorka | 82 | Nascimento | 80 | Koren | 78 | Oram | 77 | | Kittel | 81 | Pluchkin | 79 | Dumoulin | 78 | Gretsch | 77 | | Keizer | 81 | Malori | 79 | Oliveira | 78 | Lecuisinier | 77 | | Kritskiy | 80 | Dal Col | 79 | Campenaerts | 78 | Frison | 77 | | Howson | 80 | Vorobev | 79 | O'Shea | 77 | Madrazo | 77 | | Yatsevich | 80 | Golovash | 78 | Bibby | 77 | Haig | 77 |
All there it left is to wish every manager good luck, and every rider a great race without any fatal injuries.
Startlist:
Edited by Tamijo on 06-01-2018 08:50
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| tsmoha |
Posted on 05-01-2018 08:35
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Directeur Sportif
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Jack Haig!
Might be the first time we enter a GT with one of those 78/79 MO third-tier climbers, who can be in some winning breakaways at some point. This actually makes for some secret hopes to join breakaways, but obviously we can't expect a high GC result. Anything less than Top-20/25 would be a bummer though, as Haig should at least benefit from the few TT kilometres.
The TTT looks out of reach with our line up here. Tinkoff apparently with a too strong line up to make us dream about a win in the opener. But it would be nice to get a podium result.
Should be a thrilling battle for the GC crown. Hoping for a less one-dimensional decision than what Alacorn brought to us in the Giro 
Thanks for the preview! Always a special job to take over a GT report.
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| roturn |
Posted on 05-01-2018 08:42
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If I had known the crazy startlist here, it wouldn`t have been my GT with the strongest line-up...probably should have sent Keizer to the "easy" Giro for a top5-7 and Olivier as leader here for top20.
Anyway, Keizer with chances for a top10 even though I`d rate him more top15 with Guldhammer, Monsalve likely finishing ahead of him.
That said my team here is hopefully going for couple of stage wins. Chances are very high. Groenewegen as best sprinter in the field is awesome. Even more after showing how to win in stronger fields in the Giro. 5-8 sprinter stages and imo he should top his 2 stage wins from the Giro here and minimum 2 stage wins if not more are hoped for. That said, being best sprinter without a leadout sucks...haven`t expected this and otherwise would have sent 1-2 support riders here and makes me afraid the team ruins even a single stage win. That said, seems to be an issue for most top sprinters and hence could see an funny sprint preperation opening chances for a lot more riders.
Then the TTT should go fine with that team. Keizer, Dumoulin, Frison, Craddock, Koep with Olivier at 69 hopefully staying making it a decent top5-6 riders.
The ITT I have high hopes to win actually with Keizer in 3rd week. Danger is Pluchkin or Kritskiy having a great day there but should deliver decent points for us as well.
Then there`s Olivier to hopefully not only support but also go for a top20 GC and 1-2 mountain breakaways (if not Keizer himself).
So in theory I know it`s unfair to other teams but wouldn`t mind winning 4-6 stages here. 
That said, now coming to the real stars here. Pluchkin and Schleck meet each other in a GT. Nice. Add Madrazo and in especially Dombrowski and you have 3-4 riders that are potential winners here. Most likely Schleck though.
Velits after his Giro and Kritksiy also top5 challengers but imo Lecuisinier is the one being best of the rest as he is very consistent and a great rider capable of beating those two for some reason.
Thanks for your great effort Tamijo with the Vuelta and looking forward to the reports. |
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| tastasol |
Posted on 05-01-2018 08:46
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Classics Specialist
Posts: 3030
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While I enjoyed the giro very much, this is a proper GT worthy lineup! Really looking forward to following it.
Pluckhin and Schleck as the two biggest favourites, I'd say. Will be interesting to see how the race pans outvif Pluckhin finds himself in the race lead early on. Certainly some lack of support in the mountains.
Nice to see a strong team from Aker here as well. Hopefully a top 10 or maybe two should be possible for our Norwegian friends.
Great preview, Tamijo!
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| Shonak |
Posted on 05-01-2018 08:51
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Tour de France Champion
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Came here for the breakaways but probably would have been wise to send Guarnieri/Boekmans in hindsight. The field is stacked to the max when it comes to GC, many good rider sthat could have been in scoring heaven in that Giro field, now they may face a hard time. Luckily there are enough stages for the mountain goats to shine. And finally we get to see the battle of the premium stage racers before it's too late, Pluchkin vs Schleck. Naturally, crossing fingers for Schleck, vamos.
"It’s a little bit scary when Contador attacks." - Tommy V
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| wackojackohighcliffe |
Posted on 05-01-2018 09:18
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I was not expecting all the big guns to turn up, this might be a waste of a GT for Dombo. Good luck to all.
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| Avin Wargunnson |
Posted on 05-01-2018 09:51
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World Champion
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| SotD |
Posted on 05-01-2018 09:55
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World Champion
Posts: 12631
Joined: 29-11-2006
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Hmm this was a bit worse than anticipated. I clearly should have brought Coquard here but it was a gamble as to what to do, and which GT to select.
Lecuisinier had a slim hope of a top 5 prior to this presentation. I guess the ambition will be something in the region of 7th, which is also OK, but not as good as hoped.
I don't see us outscoring Moser here either, which makes it a real struggle to get back in touch. I guess we are 1200-1500 points trailing ATM, and if we are lucky we can level out/outscore by 50-100 points here, so we really need a good run in Scandinavia and Tour of Norway.
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| Ad Bot |
Posted on 07-12-2025 23:43
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| alexkr00 |
Posted on 05-01-2018 10:03
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Considering how bad Brambilla was at the Giro with a much weaker startlist, I don't even want to imagine how the Vuelta will be considering the startlist. From our star GT of the past 2 years, Vuelta will now be our weakest.
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| viking90 |
Posted on 05-01-2018 10:59
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Abal fighting for 10/15 in the GC and Ludvigsson just outside 30th maybe, would be the plan.
Stallaert here to try to sprint for himself and get some pts instead of leading out Ahlstrand at the giro, may have been a bad discussion. But looking at the sprinters here it looks like he can get some Top 10 result atleast.
Haugard Jensen to try to get some result and the hills.
Will be a nice battle for the win, Will Pluchkin deliver as much as Nemiroff hopes and needs?
Also nice seeing our outloaned Faglum Karlsson beeing here.
Good luck everybody! |
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| Vien |
Posted on 05-01-2018 11:41
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What a brutal Vuelta! Looking forward to following it |
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| ember |
Posted on 05-01-2018 12:48
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Very, very excited for this!
It's by far the GT I've gambled the most on with both Galta and Guldhammer present. Hopefully it will make one of them perform well, and then I really hope we can get those nice extra points from another good GC placing. Just as important though, is that we're able to race aggressively, especially on the mountain stages, seeing how the racing in the mountains unfolded in the Giro. With both Galta and Guldhammer here, hopefully the odds for one of them trying their breakaway luck in the final week should be greater 
We've also got some solid domestiques for the mountains, who are here just as much because of the possibility of breakaway luck.
Must also say it's a very big, pleasant surprise to see the line up of sprinters here. It makes me fancy Holst Enger's chances for a stage win, eventhough Groenewegen is the obvious favourite. Then Holst Enger should be next in line, maybe together with Stauff. That might force us to do leadouts though, which could be a very interesting thing seeing our line up Here's for hoping we solve that in a reasonable way, if that's what the AI makes us do.
The GC battle at the very top should also be great. Schleck, Pluchkin and Dombrowski are the three favourites in my eyes, in that order. And seeing their differences as riders, it should make for some great racing! |
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| DubbelDekker |
Posted on 05-01-2018 13:32
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Nice preview Tamijo, thanks!
So here we go; our most important race all year. If Madrazo doesn't deliver or gets injured we're quite probably in for a hell of a relegation battle the rest of the season.
Pluchking and Schleck are known opponents for Madrazo and the past tells us that he's usually unable to beat them in GC. But of course we'll not let that demotivate us and we're 100% battling for the win. The opening TTT should put us in a good position to take the leader jersey after stage 4. Really hope that plan succeeds, because that might just be the little bit extra that Madrazo needs to start riding like the champion he is.
In hindsight the Giro would've been a better pick, but the 8! mountain stages and the support of the home crowds were just too good to pass up. Looking forward to this a lot!!
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| knockout |
Posted on 05-01-2018 14:12
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This startlist looks so much stronger than the Go to. 9 riders are here that would have been podium favourites in the Giro. Schleckthe big favourite with Pluchkin as main contender.
My own team is in a very similar situation to the Giro. Stoltz as oofficial leader again (jersey with the 1  ) and Vosekalns as the key rider for GC, stages and KoM. Koch is here as well. Hopefully, I'll see them both in the attacks plenty.
A Big Thank You To All MG Reporters! |
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| matt17br |
Posted on 05-01-2018 14:22
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It really looks like every single team figured that their fiercest opposition would go to the Vuelta instead, goddamn that's an insane startlist. Really looking forward to not only the fight between Schleck and Pluchkin, which hasn't happened in... quite a while I think but also the one for the rest of the top 10.
Thanks Tamijo for taking it upon yourself to report all these race days and good luck to everyone fighting for the spotlight here.
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| Croatia14 |
Posted on 05-01-2018 14:36
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Go Aberasturi! Hopefully Velits can keep up the good form. Obviously Laurent Didier to win a stage.
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| Shonak |
Posted on 05-01-2018 14:38
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Tour de France Champion
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Goes without saying of course.  <3
"It’s a little bit scary when Contador attacks." - Tommy V
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| Roman |
Posted on 05-01-2018 15:03
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My best GT line-up ever for my GC hopes, hopefully Hirt and Giogieri can be somehow good helpers for Velits, Kulhavy, Vysna or Parra Bustamante should hopefully have a free reign to go for breakaways. However, the startlist here is a really tough one. If I could hope for a podium result in Giro, my hopes here are clearly for just a result like 9th or 10th position. Still should be fun.
But well, too bad Velits is racing Giro/Vuelta combo, Sagan TdF and Vesely was in Giro. In an ideal world Velits should race Giro/TdF and Sagan and Vesely would be ideally here. Hopefully this mistake won't cost me the title, at least I got Velits in Giro right this year...
SotD wrote:
I don't see us outscoring Moser here either, which makes it a real struggle to get back in touch. I guess we are 1200-1500 points trailing ATM, and if we are lucky we can level out/outscore by 50-100 points here, so we really need a good run in Scandinavia and Tour of Norway.
I think you can gain much more on me here. Lecuisinier is clearly a superior GT rider to Velits, you should get way more good stage results than my team. And you will especially get loads of points back in TdF as it is clearly going to be a fight between Spilak and Taaramae.
In any case, should be a great fight between all of these superb climbers here.
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| fjhoekie |
Posted on 05-01-2018 17:10
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The big one for us, and in hindsight going the Giro route as was initially planned could've worked out slightly better perhaps, however I still feel Pluchkin has some great chances here. Our TTT team is especially strong, most certainly when compared to our relative weakness in previous years, and the advantage our leader has over Schleck in the ITT could play a massive role, if PCM doesn't decide to have a weird daily form at least.
Climbing wise our team is not great, I'll admit that, but Kononenko and Nepomnyachsniy are most certainly decent in the mountains, and Konovalovas should be a great guy to have on the hillier stages.
Young, Golovash and Athanasiades are good assets in the TTT and flat parts of the race should we take the leaders' jersey with Pluchkin at some point.
Ulanowski is a solid sprinter in this field too, and could get some good points as well. The main reason he's here though is that starting TTT. The TTT should in theory be short enough to utilize Maciej's good PRL stat, which made me pick him over Kochetkov for this one.
Manager of Team Popo4Ever p/b Morshynska in the PCM.Daily Man-Game |
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| cio93 |
Posted on 05-01-2018 19:09
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I thought we were on a roll with the Giro and the first Ardennes races, and then came the disaster...which put us back on neutral ground and doesn't make me very hopeful for this. Feels like we're in for a very anonymous Top 10 season.
So this is where all the good riders went Makes me feel even luckier to have achieved our Giro goal.
On the other hand, this strong startlist should play right into our cards and might give Arndt one of the coveted "breakaway/KoM contender" tags by the AI, which was the goal for this race all along. On the other hand, that's what happened to Bongiorno in the Giro already, and getting lucky twice wouldn't be very MG-esque.
We fully expect him to lose loads of time in the TTT and the late TT, but that should only help with being just out of GC range for mid-race breakaways.
Maybe he can surprise like in the TdF last year where he got 13th, but that shouldn't be the benchmark.
Beyond Arndt, we have Mager and Chevrier who hopefully can show themselves on the hilly respectively mountain stages somehow and maybe contest a stage from a break as well.
The rest of the team was selected via the "who still has 21 spare race days?" criterion. Ciolek would've liked the startlist here, but he'll still get his chances this month and this startlist imbalance compared to the Giro was hard to predict.
Overall, this might become an incredibly dull race for us if nobody feels like attacking, but then again that means any result will come unexpected.
I can't wait to follow the fight for the win though.
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