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Giro d'Italia Discussion
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| alexkr00 |
Posted on 11-05-2013 00:11
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Amazing preview!
Didn't realize that my team is so unexperienced, but all of my riders except Van Emden are new with the team so that might be an explanation.
Also, since Madrazo will be going for GT win #3 here, does anybody know what happened to mb?
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| SportingNonsense |
Posted on 11-05-2013 00:24
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alexkr00 wrote:
Also, since Madrazo will be going for GT win #3 here, does anybody know what happened to mb?
Only the 1 GT win for Madrazo so far!
He seems to have posted on the Cyclingnews forum yesterday (his first post there this year). Dont know why he hasn't been around though. Hope he wont be continuing the past trend of PT managers who stop caring, but say nothing, and then their team is disbanded at the season end.
Edited by SportingNonsense on 11-05-2013 00:30
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| alexkr00 |
Posted on 11-05-2013 00:37
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SportingNonsense wrote:
alexkr00 wrote:
Also, since Madrazo will be going for GT win #3 here, does anybody know what happened to mb?
Only the 1 GT win for Madrazo so far!
For some reason I had the impression that he also won the Tour last year 
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| Roman |
Posted on 11-05-2013 01:20
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Wow, what a preview and what a startlist as well!
The clear winner should be Madrazo, but then it should be a really great battle for every place. Hopefully, from my team's perspective Henao Montoya can repeat at least his top 10 results from last two seasons. I went for him here over Uran as I believe he will more likely attack for KOM jersey and for stages as well - I expected here would be almost every top GC riders with a good TT, so it could be good to have a rider who can do something a little bit different. Otherwise I hope Forero can at least get himself to do some sprints, as Nepo brothers and König for breakaways or Sergent a solid results in time trials.
Hopefully it will be a nice Giro for everyone! 
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| dave92 |
Posted on 11-05-2013 01:31
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What a preview.
Madrazo being sent here has ruined my dreams of an American taking a GT, but I don't think he would have been favorite anyways. I see Nibali and Trofimov rounding out the podium with Madrazo on top, but would love to see Phinney break that up. Sella and Ricco cannot be overlooked.
I am glad to see Phinney would seem to have a good shot to grab Pink in the opening time trial, unless of course Trofimov is off to one of his torrid starts.
Can't wait to see it all play out.
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| cio93 |
Posted on 11-05-2013 03:55
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So here we are at our first Grand Tour!
Enough was and will be said about the overall fight, I'll rather focus on what part we hope to play in that very special race.
Firstly, our already slim hopes of taking red home to Germany were further spoiled by the presence of Trofimov alongside Phinney and Ricco...
The tightly packed GC favourites group might see them taking significantly less points than expected in their specialty terrain, but recent PCT experiences show they should perform far too good on the actual sprint stages to make that matter any more.
Being at least third best "sprinter" would still fulfill my personal goal of giving us a healthy 2014 budget without being too optimistic this year.
Focusing on the 9 sprint stages awaiting us throughout this 3 weeks on paper, there is a notable absence - bar probably stage 9 - of enough mountain stages obviously putting the main sprinters and their surprisingly abundant helpers in time limit difficulties.
Subsequently, there might very well be enough firepower left amongst at least Puma, Vesuvio and Pokerstars to ensure all these stages to actually be bunch sprints as well.
Even though Qatar and especially T-A proved that not everything works as well on tarmac as it does on paper, we are still highly optimistic with both Bennati and Gasparotto enjoying their national bonus.
In our HQ, people publicly expecting 5 stage wins don't face doubting laughter amongst the people present.
While that is certainly possible, too many factors play a role every stage to firmly believe in that.
Nevertheless, a beneficial bonifications distribution in the first three stages might allow Bennati to wear that prestigious maglia rosa early on without the need to dominate the opposition.
The resulting increase in motivation and the extra bit of power released in his legs could help him keeping up with the best in stages 4 and 5, which might actually result in leading the race until the ITT.
Having our sponsors presented in that pink fabric for a whole third of the race would definitely make the Giro (and basically the whole season) an enourmous success for us.
Wishful thinking aside, we expect at the very least to be competitive in our preferred terrain seeing many working Puma sprint trains, and finishing the Giro with any less than two stage wins would see us leaving Italy in disappointment.
Not to be forgotten are our best bets to take the roles as stage hunters - predominantly in the latter half of the race - in Delage and Nuyens.
Both are capable and always willing to join a possibly successful break and possess the abilities to get rid of their opponents either before or in the sprint.
Still, we expect to use all 8 supporting riders to set up Bennati as good as possible in the stages that matter, and realistically, not many chances are left anymore for both to give it a try then.
To end that ridiculously long post (I felt a need to introduce us sufficiently well in our first GT):
I wish all participating teams - and especially our fellow GT debutants - good luck and above all a crash-free three weeks of extraordinary racing. 
Thanks SN as well for a great preview and everything that is yet to come.
(never write that long stuff on your mobile just to have it ruined by unintentionally changing pages...that's 2 hours of work now)
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| roturn |
Posted on 11-05-2013 08:51
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Rothaus - Aegon wants to thank Pokerstars.com for giving young Dutch sprinter Johim Ariesen the chance to collect experience in his first ever Grand Tour.
We hope he can help our German friends Mohs and Degenkolb to shine here and for some mentions apart from fighting against the time limit (even though this might be the case). 
No question that the first week will be watched by us very closely. |
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| Spilak23 |
Posted on 11-05-2013 09:07
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Great preview to what hopefully becomes a great race.
Madrazo is ofcourse the top favourite but don't think Phinney will be far off. Infact I think he will win. A really important point here to me is that no mountain stage can be really seen as tough. All mountain top finishes are quite easy before the final mountain. Only 6 Cat 1/HC climbs is really low I guess for Giro standards. Combine that with PCM 12's inability to create gaps sometimes might mean the timetjrialers should finish really high.
Phinney on one flanked by Madrazo and Spilak for me at the end.
Routing for Bennati and his sprint train aswell though Phinney and Trofimov might ruin all his chances on the red jersey.
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| Ad Bot |
Posted on 09-12-2025 17:09
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| CountArach |
Posted on 11-05-2013 11:15
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Wow, amazing preview SN. I will have to really try to outdo that for the Vuelta 
Incredibly good startlist, as the Giro is always going to have. I like that the managers here take it almost as seriously as the TdF, just like in real life. So let's have a little go at picking the top 10:
1. Madrazo
2. Phinney
3. Nibali
4. Spilak
5. Fothen
6. Sella
7. Ricco
8. Trofimov
9. Sicard
10. Henao (I will be cheering for him to do even better though)
Edited by CountArach on 11-05-2013 11:15
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| Heine |
Posted on 11-05-2013 11:17
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I guess (and hope actually) that Phinney wins this, if not him then Sella would be a great winner
Other than that I believe Puma's dreams of points jersey will be destroyed by Trofimov, that man is a machine
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| mattiasgt |
Posted on 11-05-2013 12:21
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This is going to be interesting. I hope Trofimov can continuing his good form and snatch bonus seconds in the hilly stages. Having the pink jersey after the first week is the goal, as that would help massively for the first mountain stage.
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| SportingNonsense |
Posted on 11-05-2013 12:55
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Thanks for all the feedback on the preview.
I quite enjoyed reporting Stage 1
Edited by SportingNonsense on 11-05-2013 12:55
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| Miguel98 |
Posted on 11-05-2013 12:58
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SN, of cour se you enjoyed it. 1-2 for your team is good. |
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| ANFreeman |
Posted on 11-05-2013 13:05
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Great preview and great first stage - well rewarded for SN.
That was one hell of a lead out.
[url=https://pcmdaily.com/messages.php?msg_send=19438]-Requests for Man-Game 2014 jerseys are OPEN!
Click to request!-[/url] |
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| Smowz |
Posted on 11-05-2013 13:07
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Wind chaos and Puma utterly fail to deal with it. Looks like No train for SRB here, but there is three better ones Van Heerden just needs to latch onto the right one . Van Heerden shows he is a strong customer but not good enough to beat Swift and Bennati really unless he gets one just right. Forth is okay for the opener, hoping to crack the podium a few times in next couple of days.
Big blow for Bennati though and his hopes of the points jersey and indeed of the first stage leaders jerseys bonus. Puma were probably counting on that.
Vesuvio continue their mid season surge - by the way my Italian geography is terrible what is the closest Vesuvio get to riding in the shadow of the mountain of the same name. We start on the East - do we get to the west coast?
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| roturn |
Posted on 11-05-2013 13:08
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Great report.
I like all the work with the flags and team jerseys. It`s looking really good but takes a lot of time.
I was surprised to see the Vesuvio train being the strongest. I thought no train would be a real danger for Puma as they have the strongest lead-out men.
Pokerstars should have used Ariesen. He could have sprinted better than Mohs.
And last but not least. Congrats to this brilliant 1-2. Caethoven kept his form from the Romandie obviously.
Good to see no gaps here. Would have been and early issue for many otherwise. |
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| ember |
Posted on 11-05-2013 13:12
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Fantastic report, SN! I really enjoyed that one
What a massive lead out by Vesuvio, well finished by Swift, congratulations!
Good to see Spilak being up there in the sprint, hopefully he continues to be somewhat active in the final kilometers of these flat stages, as that's most likely the best place to be, eventhough it might take some energy. |
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| CountArach |
Posted on 11-05-2013 13:14
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Well that was the most action-packed pan flat stage of all time. Amazing report.
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| Mresuperstar |
Posted on 11-05-2013 13:18
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What a leadout, if its like that for the other flat stages the other sprinters should just throw in the towel now.
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| Kami |
Posted on 11-05-2013 13:23
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Action packed stage. The fact that Ricco was near the front most of the race bodes well for the future. Seeing as i don't have a sprinter present, Ricco will also mix himself in the sprints (like last year), which gives us less chance of getting caught out.
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