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Giro d'Italia Discussion
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| ember |
Posted on 14-12-2023 10:36
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The perfect start! Hopefully it can take the pressure away from us and see us get aggressive and be able to combine Amezawa's GC ambitions with stage hunting via breakaways.
Thank you for getting the race rolling, Abhi! Looking forward to what is to come  |
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| cio93 |
Posted on 14-12-2023 12:12
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To feature only twice - and in comparably irrelevant sections at that - in such a great detailed preview of a GT shows how little focus lies on the Giro for us this season.
A somewhat weaker top climbing echelon than usual should hopefully play to our advantage though.
Usually, the 76-78MO range is where the mid- to late-race breakaway stage winners come from, so with everything tuned down a point or so across the board, I hope that bringing no less than FIVE experienced breakaway climbers between 75 and 77 MO puts us in a great position to contest mountain stages and possibly even the KoM jersey in the second half of the race.
On top of that strong depth, we have our loanee Tobias Halland Johannesen, who hopefully can go for a podium spot in the U25 classification.
Earlier races have shown that he's not necessarily considered the team leader over slightly weaker but better allround climbers like Zwiehoff, but I'm optimistic that he can still be either consistent enough or capitalize on a breakaway or two to stay in GC contention against his opposition in that age bracket.
To round out our squad, we also bring Jannik Steimle and Joris Nieuwenhuis as his support for the sprints.
Jannik barely made the favorites list in the preview, but I hope that this might actually come in handy with how sprints have been lately.
A podium spot or a couple of Top 5 results over the course of the race would be amazing.
Congrats to Aker on day 1, SKA doing SKA things!
I'm looking forward to the Dombo vs Haig duel.
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| baseballlover312 |
Posted on 14-12-2023 13:05
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Not the best start for Galta compared to some of the other GC contenders, but we're talking about differences of a few seconds here anyway. Not gonna get in a twist over it.
Love seeing SKA's prologue prowess continue to shine!
RIP Exxon Duke, David Veilleux, Double Feature, and Monster Energy |
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| Fabianski |
Posted on 14-12-2023 13:52
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Ouch, Chavanne will have nightmares featuring SKA all year long now ^^ Must suck to always get beaten by the same rider - so actually glad I sold him 
Congrats to Aker of course, good to see the best rider doing consistently well in prologues now.
For my team, I guess two Top 20 results for Küng and Bissegger is just fine; an overperformance would have been nice, but Bissegger getting to wear white is a good reward already. Now hoping that his jersey will actually be seen tomorrow - a breakaway appearance would be perfect for that 
Stüssi's lack of prologue skills obviously hurts a bit compared to many other stage racers, but can't fix that anymore ^^ Plenty of time to recover some seconds, mainly in the long ITT of course. But now, let's focus on Bol and Schmid who should have the best chances on the next couple of days!
Thanks for the report, Abhi.
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| SotD |
Posted on 14-12-2023 17:20
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Decent result from Giannoutsos. Nothing that will amount to anything but still fun to follow.
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| Marcovdw |
Posted on 14-12-2023 20:22
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Dennis with a good start. Let's keep this up
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| Ad Bot |
Posted on 06-12-2025 23:02
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| alexkr00 |
Posted on 15-12-2023 07:38
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Not off to a great start. At least Bloem picks up some minor points thanks to the KoM rankings.
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| jaxika |
Posted on 15-12-2023 07:42
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Good start for the race. Just a quick question. For leading the teams classification there arent any points? |
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| AbhishekLFC |
Posted on 15-12-2023 07:52
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jaxika wrote:
For leading the teams classification there arent any points?
No
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| redordead |
Posted on 15-12-2023 07:53
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Not the best start. Nothing in the prologue was expected, but I hoped for a bit better from Enger as he might be our best scoring option in what is a very weak lineup. We have a few more chances still, hopefully he can improve.
Looking forward to the reports and thanks to knockout for the nice preview
"I am a cyclist, I may not be the best, but that is what I strive to be. I may never get there, but I will never quit trying." - Tadej Pogačar
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| Marcovdw |
Posted on 15-12-2023 09:39
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Ahlstrand the eternal second. So close, we'll get there eventually
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| ember |
Posted on 15-12-2023 09:51
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Carlsberg everywhere! Congratulations again, bbl
Happy to see Zhao attend the sprint. He should be our best option for these stages, and good to see him get preference over Wouters. 4th place is a very good start, above what we can expect. |
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| knockout |
Posted on 15-12-2023 10:27
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Those are the stages where i regret my failure to sign a sprinter. Effectively i could close the thread once we dont make the breakaway.
Congrats bbl!
A Big Thank You To All MG Reporters! |
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| Luis Leon Sanchez |
Posted on 15-12-2023 12:54
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Castrillo with an average effort for 30th in the prologue.
Better 2nd stage from the team. Surprise winner indeed (congrats bbl) but 6th isn't too shabby from Thijssen, it's probably where he should be given the competition. With him going for intermediate points, hopefully he decides to mount somewhat of a challenge there to give us something to look forward to.
Not expecting too much from the race overall with Mas and Rodriguez. Hopefully a stage win or a KOM effort from one of them although I'd swap that for an overperformance in the GC.
Thank you for the first 2 reports! Looking forward to some exciting racing and continued great coverage
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| baseballlover312 |
Posted on 15-12-2023 14:35
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Holy shit! 
Frankly, there shouldn't be a scenario possible where Sureda wins that stage, right? I mean there are at least a dozen sprinters in the race objectively better than him. I mean, I guess you could make the argument that he made it through the early climbing portions in better shape than them, but that's obviously just cope in the end. He's a C tier guy.
But obviously I'm not the one that's gonna complain about it! I signed Sureda as a 50k guy to be my secondary sprinter with the hope he could snag a minor place from a big group a couple of times, maybe when the bumps take too much out of the pure flat guys. Instead, he's actually be fairly consistently sprinting when he's our lead sprinter, already snagging a couple of minor places this year. And here, he literally made the entire signing worth it in one fell swoop. 79 points from him this stage counting the points jersey. It's already more than we could have hoped for from the whole race. Very nice to have this boon in a race where we were all in on GC.
Now, we'll feel differently about this kind of win when AKA races his GT later in the year. But for now, I can only be thrilled for the luck! We really need these kind of freak events to avoid relegation in the end.
Thanks for the report!
Edited by baseballlover312 on 15-12-2023 19:41
RIP Exxon Duke, David Veilleux, Double Feature, and Monster Energy |
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| tsmoha |
Posted on 15-12-2023 14:44
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Lame result for Groves. Probably needs a more difficult profile?
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| SotD |
Posted on 15-12-2023 18:52
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Would have hoped to see Bouglas get a top 10, but he is a bit weaker than the top 10 riders, so I guess we need a lucky position.
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| Ulrich Ulriksen |
Posted on 15-12-2023 21:30
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Great stuff from McCormick loanee Hecht. Revard wore the TDF KOM while loaned at King Power and now Hecht does it at the Giro. Guess Bikex and I will need to find a Vuelta candidate for next year.
Thanks for the reports, congrats to BBl and Ember.
Man Game: McCormick Pro Cycling |
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| Fabianski |
Posted on 15-12-2023 21:37
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Well, definitely a surprise winner. Didn't think a 77 sprinter would ever have a chance in this sprint field - but Sureda just did it. Congrats, bbl!
This also gives me some hopes for better results by Bol later in the race, as he should easily match Sureda's skillset. But once again, his positioning was pretty awful, and he just couldn't find any room to move up. Well, next attempt in two days I guess.
Also, nice to see Janssen in the breakaway, and even picking up some KoM and sprint points - although there would have been 7 better options from the team
Thanks for the report, looking forward to the next one!
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| jandal7 |
Posted on 16-12-2023 10:27
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breakaway next time please
24/02/21 - kandesbunzler said “I don't drink famous people."
15/08/22 - SotD said "Your [jandal's] humour is overrated"
11/06/24 - knockout said "Winning is fine I guess. Truth be told this felt completely unimportant."
[PT]  Xero Racing
5x  x5
1x  x1
2x  x2
2x  x2 |
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