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Volta a Portugal - Discussions
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| tastasol |
Posted on 03-11-2024 08:28
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Classics Specialist
Posts: 2892
Joined: 11-09-2010
PCM$: 200.00
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Well, that was shit  Only small positive was Van Gestel. Hopefully just a horrible day for Cort.
Thanks for the reports.
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| whitejersey |
Posted on 03-11-2024 09:15
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Classics Specialist
Posts: 2906
Joined: 07-08-2011
PCM$: 300.00
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Taylor Phinney stays inevitable even in old age. Congrats to Roturn on the win!
Barguil just about gets into the top 10, which was the aim for him coming here so we will take that, a little sad about Coutinho's sprints but that's always a lottery!
Thanks for the reports 
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| Gustavovskiy |
Posted on 03-11-2024 09:31
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Team Leader
Posts: 6036
Joined: 20-07-2008
PCM$: 200.00
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I think I have to be content with what we got. Was hoping to leapfrog Misbah and maybe even Pidcock, but in reality I guess we're lucky to fend off Yates for 5th for a single second and both direct rivals, Almeida and Galta. Not the massive point haul we need, but it's definitely a good result.
Evenepoel's escapade had me worried a bit. Then seeing Rachid join him kinda made me ambiguous towards the breakaway. Not sure it was the best strategy to send him that early.
Congrats on the win, roturn. Phinney isn't yet old enough to be beaten I guess.
Finally thanks for all the colourful reports, sean. Really enjoyed them!
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| Ollfardh |
Posted on 03-11-2024 09:33
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World Champion
Posts: 14563
Joined: 08-08-2011
PCM$: 9100.00
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A mountain jersey! We haven't won one of those in a long time. Thanks for the reports and congrats to all happy managers!
Changed my sig, this was getting absurd.
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| Ad Bot |
Posted on 04-12-2024 06:29
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Bot Agent
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Joined: 23.11.09
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| AbhishekLFC |
Posted on 03-11-2024 10:03
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Directeur Sportif
Posts: 11685
Joined: 27-07-2015
PCM$: 1861.50
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A very poor race from Leemreize which is very strange given how near identical Carboni did so much better! Shirota's stage win salvaged the race but we get very less from the GC.
Congrats to roturn and thanks for the reports sean 
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| alexkr00 |
Posted on 03-11-2024 10:31
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World Champion
Posts: 13915
Joined: 05-08-2008
PCM$: 300.00
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So much you can expect from a 74MO guy. Next year should be better. Not bad a race for us, top 20 in the GC and two stage podiums.
Congrats, roturn! Phinney is not the dominant rider he used to be but he should glimpses of that in this race.
Thanks for the reports!
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| ember |
Posted on 03-11-2024 12:07
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Team Leader
Posts: 6851
Joined: 27-03-2008
PCM$: 700.00
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Fun to have Lastra join the breakaway. Well done to Valter for hanging on the group of favourites as well. It is the hilly stages and the opportunities missed there, as it makes for a poor race compared to what we hoped for regarding Valter. It also is really worrying for other races, like Tirreno.
Big race for Fastned and Phinney. Nice to see him delivering. Also well planned and strategized by Nemo having Eastman here go 2nd in the GC. Pidcock also super impressive and reeeally promising for him and other weeklong stage races. Congratulations to all of you, and thank you for the reports, sean! |
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| baseballlover312 |
Posted on 03-11-2024 12:59
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Tour de France Champion
Posts: 16432
Joined: 27-07-2011
PCM$: 10438.70
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Wow, that was a pretty atrocious final for us. For some reason we decided that we needed to waste all of our climbers in good GC positions to catch the break, and got nothing for it. Galta attacks early despite his poor acceleration and ends up behind almost everyone in his weight case on GC, plus guys like Pidcock and Misbah who we did not expect to finish ahead on a pure mountain stage. And Skjelmose worked way too hard for nothing falls all the way down to 29th. Really bad day for us.
Really can't afford performances like that from Galta this year, or we're headed back down to PCT.
Thanks for the reports and congrats to roturn!
RIP Exxon Duke, David Veilleux, Double Feature, and Monster Energy |
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| Ulrich Ulriksen |
Posted on 03-11-2024 15:40
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Directeur Sportif
Posts: 3269
Joined: 02-11-2010
PCM$: 300.00
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Great stuff from Yates, he needed to go early to gain ground and he made it work. if he performs like that in the rest of his races it is going to be a fun year for him. And none of them have flat time trials.
Pity he couldn't find another 3 seconds to move up two slots in the GC but at least it wasn't to Eastman.
Rest of the team was solid, if we hadn't thrown all our GC positions away on that one hilly stage it would be better but sure I am not the only one with that issue.
Congrats to Sammy on Misbah, looks like some valuable training and to Roturn on a great win as Phinney shows why he is a legend.
Thanks to Sean for some edge of the seats reports. With the team struggling to start the season management had some angst about that stage.
Man Game: McCormick Pro Cycling |
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| Fabianski |
Posted on 03-11-2024 20:00
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Grand Tour Specialist
Posts: 4673
Joined: 29-09-2018
PCM$: 185.00
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Ouch. What an awful ride by Darbellay. He gets lucky to avoid any time gaps on the hilly stages, does two very good TTs - and when we finally hit the mountains, he just throws everything away. I mean, it makes absolutely no sense that Schmid would finish ahead of him on such a stage. Well, so far Val's training looks like some completely wasted money, guess we'll have to wait a couple more years for a good Swiss stage racer.
Schmid on the other hand definitely did great to finish 16th on the day and in the GC, although it's pretty obvious that there are lots of "what if"s, in particular looking at Pidcock finishing in the front group... That's just insane, no explanation how he did this. Just Pidcock things I guess, we might have to get used to such freaking results by him.
Congrats to Phinney who delivered as expected, ending the race with two stage wins (plus a "stolen" one to start the race with), GC and points is obviously huge for Fastned. Well done also to Oxxo and Xero - the former expectedly, the latter is a complete surprise to me tbh.
I guess we didn't do too bad all in all, with a stage win and 9 Top 10s in 8 stages. But throwing away what in retrospect must almost be considered a sure Top 10 definitely hurts our scoring. 2nd in teams is a pretty small consolation tbh...
Thanks for the reports!
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| Nemolito |
Posted on 04-11-2024 07:52
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Classics Specialist
Posts: 3370
Joined: 20-04-2020
PCM$: 425.00
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Good to see the team's mountain train work in preparation for the Giro already, seems like in general they did a decent job today, obviously also thanks to the amazing SEE Turtles loanee Didier Merchan. Eastman himself didn't seem to be in his best form on the mountains, but luckily the two guys ahead of him couldn't hold on, so at least we have Eastman's 2nd in GC to give us some points here. Stage-wise and depth-wise not an amazing race with everybody except for Eastman dropping on the hilly stage and Marin/Eastman not doing well in the sprints/mountains, but the good time trial saved us here. Will need to be better if we want to score in Paris-Nice and the Giro with Eastman.
Congratulations roturn on a dominant stage and GC win, and also glad to see Ulrich do well with Yates on that final stage, seems like he will be able to continue on last year's performances. Conmiserations to some of the better climbers losing time due to pcm tactics.
Thank you for eight amazing reports, Sean!
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| OlegTinkov |
Posted on 04-11-2024 09:12
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Small Tour Specialist
Posts: 2668
Joined: 31-12-2007
PCM$: 450.00
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Only one podium placed (Banaszek 2nd at Stage 2) isn't great, but the reports made up for it. Especially at the beginning of the season it's hard to know which teams some of the riders belong to, so if you could add mini-jerseys to the reports as well that would be great seancoll.
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| DubbelDekker |
Posted on 04-11-2024 14:43
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Small Tour Specialist
Posts: 2636
Joined: 20-04-2008
PCM$: 200.00
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Love how we approached that final stage!
Cool to see Carboni getting away against many stronger climbers. Shame he couldn't keep going to the line, but still 9th in GC is a proper result and a sign that training him was a good idea.
Warchol also looked sharp sitting at the front protecting Carboni's lead. Staying with the main group and finishing 14th in GC was pretty much what we could expect of him here.
Senni had a great first week but sadly faltered a bit in the final stage. If he had managed to stay with the main group, he would've claimed 7th in GC. In the end it became 17th, but still his contribution was enough to comfortably reel in the team classification.
Overall a solid performance from our three leaders resulted in some satisfying depth scoring.
Congrats roturn! And thanks for the reports sean
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| SportingNonsense |
Posted on 05-11-2024 08:06
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Team Manager
Posts: 33046
Joined: 08-03-2007
PCM$: 200.00
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Really quite interesting to see this season's departing riders Goody and Valter both in the same race and finishing next together in GC, albeit only 11th and 12th. Interesting as well to note Phinney's strength and Valter hanging on in the mountains, when as ever thinking about how Wirtgen would have handled a race like this - pretty well this year, it would have seemed.
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