Ok DP, I'll bite. I suspect Sky will win; that's a damn strong team. Winning time: 15:15 - 15:30. Slowest time: 17:15 - 17:30. Assuming no crashes. This was a complete WAG, because there was nothing scientific about it!

Edit: Looks like I could't have been much more wrong...

BMC to win, with Sky second and Orica or Movistar to fill the podium. Contador to lose about 45 seconds and be on the back foot from the start.

If I recall, Contador's Tinkhoff team lost ~50 seconds last year. Should be interesting to see what Trek can do. They leave last out of the start gate in Nimes.

I clicked on this link:

http://tiz-cycling.racing/stream-live/


and it appears to be working from here in Canada. Should start in 2 hours. Let's see if it works or gets blocked due to geography issues.


Dev

well then let's see if we can embed it in the thread. if this slows the thread down let me know and i'll take it out:

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Contador 35 seconds off the lead and 26 behind Froome. Nice win for BMC.

Always torn on TTT - great spectacle but never seems quite right including a team stage in an event with individual classification.

Luckily for the rivals the TTT was so short as Froome may have just sealed the win right here if his team is strong enough for the rest of the race, which they likely are. From the velonews article http://www.velonews.com/...vcWc8hHMxmpIsFsw.99:

Sky’s Chris Froome took significant gains against his main rivals in the team test against the clock. Though Sky finished fourth in the stage, 9 seconds slower than BMC, the gaps were serious: 22 seconds to Vincenzo Nibali, 26 seconds to Alberto Contador, and 32 seconds to Fabio Aru. Uffff. No surprise there.
“We wanted to stay safe, but [26] seconds is quite a bit of time,” said Contador, racing his final team time trial of his career. “It’s never good to start off from behind, is it?”

Anyone have a good link to a video replay? I had to take some family to the airport and missed most of the stream.

Ouch.

I guess skys attention to detail makes the biggest difference in TTs and of course TTTs.
(In relation to other contenders teams)

Sky place way closer to the ultimate TT horsepower Team (BMC) than their rivals place to sky.

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What is weird is all those teams have access to all the same aero gear and tactics. No one is forcing them to ignore the marginal gains, but then all do ignore them (or so it seems), Then they spend 19 out of 21 days of racing trying to make up the gaps that Sky makes on those two TT days. Seems like Barguil from Sunweb is a big winner today IF he is going for GC.

#Rider Name (Country) TeamResult
1BMC Racing Team0:15:58
2Quick-Step Floors0:00:06
3Team Sunweb
4Team Sky0:00:09
5Orica-Scott0:00:17
6Bora-Hansgrohe0:00:21
7Lotto-Soudal0:00:24
8Movistar
9Bahrain-Merida0:00:31
10Katusha-Alpecin0:00:33
11Trek-Segafredo0:00:35
12FDJ0:00:38
13Aqua Blue Sport
14Dimension Data0:00:39
15LottoNL-Jumbo0:00:40
16Astana0:00:41
17Cannondale-Drapac0:00:46
18AG2R La Mondiale
19UAE Team Emirates 00:47
20Manzana Postobon0:00:53
21Caja Rural-Seguros RGA0:00:56
22Cofidis0:00:57

It's not just that they don't focus on the discipline, it's also the horsepower that they bring (or don't)

Stannard and Moscon are worth their weight (!) In results.

Or maybe it is what your hire for your team with your stacked budget. it's not like other teams don't have budget, they just don't stack the team with lightweight TTers. It is one thing to have heavy guys who can TT and ride classics or light 130 lbs guys who can't TT. Largely, Sky gets people who can ride pretty good TT's and pretty good in the mountains (at least on the first 2/3), limiting the number of people they hire who can shine in the high mountains. If I was to run I team, I'd literally have only one rider around 130's and and my team would be filled with guys 145-155 lbs who can TT. I would not bother with anyone heavier than 160 lbs on the team for a Grand Tour if we are racing for GC. Those guys are just dead weight in the mountains, and only marginally more useful in the TTs than the 150 lbs TTer (who can climb better). If I look at the rival teams for the GC, they have too many small guys who can't TT (other than Sunweb). Basically what you want is your team to be clones of the the Lance body composition (height weight...forget the dope). All those 130 lbs guys are fairly useless until it gets over 10% grade (and yes, I understand the Vuelta has plenty above 10%, but that's what your 130 lbs team leader is for....the team does not need to be filled with a bunch of those guys).

Cycling.tv has first three stages for free in canada - much better quality than tiz.

I'd have one. Like Tony Martin (165lb.). As long as he could make all the time cuts.

Because I'd want the guy, who when some asshole like Contador in concert with Quick-Step stage hunters creates an echelon split in a crosswind on a flattish stage, and your GC guy misses it, you want the one meathead who can say, "Get on my effing wheel" and then drill a 50-second gap closed all by himself.

OK, that sounds good....so we got one 165 lb guy like Martin or Bodnar, 6-7 145-155 lbs riders who can TT and climb to the 2/3 lb on the summit stages and if your GC guy is a 130 lbs climber then that's the quota, maybe one more to help him 90% up the mountain.

It's a different story obviously if you are going for sprinter stage wins. Then your team looks different.

a good plan but maybe not so easy to achieve. guys like kwiatkowski and thomas who can win flat/cobbled classics and ride with almost anyone in the mountains are rare. of course sky took a sprinter in EBH and made a mid-mountain domestique out of him so maybe the right training can get whatever you need out of anyone with the engine.

i do think sky have shown that they are able to create well-rounded riders and certainly they regularly demonstrate the value of that but few other teams or riders seem to be able to match either the leader or domestiques

I definitely agree that it is harder to construct this type of team in practice then it is to theorize. But perhaps the starting point is the starting point of the team's philosophy. Going back to the days of Jan Ullrich, his T-mobile/Deutsche Telekom team could never properly decide that they wanted to be. You'd have stupid things going on like Jan pulling for Zabel in the sprint train. Jan should have beaten Lance in multiple tours, but his team was off burning matches chasing the Green jersey for Zabel (and the guys pulling for Zabel have a slightly different body composition than a TTer who can climb). Or you have a GC focused team with too many lightweight guys who can't TT well (ex Euskatel Euskadi). Based on Astana's TTT today, it seems they did not bring enough TTers who can also climb to help Aru in both of these areas were you can win/lose time. I think this is the beauty of Sky's scouting/team building/execution....they look at the stages with the high probability of winning/losing time and try to get/make riders who can help there (basically your 145-155 lbs guys who can TT decently and climb good enough to set up the main guy). We could debate (outside of the turbo doping) that US Postal made their teams that way too.

Thanks I just watched the replay. I will probably pay the $12 USD for the full 3 weeks package. May as well enjoy the race properly.

You bring a big guy or two for the two or three hours of racing before the TV coverage starts. These guys control the breakaway attempts u till a suitable combination goes. A 130 lb climber isn't goi g to be able to pull anything back if your rivals put a dangerous person in the break. Climbing domestiques are worthless on any surface less than - 6+% grade. You didn't see much of Luke Rowe in the Tour but you can bet he was riding his ass off for the first hour.

Sky riders' ability to be world class in the mountains and compete for Olympic gold in the TT always stuns me indeed. Wiggins was the first one I noticed. Now there is Froomey of course.

I grew up watching Schleck vs. Contador. Schleck was thin as hell and could not TT. Contador was a bit shorter and very light. He TTed better but not on Olympic gold level. It were strong guys like Cancellara that did that in my world view.

Bardet etc. are now what Schleck was then. But now you have the Sky riders that do both.

What I also notice is that a lot of riders look different than the GC guys looked in the past. You always had mountains goats that were just small and therefore light. But since 200X you see more and more 6 ft. riders with a runners BMI.
Certainly Armstrong etc. looked more muscular.

Lately I read an Interview with Dan Martin. He was asked about weight obsession in the peleton and said that he does not really freak out about it. He eats a lot but thinks that way he has more energy and also burns more in training.
That was very interesting, as I guess Froome is much more obsessed with it.

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10k - 30:48 / half - 1:06:40

I agree with most everything here except the Dan Martin thing. He looks like anorexic Lance!

Exactly. There is a lot of work to be done in a GT just keeping your lead rider(s) out of the wind and out of trouble before the mountains even begin. Take a team of climbers without any other options and you'll end up like Euskatel, finished.

Have you been watching the same Tours de France (yes, I know the Vuelta is not the TdF) as the rest of us for the past few years, where the 6'1"-6'2" 150lb guys are out-climbing the 5'6" 130lb guys for the past...how many TdFs has Sky won b/t Wiggo and Froome?

Also, Miguel Indurain.

I mostly agree w/ your assessment about 145-155 lb riders who can TT. No one is winning a GT without being able to TT. But a team full of Quintanas and Portes would not be a viable GC-winning team without the rouleurs to do the work..

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no sponsors | no races | nothing to see here

We are in agreement that you don't want a team filled with 130 lbs guys and generally your 5'6" 130 lbs guy does not win the grand tour. And we can go back to Anquetil-Merckx-Hinault-Fingon-Lemond-Indurain-Riis-Ullrich-Lance. The guys who win are 5'10" to 6 ft who can TT.....if you look at it, they are just a bit lighter than the 5'10-6'1' Kona winners who can TT and can still run....same deal to win a Grand Tour. You have to TT and be able to climb. Some exceptions are Delgado, Pantani, Poulidor (eternal second to Anquetil and Merckx, won a Vuelta), Quintana (Giro/Vuelta), Hampsten (Giro). Contador is still a "heavy" small guy (up around 138 lbs) who could TT so not sure which camp to put him in but he is closer to 5'10" so his levers are OK. I would not put him in the camp of pure climber.

I remember back before there were powermeters, all the work they put in to try to make Andy Hampsten into a better TTer....same thing with Lucho Herrera (the first Colombian climber who won Alpe d'Huez in 1984). The physics just work against these guys when it gets flat.

In any case, if I was movistar and I really wanted to use Quintana as my best hope for the win, I'd stack the team with medium size TTers guys who can climb OK and a few big guys. Quintana does not need "helpers" when it gets above 8%. At that point his helpers are Bardet-Froome-Aru etc, whomever he needs to make an alliance with at that moment to beat one or more of the others. With Landa moving to Movistar, will be interesting to see who gets what role now.

In any case it is game on for Stage 2. If the crosswinds are big, as someone mentioned, you need Luke Rowe type guy riding the tempo and blocking the wind.

Yeah, yeah, thats what I wanted to say. In the article they mentioned how light Martin looks and asked about his weight. Martin said that he does not knoe. He thinks there is a lot of obsession about weight in the peleton. But he explained that he is not like that. He eats a lot but he also burns a lot and thats the way he comes to his weight.

I'm not sure if thats true or if he just says that to sound laid back. But it is certainly different from Fromme, who always highlights how carefully he eats.

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10k - 30:48 / half - 1:06:40