A few years ago, Quintana seemed to lose his turbo. He became timid and reactive; very unfortunate. When he is on form he climbs as good as anyone, but unless he is already far behind in the GC he no longer seems willing to take digs at his opponents. All year he has looked like he is just hanging by a thread with the killer younger Colombians (and other GC skeletons) on all of the big climbs.

I don't think he is holding back form though. I think he has been surpassed by a scary good new crop of young countrymen who can not only climb, but some of who can TT (which Nairo still struggles with). Dani Martinez and especially Egan Bernal have surpassed him. Sosa may have also, but at the World Tour level he has yet to be turned loose on his own accord. Others clearly beyond him are the Yates brothers; Tom D; Froome; Martin; Nibali; Thomas; Gesink? Fuglsang? Lopez? Uran? I could go on and on.

Its not that I'm not a fan, but I think his time has gone. He seems like a good man and seemingly clean as well so I wish him well. When he is on it is golden. I just don't see a win in the cards for him.

I think he's plenty aggressive, even at Paris-Nice. He just can't drop the best climbers at will like we tend to expect. But over the last few years he's one of a very short list of people who directly attacked Froome in Grand Tours. Not a ton of success there, but he has pushed his chips to the middle rather than just racing for 2nd.

I think he wasn't working today simply because he was at his limit and afraid of leaving himself exposed to a counter by Bernal.

Also Movistar did the bulk of the work today in controlling the break despite Lotto being the team of the GC leader.

Go watch Paris-Nice replay and then report back.

I watched that race... it was far from impressive and too few in the last a few seasons.

I think he was just at his limit & has an amazing poker face. If he could have gone he would have.

There is a rule in bike racing: if you don't like someone sucking your wheel, then drop them.
There is no requirement to go to the front and pull.
Think about that when you watch bike racing.

Yeah, an 8-stage race with three lead changes, Quintana throwing everything at Bernal on stage 7 (and Bernal sitting on Quintana’s wheel) and then laying down a 50k attack on final stage is a real snoozer and lack of effort.