Seems like Heras has contacted a lawyer to leave USPS one year early in order to join Liberty Seguros (the new team of manolo saiz) to be the leader…
Bruynel has declared he didn’t like the situation but couldn’t do anything to keep Heras within the team and if he wanted to leave, then he would…
(www.lequipe.fr in french)
Oh dear. that may scupper Lance’s plans for next year. We better hope that Beltran is in good climbing shape for the tour or Armstrong has no chance…
What did Heras do this year in the Tour? Nothing, he was sick for most of the race and Lance mananaged to win without his help. Will this hurt Lance next year, sure beacuse the team won’t be as strong, but I don’t think it will be the difference between Lance winning and losing.
If Heras does leave, that should make the TT up Alpe d’Huez a little more interesting since Heras would be riding it to win since he wouldn’t have to be riding in support of Lance.
Agree. Heras departure makes a mountain top win for Armstrong a bit less likely, but Heras is still a very small threat to the overall. As long as he has Ekimov, Pena, and Hincapie to help pull him through the TTT, the only thing Armstong needs to worry about is showing up in good shape and keeping the rubber side down.
Make no mistake about it, Heras is an integral member of the USPS TdF strategy. They will have to change that strategy, but LA is still the strongest TdF rider out there. You need to be able to do two things in the tour TT and climb. You also need a team to protect you when people gang up on you (as was witnessed in the last Tour). Leaders of various teams continually pounded LA, and he suffered for it without the help of his teammates. If that happens again this year (especially with Heras as one of the attackers), LA may not be able to hold on… Will be very interesting indeed.
Every year, year after year, there is always a huge discussion about how strong US Postal will be. Great riders win the Tour because they are the men that crush their opposition when the road tilts skyward, or in the case of Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain, they simply time trial a level above the rest of the field.
As good as Lance’s team has been over the years, Armstrong was the one who put all his foes to the wayside. A really good team can make things easier, but they can’t win the tour for you. Especially with the new policy that you can only lose a certain amount of time in the team time trial, a great team will only get you so far.
Greg LeMond won the ’89 tour and he finished with four teammates.
The last dominating team in the Tour de France was La Vie Claire in 1986. They had riders in 1st, 2nd, 4th, 7th, 12th and 22nd place in the final GC. As a team they just ground the opposition to dust one by one until only LeMond and Hinault were left. Andy Hampsten was 4th in his rookie tour and it took him eight years of being a team leader to equal that finish that he did with La Vie Claire.
Robert Heras is not Greg LeMond, Bernard Hinault or for that matter, even Andy Hampsten.
If Lance Armstrong prepares as he always has and comes to the tour ready, he will win again, even if he had me for a teammate. For four years he was so clearly the best rider that the race was as ho-hum as Miguel Indurain’s dominating wins. If his fitness is not as complete as usual, or his motivation is not there, then a great team won’t save him.
Discount Jan Ullrich for next year’s tour. Let’s stop kidding ourselves. Without the Team Time Trial this year, Lance doesn’t win #5. It’s as simple as that. The team time trial put Euskatel at a huge disadvantage in the mountains, and allowed Lance to focus only on Jan. Especially after the Beloki crash. The TTT also gave Lance the time he needed to keep Jan at bay. And Jan’s team wasn’t exactly built for the TTT, nor were they as cohesive as US Postal. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a Lance fan, and don’t want to start a flame war. However, has anyone seen Jan’s team for 2004? The roster reads like a who’s who of cycling. Not to mention that small swiss team that is buying up all the talent they can get their hands on (Phonak) to support my favorite american rider. Throw Heras into the mix, who, with Tyler, knows exactly how Lance operates. Not to mention Euskatel can build their team around climbers and all but forget about the TTT, and only lose 2:30 to the winner. If it is possible to top the excitement of the 2003 tour, 2004 has the makings of an Epic tour. It will be an interesting July. Interesting, indeed…
There is no way you can point to one day in a three-week stage race and say that with a different result that Ulrich wins. Just for the sake of speculation let’s say that Lance and Jan finish the TTT dead even.
What if Lance doesn’t warm up in the heat and get dehydrated for the first ind. TT? Maybe then he buries Jan and not the other way around. Let’s say that Ulrich takes the Yellow Jersey and now he has to deal with the day-to-day stress of defending his lead against all comers. Lance sits in and instead of putting a minute or so into Jan at Luz Ardiden, he comes in well rested, doesn’t crash and destroys the field by five minutes as he has done in the past.
The truth of the ’03 Tour came on the slopes of Luz Ardiden when Jan and the others folded under the pressure of the race and Lance did not. If I wanted to win the Tour I would prefer a well-established team that I know will support me and be there when I need it. New teams don’t always work out the way that riders hope. We shall see…
you guys are funny…
I give one info about Heras and everyone draws conclusions like what I am really saying is that Lance will have a weaker team etc…etc…
I agree with CDW…the leader makes the team.
That said to say that Lance is the only one who decides if he will win or not is not knowing cycling at all…
I always wondered what would have happened if Beltran didn’t move to USPS and rode for Jan. Heras didn’t do that much in the mountains this year, Beltran did most of the work, would Jan have won if the entire Cost team stuck together during the hard times?
And I love Lance but I am more interested in seeing a great race like 2003, 2002 was no fun at all.
A
I just got the following in my USPS-enewsletter. What a bummer!! -Trisha ============================================== THE NEWSLETTER FROM THE USPOSTAL-BERRYFLOOR PRO CYCLING TEAM
Roberto Heras choses for Liberty Seguros. Vuelta-winner Roberto Heras has decided to sign for Liberty Seguros, the new team of Manolo Saiz, former director sportif with Once-Eroski. Earlier on, 20 Saiz had unsuccessfully tried to sign Alejandro Valverde and Joseba Beloki.
<<Earlier on, 20 Saiz had unsuccessfully tried to sign Alejandro Valverde and Joseba Beloki.>>
How is Beloki doing after that crash? Didn’t he have multiple fractures including hip and wrist? That’s gotta keep one off the bike for a while. Shoot, if I wiped out doing 40 plus on a decent, I’d have the willies getting back on the indoor trainer…
Brett
Beloki and his brother just did a small training camp with the Brioches boys in France. There is an article on it on cyclingnews.com (or was it PezCycling). He’s back on the bike and looking forward to his new team.
I always seem to be in the minority when it comes to what Tours I like the most. I like dominating performances. They are truly amazing to watch to me. I absolutely hate to watch people ride poorly - I have always been good at watching something and then executing it myself, so I am at the heart of it afraid that their bad form will be contagious and really don’t want to watch. Most people seem to enjoy bad football played in close games too judging by the NFL ratings.
I liked the Vuelta this year just to see Heras win the last mountain TT, which was probably the most beautiful ride of the year. The 2003 Tour is one I will probably rarely watch again since nobody was really on form other than Beloki and he was out early.
he has actually signed with Brioches-La Boulangere
about 2 weeks ago.
he has actually signed with Brioches-La Boulangere
about 2 weeks ago.<
I assumed that everyone already knew that he’d signed with them (and assumed that everyone reads cyclingnews.com or velonews.) The camp was the first get-together of the team.
as far as head to head with Armstrong, that may not even happen next year. if I were a new spanish team (i assume they are spanish) trying to secure local sponsors I may want to focus on the tour of spain intead. he is a proven commodity there and he is from spain. challenging lance in july would really hurt him come time for spain. maybe focus on italy and spain this year, wait until armstrong is gone and then hit france. is it financialy wise for a new team to take a chance of imploding against the blue train in france or stepping in for ONCE in spain.
last year only Ulrich could challenge Lance.
that said you never know what the next year will bring…there are some very talented young riders out there, Mayo, Basso, Chavanel (needs a couple of more years though)…
in 1990, Indurain was a very good rider, won one stage in the TDF (a mountain finish in front of Lemond if I recall) the next year he started a 5 year reign…
that said I agree that Saiz should probably focus on the Vuelta for his new spanish team (partially US actually as Liberty is the spanish division of a US company…insurances If I remember?)
$$$ seems to make the cycling world go round.
you can remove cycling…