chris froome

mcgratheoin

MPFG wrote: »

The anti SKY bias is remarkable and unjustified by so many ..

Completely disagree. There has been barely a word written about SKY in British media that wasn't complimentary and suggesting that it's an anti-British sentiment from continental media and a SKY witchhunt. This is because the general British and Irish media don't give a hoot about cycling except when the tour is on. I've heard so many people say that "nobody said anything when Astana were so strong in the Giro" but what that really means is that nobody said anything in English! To judge the zeitgeist of the entire cycling world based on media reactions to the TDF is ridiculous and feeds into the same reactionary jingoism that we always see, be it American, Spanish, Kazakh or British.

diomed

mistermatthew wrote: »

He had a knee injury, that's why he was holding the car. People pretend it was because he was getting dropped.
I don't know if this is what you have read or believe. But it was not a lack of ability to complete the climb that had him holding the car. It was injury. His previous grand tour before the dq was 34th on GC in the tour, showing surviving the climbs was not an issue.

Chris Froome was disqualified for holding onto a car going up a climb on stage 19 of the 2010 Giro d’Italia. He said he had a knee problem.

Ok, let’s say he had a bad day on stage 19. Let us believe his story that he had a bad knee.

Can we find some place on the 2010 Giro d’Italia where he was healthy and doing well? (Stage 1 was only 8.4 km)

After stage 18:- 104th Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 2:25:03
(the day before he held on to the car and was disqualified)
After stage 10:- 131th Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 1:03:13
After stage 8:- 116th Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 0:53:46
After stage 5:- 163rd Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 0:16:01

He was 104th of 151 the day before he was disqualified in 2010, about 2 1/2 hours behind the leader.
The following year he was 2nd in the Vuelta Espana.

Doc07

mcgratheoin wrote: »

Completely disagree. There has been barely a word written about SKY in British media that wasn't complimentary and suggesting that it's an anti-British sentiment from continental media and a SKY witchhunt. This is because the general British and Irish media don't give a hoot about cycling except when the tour is on. I've heard so many people say that "nobody said anything when Astana were so strong in the Giro" but what that really means is that nobody said anything in English! To judge the zeitgeist of the entire cycling world based on media reactions to the TDF is ridiculous and feeds into the same reactionary jingoism that we always see, be it American, Spanish, Kazakh or British.

That's a good point. If its not in English (or if the winners dont speak English) then it's like it never happened. You could easily believe the only doping scandals were Armstrong and Festina if you only read english language media. The year before the Festina scandal there was a very similar haul of drugs at the 1997 Giro. Not that you would ever know as it never made it to English speaking media. Pantani was involved in a doping trial in Italy that stretched over a couple of years in the early 2000's. He was at the time probably the highest paid cyclist in the word but I barely knew who he was despite always reading the sports sections of the times, independent etc. Frank Vandebrooke is another example of a crazy situation never making it into mainstream media.

odyssey06

Hmm, Bradley Wiggins finished the Giro in 2008 in 134th place... In 2009 he was officially on the podium in the Tour de France... go figure. Seems Froome isn't the first Team Sky rider to jump 100+ places from one year to the next...

eeeee

Ok people are treading a very fine line speculation wise. No more hints, wonderings or…speculation. There will be deletions!

mistermatthew

He was injured at that race. Stage 19 was the point he pulled out.

The previous season was a better indication of results. He was consistently a top 20% finisher on mountain stage. He was never a bad climber.

diomed wrote: »

Chris Froome was disqualified for holding onto a car going up a climb on stage 19 of the 2010 Giro d’Italia. He said he had a knee problem.

Ok, let’s say he had a bad day on stage 19. Let us believe his story that he had a bad knee.

Can we find some place on the 2010 Giro d’Italia where he was healthy and doing well? (Stage 1 was only 8.4 km)

After stage 18:- 104th Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 2:25:03
(the day before he held on to the car and was disqualified)
After stage 10:- 131th Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 1:03:13
After stage 8:- 116th Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 0:53:46
After stage 5:- 163rd Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 0:16:01

He was 104th of 151 the day before he was disqualified in 2010, about 2 1/2 hours behind the leader.
The following year he was 2nd in the Vuelta Espana.

Captain Havoc

Just to add to Gadreta's post, speculation about athletes in other sports is the same as speculation about cyclists.

StevieGriff

diomed wrote: »

Chris Froome was disqualified for holding onto a car going up a climb on stage 19 of the 2010 Giro d’Italia. He said he had a knee problem.

Ok, let’s say he had a bad day on stage 19. Let us believe his story that he had a bad knee.

Can we find some place on the 2010 Giro d’Italia where he was healthy and doing well? (Stage 1 was only 8.4 km)

After stage 18:- 104th Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 2:25:03
(the day before he held on to the car and was disqualified)
After stage 10:- 131th Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 1:03:13
After stage 8:- 116th Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 0:53:46
After stage 5:- 163rd Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 0:16:01

He was 104th of 151 the day before he was disqualified in 2010, about 2 1/2 hours behind the leader.
The following year he was 2nd in the Vuelta Espana.

He came second in the British National TT a few months later and then went on to do a solid winter with the probably the best team on the planet for improving and molding riders who already CLEARLY had potential. (Sweeping statement alert)> I think all of the naysayers who immediately presume anyone who makes big improvements has never once pushed themselves in training and just can't fathom hard work so they presume something untoward is going on.

diomed

mistermatthew wrote: »

He was injured at that race. Stage 19 was the point he pulled out.

The previous season was a better indication of results. He was consistently a top 20% finisher on mountain stage. He was never a bad climber.

You seem to be labouring the point about whether he was/was not a good climber.

Although you say he was injured on stage 19 in the 2010 Giro d'Italia when he was disqualified I see he was 23rd on stage 14, and 39th on the stage 16 time trial, but still hours away from a grand tour contender. He lost plenty of time on every stage.

In the previous Giro d'Italia, 2009, you say he was in the top 20% on climbs when he finished 34th overall.
He finished 7th in the young riders classification.
He was 1h 15m 21s behind on General Classification in 34th.
Perhaps he didn't lose all that time on the climbs. He must have lost it on the flat stages.

He went from hours behind to grand tour podiums in a year.

MPFG

mcgratheoin wrote: »

Completely disagree. There has been barely a word written about SKY in British media that wasn't complimentary and suggesting that it's an anti-British sentiment from continental media and a SKY witchhunt. This is because the general British and Irish media don't give a hoot about cycling except when the tour is on. I've heard so many people say that "nobody said anything when Astana were so strong in the Giro" but what that really means is that nobody said anything in English! To judge the zeitgeist of the entire cycling world based on media reactions to the TDF is ridiculous and feeds into the same reactionary jingoism that we always see, be it American, Spanish, Kazakh or British.

I have not read the British media nor did I judge anything on British media which you ironically seem to be doing while preaching about it. Maybe you might consider how ridiculous your argument actually is to make a judgement without any credence or understanding of my point and then jump to insane conclusion about my point eg "To judge the zeitgeist of the entire cycling world based on media reactions to the TDF is ridiculous and feeds into the same reactionary jingoism that we always see "


There is enough anti SKY sentiment on here with spurious arguments about SKY must be whiter than white and that is what I am referring to and "Quintana is clean but oh I cannot say about Froome arguments" which in itself is an allusion of guilt by comparison and a personal judgement as who knows any more about one rider beyond the other

And even if the British media wrote all kinds of rubbish what has that to do with the attitude of French or Danish or Irish to team SKY where I have seen most anti SKY comments

It seems to me that on here SKY MUST be guilty of something for some people to be satisfied...arrogance, false promises, being too good. employing the wrong people, not employing the wrong people, improving riders, being overly backed by the British media, not being transparent, not being transparent enough , wining too well, poor PR,etc etc

Or arguments like "cycling isn't clean so Froome isn't clean but hey without any evidence I say Giant , Cannondale/Garmin , etc are because I like them or I bought there media savvy campaign"

So basically I will sully a whole team without any evidence , justify it by saying well there is no credible evidence so I am justified in my view point while at the same time backing other teams or riders as clean under the same rules

Or maybe I will use the argument of improvement over time as evidence while ignoring that a rider can be ill , not in the right environment and improve later in career as has happened in many sports

Or the performance is too good will be my argument while all the while ignoring better performance or when performance is poor
Or maybe I will just say " I am not saying anything about SKY BUT,,,," because that is enough

But I guess if you want to hang someone out to dry you will and to hell with any logic

Raymzor

DonegalBay wrote: »

Why is there more belief in Quintana than Froome?

Quintana was seen as a huge talent from a young age, the team he developed at in Colombia were noted for their anti-doping stance. They willingly joined the Bio-Passport program even though as a continental team, there was no requirement to do so and it cost them big time financially. But they believed in doing it correctly.

Quintana came to Europe at 20 and dominated the Tour de L'Avenir which is the biggest development race in the world. In his first GT, he was up there as the main domestique for Valverde. 2nd in his first Tour at 23, 1st in his first Giro and now 2nd again in the Tour all before he has left the young rider category.

Compare that to Froomes career progression and it easy to see why there is more belief in one than the other.

Quintanas size and frame is built for climbing, compared to Froome he is weak at the TT but as there was no TT this year, it didn't have an effect. Froome can match the best climbers and the best TT riders which again is unusual. Quintana cannot.

To me Quintana is a huge talent who is on the edge of believabilty, evrything about his development, strengths, weaknesses seems par for the course of what is accepted as normal.

Froome on the other hand!!!

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/racing/tour-de-france/what-can-we-learn-from-chris-froomes-power-data-183677

It would be useful for Sky and Movistar and Astana to publish data for Froome, Quintana and Nibali for the last two mountain stages. Froome looked very fragile on those stages. Nibali struggled on Saturday after the big efforts Friday. Quintana was going really well which was expected. Hard to believe The time Quintana lost on Stage 2 is what settled the tour. Those windy days!

walshb

Nermal wrote: »

- Has absolutely THRASHED the times of known dopers while jogging past the finish line

You don't see how silly that sounds? It's like a case of Bolt being given the top drugs, and others being given the average drugs.

odyssey06

Back to the 2009 Giro... four out of the original top 10 in the GC in that year were subsequently disqualified.
It's 'official' winner, Menchov had been banned (for a period of two years) until 9 April 2015 due to adverse biological passport findings. Due to this, he has been disqualified retrospectively from the 2009, 2010 and 2012 Tours de France. But not the Giro.

So on the working assumption that Froome is clean, his 2009 results should be assessed in that context.

mistermatthew

In what world is Chris froome possibly the greatest grand tour rider ever?

DonegalBay wrote: »

Improving is one thing, improving from average to possibly the greatest Tour rider ever is something else altogther. Never really happened like that before the 90s.

For context some of the other biggest historical improvements in cycling were

Claudio Chiappucci(average pro to Tour contender aged 27)
Gianni Bugno(good rider to superstar aged 27)
Miguel Indurain(climbing with Paul Kimmage in 87 Tour, 5 time winner from 91)
Bjarne Riis(from almost the dole queue after 3 seasons as a pro to Tour winner aged 32)
Lance Armstrong(ironically the smallest jump from top one day rider to Tour winner)

Forgot another Michael Rasmussen

LeoD

mistermatthew wrote: »

In what world is Chris froome possibly the greatest grand tour rider ever?

He clearly could have won the Tour in 2012 but had to drag Wiggins up every mountain as per his job description. When given the team leadership the following year he pi**ed home without a bother. Last year, who knows but you certainly wouldn't have bet against him and this year it was a pretty straight forward procession to the finish despite the 15 mins of excitement on Alpe d'Huez. Chris Froome could very easily have 4 Tour victories under his belt by now and he probably has a few more to come so it isn't inconceivable to think that he could be the greatest grand tour rider ever.

Chips Lovell

Locked, since it's just become another doping speculation thread, despite mod warnings. Well done folks