HNB Results
by Chris Fontecchio on Feb 28, 2009 11:53 AM EST
in News
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Print- Thor Hushovd (Nor) Cervelo TestTeam
- Kevyn Ista (Bel) Agritubel
- Juan Antonio Flecha (Spa) Rabobank
- Greg Van Avermaet (Bel) Silence Lotto
- Marcus Burghardt (Ger) Team Columbia-Highroad
- Frédéric Amorison (Bel) Landbouwkrediet-Colnago
- Andreas Klier (Ger) Cervelo TestTeam
- Heinrich Haussler (Ger) Cervelo TestTeam
- Niki Terpstra (Ned) Team Milram
- Tom Boonen (Bel) Quick Step
- Discuss...
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Crash
Can someone who has had a chance to watch a nice slow replay tell me exactly what happened in the final sprint and how it impacted the above listed riders?
Otherwise, that was a fantastically enjoyable race. I was really hoping the Hausler duo was going to stay away.
Not 100%
but my interpretation was that HH and then Langeveld went from the right side in to the middle at the same time as the guys behind were winding up and moving left to middle. Pozzato was caught in the closing gap between the two and hit Langeveld who didn’t see him coming up from behind. It looked to me that the only two who were not affected were Thor and Ista (and perhaps Klier who was just done leading out Thor).
Sounds about right.
Boonen said he had to swerve to get around Pippo and lost about 30 metres in the process.
As I watched one of me team members (Langeveld) swing out and almost ruin the
season of another team member (Boonen), all I could think of was “why the hell are you swinging blindly into an onrushing, disorganized, sprint?”
Were I Pozzato I would be pretty torqued off this morning.
"I didn't look for him and I didn't see him. If you base your race on another rider, most of the time you lose."
Tom Boonen
Pozzato.
Ok, not just the obligatory pippo post – did he get hurt, or just blocked from any chance to contest the race?
He crashed pretty hard. Apparently he has a hemotoma in his leg and a very sore elbow
but no word as to how serious it is.
First the obvious
ctv continues to be a pathetic failure that I for some reason keep hoping will get its act together. Now to the race, 3 Germans in the top 10, I’m happy, Burghardt should be leader at Flanders. Also 3 VDSers in the top 10, and Boonen actually wanted to win already, that’s a good sign to me.
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
CTV....then the race (again)
I had organized some friends around for the race, i’m in France, to discover that ‘Worldwide’ doesn’t include a number of European nations…..checked CTV the night before….no mention of this until the day of or late the night before. This is unacceptable…even a week before and I would have been a little miffed. I emailed them…doubt I’ll get a response. I’d like to report them to a Consumer Standards commission or something…but I don’t know to whom to address my/our concerns.
The race:
Excellent….difficult to find fault….though if I was Langeveld, I’d be a little upset with Flecha et al….they injected the impetus that brought the final break back. Lotto and QuickStep should have got together and brought the break back earlier and tried to launch Chava or Gilbert, failing this…hold on for a bunch sprint which I think Boonen would have won if the sprint unfurled per normal.
by bradBordeaux on Feb 28, 2009 12:27 PM EST up reply actions
Guess we'll never know
but I wonder if Langeveld didn’t give the go-ahead for the chase from behind feeling he couldn’t take Haussler in the sprint. He looked fairly spent.
Good job Cervelo
had a guy in a long break, and then the winner, too. 3 guys in the top 10.
Ô col Bayard, Ô Tourmalet, à côté du Galibier, vous êtes de la pale et vulgaire bibine !
Three in the top 20.
All in the sprint with the same time.
Van Avermaet in 4th.
Racing for Victory and Free Beer!
My only VDS comment
I see people talking about how many VDS points they got today. Cool.
Another way to think of it though is realizing that for some riders the Northern Classics are by far the main place they get VDS points during the year. Take, oh Fletcha for instance. After Paris-Roubaix he earns squat. His whole worth for a VDS owner is what he does these six weeks.
Likewise for a few other riders. So when I see Chavanel doing so much work and getting exactly zero points, or Gilbert getting 10 points, Nuyens getting 20, etc. I’m thinking these guys better step it up now or their owners are screwed. Obviously they still have a chance to step it up. But those are points lost today that they won;t get back.
OTOH, guys like Haussler or Ista: these points are bonus.
in the middle are guys like Klier or Amorison: are these points just one off points for the year or can they duplicate theior results later on in Belgium (knowing that after Belgium they are also non-factors)? Every year there are riders that get one good result in Belgium and that’s it.
Thanks for turning my attention to Thor
for this year’s VDS. I’m not sure I’d put him on my team if you hadn’t talked him up. He’s still got a long way to go in order to pile up enough points to make the choice worthwhile, but for a first-time VDS, this is the best way a season could start. I couldn’t ask for more.
Ô col Bayard, Ô Tourmalet, à côté du Galibier, vous êtes de la pale et vulgaire bibine !
I asked Chris to submit Amorison..
After he forgot I’ve never make a point of it but if he’s getting this result I surely gonna regret that
Crashdan: "Veni Vidi Vici beats Wing Kong Exchange... … and I’ll change my signature to a backwards smile for a month."
Veni Vidi Vici beats Txirrindulariak and I win a date..
Hey, why isn't the Insubria GP thing a VDS race?
Ginanni won and he would have picked up some points for me. I hope he actually continues these good results in the bigger races, so I can benefit off him.
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
Is it too late to quickly include the GP Lugano?
he may win that one as well.
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
I'm curious, what impact do you think the Rabo Rush of Blood had on the race?
I have my own ideas, I think that, as a general idea it was a good one, it thinned the group out, it dramatically reduced the gap to the leaders and forced some big names to play a personal role in the chase; but I notice that a number of post race write ups don’t even mention it.
CyclingNews, VeloNews, Eurosport, none of them make mention of it.
They definitely made the race
the thing that didn’t play in their favour was Langeveld ending up in a break he probably couldn’t win from, which locked up the others and made it impossible to utilize their strength in numbers. Not the result of bad tactics or stupidity, just bad luck.
I don't think people should be upset about Rabo's performance
they should be happy. First of all they got a podium, what’s so bad about that? They showed they will be a big threat in April and were the most well represented team in today’s race. Also, they didn’t have a sprinter up there, so it’s no surprise they wanted Langeveld to stay away, at least he only had 1 tough guy to beat, not 15. I don’t know what Rabo could have done much better, they just didn’t have a rider fast enough to beat Hushovd in a sprint.
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
I like them purely for breaking the race apart and making others work
I like aggressiveness and smarts and they came up with the goods.
"I didn't look for him and I didn't see him. If you base your race on another rider, most of the time you lose."
Tom Boonen
Rounding out the top 15, with VDS points
1. Thor Hushovd 250
2. Kevyn Ista 200
3. Juan Antonio Van der Flecha 180
4. Greg Van Avermaet 160
5. Marcus Burghardt 140
6. Frederic Amorison 120
7. Andreas Klier 100
8. Heinrich Haussler 90
9. Nikki Terpstra 80
10. Tom Boonen 70
11. Thomas Voeckler 60
12. Bram Tankink 50
13. David Boucher 40
14. Nick Nuyens 30
15. Philippe Gilbert 15
Google is my domestique.
Not bad
1, 5 and 10 give me 460 pts on the first day. If I can keep up this pace, things will be looking alright!
As a first time VDSer
I’m inferring from this result that there is a ton of value to be found by picking low point riders on the basis that they will be strong enough to make a finale, even if you know they aren’t likely to win. In some ways this seems obvious, but it wasn’t really how I was thinking about my team. As someone else pointed out, Burghardt and Haussler have already paid off more than half their cost. 5th and 8th in a semi-classic aren’t really particularly memorable results, certainly not the kind of things i would have focussed on in thinking about riders. Anyway, 5, 8, 9, 10, 15 is OK I guess.
Right you are!
VDS is sorta like NASCAR where consistent also rans rack up big points. With VDS the big guys, in this case Boonen, Thor, Pozzato, Chavanel, Gilbert, need to podium. The other guys, like the two you mentioned, just need to place high.
yes
i was hoping to see Chav and Gilbert higher up there to bring some initial return on my investment. at least Gilbert rides a long season and holds form; Chav will have to start scoring now as his last season earnings are likely to become a trickle, though i’m not sure how his program will play out with the new team. Flecha made good today, as did Haussler, and i think i about broke even with Van Avermaet…
You may very well think that; I couldn't possibly comment.
good point.
I guess it’s a good strategy (at least when picking cheap riders) to pick a few aggressive guys and stage hunters – even if they don’t win, they’ll tend to be in the mix and gather some points. It won’t do much good to their CV, but could be quite useful to a VDS.
Ô col Bayard, Ô Tourmalet, à côté du Galibier, vous êtes de la pale et vulgaire bibine !
Even if you know the strategy
picking the names is always a bit of a lottery. Who among the one or two pointers has been told to fetch bottles for the first hundred miles then freewheel to the end is something that none of us know. and even those guys sometimes strike it lucky by marking the right break. Bram Tankink did diddly squit for me last year, but I’ve no regrets right now because I don’t think he’ll score much more.
4th and 15th for 165
Not gonna complain.
Cervelo kicked ass today.
Racing for Victory and Free Beer!
I'll take my 150 for today and head to the showers
If I can pull that per race I’m more than happy.
Thank you for the points mr Voecler and Mr. Haussler.
Just spinning the pedals in the hills of Western Maryland
Don't worry
Ursula’s sure to come up with some reasoning as to why that is a really bad thing to do on the first day.
about 8%?
of what you need to break 10k this year, nice haul for a single one-day race!
I got 90 and injuries
Given that our sponsors,
Fromagerie Duval, required a plurality of French riders (we have seven)on our team this year, we are well on our way to meeting our goal: the snakeboat line.
Well, considering that you better than doubled it last year, I'd say that's a safeish bet.
On the other hand…seven French riders?
Google is my domestique.
OK, safe-ISH
but with the seven french riders and the regression to the mean factor…well let’s just say Fromagerie is going for a more Poulidor, less Anquetil appeal in ’09.
Holy crap. - Nice job.
Although with that kind of haul, I’m thinking (with being too lazy to go look at the names) that you’ll need a great spring as once it’s over, so is a majority of your scoring? Or was is your team got a couple high up GC type guys too?
Either way, great job!!!!
"The most wasted day is that in which we have not laughed."
Look at little Tommy Voeckler!
Damn, I left him off this year.
Sometimes I wonder...why is that Frisbee getting bigger?...and then it hits me.
He was one of the couple I kept going back and forth with.
I love the guy’s never quit attitude. Some good heart right there. :-)
"The most wasted day is that in which we have not laughed."
Does anyone here have 2nd place on their team?
Who the hell is Kevyn Ista?!?!?
Racing for Victory and Free Beer!
I kinda wish I had
for 2 points he’s already paid himself off, even if he retires from the sport tonight. Any points he gets from now on is gravy.
He got zero last year btw.
I also see
somebody has already updated his wikipedia page to show today’s result. The page doesn’t say much about him though. All I gleaned is that he’s Belgian and is 24 yo.
Dom Rollin @137th 12:32 back
I’m a little surprised by that. I expected him to do a little better. Did he have any mechanical problems, or just a hard day on the bike?
I wouldn't be at all surprised
to see him in the top 10 tomorrow. Lots of riders do both races this weekend but most have a good day and a bad day.
I suspect that there is something in this
If it was clear that you had missed the race winning move, i.e. when Rabobank lite it up, you could (a) decide to bury yourself and try to get across or (b) turn this into a training/prep ride for tomorrow’s race….
He had a mechanical jsut as Rabo was firing all their guns off the front. They showed him on the coverage. He’ll be there tomorrow…cause Haussler probably won’t be (and Thor’s not starting).
missed that
i’m hoping for good things for/from him tomorrow…
You may very well think that; I couldn't possibly comment.
If Haussler is anywhere in the mix tomorrow
then I’ve considerably underestimated him (and he’s on my VDS team, too).
Haussler definitely spent himself today.
On the other hand, he clearly would have won a two up sprint at the end and you have to think it was only the rabo chase / Langeveld’s unwillingless or inability to share load with him near the end that denied him the victory. He was so clearly the stronger of the two of them it’s silly, and pretty much every time he took a pull in the last 10k the gap started opening up again. Langeveld, either deliberately or by virtue of sheer bloody exhaustion, really sandbagged him.
So I agree with you that if he does anything tomorrow he is either on the form of his life right now or well set up to become a monster sooner rather than later, but I’m not even sure that if he fails to do anything tomorrow those things may not still be true. He has definitely shown something in the past month.
I agree
I think the only way one can consider tomorrow’s race to be possibly indicative of his future is if he gets in the mix again.
Cervello tomorrow
For KBK Cervello will have Reimer and Lancaster in place of Hushovd and Roulston. I can imagine they will do much the same tactics today including putting one rider in the break. That rider almost definitely won’t be Haussler and I can imagine it being Reimer. Then in place of Hushovd I could se either a) Hammond, or b) Haussler with Lancaster being the lead-out instead of Klier.
Anybody hear how Pozzato
is aftet the crash? He was riding well to that point.
From CN:
Pozzato also felt he had good chances of winning. “I was alongside Hushovd when I crashed.” Pozzato suffered a hematoma on his left thigh. “I injured my left elbow, too – it hurts pretty badly.”
Doesn’t sound too serious, I guess. I hope he’ll be OK.
Ô col Bayard, Ô Tourmalet, à côté du Galibier, vous êtes de la pale et vulgaire bibine !
Levi out of P-n fractured sacrum in stage 3 of ATOC
Not good for my team. Also several other Astana injuries at HNB.
Just spinning the pedals in the hills of Western Maryland
So you want to duke this one out?
Pistols at dawn, like?
Its right where the nerves and arteries head to the legs
I had a severly pinched nerve right there in high school that ended my nondescript wrestling carreer.
Just spinning the pedals in the hills of Western Maryland
Wasn't that where Dave Zabriskie injured himself during last year's Giro
that was said to be a minor fracture too and it cost him most of the season.
Yeah, also I seem to remember that Zabriskie fractured vertabrae.
In any case his injuries were doubtless vastly more serious.
Yep!
So says velonews. Had a non-displaced fracture and was wondering why the pain wouldn’t go away post-ToC. Damn. The nugget is even tougher than I realized.
Must have been painkillers that kept him smiling in California.
I remember his being part of that major crash early in the TdF years ago (Tyler Hamilton also broke his Collar bone that same accident but still raced.) VS interviewed him a day or so later in a wheel chair nursing a broken hip. I think it was Rabobank that dumped him that winter.
Speed on the descent can easily be lost when you slam into a tree.
Looks like I jinxed my Astana riders this year
Vaitkus broke his elbow in the final crash today, and Levi is out after fracturing his sacrum.
Not a good VDS start here, zero points today (I was counting on Vaitkus for the classics)
What did I miss?
I was racing this morning. Looks like my man was shut down by the wreck too, no worries, my big man Nick Nuyens will be there tomorrow.
What I want to know is who has Kevyn Ista on their team. And who’s the other idiot besides me that somehow overlooked putting Haussler on their team, geez.
What? did I see that Levi is out with a sacrum fracture? For f#*k sake.
Well he can't be a super domestique for my captain now
oh well, my cap will be fine without him. Levi’s next start will most likely be Castilla Leon, and there he can once again be a super domestique for my captain….Hopefully Levi gets well soon, but I don’t think he will miss any more than P-N.
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
Plus
it’s not like anyone’s counting on him to do anything in Belgium. Yeah, losing him for P-N is a bummer, but if you look at last year, he didn’t get anything until the Giro (and only 45 point there). So I think you’re fine. In fact, looking back at it, not picking him may have been a mistake on my part. We’ll see…
looks like he is
according to the startlist at cyclingfever:
http://startlist.cyclingfever.com/startlist.html?_p=startlijst&id=19162
Ok, reflecting, here's the question:
Is Cervelo about to become this year’s Columbia, even in a small way? I don’t know if their women’s team, while certainly very solid, is all that, but the men look rather amazingly strong even if they don’t quite have a GC threat to make everyone tremble in fear. But they are not only animating the races they are in, but winning quite a few of them in the first month or so, in a way that, if they can keep it up, might just look mighty impressive by the end of the year.
Thoughts?
They are starting off with a bang, I hope they don't fizzle
My feeling is that they are pretty deep and very motivated and wil impress all year long.
Hmmm, similarities are there
they have classics guys and good sprinters, they actually have a GC podium threat in all 3 GT’s though. Sastre in the Giro and Tour and Marchante in the Vuelta(the one gt he can do well in). Another comparison could be, will Haussler be this years Greipel? It could well happen.
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
I'm so pissed I missed him, scratching head as to how.
With my lousy team, that’s probably the least of my worries.
Is Sastre riding the Giro this year?
I had assumed he would ride the Tour and the Vuelta like last year. Hm…
As far as the larger point goes, Cervelo does seem to be shaping up to be stronger than I, at least, had initially realized. But Columbia doesn’t look like they’re any less of a team than last year. Could make for some good racing this year…
Yes, Sastre is going to the Giro and not the Vuelta
he has also says he will go to win. That leaves the Vuelta for Marchante to be leader, I expect he will get a top 10 there(he’s on my VDS so he better!)
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
I would say
that Cervelo have a GC threat that makes a lot more people tremble in fear than Columbia.
Kirchen (or Rogers, or Lovkvist, or Monfort, or Big George) is no Sastre.
I agree on the GC point...
I didn’t mean to suggest that either team didn’t have one, but I should have pointed out that Cervelo has much more of one.
Part of what I’m interested in is the way a few guys seem to have blossomed there who were struggling or only doing middling well where they had been before. I wonder if this is a different approach, or more a matter of being given better opportunities.
(with the caveat that it is still early, of course)
Sorry I missed race
… other plans (lame excuse?)
but pretty inspiring reading through the threads …. what a place!
formerly known as cyclingchallenge
Thor isn't starting tomorrow, so maybe Haussler can have another go at it
oh and what happened to Ciolek? I was too busy attempting to get into the ctv feed that I didn’t notice, I just read on the live thread that he abandoned.
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
Oh, maybe I read something about a mechanical
or maybe I was so frustrated at ctv that I just imagined readind something that didn’t happen. Anyways I expect him to be in contention tomorrow.
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
No, he did crash. It just doesn't look like he abandoned.
According to Gerry van Gerwen of Milram:
Fortunately, Gerald and Martin [Velits] came away with only bruises and minor injuries, so both of them can try their luck tomorrow at Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne."—VeloNews
Google is my domestique.
Oh, luckily
these damn early season crashes are so scary!
"If you go (with a break), you can either win or not win. If you don't go for it, you definitely won't win."
~ Jens Voigt
This thread reminds me that last year there were frequently two post race threads.
One for discussion of the race results and incidents etc..
Second for VDS bragging rights etc.
And occasionally a third for the CTV rants.
Speed on the descent can easily be lost when you slam into a tree.
Dominique Rollin had a mechanical. Hons posted it in second live thread.
Rollin
mechanical :(
by Hons on Feb 28, 2009 6:28 AM PST
saw it live on the french feed. Mentioned him by name and talked about the ToC…and I saw his #
by Hons on Feb 28, 2009 6:31 AM PST
Domoneyique!!!!!
My new nickname for him. Must have been the poutine and booze….
This guy has a serious engine. Good to see a Canadian with the power to ride with the Euros. Let’s hope he can work for Thor for the next month. If he can get Thor to Arenberg, he may have a real shot at it.
As for those uniforms, starting to work on me. Once you see the arms raised, it all makes sense as to why the logo is placed the way it is.
Not getting the logo. Two mice nose to nose? Or a single animal face (fox? cat?) full on?
Thor with arms raised in Rorschach jersey. What do you see?
Google is my domestique.
+1
This guy has a serious engine. Good to see a Canadian with the power to ride with the Euros.
i like the Cervelo kit, too, including the logo – way better than what Columbia got for sure…
You may very well think that; I couldn't possibly comment.
I'm trying to thing of something sufficiently bad to substitute for the Columbia kit...
…in order to make clear how um, well, weak a compliment it is to say something is better than it. Bubonic plague, maybe?
Is a zebra
Black with white stripes or white with black stripes?
I do see what you are saying. Thanks. Now that’s all I’ll see.
Stil waaaaayyyyy better than Columbia. is P90X is small sponsor on that team? How else can you explain the six packs?
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