Dauphine Libere Race Recap
by ursula on Jun 14, 2009 10:39 AM EDT
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First, chapeau to Stef Clement for the final stage win!
Second, the final top 10:
GC
1. Valverde 2. Evans 16"
3. Contador 1' 18" 4. Gesink 2'41"
5.Astarloza 3'40" 6. Fuglsang 4'08"
7. Nibali 4'21" 8.Zubeldia 5'05"
9. Millar 5'28" 10. Le Mevel 6' 19"
So, in the end, what do we leave this race with?
1) Alejandro Valverde. If this is his last race then he leaves as a champion. His attack on Mt Ventoux was classic. He then defended against repeated Cadel Evans' attacks. Chapeau Alejandro!
2. Cadel Evans: Physical abilities 10 out of 10. Mental abilities 6 out of 10. Cadel's physical form looked better than any other rider in this race. That of course begs a couple of questions. First, and we'll be hearing this for a few weeks now, is he peaking too soon? My guess is no: he's shown the last two years that he can put in a hard Dauphine and follow it up with a hard TdF.
The next question is has he learned how to beat the other best riders in the world? The answer looks equally clear: no. Yeah, I know that folks loved how he attacked Valverde the last two days. I agree it was fun to watch. But it was ineffective and in the end that's what matters. First he worried about the wrong riders up Mt Ventoux- not only Contador but also Gesink and Fuglsang-and lost his lead. Second he just could not figure out how to shake Valverde and Contador on any climbs. Considering that Contador didn't look in top form, that's got to be concerning for Cadel.
On the plus side, Cadel has a possibly decent team with him now. No they aren't Saxo or Astana or Rabobank or Liquigas but one can imagine Cadel getting a little help in the upcoming Tour.
3. Alberto Contador: politician? First lets all realize that Contador did what he said he was gonna do: not ride for the GC. No sandbagging. He was here to ride into shape, and that he did. But second, and maybe just as important, he did crucial domestique work for Valverde, and Al appreciated it; I'm sure Valverde's teammates appreciated it too. Come Tour time, with Caisse d'Epargne no longer having a real GC threat, Contador will feel good about asking them for occasional and possibly crucial help. Nice to have two teams working for you.
4. Jakob Fuglsang- newest relevation. Yet another kid who looks to have serious GC hopes over the next few years. Saxo is reloading. Hopefully this kid will lead them in the Vuelta if Andy Schleck doesn't race there?
5. Great course this year, no?
Now on the Suisse.. Ster Elektrotoer... national champiuonships,, and the Tour. And remember... Savant! loves you!
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It's no secret that I love the Dauphiné
But I can’t help feeling a little funny about a race where the winner is currently suspended in Italy for doping offenses, and the 3rd place finisher wasn’t really interested in winning.
But what a great course this year!
sometimes life is a false flat
1) Alejandro Valverde.
If this is his last race then he leaves as champion a lucky bastard that managed to cheat another few unlucky sods before taking a well deserved rest.
Potato potatoe
How many points does he finish with for the year? -- assuming he's chuicked out.
Will he get to keep what he earned?
Let's see
I’m just estimating that he will have about oh… about 1000 points after this race, maybe a bit more. It will be interesting to see if he’s suspended before the Spanish national championships where he could earn more points.
He keeps all his points. Rule of thumb with VDS points: if the final standings has a rider in a points-earning place, he keeps them. So Colom still has his points too.
Anybody have 1, 2, 3 on the jerseys?
I have Evans winning points and Fedrigo mountains, but don’t know 2nd and 3rd for those.
I can't understand why people cheat--Mark Cavendish
Correction...they have the mountains, not the points. Oh, well--almost there...
I can't understand why people cheat--Mark Cavendish
Nice day for Garmin, by the way.
Duggan 2nd in last Dauphine stage, Farrar won Delta Tour of Zeeland.
I can't understand why people cheat--Mark Cavendish
Incidentally, Farrar also won all the other jerseys in Zeeland
Young rider, intermediate sprints, points. Not the team GC, though, that one was for the combined Rabo CT/PT team (racing as “National Selection” which is bullshit).
Tyler 'Cannibal' Farrar
Somehow that just doesn’t sound anywere near as cool when Merckx pulled similar stunts in the TdF.
"Where there’s a will, there’s a way.": Alberto Contador, shortly after waking up from brain surgery.
If Farrar ever pulls that off in the Tour, I'll call him whatever he wants.
I can't understand why people cheat--Mark Cavendish
Hooray for Timmy Duggan
Been quite the year for the local Boulder boy. Coming back from the crash he had was hard and now to put in a quality effort. Looking forward to good stuff from him!
25s on dirt, what's not to like?
?Where did he come from.. Don't know the guy and he's here out of the blue..
Become second from a 25 men strong breakaway.. Impressive
Crashdan: "Veni Vidi Vici beats Wing Kong Exchange... … and I’ll change my signature to a backwards smile for a month."
Frining "It's what he thinks.. But he always do.. I eat my shoe if he ride top 15 in le Tour" about Devolder
Enjoyed the race however
I am not completely thrilled with Astana riding for CdE. Another thing that bugs me is that if Cadel doesn’t attack, people criticize him and if he attacks the crap out of the field, people criticize him. Which is it? Attacking Cadel or wheel sucking Cadel? It has to be one or the other. I don’t hear anyone criticizing Valverde, who is most likely as dirty as they come and most certainly about to be suspended for the next two years or Contador who is helping that same dirty rider. Just venting, that’s all.
If I just had one more gear, I...
I don't get the Cadel critique either this time
He tried, he failed, he tried again but the odds were stacked against him.
If anything he needs to try and formulate a different style of attack but against better pure climbers it’s always going to be hard.
well
i guess you could criticize cadel’s inability to effectively attack on climbs like those. But then that explains why he often doesn’t attack – he knows he’s not going to win that way. I think a lot of people are just not big fans of his, or dislike his style, his lack of personality, etc, and so they criticize. I don’t have anything against him, myself. He is who he is.
As for Contador – i don’t take it that he was necessarily helping or riding for cde or valverde, he just didn’t expend the energy to try to win himself. He didn’t try to beat valverde but i don’t really see that he helped them just because he didn’t help Cadel either, or go for first place himself. He did announce before the race that he wasn’t really there to win.
Contador
Did not help Cadel chase Valv. He did help Valv bring back Evans. There sure was some helping of CdE going on there. He is allowed to do that of course.
I guess Evans biggest problem stemmed from the fact that he is no patron of the peloton. Armstrong, Hinault, Merckx etc. would not have to put up with that kind of shit.
"Where there’s a will, there’s a way.": Alberto Contador, shortly after waking up from brain surgery.
Bert didn't not come to DL to win
he’s training. or, as I read somewhere, trying to get into Cadel’s head at the same time…
looks like mission accomplished.
Contador was actually honing his patron skills
A patron does not always win, but he does decide who gets to win. Perfect example in DL this year.
"Where there’s a will, there’s a way.": Alberto Contador, shortly after waking up from brain surgery.
I didn't mind Cadel attacking at all- it was great in fact.
he had two problems:
- First he sucked the wrong wheels up Mt Ventoux. Anyone care to dispute that?
Second, as been said above, his attacking is not quick enough to crack Contador who has a much faster acceleration. Possibly Evans could keep attacking and eventually Contador would attack, but he needs more mountain to do that and it’s equally likely that Contador could outlast him at least at the Tour.
But all in all I never bought into his wheelsucking negative image here; it’s just that as we saw his attacking style is not decisive so he doesn’t do it much.
Be that as it may, Evans now has to think of alternative ways to shake Contador and the rest at the Tour. Different places to attack.
"Evans now has to think of alternative ways to shake Contador "
Are you all picturing Cadel sobbing quietly as he watched AC smoke the TT in Paris-Nice too?
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