"The 33"-Road Bike Racing - Cipo - why noit finish something

Is anyone else out there tired of hearing how Cipo is going to ride in a grand tour "until the first serious mountain stage"? I have only been following international cycling for a few years. As a nubie I have to say that I find it much more interesting to watch the all around riders than the super specailists like Cipo. At first I thought he was cool and routed for him. After last year when he just kind of quit everything I started wondering.

Now I read on VeloNews' web page that he is already planning to abandon the Giro before it even begins!! I understand his desire to do track, but I think he does cycling a disservice by becoming the "King of Abandonment". Aside from one day races, he hasn't finished anything lately (yes, I know he was injured in last years Giro). His pathetic performance at the Veulta was not the behavior of a champion. Perhaps Leblanc & co. were right when they elected not to invite him to the TDF last year because of his habbit of abandoning when things got tough in the past. You didn't hear Tyler Hamilton saying "I quit"!! Oh, and he never "retired" in a flurish in the midst of one of his best seasons either.

How about it Mario!! Lets see you train to FINISH a grand tour this year!! Then you will deserve the title "Super Mario"!!

Some of us feel the same way. Though I respect him as a sprinter, I don't respect him as a rider. Zabel can beat 9 out of 10 people in a sprint and still finish a tour.

I guess it is all about priorities!

Priorities is exactly right....Cippo goes out to win stages, not the Tours......in the same way Lance goes out to win the TdF but doesn't ride the Giro or Vuelta.

Priorities is exactly right....Cippo goes out to win stages, not the Tours......in the same way Lance goes out to win the TdF but doesn't ride the Giro or Vuelta.


well I think planning to abandon a race is much different than deciding not to ride it in the first place. The idea of a grand tour is to ride 21 stages. Abandoning is sort of like racing for the intermediate sprint prizes and then quitting before the finish.
I dont think all the pros are supposed to ride every grand tour each year.

I just dont like it because Cipo can train just for the first week, and race and try to beat guys that have trained to handle a 3 week race... I dont think that is very fair (but what can ya do?)

there is nothing terribly unusual about a sprinter abandoning a stage race when it heads into the mountains. petacchi did this in all three grand tours this year. mcewen has done it. so have many of the one-day classics guys. this is normal.

having said that, cipollini has finished the giro three or four times, including 2002 and 2001. he has the record for giro stage wins, and has won some of the toughest races on the calendar. he is anamazing athlete and he has nothing to prove.

there is nothing terribly unusual about a sprinter abandoning a stage race when it heads into the mountains. petacchi did this in all three grand tours this year.

Petacchi did finish the Vuelta this year. My guess is that he didn't want to be compared to Cippo in that (quitter) way. :D

Priorities is exactly right....Cippo goes out to win stages, not the Tours......in the same way Lance goes out to win the TdF but doesn't ride the Giro or Vuelta.

Lance doesn't abandon the TDF though. That's the difference.

It's the Tour De France. Not the five day tour of the flatlands.

To win a bunch of stages is good. To win a bunch of stages AND finish the race is great.

he has nothing to prove.

Sure he does. That he can finish the worlds biggest bike race.

there is nothing terribly unusual about a sprinter abandoning a stage race when it heads into the mountains. petacchi did this in all three grand tours this year.

He abandoned one grand tour. He finished the vuelta, and missed the time cut on a late stage in the giro (I believe 30+ riders missed the time cut so you cant say that was on purpose, only a few days from the finish)

You are right that Cipo has nothing to prove though. Maybe he has something to prove with his wins of today, but he has a damn good career history.

He abandoned one grand tour

He's entered 6 TDFs and finished none.

Again, the TDF is not a 5 stage race.

http://www.first-contact.demon.co.uk/cycling3/chip.jpg

Mario on the Col de Restefond during the 1993 Tour de France.

Let's all add a caption. I'll start:

"Why can't I be a complete rider like Indurain or Kelly???"

well I think planning to abandon a race is much different than deciding not to ride it in the first place. The idea of a grand tour is to ride 21 stages. Abandoning is sort of like racing for the intermediate sprint prizes and then quitting before the finish.
I dont think all the pros are supposed to ride every grand tour each year.

I just dont like it because Cipo can train just for the first week, and race and try to beat guys that have trained to handle a 3 week race... I dont think that is very fair (but what can ya do?)

I don't think there is anything wrong with it....it's his strategy to achieve his objectives. And he doesn't just train for the first week of the TdF...he has wins throughout the year. Like I said, how does that compare to Lance "just" (as you put it) training to win one tour. Both of them work very, very hard, and both work to acheive their respective objectives.
Some would say it's not fair that Lance only rides one grand tour when many other riders, especially the Italians are almost required to ride at least the Giro and the TdF. I happen to think it is fair.....and I also think it is fair for Cippo to acheive his objective of winning sprint stages while disregarding the overall race. Cippo may be considered in a less favorable light than, say, Zabel, who does complete tours. Maybe in 20 years time Lance will be considered in a less favorable light than, say, Indurain, who competed and won more than one grand tour in a year.

http://www.first-contact.demon.co.uk/cycling3/chip.jpgLet's all add a caption. I'll start:

"Why can't I be a complete rider like Indurain or Kelly???"
i'd like to see cipo of today, near the end of his career, up against indurain in his prime in a bunch sprint. :)

as for kelly... well, they didn't call him "the animal" for nothing.

No point in dissing Cipo for not finishing a tour now! Mario's a one trick pony... if he tried to finish a stage race, it would come off all wrong... 'washed up sprinter suffering at the back of the pack misses the time cut.'

Besides, he won stages. He was in the headlines. Personally, I admire riders like Ekimov, Hincapie, heck, even Lombardy, and others whose names escape me at the moment (what does that tell you) but they don't win. Fans and sponsors want winners.

(Yes, there are exceptions, Museeuw (sp?) comes to mind.)

as for kelly... well, they didn't call him "the animal" for nothing.

Sorry to get off topic here, but the mention of Sean Kelly, a complete rider in every sense ala Laurent Jalabert, reminds me of the story about how Sean found himself boxed in between two riders with the finish line rapidly approaching. Unable to get through the inches between their bars, he simply picked up the front of his bike and threw his bars over theirs to get past them, of course creating massive chaos. He finished ahead of them but was disqualified. This, or his descent of the Poggio to beat Argentin at the line in Milan-San Remo, is the most memorable Kelly moment to me. Alas, he was not tactically perfect, as evidenced in 1984 when he was smoked to the line by one Greg Lemond. Kelly was never to win the World Championships.

I remember LeMond pulling out that race. Kelly is a guy who, maybe more than most, would have benefitted from modern radio communication with his DS.

I like Cipo. When Domina or before that Acqua & Sapone got the leadout train going it was a beautiful thing to see. Cipo is nearing the end of his career and will retire from the sport with a record many, many riders would trade theirs for. Also other than manufactured ones like his feud with LeBlanc there's been none of the scandal/allegations that seem to be ever-present in the peloton.

Yes, he's (very) showy and no he doesn't care for riding hills at all but that's been his MO for the better part of 20 years and while he doesn't lack for ego you don't hear him comparing himself to the GT winners either. He seems to know what his domain is and doesn't venture out of it.

It seems to have worked well for him, plenty of $ and his picture in the press with drop dead gorgeous women, (though I hear he's quite faithfully married), on a regular basis. It would certainly work for me.

http://www.first-contact.demon.co.uk/cycling3/chip.jpg

Mario on the Col de Restefond during the 1993 Tour de France.

Let's all add a caption. I'll start:

"Why can't I be a complete rider like Indurain or Kelly???"

Because of those ugly sunglasses? :eek:

"When I get done here, I've entered the slalom!!" :D

hmmm some other one-trick ponies:

roger de vlaeminck, who absolutely loathed the grand tours and, when he could, focused exclusively on the classics.

rik van looy, who won a buttload of gt stages, but almost always bailed before the mountains.

adri van der poel, a man for the springtime and the fall, who won two tour stages in his career, but never finished.

peter van petegem, who has an arrangement with his time that, if he wins a classic, he doesn't have to ride the tour at all.

ludo dierkxens and nico mattan, who sought out teams that would not do grand tours on pupose... the ultimate hard men, johann museeuw, andre techmil and andrea tafi...

it might come as a surprise to those of you who are victims of lance fever and the us media's tunnel-vision focus on the tour, but there are other races.

it might come as a surprise to those of you who are victims of lance fever and the us media's tunnel-vision focus on the tour, but there are other races.

would that be the Coors classic or the Tour 'Dupont?

Marty

It is pretty pathetic.

He is utilising the large name the race has, consequently the large supporter base and coverage it receives, but then not actually 'competing'. The whole point why winning a Tour stage is such a big deal is because it is such a grueling race. Riders are pacing themselves and you get one guy (or a group) just emptying themselves in the first few days and then quitting. You'd hope they would win...

I firmly believe anyone who drops out should be stripped of their stage win. There is such much etiquette in cycling, yet a guy can win a stage then take his bat and ball and go home? Surely it's got to rub the rest of the peleton, who pull their finger out and finish, the wrong way.

It's kinda like a quarterback throwing three spectacular touchdown passes in the first quarter and then going home - leaving his teammates to slug it out for another 45 minutes.

He's basically saying that he doesn't really give a damn about the race. As long as he gets his few minutes of glory.

i'm guessing that you guys are fairly new to the sport of cycling...

there have always been at least two kinds of riders, one-day specialists and grand tour specialists. these two different kinds of racing require different skills and physiologies. it is a very rare occurance when someone like a merckx or hinault comes along who can do both.

one thing you'll note is that grand-tour general classification contenders rarely rack up impressive stage wins. the reason for this is that the short-term effort needed to win on a single day inevitably subverts the long-term effort of finishing with the lowest cumulative time after three weeks of racing.

the bottom line is that they are different disciplines, just as the gc, points and mountains competitions are different disciplines.

croak writes:


I firmly believe anyone who drops out should be stripped of their stage win.

i can really see the sponsors who keep the sport of cycling alive really going for this. the race would not go on without without them, and they will not sponsor teams unless they get exposure. there can only be one overall winner, but there can be almost two dozen stage winners, guaranteeing plenty of exposure for less-than-overall wins.

personally, i think that no one should be allowed to race in the tour de france unless they also race at least three of the major classics and two of the shorter tours, with at least six months of continuous competition. so-long lance.

i'm guessing that you guys are fairly new to the sport of cycling...


I've been watching since the mid-80s. Not new to it at all.

That there are riders who specialize in one day races isn't news to anyone. And there are riders who are nothing more than sprint specialists. So maybe these riders should stick to flat one day races and leave the big tours to those who want to ride them and who will at least try and finish. Better to try and miss the time cutoff than to not try at all.

Don't get me wrong. I'm no Lance apologist. I'm tired of the increasingly specialized world of grand tour riding. I too think that Lance should get his butt out in February and race Het Volk and finish the year with the Tour of Lombardy. I'd love to see him race all three grand tours. If you've paid any attention to what I've posted in the past, you'd know that I'm really really tired of all the attention paid to the TDF.

Anyway. I'm looking forward to the spring.

http://www.panderzinedistro.com/cycling

hmmm some other one-trick ponies:

roger de vlaeminck, who absolutely loathed the grand tours and, when he could, focused exclusively on the classics.

rik van looy, who won a buttload of gt stages, but almost always bailed before the mountains.

adri van der poel, a man for the springtime and the fall, who won two tour stages in his career, but never finished.

peter van petegem, who has an arrangement with his time that, if he wins a classic, he doesn't have to ride the tour at all.

ludo dierkxens and nico mattan, who sought out teams that would not do grand tours on pupose... the ultimate hard men, johann museeuw, andre techmil and andrea tafi...

it might come as a surprise to those of you who are victims of lance fever and the us media's tunnel-vision focus on the tour, but there are other races.

I haven't been watching that long. The earliest epic moment I can remember
following was Bernard Thevenet passing Eddy Merckx in the Pyrenees while Thevenet stomped a 53-23 up the mountain.

But I do remember DeVlaminck, the best rider in history at the Paris Roubaix, Record holding 6x winner on the Tirreno Adriatico 7 day stage race, and 3x winner of the Green Points Jersey in the Giro. Along with other classic and cyclocross wins to numerous to mention, I personally will refrain from calling him a one trick pony.

With regard to Rik Van Looy bailing before the mountains, he finished 4th overall in the Giro in 1959 and 3rd overall in the Vuelta in the same year, 11th and King of the Mountains in the Giro in 1960, 7th in the giro and 7th in Paris Nice in 61 and 10th overall in the TDF in 1963(no mean feat to finish top ten in the TDF).

Adri Van der Poel is also a multifaceted rider capable of sprinting and cyclocross, but I digress, because if I was any one of these or one of thousands of other riders who had the opportunity and talents to be a pro, I would capitalize on the talents and skills that I had to make the most of my career. If the only thing I could do was climb, that's what I would do. If the only thing I could do was carry water bottles, that's what I would do.

I will leave it to the consciences of each individual that they have done their best.

i'm guessing that you guys are fairly new to the sport of cycling...

there have always been at least two kinds of riders, one-day specialists and grand tour specialists. these two different kinds of racing require different skills and physiologies. it is a very rare occurance when someone like a merckx or hinault comes along who can do both.

one thing you'll note is that grand-tour general classification contenders rarely rack up impressive stage wins. the reason for this is that the short-term effort needed to win on a single day inevitably subverts the long-term effort of finishing with the lowest cumulative time after three weeks of racing.

the bottom line is that they are different disciplines, just as the gc, points and mountains competitions are different disciplines.

croak writes:



i can really see the sponsors who keep the sport of cycling alive really going for this. the race would not go on without without them, and they will not sponsor teams unless they get exposure. there can only be one overall winner, but there can be almost two dozen stage winners, guaranteeing plenty of exposure for less-than-overall wins.

personally, i think that no one should be allowed to race in the tour de france unless they also race at least three of the major classics and two of the shorter tours, with at least six months of continuous competition. so-long lance.

Not new really, just don't pander to the accepted I suppose.

I understand why it happens, my point is more that there are one day races for the one day specialists. That's where they should derive their glory. They are riding the tail-coates of the grand tours (and in particular, it's popularity in the US) and reaping the financial rewards.

In essence, Cipo is getting paid for being a quitter, which detracts from the morality of the sport. Cycling has always been a sport of gentlemen (and ladies!) in my eyes.

To highlight my point, Brad McGee (FDJ) won the Prologue of this years event, the short time trial (5km? I can't remember...). Now, he is a sensational time trialist (World Champion at one stage?, junior for sure) and could have just trained for that stage, won it and gone home. He probably would have blown everyone away if he did this but a fair margin. But he didn't. He is no mountain goat and ended up falling well back in the field. He did, however, push through the entire race to help team mate Cadel Evans win the green jersey over McEwen. Now, he is a cyclist, a gentleman and a damn hard worker. An Aussie too! ;)

Yeah, so I'm biased... sue me :)

In essence, Cipo is getting paid for being a quitter, which detracts from the morality of the sport.
no. he gets paid for being a winner. he has won more races than almost anyone else in the pro peloton.

Cycling has always been a sport of gentlemen (and ladies!) in my eyes.
this made me laugh, actually. the sport began as a kind of professional wrestling on wheels. the racers were seen in pretty much the same light as circus strongmen. the first winner of the tdf was dq'ed from the second for taking a train in one stage. throughout the early years of that race, supporters of this or that racer would throw tacks an oil on the road in front of their heroes' rivals.

the pélissiers were "gentlemen?' maurice garin was a gentleman? eugene christophe?

the original idea behind six-day races was that the racers would ride for six days. straight. 24-hours a day. people would go to the velodromes to watch racers crash and burn, hallucinate and die.

there was nothing "always" gentlemanly about the sport of cycling. it is a circus. the best racers are the best showmen. cipollini is a show man. and he has a far more extensive palmares than any tour winner of the last five years.

...To highlight my point, Brad McGee (FDJ)...did, however, push through the entire race to help team mate Cadel Evans win the green jersey...

You meant Baden Cooke, right?

You meant Baden Cooke, right?

I do indeed ;)

Lance doesn't abandon the TDF though. That's the difference.

He doesn't now, but he certainly has in the past.