License2Ill

An enlarged heart works well, for a while at least.

Sylv

Tejay explained after the race he was dehydrated and experienced heat exhaustion symptoms.

Athens80

I've got a sinking feeling going into today's stage. The last year and a half Sky has been so dominant: not just Froome and Porte now, but Wiggins, Sergio Henao, and Rigoberto Urán, at least. Sky's third lieutenants have looked strong enough to contend for the GC if that were their role. Is it great talent selection, great coaching, great common cause, great contracts? Sky has 5+ of the most dominant stage riders in the world.

OrionKhan

I think you got me mixed in with another poster on the Quintana comments.

My point is that Froome put up an effort that rivaled the record for that climb. The top times put up by known dopers. Is that a definitive conclusive evidence of doping in a court. No, of course not. We're all just a bunch of idiots running our mouths on BF. But it is highly suspect. And what seen time and time again, is that these "remarkable" efforts have turned out to be assisted. Sure it might take years for it to come out. But it always seems to come out in the end.

reef58

This is not entirely correct either. The yellow jersey group had issues. T-Mobile could not chase because Kloden was already dangling off of the back. Oscar P was basically gifted the jersey with a 30 minute breakaway win. He was a decent rider, but not a strong GC leader. You had riders like Levi in the yellow group, who had no reason to chase Landis. You really had a few teammates of Oscar P who could chase. I am not saying the yellow jersey group could not have done more, but it was a weak group with many hitchhikers.

Jseis 

Linear induction is where it's at. Bike frames will get longer.

atbman

.

The comparison with USPS seems rather weak to me. Like Sky, they were simply the sponsors and had nowt' to do with the sport. BC, on the other hand are the sports governing body in the UK, most of their funding comes from Sport England and Dave Brailsford has been the lead manager/inspirer, etc. for both their track and road successes. For Team Sky to carry out organised drug use would be catastrophic to the whole of the sport in the UK and my judgement (possibly fallible, given cycling's long and dubious history with drugs) is that such a drug programme would be far too risky.

However, BC's success seems very similar to the rapid rise of Japan in the worlds car markets, which was based, not on any secret or new ideas, but on the principle of "continuous improvement" - sound familiar?

I agree questions should be asked of any outstanding performance, but I'd like to see a more carefully nuanced discussion of this, since we all know that weather conditions - wind, temperature, etc., can make minutes+ difference. I have read, for example, that one French newspaper's comparisons of other riders' performances were based on them all having the same weight

I understand the cynicism and doubts and am keeping my fingers crossed.

Giacomo 1 

So stage 9 is history and I see there are only a quarter the amount of posts there as there are here. Why is that?

Where are all of you "Sky is doping" posters today?

sprince

You'll have to wait for stage 15.

Athens80

Part of that would be that we've had four times longer to discuss stage 8.

Zinger

I'm not to the point of accusation but I'm just a bit suspicious because of two things: Geert Leinders and yesterday's ET. I'll weigh that against the downside of Sky taking such a risk and the belated testing for anything new that the PED designers might have come up with. You can still mainline small amounts of EPO, btw, and get it past the tests but the risk of catastrophic positives make me temper my suspicion a bit.

I can certainly see why other people share my suspicions. I started having them in about 2001 or so if not somewhat before.....Let's just say I was surprised in '99 at the TDF result. Froome's performance is much less a surprise.

OrionKhan

I think the lack of interest is because the race is pretty much Froome's to lose going forward. Short of some unforeseen circumstance happening to him, he's going to win fairly easily. All he has to do now is mark wheels. He's proven that none of the contenders can ride away from him on the big mountains. He'll attack one or two more times just to build his lead. But it will be fairly boring from a competitive standpoint from here on out. That will be interesting. And it also looks good for Sagen to win the Green. The KOM is still up for grabs.

sprince

There is another two weeks of racing ahead. Stage 8 was unusual in the very abrupt change from flat to high mountains. It's way too early to call a winner based on one aberrant stage. Nothing will happen next week, and then the final week will be a entirely new race.

OrionKhan

Meh, I don't see Froome having a "bad day" out there. Short of something out of the ordinary, I don't see anyone out riding him in the mountains. He just has to mark them going forward.

Laggard

I've noticed a 75% drop off in posts since Lance retired. The 99ers were not here for cycling, just Lance and the TDF.

Giacomo 1 

And now the 99ers seem happy to be back for Froome, Sky and the TDF.

Zinger

I think it injudicious to assume off of what little we know but naive not to wonder about things like relative ETs and former team doctors implicated in doping scandals. I don't think you necessarily have to be a Lance fanboy to be a little suspicious considering some guys are still taking the risk to dope. Anyone would have to wonder how many slip through the controls even now.

Bacciagalupe

Or maybe it's that the "zomg he's doping" crew have less to say about Stage 9.


That "foreseen" part now includes his team not being nearly as strong as expected, and a bunch of Spaniards -- or just a bunch of teams -- plotting together to take down Sky.

Another question is whether Froome is the type of rider who gets better as a grand tour goes on -- something that doesn't appear to have been the case in last year's Vuelta.

And there's the usual potential issues: Illness, bad days, mechanicals, peaking too early, the list goes on. Sky does not have this anywhere near as wrapped up as last year.


Yep. He's got to mark wheels. Lots of wheels. Not easy, even for a top GC rider. It also makes for a more exciting race than watching Team Sky slowly reel in Nibali.


I'd say that Stage 9 shows otherwise.

This won't be like last year's Tour, where Sky commanded the race nearly every day. On a day without a summit finish, Froome was isolated and attacked several times, had to dig deep, and had to let Martin and Fuglsang go. Wiggins didn't start. Kiryienka is out. Talansky is down by 9:35. Porte lost 18 minutes in a single day. Sky obviously does not have two serious GC threats this year.

Meanwhile, Contador and Kreuziger are hovering at 1:51, and didn't lose any time on Sunday. Valverde and Movistar controlled most of the stage. Rodriguez is still in contention. Schleck is down by 4:00, but climbing well, and it wasn't that long ago that he tore a 2:00 lead in a single climbing stage.

It's way too early to know how this will compare to other years, but I'd say it is clear that Sky has nowhere near the power and control they did last year.

Athens80

Talansky, despite the name, is not on Sky. Not sure how you'd figure that Dan Martin and Jakob Fuglsang would be big for Sky commanding the race either -- they weren't a big help for Sky last year.