2014 Tour De France

[christopher scott]

I am looking forward to the team work between porter and froome next year. porter i think has posed an important question. how fit and strong is he really. remember this year when he turned round fetchd s gel or something and rode back up the froome, seeing that he had made two massice attacks earlier. he really is a strong one.

[Jaco-fiets]

I hope Froome dogg takes it again next year but unfortunately my support for him will only stretch as far as Wiggo's inclusion in their tour team. If that chop rides then I hope the other teams team up against Sky

 

Sad but true

[ScottCM]

+1 on the Anit - Wiggins parade.

[ScottCM]

Vincenzo Nibali approaches 2014 Tour de France with 'more maturity'

 

Vincenzo Nibali (Astana) approaches the 2014 Tour de France with more maturity. According to his trainer, his year away from the Tour and changes made have served the Sicilian 'Shark' well.

"Maturity," Nibali's long-time trainer, Paolo Slongo told Cycling Weekly. "He married and he changed teams. He has more responsibilities at team Astana. In team Cannondale, the staff looked after everything for him, what he needed and didn't need to do. Taking on responsibility in Astana helped him mature."

Nibali won the 2010 Vuelta a España and gradually improved in the Tour de France with Italy's famous green team. He placed third in 2012 behind Sky's Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome.

Nibali switched into team Astana's blue at the start of this season after seven years with Liquigas-Cannondale. The 29-year-old decided to take aim at the Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a España and skipped the Tour. It paid off, with the winner's pink jersey in Italy and second place in Spain.

Nibali also had to think on his own along the way. He was unable to rely on Slongo or Cannondale's top brass, Roberto Amadio and Stefano Zanatta but excelled regardless. He wrestled the lead away from Froome in Tirreno-Adriatico, took on Wiggins to win the Giro del Trentino and of course, came out of a snow-ravaged Giro looking rosy.

"The Giro's completed a circle for Nibali," national coach, Paolo Bettini told newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport at the time. "He kept improving in the last three years, kept his feet on the ground, but also matured as a man and how he manages a team."

Astana's experienced team manager, Giuseppe Martinelli guided Nibali through 2013. For next season, he also secured Slongo's services. The Italian from Treviso will work as a trainer/sports director, specifically following Nibali's Tour group.

"Martinelli asked me at the end of last year and kept after me this year," Slongo said. "What convinced me was Nibali's Tour project. I had Peter Sagan in the ranks at Cannondale but with Nibali it's different because I'll be working on trying to win Grand Tours."

Slongo's job is to help take Nibali to the podium's top step in Paris. Next July's route, light on time trials and heavy on climbs, should suit him well. It may even produce a two-way jersey tussle between Nibali and Froome.

Nibali officially starts working towards that yellow jersey this week at a team gathering in Tuscany. The tentative path has Sicilian in Calpe for a December training camp and in Tenerife for high-altitude miles. Slongo will follow his progress and make tweaks to have the more mature Nibali on target first for the Ardennes Classics in April and then the Tour.

[Cav']

I am looking forward to the team work between porter and froome next year. porter i think has posed an important question. how fit and strong is he really. remember this year when he turned round fetchd s gel or something and rode back up the froome, seeing that he had made two massice attacks earlier. he really is a strong one.

Porte*

[Jakkals.]

Porte*

 

Richie Froome

['Dale]

Porte*

 

I think Porter is gonna be team leader for the preceding Giro.

Who will serve him?

Will he have enough legs to serve Froome effectively?

 

Hmmmm

[ScottCM]

I hope for his sake, he does get the opportunity to lead Team Sky at the Giro, if i had one wish it would be that Froome and Wiggo were both on Team Sky for the Tour. Would love to see them kill each other on the road to the detriment of the mighty wealthy "TEAM" Sky. Sure would be interesting from a neutral fans point of view.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(And the Andy comes and takes the Win )

[eddy]

 

Froome admitted that cobbles would take him out of his natural element .......

 

 

That is just such cr@p !!!!

 

Anybody who has ridden a bike on Jo'burg suburban roads like he has, will relish the opportunity to ride on the cobbles. It will comparatively feel like riding around on a marble floor .

[ScottCM]

Contador to follow "cyclical" build-up to Tour de France

 

 

Alberto Contador will aim to have some peaks in form in the early part of next season, rather than replicating the more gradual approach he had to the Tour de France this year, according to Saxo-Tinkoff directeur sportif Phillipe Mauduit.

Contador finished in 4th place at the 2013 Tour and has already signalled that he will start next season significantly later than he did this past campaign, when his first race was at the Tour de San Luis in January. He then looked to build his condition steadily towards July.

In 2014, Mauduit said, Contador will instead aim to reach form early and win selected stage races, but he is likely to stay away from racing in late April and early May ahead of his final build-up to the Tour.

"The option chosen in 2013 didn't fit with Alberto's physiology or with his psychology," Mauduit told L’Équipe. "In years gone by, he had set himself some very early targets, like Paris-Nice and the Tour of the Basque Country. We're going to go back towards this more classic approach." [Contador won Paris-Nice in 2007 and 2010, and the Tour of the Basque Country in 2008 and 2009 – ed.]

"Some riders, like Alberto, need something more cyclical, where they have a big period of work, a peak of form, a rest period, then a new phase of work, a second peak of form… It's closely linked to the rider's motivation. If you don’t understand that, there’s every chance that you'll fail."

While Contador seems set to begin his season at the Volta ao Algarve in February, and will ride both the Tour and the Vuelta a España, the details of the remainder of his 2014 race schedule are yet to be decided.

"We don't know the route of Paris-Nice yet, for example. Before committing to a race, you'd like to know what kind of ground you're dancing on," Maduit said. "The only parameter that's fixed is the alternation between periods of racing, resting and working in the mountains."

Mauduit did confirm, however, that Contador's racing is likely to be restricted as spring draws to a close due to a pollen allergy. "Alberto is really handicapped by pollen, so in late April, early May, you wouldn't have much interest in putting him through big workloads at races," he said.

"Instead, he's going to go to places in the mountains where nature will leave him alone. The allergy doesn't stop him from working hard, he just needs to adapt."

[ScottCM]

I think Porter is gonna be team leader for the preceding Giro.

Who will serve him?

Will he have enough legs to serve Froome effectively?

 

Hmmmm

 

Porte: I need to ride in a team where I'll be the leader

 

 

Richie Porte has indicated that he will have to leave Team Sky at the end of his current contract in order to fulfill his own personal ambitions in three-week Grand Tours.

The Australian has two years remaining on his existing deal with the British team but said that the presence of Chris Froome at Team Sky means that he is likely to go elsewhere in 2016. Porte signed a two-year contract extension in May of this year, meaning that his current deal does not expire until the end of the 2015 season.

“As much as I love being there and being the wingman, it's not what I always want to do," Porte told The Herald Sun before travelling to Europe for the team's training camp in Mallorca.

“I've shown by winning Paris-Nice and coming second in the Dauphiné and Basque, they're pretty big races in the sport. I think the next move for me is two more years at Sky, but then I really think I need to get out and ride in a team where I'll be the leader."

Porte joined Team Sky from Saxo Bank at the beginning of 2012, and played an important part in helping Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome win the past two Tours de France. The 28-year-old was handed the reins of leadership for Paris-Nice in 2013, where he claimed overall honours, and at the Tour of the Basque Country, where he finished second behind Nairo Quintana (Movistar).

For most of 2013 Porte was relegated to a role in support of Froome, finishing second behind his teammate at Critérium International and the Critérium du Dauphiné. However, Porte said that Froome’s status as Team Sky’s leader is not open to debate, particularly given that he races under a British licence. Like Porte, Froome will turn 29 next year.

“I think Chris Froome is the rider of this generation. I think he's going to win more than one Tour and it's unrealistic of me, in a British team, when he's got a British passport [to assume control]," Porte said. "To be honest, it's going to be hard to beat Chris, but in another team who knows?"

“Me personally, I think I do have the qualities to be a contender. I mean, I can climb and time trial and hold my own in the descents too. The ultimate GC rider has to be good at everything."

Although Porte suffered a jours sans on the 2013 Tour’s second mountain stage to Bagnères-de-Bigorre, he took heart from his strong showings in support of Froome elsewhere during the race and he admitted to wondering what he could have achieved had he not been riding as a deluxe domestique.

“I was there in situations where it was Froome, [Alberto] Contador and Porte and I was thinking, 'Well, I need to start being a little bit more selfish next year and ride for myself'," said Porte, who will lead Sky at the Giro d’Italia next season before teaming up with Froome at the Tour.

"I'll have the opportunity to ride in the Giro and ride for myself. For me, the dream is to win a Grand Tour, any Grand Tour. I've been out of Australia long enough to realise there are other races other than the Tour.”

[jcza]

This will surely end in tears...

[eddy]

This will surely end in tears...

 

No kidding !

 

Even someone as socially awkward as I am can read the body language........ It does not look like a joyous occasion

['Dale]

This will surely end in tears...

 

Oi!

 

'Berto looks like crying inside.

 

NOW CALLED TINKO'- SAXO....

[nickc]

No kidding !

 

Even someone as socially awkward as I am can read the body language........ It does not look like a joyous occasion

 

I believe Berto had just been told by Tinkoff he is going to have to go faster !!

[jcza]

Tinkov is a total loon, follow him on twitter for a laugh.