Pro-cycling thread

Wow from the Giro today !!!!

Wonderful ride from Dumoulin.

Ah well. An animated last 5km.

Nibali's really past his prime isn't he? Just doesn't seem to be up to it no matter the terrain and there's a fleet of younger riders that are making him suffer

You with me yet? I thought he looked amazing on Blockhaus. Quintana's morale must be fairly low after that.

Still backing Quintana?

Long way to Milan but to drop Nairo like that must do some psychological damage. Windmills looked fresh as a daisy warming down.

Pure class by Dumoulin today..

we've seen this before though-Dumoulin just doesn't have the legs for longer climbs of the kind that are coming this week and when he cracks he's going to lose minutes.

I'm with you, it's just that I have seen some things in the 2015 Vuelta and 2016 Giro that tend to make me withhold hopes & dreams of Dutchies winning GT wins somewhat

Tom was the BOSS today <3

He seems a bit stronger mentally now though. Great that he picked up some extra time advantage

Good thing he has minutes to lose, and a TT to come.

Chapeau, now for...

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Dumoulin counter attacking and winning today changes the dynamic a bit. Quintana needs to find somewhere between 3-4 minutes. Will he be prepared to attack from a long way out and risk being countered, or ride conservatively and maintain his podium position?

ride conservatively and maintain his podium position

I don't think this is going through anyone's mind.

Dumoulin remains unproven in a mountainous final week. He's clearly the favourite now, but he still has a tough week of five consecutive mountain stages to face and, history shows, that the type of rider he is can struggle with that.

Just look at Alex Zulle in 1998 as an example.

It's how Quintana has always ridden against Froome at the Tour.

What happened to zulle in 98?

ran into Marco Pantani

Dumoulin remains unproven in a mountainous final week

he lasted until the penultimate day in the Vuelta 2015 without planning to go for a GC top 3, I'd say he's proven himself but got caught just short of winning the thing. He's prepared now.

Tuesday:

Thursday:

Friday:

Saturday:

With the depth of team that Quintana has relative to Dumoulin I'd be surprised if we don't see him going into Sunday's TT with five minutes on him.

@peter_v I don't think he's ever been frail mentally, it's just a question of his natural physique and the ability to sustain that climbing power over a 25/30km climb versus a 10km lump like today's. Think of the effort it took to get a very sickly looking Wiggo through the mountain stages of the Tour (also what we now know as kenacort assistance included) next to a very healthy looking Dumoulin too-I think you're more likely to see Kruijswijk and Pinot on the podium than him at the end of the week just because Tuesday will rinse him and then he won't have much of an opportunity to recover.

He was a few minutes ahead of Pantani entering the final week. Lost all of that in one stage in the Dolomites, then collapsed the next day and lost 30 minutes.

The last week of this Giro is very different to the last week of that Vuelta. Five back to back mountain stages with lots of climbing above 2000 metres, it's a stiffer challenge.

All things being equal Dumoulin will prove that he's the strongest rider in the race, but so far we've had three summit finishes with hardly any climbing before them. Next week is very different.

The beauty is that we can all try and predict it but we will find out on the road. I like the look of Dumoulin this year because:

• he is more physically mature than he was in 2015 when he cracked at the Vuelta
  
• he is riding in a mentally mature way - pacing himself rather than going into the red trying to follow moves
  
• he is lighter, but his TT-ing is as good as ever
  
• he rode very well on Blockhaus, a very tough and long climb that doesn't suit him
  
• his counter attack today suggests he is feeling mint. You might have expected him to mark and conserve energy given what is to come.
  
  

It could be that the aggregation of climbing in the final week will be too much - that is the test for him. If he deals with Stage 16 and 18 I think he should take it.

I'm not proclaiming him as winner yet. But remember the stage he won in the Tour de France last year? just sayin'... cc @andyp

amen