Bardet and Pinot PHOTO / LIONEL BONAVENTURE
That is my question. Both want to be considered great cyclists, not great French cyclists. It is a cruel and heavy burden to be an excellent French cyclist. When are you going to win the Tour de France? Bernard Hinaults don’t come around very often, maybe never again. Hinault was the French Merckx; winning was everything. If he was not a cyclist he should have been a professional fighter. Fignon was called the professor because he was from Paris and wore glasses, not because he was an intellectual. He managed to win some Tours and not be a badger. He was not out happily slugging protesters. If Hinault had lost to Lemond by eight seconds…one, it wouldn’t have happened. Hinault would have burst his own heart to finish nine seconds faster. Two, if he had lost by eight seconds, he would have slugged Lemond so damn hard it would have put him back in the hospital.
I hope the French are happy they have any prospective Tour winners. The Americans have none. Most countries do not because it takes a special genetic freak in a sport of genetic freaks to be one. The English had to sweep their post-colonial, high altitude Kenyan supply system to come up with one. Of this French pair I have a bias toward Romain Bardet partially because he rides for AG2R and on Keepers Tour 2012 we met directeur Vincent Lavenu. VL seemed a good sort and for inexplicable, Rule ignoring reasons, I sort of like their kit, but I digress.
Thibaut Pinot and Romain Bardet: both 24 years old, both stage winners in the 2015 Tour, both prodigious climbers, both saddled with the “next French hope” mantle.
Judging from this edition’s Alpe d’Huez stage, Pinot actually may be be the stronger climber. If you can ride everyone off your wheel on Alpe d’Huez, you are a badass. For climbing style points, Romain wins. He is solid and smooth to Pinot’s lack of. Going downhill, if you try to pedal through a corner and catch your inside pedal (and crash) doing so, points off. Bardet descends like Philippe Gilbert, that is to say, avec grande vitesse et les grand testicules.
Being the best climber or best descender does not make a grand tour winner. A grand tour winner does not have to be the best at anything, just very capable at everything. And not sucking at anything, like descending or time trialing and not having a jour sans.
Can either of these guys time trial? If Pinot can he should, by all rights, be one podium step closer in Paris than Andy Schleck* ever got. There is a large leap between a top ten Tour finish and a podium finish. It might be a larger leap from the third podium step to the top. Pinot and Bardet are in this mix.
Neither of these guys seem like punch throwing firebrands like Hinault, which may be good. Then who can better handle the pressure of being the next Fignon?
*I can still make fun of Andy Schleck even though he retired, yes?
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@Gianni
I'll take that one for 10. I have found it strange that he never soap boxed his drug ban adjusted result, didn't seem to demonstrate sour grapes, which leads to an Omerta type viewpoint. What good did he do after that tour? Post that year, as Vader would say, I find their lack of form disturbing..
Pinots pedal strike - I watched the P&P and Eurosport/Kelly coverage of that, and found it laughable how an amateur like me could detect the simplest of rider errors, while the pro commentators were picking all sorts of equipment fuckups, road surface variations and the like.
For me it's Bardet. He can go up, but fuck me he can go down! Pinot looks stronger for the minute however.
Also agree, neither have the teams to do it when the big 4 are on point.
There was, however, something gleefully French about how they scratched their nuts while Cummings smoked them for that stage win. It was awesome, I was so happy for mountain chewbacca..
@frank
wouldn't that line of thinking make you about as Dutch as I am which can't be right as I was born in Hong Kong which would make me Chinese?
i prefer to think of myself as a Brit and you as a loud American.
@frank
Yeah like David Millar is from Hong Kong.
His parents are British, his grandparents are British - he has British nationality by right.
You non-imperialists don't understand the expat world.
@wilburrox
Sir, if it were in my power to hand on the +1 badge it would go to you for that comment alone.
The rest of the post was pretty good as well, but that made me laugh.
Given that Brailsford has stated he wants to win the tour with a French rider, I'll go for Bardet once he signs for Sky. Once he does win, we can uncover the fact his mum had an affair with a travelling Hoover salesman from Croydon in February 1990 and so is, in fact, English.
@ChrisO
I don't want to confuse things but Millar isn't from Hong Kong, he's a Malteser.
@chris
But that would make Wiggins Belgian.
The final word: Froome is clearly British, otherwise the French would not throw urine at him!
@ChrisO
undoubtably Belgian.
@ChrisO
You're right, I should have said he was a Brit (there'll be a whining Scot along in a moment) who happened to been born in Malta. Unfortunately, the cheap pun was irresistible.
Isn't Wiggo half Aussie?
@Brendan O’Donoghue
English. The French are quite chummy with the Scots.