2014, Amstel Gold Race, Gilbert Philippe, Valkenburg (pic: ©Sirotti)
Ooooof! The VSP generator and operators need more than a week to recover from that race. Tommeke may never recover, that chance will never come again.
We now move into the Netherlands and the first of three Ardennes races. Whomever did well in Paris-Roubaix probably won’t like all the hills in Amstel. Same with the beer but I’ll leave that beery subject alone this year.
PhilGil has been busy fighting drunk drivers (He Badger’d him!) and is now off the start list then again he is back on as of Wednesday. Sure, the police pay attention when the cyclist in the altercation is Philippe Gilbert, ffs. Matt Hayman and Tony Martin are on the list, ouch, no rest there. So rest, recover, don’t spare the malted rehydrating beverage. No Delgados please.
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I watched the finish again last night and it just seems odd to me.
So many teams had thier team leaders with support in the final selection but they were all just looking at each other when the big move went down - I was almost (almost) thinking it must have been fixed because it just seems so crazy that no one followed - when Valgaren went it looked like a couple tried but either stopped or popped. Perhaps it was because they were all marking each other - so none of the names went, because none of the names went - they just neutralised each other. But even then is seems strange that the support riders wouldn't chase down the move - a lot has been made of Matthews and Gerrans, no doubt because of the Worlds debacle, but it seems to me there were other teams who seemingly stuffed the finish despite having numbers.
All that said it could just be that they were toasted having dodged the street furniture, endured the downpour and gone up and down all day - maybe no one could go when it mattered and I guess if the leaders can't go why should you expect the support riders to be able to go?
@dyalander in last year's race, Matthews absolutely cooked himself following the standard Gilbert attack up the Cauberg, but because the finishing straight is so long over the top, they were reeled in again before the finish, at which point he had no sprint left. I think there was a lot of assuming that the two up the road wouldn't last, especially seeing as that finishing straight was apparently in to a head wind.
right, I'm buying a dartboad to figure out picks for this weekend
@Mikael Liddy
sure, he wouldn't have wanted to get burnt again and I'm sure quite a few others didn't go then for the same reason, but then why not chase and reel them in like last year? And why not send your team mate to cover the move? And that doesn't just go for OGE - a bunch of teams had numbers.