Velominati Super Prestige: Giro d’Italia 2017
I spy with my little eye a certain Michele Scarponi, who sadly lost his life while out training near his home two weeks ago, in there amongst his teammates after his captain, Nibbles, won the race. I’m torn about a death like Michele’s – we subject ourselves to similar risks every time we climb aboard our bikes and we accept it as part and parcel of our craft. Yet, while every day members of our tribe lose their lives to their trade, it takes a high profile rider to remind us how real that risk is.
But onto lighter topics, Nibali won the Giro last year going downhill, and it happened on the one stage I managed to sleep through which is another way of saying I missed it. But I love waking up to a that WTF feeling only a reshuffled GS can give you.
The race starts Friday morning, which is sooner than I expected, so I’ll stop typing so you can start picking. Get them in by the time the clock goes to zero, and remember that our Grand Tour scoring rules are a little different than the smaller events. So jump on that start list and get prognosticating!
Good luck!
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@davido
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Fixing Dumoulin to Tom Dumoulin since Dumoulin gets mapped as Samuel Dumoulin.
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Not rest day swaps, and Orica for their first GT win!
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As with everyone else, just reaffirming the original picks after the mechanical at the start, rather than changing them.
Thanks for reopening @frank
Nairo clearly the classiest but will he hold back for the tour.
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Leaving my picks the same as the previous “just in case” list, even if most of you are going with Quintana.
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Yesterday’s stage was more up and down than I expected it to be. Sardinia looks like it’d be a cool place to ride around for a few days. Well done Greipel for continuing his record of stage wins in every Giro. What happened to Ewan in the sprint? They called a mechanical but it looked to me as if he unclipped his left foot in the squeeze.
First round picks (not second rest day swaps)…
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Boy I hope I don’t cop a 25 point penalty…
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I Think I’ll wait for Sundays stage before I pick my picks. Strong cross/tailwind for the 1st 100km then up to 50mph cross/headwind for the finale. It could be fireworks from the start and the end of some GC dreams. Or it could be a snooze fest like the 1st two stages as everyone waits for Etna.
Okay, sticking with the same. Ready for chaos!
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No rest day swaps but just the first round repeated in appropriate form.
1. Quintano 2 Nibbles 3 DuMoulin 4 Kruijswijk 5 Thomas
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Not sure these were my exact picks but pretty sure. I didn’t pick Rohan and Dennis’ Laugh In, if that’s what you are thinking.
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@David Olson = xyxax, BTW
How the fuck is there a rest day after three days… as if starting on a Friday wasn’t bad enough.
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@ChrisO
I’m guessing it’s more of a “how do you open a window after the thing has started to enable selections”. I’m assuming (hoping) that @Fraughnk then manipulates everyone back to zero on the deductions perspective when the window closes – though I see the window seems to have another 21h to go!
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@ChrisO
Early rest day is needed because there’s a 12-hour ferry ride from Sardinia to Sicily for all the team vehicles. (Riders got a quick plane flight last night).
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Hey guys – since today is the rest day anyway, I extended to tomorrow morning. Jeez. What a cluster. I’ll also make sure no one gets penalties for the little bug we have with the rest day swaps…
@LeoTea
The swaps are a bug because its a rest day but the picks were still open…don’t worry about it, I’ve cleared them all out. Sorry about the clusterfuck. Did it all in too much of a rush!
@xyxax
It’s good of you to let your alter-ego out now and then.
This should be interesting.
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A propos of almost nothing, I hope everyone’s gotten over their Schleck-ons: yesterday’s performance at the Giro makes Bob Jungels the greatest Luxembourger cyclist since Charly Gaul. That was some pretty badass riding.
Just reaffirming my original picks (per post #36). The website is all kinds of struggling on my laptop at the moment so apologies in advance if I post this multiple times.
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Hurrah! It worked! Well done for sorting this all out, @frank!
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@Steampunk
It was pretty damn spectacular alright. Nothing gets me more excited about an upcoming cycle race on the telly than the magic word “crosswinds”. Echelons! F*** yeah! (apologies to Team America: World Police)