Categories: Velominati Super Prestige

Velominati Super Prestige: la Vuelta a Espana

The inaugural Velominati Super Prestige continues with its the final Grand Tour of the season, la Vuelta a EspaÃ±a, on Saturday, August 28. This will be the final opportunity for contestants to rake in a load of points; and with the list of injuries, and non-starts together with riders using the race as preparation for the World Championships in October, it will make it all the more challenging to pull together some good picks.

This particular Grand Tour is simultaneously the most boring and most exciting; various sections of Spain features desert with dead-straight roads where little is to be seen aside from a colorful peloton gliding along a road for 6 hours. On the other hand, the mountains are steep and brutal, and the weather this time of year can be atrocious, so the mountain stages tend to showcase fireworks like we don’t see elsewhere during the season.

Having run the VSP Giro and Tour editions where we tested the ruleset for picks, and I think by this time we’ve managed to set up a scoring system that seems fair and helps to close down the competition to afford newcomers the ability to catch up with some good picks. There is a full overview of the rules and standing at the VSP Schedule, Rules, & Results page, but here is the ten-second overview:

Every contestant is to choose their top five General Classification picks of the race. The final podium of la Vuelta is worth 15 points to the winner, 10 points for second, 5 points for third, 3 points for fourth, and 2 point for fifth. Given the effect crashes can have on a tour, there are guidelines around making changes to your lineup during the race: you’re allowed to change your lineup if any rider in your pick list drops out for any reason without any penalty; rest days will allow contestants to make changes to their lineup, however those changes will come at a point penalty. (Visit the VSP Schedule, Rules, & Results page for a complete breakdown of these points.)

Every day, the leader in the points standings will have the honor of wearing the Golden Jersey when posting on the site; the overall winner will wear the Golden Jersey for the remainder of the season and will also earn an “Obey the Rules” bumper sticker. All reader’s points qualify towards the final prize of the free Velominati Artisan’s Shroud. As always, if you are inclined to enter, simply post your predictions for the top five placings.

Continuing with our jersey picks from the Tour de France edition is the competition of naming the winner of the points and climber’s jersey winners. There will be no points awarded towards these two jerseys, but the leader of the competition will have the honor of commenting with associated jersey badge throughout the competition and the winner will earn the right to comment with that badge until next year’s race. The contestant who picks both the final points and climbers jersey winners correctly will win a Velominati Logo bumper sticker. Tie-breakers will go to the first contestant who posts their entire lineup (all 5 GC picks plus points and climbers jersey winners). Given that this sub-competition has no points, pick substitutions will only be granted under the DNF regulations of the VSP; no rest-day substitutions are allowed.

Sub-competitions will be conducted while the Vuelta is underway for specific stages. These stages will be chosen a few days prior to the stage being held and will be selected based on the current race conditions with the aim of choosing the most decisive and exciting stages of the race, so check back often to make sure you don’t miss out. Sub-competitions will be held in separate editions.

Good luck!

Rules and results are posted Velominati Super Prestige page.

frank

The founder of Velominati and curator of The Rules, Frank was born in the Dutch colonies of Minnesota. His boundless physical talents are carefully canceled out by his equally boundless enthusiasm for drinking. Coffee, beer, wine, if it’s in a container, he will enjoy it, a lot of it. He currently lives in Seattle. He loves riding in the rain and scheduling visits with the Man with the Hammer just to be reminded of the privilege it is to feel completely depleted. He holds down a technology job the description of which no-one really understands and his interests outside of Cycling and drinking are Cycling and drinking. As devoted aesthete, the only thing more important to him than riding a bike well is looking good doing it. Frank is co-author along with the other Keepers of the Cog of the popular book, The Rules, The Way of the Cycling Disciple and also writes a monthly column for the magazine, Cyclist. He is also currently working on the first follow-up to The Rules, tentatively entitled The Hardmen. Email him directly at rouleur@velominati.com.

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View Comments

Steampunk says:

Sep 15 2010 at 6:27 pm

frank :
Personally, I think it has to do with how much time they work at it. I bet a guy like Faboo takes his TT bike out for kicks and is really used to riding it; I bet the Grimps are just like, "Awww...Dad?!? Do I hafta?" every time Bjarne sternly tells them to climb aboard. The more they practice, the more aero they get, the faster they get...

You could be right, but I'm having a very hard time believing that even the free-spirited Schlecks (as Riis called them recently"”maybe just Andy) would put off that kind of training, especially since they're mere seconds out of being world beaters.

Jarvis :As for some riders ability to TT and climb and other to fail miserably at TTing, it's not about the amount of power one or the other has or hasn't, otherwise the Grimps wouldn't be able to climb with the best. I think it mainly comes down to technique, climbing is a lot more about power-to-weight, while in the TT you have to be able to convert that power into speed rather than just combating gravity. So smoothness of stroke and body, mental aptitude and a big one, the shape of your body. Simply put, some people fold themselves into an aero shape better than others.

You probably nailed it there.
Steampunk says:

Sep 15 2010 at 6:32 pm

@frank
Actually, it was the orange chainring that caught my eye before the helmet. Still trying to decide if that's awesome or hideous. How many riders are rocking the ovoid? I seem to remember Wiggins on one and Sastre and, of course, Julich, but I thought this experiment was pretty much done a decade ago.
Collin says:

Sep 15 2010 at 7:26 pm

From my homeboy Dave Zabriskie's blog, in reference to his break in Stage 14:

"One thing I left out about yesterday's update was that when I blew I hid in a driveway until the field passed. As a result some people never thought I got caught until everything was done. But today Phillipe Gilbert told me he saw me hiding and was cracking up."

What other sorts of pranks do people pull in the peloton? Or are they mostly all taking themselves too seriously?
Jarvis says:

Sep 16 2010 at 1:02 am

@frank
the stubby helmets might be something to do with what you see in that picture of Millar. When a rider looks down, the back of the helmet goes up and the full-length aero helmets stick a fair way up into the wind and as such are about as aerodynamic as a brick. The stubby might be an attempt to reduce this problem, perhaps someone worked out that a rider loses more time by sticking a full-faired helmet up into the wind than they do by the loss of aerodynamics provided by the stubby. I imagine it's very hard keeping your neck in the most aero position for the whole TT and some look down a lot, inc. Millar. Don't know, but was it all of the Garmin team, or just certain riders?

@Steampunk
That was biopace and it was done with by '92. What people didn't think to do was use them on TT bikes rather than road bikes. I don't know what went wrong with bio-pace, but they were horrible, perhaps they weren't extreme enough. These new 'rings seem to have taken off though.
Nathan Edwards says:

Sep 16 2010 at 1:35 am

@JarvisAll the pictures I saw on the Garmin site were like that (DM, DZ and TD)... so probably all of them
Cyclops says:

Sep 16 2010 at 10:59 am

Or this?

In an almost-poetic way to finish his career, Arrieta dropped out of the Spanish Grand Tour at the foot of the Lagos de Covadonga, the same climb which proved too much for five-time Tour de France winner Miguel Indurain...
Cyclops says:

Sep 16 2010 at 11:02 am

Or this?

Arrieta retires...

"In an almost-poetic way to finish his career, Arrieta dropped out of the Spanish Grand Tour at the foot of the Lagos de Covadonga, the same climb which proved too much for five-time Tour de France winner Miguel Indurain..."
frank says:

Sep 18 2010 at 8:29 am

What an amazing ride by Nibbles!!
Jarvis says:

Sep 18 2010 at 9:07 am

yeah, thank god for that...couldn't have been a worse scenario than Mosquera winning GC, not least for my GC chances. As usual I was miles off with the stage
frank says:

Sep 18 2010 at 12:32 pm

@Jarvis
You are certainly making a strong push in this edition, that's for sure!

@all
The overall stays largely the same (including bonus points)

1 Andy 17 points
2 Jarvis 13 points
3 Hawkeye 13 points
4 KitCarson 5 points
5 Steampunk 4 points
6 Roberto Marques 4 points
7 Geof 3 points
8 Marcus 2 points
9 Frank 2 points
13 Sgt 1 point
10 John 1 point
11 Marko 0 points
12 Minion 0 points
14 Nathan Edwards 0 points
15 Ben 0 points
16 Brett 0 points
17 Cyclops 0 points