Boonen in disarray?

dexjava said:

So far he's whined about:
a) The length and difficulty of the tour
b) The sprints being too slow for him, just like Cippolini
c) McEwen didn't want to work with him in a break
d) His tummy is upset

I know i'm missing some more.

Clearly, Boonen is in disarray.

Did we really need three seperate threads for this?

dexjava said:

So far he's whined about:
a) The length and difficulty of the tour
b) The sprints being too slow for him, just like Cippolini
c) McEwen didn't want to work with him in a break
d) His tummy is upset

I know i'm missing some more.

Clearly, Boonen is in disarray.

Clearly, the whole TdF is in disarray without the boss.

tcklyde said:

Did we really need three seperate threads for this?

It was a joke, because there were already a lot of Boonen threads.

Sorry to take away precious space that could be used by valuable doping threads.

DiabloScott said:

Clearly, the whole TdF is in disarray without the boss.

ITS TRUE!!
Landis motioned for a nature break and then Freire takes off yesterau forcing McEwen to get Lotto to chase or at least Robbie chased.
Boonen: "Lets put it this way. McEwen didnt make himself a lot of friends in the bunck yesterday."

bobke said:

ITS TRUE!!
Landis motioned for a nature break and then Freire takes off yesterau forcing McEwen to get Lotto to chase or at least Robbie chased.
Boonen: "Lets put it this way. McEwen didnt make himself a lot of friends in the bunck yesterday."

One can only imagine, but nature calling aside - can't blame Robbie for wanting to attack, it's his Green Jersey on the line here, I bet he's wishing Popo would pull something on the bag on GC to get back at Landis for refusing to chase 🙂

Where is the quote from?

DiabloScott said:

Clearly, the whole TdF is in disarray without the boss.

You've noticed that too? And now we have Lemond whining more on OLN....We have Boonen being shown how to properly sprint when it matters. And then his whining.

Everyone wants to show their failures are as a result of the other guy being a doper....

The peloton is in complete dissarry....

"Lance come home..... Lance come home ..."

The entire cycling world is in disarray.

DiabloScott said:

Clearly, the whole TdF is in disarray without the boss.

His retirement could have been the best move of his career ...

cyclingheroes said:

His retirement could have been the best move of his career ...

Why?

wolfix said:

Why?

Because there is a war going on in the cycling world...

I agree. A rider right now has to be almost embarressed to be a cyclists in the ProTour. The guy that wins this year will have the title of winning a TDF where no one important was there. [Even if that is not true]

When other riders are adding fuel to the doping presss [Boonen] the story becomes the main event.

When doping has taken down the "nice guy" of cycling [Jan Ullrich] it makes it believable that "everyone" is doping.

This years event is not a TDF classic , nor has the legendary status of other TDF's of past. The word "epic" has to do with the fan's patience with the sport more then it applies to the riders.

wolfix said:

I agree. A rider right now has to be almost embarressed to be a cyclists in the ProTour. The guy that wins this year will have the title of winning a TDF where no one important was there. [Even if that is not true]

When other riders are adding fuel to the doping presss [Boonen] the story becomes the main event.

When doping has taken down the "nice guy" of cycling [Jan Ullrich] it makes it believable that "everyone" is doping.

This years event is not a TDF classic , nor has the legendary status of other TDF's of past. The word "epic" has to do with the fan's patience with the sport more then it applies to the riders.

I'm not at all sure that had Basso or Ullrich won - we wouldn't think "It's just because Lance wasn't there". I'm pretty sure I'd think that, I think Lance had it in the tank to win another year (though I definitely think he did the right thing, even though I wanted to be able to watch him a year more, being a new fan of him and the sport).

This year winner was suppose to end up as second best as it is, and actually - without the three biggest names, it makes things look more even, in a way.

Yes, comparing to last year at least, this peloton is riding in the shadow of a rather big elephant no one really want to talk about, but I still think we're seeing some fair bit of cycling that has nothing to do with doping.

Boonen has also argued that Rujano and Garate took two spots from his regular lead-out train. Including one of his main lead-out men. I already made this observation before the Tour began that I was very surprised Guido Trenti was not on the team.

Other factors not mentioned by Boonen could be:

-- Quickstep team's fatigue from having defended several days of Boonen in yellow.
-- There are fewer sprinters' teams to help bring back breakaways on stages where the final sprint seems ideal for sprinters. That is because (i) Credit Agricole is not going to work as much, since Thor already has a stage win and knows Boonen wants a stage win more, (ii) Davi is not chasing as much as if they were not trying to podium with Cadel Evans (i.e., they are saving themselves in part to support Cadel as well as keep Robbie in green), (iii) Freire's team Rabo is also saving itself to help Menchov try to win GC, and (iv) Milram knows that Zabel's chances are not that great and had a bad experience in the Giro with other people using the Milram lead-out.

Or could it be the simple fact that Robbie McEwen is a better sprinter right now?

Well, I'd have to say that not having Guido Trenti is a difference.

McEwen probably has an advantage over Boonen in more chaotic, less lead-out-train driven, slower sprints where moving around and jostling for position are more important.

Another reason Boonen didn't discuss is that he was working on trying to get over climbs earlier this year, in hopes of wearing Green. That work in the mountains probably was different from his usual preparation methods.

wolfix said:

Or could it be the simple fact that Robbie McEwen is a better sprinter right now?

Boonen is a tad off in sprinting form. He is not handling the situation very well.

I'll take a whinging Boonen over McEwen any day. In his comments the other day it was "[censored] Evans, he can help himself. I need the team for me. Me. Me. Me. Blah. Blah. Blah..."

Bro Deal said:

Boonen is a tad off in sprinting form. He is not handling the situation very well.

I'll take a whinging Boonen over McEwen any day. In his comments the other day it was "[censored] Evans, he can help himself. I need the team for me. Me. Me. Me. Blah. Blah. Blah..."

Yeah but Robbie headbutts people, so he's fine in my book. When Robbie headbutts people, it takes the focus off doping for a micro second.

I'm tired of him sitting up everytime he can't win. What a chump. He going to whus himself out of the green jersey if he hasn't already. I used to like him, but not anymore. I started having my doubts after Petachi won MSR last year. Same [censored]. He saw he couldn't win and stopped pedaling. I'm sure his teammates love that.

dexjava said:

Yeah but Robbie headbutts people, so he's fine in my book. When Robbie headbutts people, it takes the focus off doping for a micro second.

Ah, that explains why there has been no discussion of footballers as part of the scandal... 🙂