Leipheimer

Sorry, Musette, but I must protest at this assertion that Bruyneel has 9 GT wins as a DS. At the risk of repeating myself - Sean Yates was DS for Savoldelli's Giro win

Credit where it's due, please

Bruyneel's good but he did get to work with one of the best cyclists of all time in lance. Riis's record so far as a ds is good and over the next few years expect him to compile a cv as good as johan

Eldrack said:

Yah know, I am thinking that perhaps, when Ivan Basso has say, done the double, won the TdF 5 times, won the Vuelta, done the triple or whatever peoples opinions of him might start dropping. I mean, when Lance won his first TdF in 1999 what did people think of him them. I'm sure everyone loved it, plucky cancer survivor winning the worlds greatest sporting event and all. Then he won again, and agian, and again. When did people start thinking, hmm, isn't he just a little too good. And then they started to hate him, his team etc etc. So maybe the same will happen to Ivan Basso. I think he stands more of a chance as he seems to be a generally nice guy etc, but you never know.

This post made me smile.

I really like Basso. But what will people begin to say of him if for example he was to win 5 Giro/Tour doubles?

It seems if you win your a champ. If you win to much you make the sport boring...

Rhubarb said:

This post made me smile.

I really like Basso. But what will people begin to say of him if for example he was to win 5 Giro/Tour doubles?

It seems if you win your a champ. If you win to much you make the sport boring...

ah, but it's the manner of the winning, isn't it - Armstrong's and Indurain's wins were clever, well constructed, brilliantly efficient - and ultimately dull - personally, I crave panache, the odd grand exploit, the leader's jersey on the attack throughout the race, the possibility of a nail biting finish....

micron said:

I crave panache, the odd grand exploit, the leader's jersey on the attack throughout the race, the possibility of a nail biting finish....

That's why guys like Pantani and Jalabert were great. And Virenque with his TdF podiums was fun to watch. Hopefully we may see some of this at this year's tour.

It is the spectacle and drama, isn't it? The last really exciting Tour was 2003 - Lance faltering, Jan stalking him 15 seconds back, and it all came down to a final TT in the rain. Would have been even closer if Mayo hadn't nicked Jan on Luz Ardiden for the bonus points. You can't write fiction that good. For the most part, the last two Tours have been relatively lackluster, as was 2002, though I don't know whether to blame LA, or the rest of the peloton that seemed to have given up.

DL this year was downright exciting to watch, with Mayo and Ullrich showing their old form, and Levi getting some long overdue recognition. Same for Paris-Roubaix, lots of drama there.

As an American who was drawn back to professional cycling by LA, it took me a couple of years to figure out why the classics get so much attention over there, and regret that we get such [censored]-poor coverage of them over here. The classics are just a lot more exciting to watch - lots of drama and slashing attacks all in the same day, while the GT's are more of a study in patience, punctuated by a few thrilling moments. (do love the TTT, though - they look so graceful in formation)

JohnO said:

The classics are just a lot more exciting to watch - lots of drama and slashing attacks all in the same day, while the GT's are more of a study in patience, punctuated by a few thrilling moments. (do love the TTT, though - they look so graceful in formation)

I mostly agree, although there are some exceptions; Paris-Roubaix is mostly pure attrition. But, if you know the sport, there is nothing like the evolving landscape of a GT with its multiple simultaneous competitions and its possibility for comebacks as strength ebbs and flows from day to day.

But also the occasional train! 🙂

wicklow200 said:

Browsing various cycling message boards, I noticed one or two comments recently hoping LL would NOT do well in the DL or Tour, would lose lots of time in the mountains etc

Thanks

Nice article about Leipheimer in this Sunday's Sacramento Bee:

[font=Times New Roman]Leipheimer knows all about cycles[/font]

[font=Times New Roman]He can make a move in the Tour de France after the retirement of Lance Armstrong.[/font]

[font=Times New Roman]By James Raia -- Special To The Bee[/font]

[font=Times New Roman]Published 12:01 am PDT Sunday, June 25, 2006
Story appeared in Sports section, Page C7[/font]

[font=Arial]Levi Leipheimer has succeeded at the top level of professional cycling for nearly a decade. But the four-time Tour de France competitor has arrived at a new competitive plateau. [/font]

[font=Arial]With Lance Armstrong now retired, Leipheimer, the part-time resident of Santa Rosa, is the most accomplished of a select group of remaining veteran Americans still on the international circuit. [/font]

[font=Arial]Competing for five teams, eight U.S. riders, likely led by Leipheimer, will compete in the 93rd Tour de France beginning Saturday. [/font]

[font=Arial]Without Armstrong in the race for the first time since 1999, 21 teams and 189 cyclists will progress 2,272 miles from Strasbourg to Paris. [/font]

[font=Arial]One-day visits to Luxembourg, Holland and Spain will complement the counterclockwise traditional journey across the French countryside and into the Alps and Pyrenees. [/font]

[font=Arial]"There are a few favorites, but the race is so hard and so fast, it's not like you're going to see somebody you've never expected to win, win," said the 5-foot-7, 135-pound Leipheimer, who finished sixth overall last year. "The teams with the favorites will still try to control the race as much as possible. [/font]

[font=Arial]"It's certainly not going to be a completely different tour. The only thing is that someone else is going to win for the first time in eight years." [/font]

[font=Arial]Since returning to cycling in 1999 after a two-year battle with metastasized testicular cancer, Armstrong won the Tour de France -- cycling's pinnacle event -- seven consecutive years. He retired after his 2005 title. [/font]

[font=Arial]Americans Bobby Julich, Floyd Landis, David Zabriskie, George Hincapie, Christian Vande Velde and Leipheimer, all former Armstrong teammates, also found varying success. But Armstrong, brash and dominating, was the story. And even in retirement as the part owner of the Discovery Channel team, he attracts as much attention as any current rider. [/font]

[font=Arial]On the bike, this year's Tour features only one former winner, German Jan Ullrich. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leader of the T-Mobile squad, Ullrich placed third in 2005 behind Armstrong and Italy's Ivan Basso. Ullrich won the Tour in 1997 and also has five second-place overall finishes. Basso, captain of the sport's top-ranked team, CSC, also returns, as will all top-10 overall riders from last year -- except Armstrong. [/font]

[font=Arial]"I feel my chances are good, but I'm not a big favorite like Basso or Ullrich," said Leipheimer, 32. "When people ask my goals for the Tour, it's not really something you can put a number on or a time on or anything like that. There's a lot that you can't control, like who's riding well and how many people are riding well. [/font]

[font=Arial]"I think it just has to do with a personal feeling or preparation and riding the race to the best of my abilities. I feel like I'm training as strongly as I ever have. I'm smarter, more consistent and have more focused training." [/font]

[font=Arial]Like others, including Armstrong, Leipheimer also turned to Dr. Max Testa in Sacramento for individualized training. Testa was a pro cycling team physician in Europe for a decade before moving to the United States in 2001 to help co-found the sports medicine program at UC Davis. [/font]

[font=Arial]In Leipheimer's instance, Testa assessed and adjusted various components of the rider's skills -- cadence to riding position. Leipheimer says he's now able to train harder as he approaches the waning years of his career. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer also raced differently this season. While usually competing in event-packed spring seasons in Europe, he remained in Northern California to train and competed periodically. [/font]

[font=Arial]As the favorite, Leipheimer last February won a prologue in San Francisco and held the race lead before an exuberant crowd when the opening of the inaugural Tour of California ended in Santa Rosa. He finished sixth overall after a disappointing time trial in San Jose. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer was ill early in March but returned to compete in second-tier Northern California road races in Monterey and Milton. He then returned to Spain, where he lives during the season with his wife. By early June, he was in prime form and won the overall title at Dauphine Libere, a key weeklong Tour de France preamble. [/font]

[font=Arial]"It's been a lot different this year," Leipheimer said. "I really haven't raced that much. But I've been training very well." [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer finished eighth in the 2002 Tour and was predicted as a potential top-three finisher in 2003. However, he crashed in the first stage, suffered several broken bones and missed the rest of the season. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer was on his way to a top-five overall Tour finish in 2004, compiling nine top-20 and two top-10 stage finishes. But he had difficulties on a mountain stage and in the individual time trial to cycling's most famous mountain, L'Alpe d'Huez. Leipheimer lost appreciable time and eventually finished ninth. [/font]

[font=Arial]Last year, Leipheimer began a two-year contract with Gerolsteiner, the team sponsored by a German bottled water company, and he had his career-best season. He was in fifth place overall entering the last day of the Tour de France but lost one position to aggressive Alexander Vinokourov of Kazakhstan in the usual ceremonial ride to Paris. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer rebounded in late August and claimed the nine-day Tour of Germany. While German teammate Georg Totschnig and Ullrich were favored on home soil, Leipheimer moved into the lead while winning the mountainous fourth stage. It ended at Rettenbachferner in Austria, the highest in European cycling at 8,760 feet. [/font]

[font=Arial]The thin air victory and his desire not to be upstaged on the final stage will provide additional Tour de France motivation this year. [/font]

[font=Arial]"I think the Pyreness will be a little bit easier overall this year," said Leipheimer, who never has won a Tour stage. "But I believe the Alps will be very hard. When I look at the stages, there are three very difficult days right in a row." [/font]

[font=Arial]Tour de France[/font]

[font=Arial]When: Saturday-July 23 [/font]

[font=Arial]Stage 1: Saturday, coverage begins at 5:30 a.m. [/font]

[font=Arial]TV: OLN [/font]

[font=Arial]Levi Leipheimer file[/font]

[font=Arial]Born: Oct. 24, 1973, Butte, Mont. [/font]

[font=Arial]Resides: With wife Odessa Gunn in Santa Rosa. [/font]

[font=Arial]Ht., wt.: 5-foot-7, 135 pounds [/font]

[font=Arial]Turned pro: 1997 [/font]

[font=Arial]Teams: Gerolsteiner (2005-06), Rabobank (2002-04), U.S. Postal (2000-01), Saturn (1998-99), 1997 (Comptel-Colorado Cyclist). [/font]

[font=Arial]RESULTS[/font]

[font=Arial]2006: Sea Otter Classic, road race, eighth; Copperopolis road race, first; Volta a Catalunya (stage race), 20th overall; first overall, Dauphine Libere. [/font]

[font=Arial]2005: First overall, Tour of Germany (plus one stage win); second overall, Tour de Georgia; third overall, Dauphine Libere; sixth overall, Tour de France. [/font]

[font=Arial]2004: Stage win, Setmana Catalana; fifth overall, Tour of the Basque Country; fifth, Tour du Haut-Var; eighth overall, Dauphine Libere; ninth overall, Tour de France. [/font]

[font=Arial]2003: 58th overall, Vuelta a España; 13th, world TT championship. [/font]

[font=Arial]2002: First overall, Route du Sud (plus TT stage win); eighth overall, Tour de France. [/font]

[font=Arial]2001: Third overall, Vuelta a España; fourth, world TT championship; second overall, Vuelta a Castilla y León; sixth overall, Tour of Burgos; stage win, Sea Otter Classic; stage win, Redlands Classic. [/font]

[font=Arial]2000: TT stage win, Circuit Franco-Belge. [/font]

[font=Arial]1999: First overall, GP de Beauce (plus one stage win); first, U.S. National TT Championship; two stage wins, Fitchburg-Longsjo Classic; two stage wins, Tour de 'Toona International. [/font]

[font=Arial]1998: First overall, GP de Beauce (plus one stage win); stage win, Nevada City Classic. [/font]

[font=Arial]1997: First overall, Natural State GP (plus two stage wins); stage win, Cascade Classic; stage win, Tour de 'Toona; stage win, Killington Stage Race. [/font]

[right][font=Arial]-- James Raia[/font][/right]

lwedge said:

Nice article about Leipheimer in this Sunday's Sacramento Bee:

[font=Times New Roman]Leipheimer knows all about cycles[/font]

[font=Times New Roman]He can make a move in the Tour de France after the retirement of Lance Armstrong.[/font]

[font=Times New Roman]By James Raia -- Special To The Bee[/font]

[font=Times New Roman]Published 12:01 am PDT Sunday, June 25, 2006
Story appeared in Sports section, Page C7[/font]

[font=Arial]Levi Leipheimer has succeeded at the top level of professional cycling for nearly a decade. But the four-time Tour de France competitor has arrived at a new competitive plateau. [/font]

[font=Arial]With Lance Armstrong now retired, Leipheimer, the part-time resident of Santa Rosa, is the most accomplished of a select group of remaining veteran Americans still on the international circuit. [/font]

[font=Arial]Competing for five teams, eight U.S. riders, likely led by Leipheimer, will compete in the 93rd Tour de France beginning Saturday. [/font]

[font=Arial]Without Armstrong in the race for the first time since 1999, 21 teams and 189 cyclists will progress 2,272 miles from Strasbourg to Paris. [/font]

[font=Arial]One-day visits to Luxembourg, Holland and Spain will complement the counterclockwise traditional journey across the French countryside and into the Alps and Pyrenees. [/font]

[font=Arial]"There are a few favorites, but the race is so hard and so fast, it's not like you're going to see somebody you've never expected to win, win," said the 5-foot-7, 135-pound Leipheimer, who finished sixth overall last year. "The teams with the favorites will still try to control the race as much as possible. [/font]

[font=Arial]"It's certainly not going to be a completely different tour. The only thing is that someone else is going to win for the first time in eight years." [/font]

[font=Arial]Since returning to cycling in 1999 after a two-year battle with metastasized testicular cancer, Armstrong won the Tour de France -- cycling's pinnacle event -- seven consecutive years. He retired after his 2005 title. [/font]

[font=Arial]Americans Bobby Julich, Floyd Landis, David Zabriskie, George Hincapie, Christian Vande Velde and Leipheimer, all former Armstrong teammates, also found varying success. But Armstrong, brash and dominating, was the story. And even in retirement as the part owner of the Discovery Channel team, he attracts as much attention as any current rider. [/font]

[font=Arial]On the bike, this year's Tour features only one former winner, German Jan Ullrich. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leader of the T-Mobile squad, Ullrich placed third in 2005 behind Armstrong and Italy's Ivan Basso. Ullrich won the Tour in 1997 and also has five second-place overall finishes. Basso, captain of the sport's top-ranked team, CSC, also returns, as will all top-10 overall riders from last year -- except Armstrong. [/font]

[font=Arial]"I feel my chances are good, but I'm not a big favorite like Basso or Ullrich," said Leipheimer, 32. "When people ask my goals for the Tour, it's not really something you can put a number on or a time on or anything like that. There's a lot that you can't control, like who's riding well and how many people are riding well. [/font]

[font=Arial]"I think it just has to do with a personal feeling or preparation and riding the race to the best of my abilities. I feel like I'm training as strongly as I ever have. I'm smarter, more consistent and have more focused training." [/font]

[font=Arial]Like others, including Armstrong, Leipheimer also turned to Dr. Max Testa in Sacramento for individualized training. Testa was a pro cycling team physician in Europe for a decade before moving to the United States in 2001 to help co-found the sports medicine program at UC Davis. [/font]

[font=Arial]In Leipheimer's instance, Testa assessed and adjusted various components of the rider's skills -- cadence to riding position. Leipheimer says he's now able to train harder as he approaches the waning years of his career. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer also raced differently this season. While usually competing in event-packed spring seasons in Europe, he remained in Northern California to train and competed periodically. [/font]

[font=Arial]As the favorite, Leipheimer last February won a prologue in San Francisco and held the race lead before an exuberant crowd when the opening of the inaugural Tour of California ended in Santa Rosa. He finished sixth overall after a disappointing time trial in San Jose. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer was ill early in March but returned to compete in second-tier Northern California road races in Monterey and Milton. He then returned to Spain, where he lives during the season with his wife. By early June, he was in prime form and won the overall title at Dauphine Libere, a key weeklong Tour de France preamble. [/font]

[font=Arial]"It's been a lot different this year," Leipheimer said. "I really haven't raced that much. But I've been training very well." [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer finished eighth in the 2002 Tour and was predicted as a potential top-three finisher in 2003. However, he crashed in the first stage, suffered several broken bones and missed the rest of the season. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer was on his way to a top-five overall Tour finish in 2004, compiling nine top-20 and two top-10 stage finishes. But he had difficulties on a mountain stage and in the individual time trial to cycling's most famous mountain, L'Alpe d'Huez. Leipheimer lost appreciable time and eventually finished ninth. [/font]

[font=Arial]Last year, Leipheimer began a two-year contract with Gerolsteiner, the team sponsored by a German bottled water company, and he had his career-best season. He was in fifth place overall entering the last day of the Tour de France but lost one position to aggressive Alexander Vinokourov of Kazakhstan in the usual ceremonial ride to Paris. [/font]

[font=Arial]Leipheimer rebounded in late August and claimed the nine-day Tour of Germany. While German teammate Georg Totschnig and Ullrich were favored on home soil, Leipheimer moved into the lead while winning the mountainous fourth stage. It ended at Rettenbachferner in Austria, the highest in European cycling at 8,760 feet. [/font]

[font=Arial]The thin air victory and his desire not to be upstaged on the final stage will provide additional Tour de France motivation this year. [/font]

[font=Arial]"I think the Pyreness will be a little bit easier overall this year," said Leipheimer, who never has won a Tour stage. "But I believe the Alps will be very hard. When I look at the stages, there are three very difficult days right in a row." [/font]

[font=Arial]Tour de France[/font]

[font=Arial]When: Saturday-July 23 [/font]

[font=Arial]Stage 1: Saturday, coverage begins at 5:30 a.m. [/font]

[font=Arial]TV: OLN [/font]

[font=Arial]Levi Leipheimer file[/font]

[font=Arial]Born: Oct. 24, 1973, Butte, Mont. [/font]

[font=Arial]Resides: With wife Odessa Gunn in Santa Rosa. [/font]

[font=Arial]Ht., wt.: 5-foot-7, 135 pounds [/font]

[font=Arial]Turned pro: 1997 [/font]

[font=Arial]Teams: Gerolsteiner (2005-06), Rabobank (2002-04), U.S. Postal (2000-01), Saturn (1998-99), 1997 (Comptel-Colorado Cyclist). [/font]

[font=Arial]RESULTS[/font]

[font=Arial]2006: Sea Otter Classic, road race, eighth; Copperopolis road race, first; Volta a Catalunya (stage race), 20th overall; first overall, Dauphine Libere. [/font]

[font=Arial]2005: First overall, Tour of Germany (plus one stage win); second overall, Tour de Georgia; third overall, Dauphine Libere; sixth overall, Tour de France. [/font]

[font=Arial]2004: Stage win, Setmana Catalana; fifth overall, Tour of the Basque Country; fifth, Tour du Haut-Var; eighth overall, Dauphine Libere; ninth overall, Tour de France. [/font]

[font=Arial]2003: 58th overall, Vuelta a España; 13th, world TT championship. [/font]

[font=Arial]2002: First overall, Route du Sud (plus TT stage win); eighth overall, Tour de France. [/font]

[font=Arial]2001: Third overall, Vuelta a España; fourth, world TT championship; second overall, Vuelta a Castilla y León; sixth overall, Tour of Burgos; stage win, Sea Otter Classic; stage win, Redlands Classic. [/font]

[font=Arial]2000: TT stage win, Circuit Franco-Belge. [/font]

[font=Arial]1999: First overall, GP de Beauce (plus one stage win); first, U.S. National TT Championship; two stage wins, Fitchburg-Longsjo Classic; two stage wins, Tour de 'Toona International. [/font]

[font=Arial]1998: First overall, GP de Beauce (plus one stage win); stage win, Nevada City Classic. [/font]

[font=Arial]1997: First overall, Natural State GP (plus two stage wins); stage win, Cascade Classic; stage win, Tour de 'Toona; stage win, Killington Stage Race. [/font]

[right][font=Arial]-- James Raia[/font][/right]

I think Levi has a great chance of doing well this year considering that his main rivals may all be implicated in doping and he has been very far from any such stories.

hombredesubaru said:

he has been very far from any such stories.

I had no idea that he came back to California to race the Sea Otter Classic this year.

lw

musette said:

Even if Bruyneel planned, which he did by recruiting Popo, he could only do so much while LA was around. Which established GC rider would want to be a "pure" domestique to LA in the Tour, except for somebody who was very focused on the Giro and needed to leave his old team (like Savo) or somebody who was very young and probably more years away from truly contending for the Tour than the years LA would be around (like Popo)?

Riis has won one GT as DS (not even the TdF) and Bruyneel has won nine. When Riis has helped somebody win seven consecutive TdFs, he can try and claim that he might be on par with Bruyneel.

UCI Team Rankings
2006 CSC-1st DSC-6th
2005 CSC -1st DSC -8th
2004- CSC -2nd USPS-6th

Sorry Musette, but there is a whole lot more to cycling than the just GT's. The real stars come out in the classics, and they are far more exciting races to boot. Bruyneel can win a GT, but he has yet to win ANY of the 5 MONUMENTS of cycling. Paris-Roubaix, Tour of Flanders, Milan-San Remo,Leige-Baston-Leige,Giro D' Lombardi. Or any of the other classics

CSC won Paris-Roubaix and the Amstel Gold this year.

You are right, Riis isn't on par with Bruyneel. He is way above him. Or at least his team is.

EvilJediJ said:

UCI Team Rankings
2006 CSC-1st DSC-6th
2005 CSC -1st DSC -8th
2004- CSC -2nd USPS-6th

Sorry Musette, but there is a whole lot more to cycling than the just GT's. The real stars come out in the classics, and they are far more exciting races to boot. Bruyneel can win a GT, but he has yet to win ANY of the 5 MONUMENTS of cycling. Paris-Roubaix, Tour of Flanders, Milan-San Remo,Leige-Baston-Leige,Giro D' Lombardi. Or any of the other classics

CSC won Paris-Roubaix and the Amstel Gold this year.

You are right, Riis isn't on par with Bruyneel. He is way above him. Or at least his team is.

what an absolutely retarded statement. are you seriously saying that winning the classics is vastly more difficult that winning the TDF, GDI, or TOS, or other GTs???

the team was built to win the TDF, not any of the other classics. essentially, your comment suggests that if bruyneel would have failed to win 7 effing TDFs but won some of the others then he would be a better DS.

let's wait until Riis wins the TDF at least once before you annoint him king of the DS. 🙄

btw, i'm not a huge bruyneel fan, in fact i'm really rooting for CSC this year...but i gotta call BS when i see it!

[quote="cheapie"]what an absolutely retarded statement. are you seriously saying that winning the classics is vastly more difficult that winning the TDF, GDI, or TOS, or other GTs???
QUOTE]

A)There are no other Grand Tours. B) I never said winning the classics was vastly harder than the grand tours.

C) CSC has been the TOP TEAM in the world the last two years. The Discovery Team can't even crack the top 6. Therefore CSC is a better team. This isn't debatable.

D)Yea, the team was built to win the TDF, and CSC was built to be a team that can win YEAR ROUND and they DO. Which is more impressive than designing your team around one rider and one race.

You can't really call that retarded logic, can you?

[quote="EvilJediJ"]

cheapie said:

what an absolutely retarded statement. are you seriously saying that winning the classics is vastly more difficult that winning the TDF, GDI, or TOS, or other GTs???
QUOTE]

A)There are no other Grand Tours. B) I never said winning the classics was vastly harder than the grand tours.

C) CSC has been the TOP TEAM in the world the last two years. The Discovery Team can't even crack the top 6. Therefore CSC is a better team. This isn't debatable.

D)Yea, the team was built to win the TDF, and CSC was built to be a team that can win YEAR ROUND and they DO. Which is more impressive than designing your team around one rider and one race.

You can't really call that retarded logic, can you?

Cheapie -- I see your position, but I have to disagree. The football analogy doesn't work for me. A football team plays in a single league, and the sole ultimate goal is the Superbowl. Everything else -- division titles and conference championships, are merely stepping stones.

Professional cycling's a bit different. The Classics are their own reward, and each classic win is it's own ultimate achievement. Same for the Grand Tours, etc. There is no doubt that the TdF is the most prestigious cycling achievement of the year, but it is not the goal of every professional cyclist. I think a team that can go out and win a classic or two, boast a world champion, and maybe throw in one of the two non TdF Grand Tours, has had a far better year than a team that only wins a single event, even if it's the TdF.

On the other hand, however, the reason I admire Disco and Bruyneel for what they accomplished over the last 7 years is that the team did not exist for the purpose of winning classics, etc. The raison d'etre of the team was to support LA in his stated goal of winning the TdF as many times as possible. All other considerations were secondary, and in that light it's a minor miracle that they achieved as much "non LA in yellow" success as they did. Popo got the white jersey last year, Hincapie got a high-profile stage win, Salvo won the Giro, etc. But if they had lost the TdF and anyone except LA was in yellow in Paris, the Discovery team would have been a huge failure, because that was the ONLY objective -- for an American-sponsored team to have an American "hero" win the only bike race a majority of Americans have ever heard of. So as I said, I respect everyone involved in the Disco organization for achieving such a difficult objective year after year.

On the other hand, however, from the perspective of the professional cycling season, which is far more than the TdF or grand tours, Disco cannot be called the most successful team, not by a long shot. As I said, however, that was never the team's objective. That needs to change in the future, however, if Disco is going to parlay the high-profile it created through LA and the TdF into more diversified, consistent results year-round.

"no debate about the better team? depends on what your focus is. they are/were a far better team at delivering a TDF win. did they race everything and accumulate points? of course not. i would concur that they have had better all-around riders, hence the high points. that's kind of like debating who the best football team over the last few years based on average ranking of the players without taking into consideration which team won the super bowl the last 7 years. "

The reason why we have a Pro Tour and a scoring system is so that these arguments are no longer matters of opinion, they are quantitative. Why would you assume that the TDF is the superbowl of cycling. Wouldn't the winner of the Pro Tour be the equivalent of the Superbowl champion? It's harder to be in good shape all year then just a single month. Danilo Di Luca was the best rider of the year last year.

"and why is it more impressive to win year-round? ask ullrich/basso, etc. if they'd rather be on a good all-around team or on a TDF winning team. i'm guessing it would be the latter."

What kind of silly analogy is this? Of course they would rather be on a TDF winning team because that way they get all the glory. Basso and Ullrich can't win Milan-San Remo or Paris-Roubaix, so they wouldn't care as much about having a team for those races. (Mind you CSC did win Paris-Roubaix this year). Ask Bettini, Di Luca, Boonen or Rebellin the same question and their answer would be completely different.

The Pro Tour/UCI scoring system was created so that the question could be answered- who really is the best cyclist in the world? Sure Ullrich would crush Bettini in a time trial in July during the TdF , but Paulo would drop him like a sack of potatoes in Giro D' Lombardi. So they devised a point system to quantitavily answer this question. Is the scoring system perfect? No- I in fact think that they don't give enough points to stage wins..but hey..it's close enough.

EvilJediJ said:

The reason why we have a Pro Tour and a scoring system is so that these arguments are no longer matters of opinion, they are quantitative. Why would you assume that the TDF is the superbowl of cycling. Wouldn't the winner of the Pro Tour be the equivalent of the Superbowl champion? It's harder to be in good shape all year then just a single month. Danilo Di Luca was the best rider of the year last year.

C'mon, you haven't thought this through. Cycling is not a sport with one title and one goal. Certainly not a team or individual Pro Tour title, not an established tradition, it will be a decade before people buy into that. And even then, cycling allows for multiple goals. Lots of classics riders will never target a GT. A climber will never target Worlds.

As for your last statement, I certainly agree with you, but I recall the debates here on this forum and I can assure you that only a minority were putting DiLuca as "best." I gave it my best argument, but so few agreed with me and you. 🙁

EvilJediJ said:

What kind of silly analogy is this? Of course they would rather be on a TDF winning team because that way they get all the glory. Basso and Ullrich can't win Milan-San Remo or Paris-Roubaix, so they wouldn't care as much about having a team for those races. (Mind you CSC did win Paris-Roubaix this year). Ask Bettini, Di Luca, Boonen or Rebellin the same question and their answer would be completely different.

yes, we agree. But...

EvilJediJ said:

The Pro Tour/UCI scoring system was created so that the question could be answered- who really is the best cyclist in the world? Sure Ullrich would crush Bettini in a time trial in July during the TdF , but Paulo would drop him like a sack of potatoes in Giro D' Lombardi. So they devised a point system to quantitavily answer this question. Is the scoring system perfect? No- I in fact think that they don't give enough points to stage wins..but hey..it's close enough.

No, it's not very close, because there is no one target in this sport. There is no objective comparison of classics/GT. The one point system we have is arbitrary. Now, lots of sports have arbitrary rankings. But I argue that sports with a clear goal - world cup champion, say - mean that at least it is clear what the ranking is trying to approximate (never mind USA's #5 FIFA ranking earlier this year 🙂 ). In cycling, no. Otherwise it would be clear whether Boonen or DiLica had the better year, and it just isnt.

JRMDC said:

C'mon, you haven't thought this through. Cycling is not a sport with one title and one goal. Certainly not a team or individual Pro Tour title, not an established tradition, it will be a decade before people buy into that. And even then, cycling allows for multiple goals. Lots of classics riders will never target a GT. A climber will never target Worlds..

That is actually my exact point. I don't think the Pro Tour is the end all be all and there is NO superbowl of cycling...but if anything were to be the Pro Tour title takes the better all around rider than winning the TdF. I agree with you. I'm sorry for not making myself clear.

What the people arguing against me are acting as if winning the TdF is the end all of the sport and their for Bruyneel is the best DS. I am pointing out exactly what you did, there are multiple goals.

Now the End Goal of a team might not be to capture the Team Pro Tour Title, but the amount of points racked up in this competition is a GREAT INDICATOR of how well they did accomplishing the MANY goals throughout the season.

JRMDC said:

As for your last statement, I certainly agree with you, but I recall the debates here on this forum and I can assure you that only a minority were putting DiLuca as "best." I gave it my best argument, but so few agreed with me and you. 🙁

yes, we agree. But...

No, it's not very close, because there is no one target in this sport. There is no objective comparison of classics/GT. The one point system we have is arbitrary. Now, lots of sports have arbitrary rankings. But I argue that sports with a clear goal - world cup champion, say - mean that at least it is clear what the ranking is trying to approximate (never mind USA's #5 FIFA ranking earlier this year 🙂 ). In cycling, no. Otherwise it would be clear whether Boonen or DiLica had the better year, and it just isnt.

I think the small margin of error within the scoring system can allow for arguments when riders are fairly close in Pro Tour Points.

But when CSC has 50% more points than Team Discovery. There is no room for argument.

Now it may not be an exact science, but it isn't ARBITRARY.. it's not as if the members of the UCI sat in a room through some dice in the air, picked numbers out of a hat and decided that the winner of the Tour would get a 100 points, the winner of Leige Baston Leige 50..etc.. The based the point scaling on difficulty, prestige, competition..etc

EvilJediJ said:

Now it may not be an exact science, but it isn't ARBITRARY.. it's not as if the members of the UCI sat in a room through some dice in the air, picked numbers out of a hat and decided that the winner of the Tour would get a 100 points, the winner of Leige Baston Leige 50..etc.. The based the point scaling on difficulty, prestige, competition..etc

We are in general agreement, so I won't debate to the death 🙂 (kick me off this board, I obviously don't belong!) but what you have described is arbitrary, despite the invoication of "difficulty, prestige, compeititon." Yes, in fact it is "as if," because some people DID sit in a room and assigned points based on their arbitrary opinions (albeit grounded on their personal cycling experience, but also their personal cycling preferences) as to what is what. For example, their arbitrary opinions resulted in miniscule rewards for stage wins in GTs relative to single-day races. They chose one among a zillion options.

Well, maybe I am debating until at least life support if not death, oh well. 🙂