O/T Cycling

[P/T Indie]

Somehting for Christies Child to get excited about

A bit ambitious it's all well and good having Cavendish, Wiggins and co in the team but as soon as any of them get near a hill they are knackered


http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/cycling/7912024.stm

[Richard Head]

Presumably Dave Brailsford has identified one or more riders who are presently in the under 23 acadamy as potential Tour winners. Cavendish is likely to be a multiple stage winner and challenger for the Green jersey for the next decade but is signed up for Columbia-High Road for this year and next.

Brailsford is already planning a team around Cavendish for the road race at the 2012 Olympics where we will make sure it is a flattish course to give Cavendish the best chance of a Gold medal

[Christies Child]

There are a few local lads who are now with pro teams who with the right coaching could well make the squad.

Mine and Ian Singleton's old club the Lune RCC have present riders in their ranks who have encouraging futures ahead of them IF they dedicate themselves to their chosen sport. The financial rewards can be considerable.

[Richard Head]

Any progress these lads make isnt going to be helped by the increasing number of Premier Calendar events being cancelled because of problems with the police.

I suppose the best local rider of recent times is Ben Greenwood but he is short of the standard needed to get in the Team Sky squad

[Christies Child]

Isn't Ben going to spend the season in Italy? Maybe it's what he needs to move to the next level.

I understand that there is somebody else living locally of whom great things are expected. Forgot his name though......

[Richard Head]

Ben will be racing for Rapha-Condor again this year. He spent 2007 in Italy where he didnt get any wins but had quite a few top ten finishes

[morecambe mick]

But why?

Bloody silent assassins!

[CASS]

As a younger man we used to ride up and watch the Porthole GP around Windermere. Not a race obviously but a TT. For many years the battle was to break the hour mark and it was eventualy beaten ...Then there was a period when Preston lad Gethin Butler did very well and won for a few years well within the hour. Then one year a certain Mr Boardman entered, We wached him warm up,and set off with No 1 pinned on his back.....46mins later he was back,
46 MINS !!,There are no short cuts on this route apart from the ferry,so not only had he gained first place he had smashed the record out of the water.My point is that around that time Gethin Butler was about as good as it gets in the TT world "around here", then up steps a pro and Bang,the gulf is evident. No doubt Master Greenwood will give it is best shot and I really hope he makes the grade,but Boardman's performance that day just underlined how good the top pro riders are.
The last time I ventured around the lake on my bike it took us 8 hrs,but you will be pleased to hear we NEVER passed a pub,without going in.

[durhamshrimp]

This is just another trade team with a GB core, not much different to a lot of the Italian or French teams. It won't be Great Britain, the team will be called Team Sky or Sky HD+ or whatever. Much the same as the other trade teams. Plus there will be international riders on the team. It's a long way from what seemed to be the early hope of a Great Britain road team in Great Britain colours.

[Christies Child]

This is just another trade team with a GB core, not much different to a lot of the Italian or French teams. It won't be Great Britain, the team will be called Team Sky or Sky HD+ or whatever. Much the same as the other trade teams. Plus there will be international riders on the team. It's a long way from what seemed to be the early hope of a Great Britain road team in Great Britain colours.

The idea is to produce a British winner, backed by a British team, made up of British riders.

ANC tried it a few years ago but with little success.

Circumstances and technology has changed and we lead the world in many innovative ways that the possibility of achieving what at one time would have seemed impossible is now possible.

Who would ever have thought that we would have done what we did in the velodrome in the Olympics, but with skillful coaching, the right equipment and the will to win we achieved the unthinkable.

It could well happen again.

[Richard Head]

The idea is to produce a British winner, backed by a British team, made up of British riders.

ANC tried it a few years ago but with little success.

Circumstances and technology has changed and we lead the world in many innovative ways that the possibility of achieving what at one time would have seemed impossible is now possible.

Who would ever have thought that we would have done what we did in the velodrome in the Olympics, but with skillful coaching, the right equipment and the will to win we achieved the unthinkable.

It could well happen again.

The idea of a British winner of the Tour might seem over ambitious but unless you give it a go you will never know.

Whatever happens, with Dave Brailsford at the helm its bound to be better than the ANC/Halfords fiasco in the 1987. Only 3 riders finished the tour, the riders didnt get paid and the team folded soon afterwards. Amazingly one of the ANC finishers that year, Malcolm Elliott, was still racing last year in the Premier Calendar races against the likes of Ben Greenwood and he is now well into his forties

[Richard Head]

As a younger man we used to ride up and watch the Porthole GP around Windermere. Not a race obviously but a TT. For many years the battle was to break the hour mark and it was eventualy beaten ...Then there was a period when Preston lad Gethin Butler did very well and won for a few years well within the hour. Then one year a certain Mr Boardman entered, We wached him warm up,and set off with No 1 pinned on his back.....46mins later he was back,

It is rumoured that Chris Boardman's team manager at that time, Roger Legeay, will be offered a role within the new Team Sky

[P/T Indie]

Cavendish has won the Milan-San Remo he must be developing into an all rounder as there are a few hills in it.

“Crossing the line first was the sweetest thing, but the second sweetest thing was seeing Tom Boonen go backwards past me on the climbs,” he said.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/more_sport/cycling/article5956522.ece

[Christies Child]

A superb result for the Isle of Man raised cycling pro.

Confidence is 95% of the winning criteria in the sport and the guy has it in abundance.

[Richard Head]

While this win for Cavendish was a major step up, the hills in Milan-San Remo are nothing like the the mountains they climb in the Tour de France. While he will never be an overall contender in the Tour, the way he is going by the end of his career he could end up with a record number of stage wins and points jerseys.

The only other one day classics which suit him are Ghent-Wevelgem which he will be going for on April 8th and Paris-Tours. He seems to think that he has a chance of winning Paris-Roubaix as well somewhere down the line though.

[durhamshrimp]

While this win for Cavendish was a major step up, the hills in Milan-San Remo are nothing like the the mountains they climb in the Tour de France. While he will never be an overall contender in the Tour, the way he is going by the end of his career he could end up with a record number of stage wins and points jerseys.

The only other one day classics which suit him are Ghent-Wevelgem which he will be going for on April 8th and Paris-Tours. He seems to think that he has a chance of winning Paris-Roubaix as well somewhere down the line though.

I wouldn't be surprised to see him turn into a decent enough climber, he's still very young and his climbing has vastly improved in the last year or so. Will be interesting to see how he develops.