Spring Classics 2024

[Gipfelstuermer]

Missed Scheldeprijs as the team is in the Basque Country because of the fight for the Div2 crown...

So now focus on Roubaix! A win there would be helpful for the Div2 crown of course.

Line-up is a no-brainer. Sort by pave skill and select the first 9 riders.

Atabay 79
Kemp 77.2
Cetiner 75.2
Carluccio 74.1
Orsini 72.7
Cotrufo 72.1
Aïnouz 71.8
Moriondo 70.7
Schmalen 68.7

Weak on paper, especially compared to last year when we brought 5 riders with 80+ pave, who together enabled Poulnikov to win. Nevertheless, the team this year is strong in terms of experience! DDV-winner Atabay and RVV-winner Kemp should definitely be amongst the favorites. Especially Kemp: If you can win RVV with 42 mountain (lowest ever for a winner?), you can definitely win in Roubaix. Makes we wonder though... what is the lowest pave skill a Roubaix winner has ever had? Started going through the history of winners, but I think the pave skill shown for super old riders is buggy... for example Kuuno Kasendi (Falkenbier) shown as 86 flat and 60.2 pave.... cant be correct... so this will remain a mystery for the moment (unless anyone knows why old pave skills would be buggy?)

Anyway, for Sunday we expect pave specialists like Tsegaye, Magritte, Gafurbekov and Faraday to leave their mark on the race! Hopefully lots of teams join the race!

By the way, we have one advantage vs the real race! No ridiculous chicane planned before Arenberg! So riders are safe and there shouldnt be any crashes on the pave!

[Robyklebt]

Paris-Roubaix... forgot, who cares, didn't win, think I got a top 10, yihaa.
Might talk about it in another thread later, our edition seemed incredibly low siebing. But why? Different ideas, one could be that the bug fix changed some stuff. But that might not be it either, it could be bad siebing. In past editions that were more selective I did the siebs, I know how to do them, this time I didn't, and clearly the sieb tactic by AGF was weak, not to say noobish. (I said it anyway). In the morning with bear the result was weak siebish too, but there didn't see it, or just the end? Or not even that? So no comment. The evening with FL on the other hand there were some guys ahead, saw nothing. Would need some feedback from those people on how they felt the pavé siebs were. Anyway, I won PR twice with guys with under 80 pavé as well, so it's not like in the past it was always for 80+ guys either.

Flèche Wallonne

Second place. The horrror. The depression. The hate for Bright. Undescribable. Unlike in the past, where I got beaten by classics etc. while being favorite this time I was beaten by a weaker climber, while favorite. Easy control, Bright helped, that horrible human being, he helped. Very easy control, but that group could have done it alone too. Many of the team have energy to spare. Henri, Almirall, Longbottom. Before the second last Mur, attack by 3 guys, easily controlled too, 30" to Longbottom and Almirall, all good after that Mur. But Gipfel continues, probably planning the attack, I chase behind, planned to go in with Leku at some point, but Bright (horrible man) beat me to it with Thayne, so I waited a few km longer. Then in, last Ereffe on the 4 classics attack 9" ahead. I didn't even realize it... and kept riding with Leku the next km instead of Woldemariam. 14" Woldemariam in for the downhill, then stayed in by mistake sort of, then finally realized there was a group, of course Wolde stays. In front helped by Brights classic who didn't join (very nice guy this Bright) for McMell in the back (horrible guy Bright).
16" before the last ascent, Marquez goes, Flopp follows, wins the sprint. Fully deserved by Bright, especially since he rode as much as me (which I thought was too much, but didn't say it, wanted to profit from his help, and I'm also aware that on a steep km often the first attack can be followed by a weaker guy) AND as importantly, he went for the win by following, not for safety by attacking himself and guaranteeing himself a good placement, but probably no win. Win or nothing (well, safety tempo was in, so maybe still second if he can't follow, but you never know, on 11.

Fully deserved by Bright, no question, but this one hurts. I consider myself a good "loser", after all I have lots of practice in it too. And think that in c4f "lose" doesn't exist most of the time. It's winning or not winning, no "losing" there. But this one feels like losing. La Flèche Wallonne is mine, I feel entitled to win it every year. Now only second. And no great classic action, no miscalculation, I just lost. Grrr. Ok, bad helping a bit, realized we needed 2 helpers too late, so had 35 energy less than Flopp in the end, could be that. Argh. Anyway, Donkey is taking this one rather badly, just because as I said la Flèche Wallonne simply is MINE. MINE MINE MINE. And now Bright's.
Better stay away from the transfer market today Giro team under reconsideration.

[Bear]

Roubaix. Heikki was on 99 form (my mistake...) and had the maximum power possible. My problem maybe that I just siebed at the last two ***** km. Maybe should have done before. But still it looked very low quality siebed. I really expected a better sieb compared to last year. For example the Tyler edition, but dont the weather back then.

[Dagestan]

Since the classic season is almost over, here's a summary of the results from the guys from Dagestan (and their foreign friends, who actually did better than the actual Dagestanians).

In short: we won 2 classics and both wins were not expected in advance. And the ones that we were hoping to win were lost in the end. But that's the fun part of the game, I guess. Here are the results of all classics we rode:
Omloop: no expectations, no chance. Abasov finishing 6th without any chance to fight for the win.
Strade Bianchi: we were hoping Amirkhanov could win this. But with opponents named Ghirga and Dopotescu, no real chance. In the end a disappointing third place.
Milano-Torino: was not expecting much from this classic, but suddenly Yagudaev found himself in a hilly sprint with an actual chance to win. In the end lost against Rochet. A pity, but second place is not too bad.
Milano-San Remo: traditionally our worst classic. Usually my best rider doesn't even make it to top 10. So 7th place with Usmanov felt like a win here.
E3 Harelbeke: again no expectations, but it's one of my favorite classics as a lot of things can happen here. At 14 km from the end Kafando took advantage of relatively low pace in the pack and attacked. He had 7 followers and coop on the group was quite bad due to uneven sprint skills. Kafando started playing poker too. Thanks to High Flyer who had no alternative in the peloton the group made it with a gap of 2 seconds and Kafando finished off his own attack in the sprint. A satisfying win.
Brabantse Pijl: We were hoping for Salikhov or Amirkhanov in this race. In the end Dzhalilov got closest to winning with a late attack, but on the final climb he was too weak. Salikov and Amirkhanov with a poor performance finished 7th and 8th. They are getting old...
Amstel: was supposed to not ride this race, but due to unforeseen events (a sick cat leading to a cancelled weekend trip to London) we found ourselves riding this race. Again no expectations as we already sold our "leader" Yagudaev. But in the peloton nobody wanted to ride. When Lula did a lot of tempo alone, we thought it was smart to go in his wheels. Khomutovski in Ragulin's wheel as a helper and our leader Sadeghi in Soria's. Then the attack came, but.. Ragulin did not attack with Letendre instead of Soria! Khomutovski found himself in the group alone, having to fight 2 Lula's, 2 Schappy's and 2 dead Narrenparty's in the final, but he showed himself very cooperative as podium would be already great for this anonymous helper. In the back there was some hesitation, so the group made it in the end. In the sprint he found himself in the wheel of Schappy's leader, with a tired launcher in front of him and Ragulin in his wheel who had probably been a helper for lots of km's already. So our best bet was to go at 150m and... Khomutovski made it easily to his first win! Not a bad first win for this 31-years old.
Fleche Wallone: Just like in Brabant, we had 2 leaders today and it didn't work out well. Amirkhanov followed a pointless attack that never got more than 5 seconds and finished 6th, while Sadeghi was siebed at an early stage. He fought back hard, but couldn't achieve more than at 14th place.

So overall 2 wins. Not too bad, considering that the team is getting weaker and weaker. Let's see what LBL will bring coming weekend. If it's anything good I will surely post again.

[cataracs]

Paris-Roubaix... forgot, who cares, didn't win, think I got a top 10, yihaa.
The evening with FL on the other hand there were some guys ahead, saw nothing. Would need some feedback from those people on how they felt the pavé siebs were. Anyway, I won PR twice with guys with under 80 pavé as well, so it's not like in the past it was always for 80+ guys either.

Why are you calling it FL group?? Are you a bigger fan than I am? Inui, "the guy that will only win a cat1 race" won, so call it the Inui group!
But anyway, the race wasn't very fast, so mostly everyone had 1-2 maybe 3 fit riders for the last sectors. then Kalidou(84.8) did the two 4stars km and the two 5stars km that followed, wasn't super selective but many riders dropped including the Medical team leader Jenci(77.4) the group remaining had around 10 riders, but then km253 0*** Tsegaye(84.1) made tempo and only 3 riders survived, so yeah it is selective enough you just have to make them fight!

[Robyklebt]

Inui? Has the guy won a cat 5 race? If not it stays the FL group:)

As for PR, no report, nothing happened. That easy!

Thanks for the siebing report..last q, how fit was Kalidou when he siebed? Compared to Inui? Roughly...

[cataracs]

Inui? Has the guy won a cat 5 race? If not it stays the FL group:)

As for PR, no report, nothing happened. That easy!

Thanks for the siebing report..last q, how fit was Kalidou when he siebed? Compared to Inui? Roughly...

Inui had a helper more for a little while in the end but it didn't really make the difference, he had like 10more energies at max

On the other hand, Hiroshi(82.4) who was also protected, but had little less energy than them at the siebs was gone. He had to fight on both the **** and his energy dropped like crazy, then he dropped on the first *****

Inui had to fight only during the Tsegaye tempo but that was enough for him to be second when the sprint started

[Robyklebt]

LBL

Not very confident about this one, no TRAIN here, just 9 guys without a clear leader. Classics... 72 max, Woldemariam... 50 sprint., 71 Lekubarri and Trutat with 45 and 41 sprint. Apart from the fact that with 71-72 most likely they won't end up in the first group, even if they do, they have no chance in the sprint. So the maybe Marquez secret leader?

1. H. Woldemariam
2 E. Almirall
3 G. Lekubarri
4 S. Longbottom
5 E. Marquez
6 E. Novelli
7 W. Stringfellow
8 L. Trutat
9 E. Verkerk

Bucquoy&Magritte(Belgians) and Ceroni will go to Liège too, in case we decide to change something. Like kick Marquez or Verkerk...But somehow I think the team won't change. Short as DS, Drinkwater as the guy in the second car will call the shots. We hope they come up with something good!

[flockmastoR]

LBL - Morning

A&D wanted to start in the afternoon, but Sundays monuments always better in the morning. Drinfeld/Oppenheimer our clear leaders, Drinfeld hardly beeing siebed but also unlikely to be able to follow classic attacks with 59 sprint still a good option for a top 10 place. Oppenheimer good classic with 73-79 and 56 sprint having topform, but even having a good classic might not be enough to end up in the first group finally. First surprise was that R4M sneaked in the morning group pretty late. With him and Sattelpuper there was some chance for chaos. So decided to to make an attack with Hamarat to bring a guy into a possible big group before my breakfast. Turns out R4M this time showing early interest to avoid a big group. So back into the peloton and breakfast. After breakfast, R4M did a farmer trick at the first chance. Dreizehn, Sattelpuper and so on riding in the back. When I was on again, I joined with Kalman getting back pretty fast. Then attack with Kalman and Hamarat, many followers including some high 6x climbers. After that Poke attacking to bring Yanez in position, later R4M attacking with his flat riders, A&D attacking with LeCun and Quickley. Pure chaos. But situation was looking not too bad for us. With Hamarat and Kalman in front, we had the option to bring LeCun to the leading group at some point, or to be there if early hard siebs follow. So Quickly was making early tempo to catch up with the R4M flat riders, then let him to the job to save his flat riders, sieb them at first chance, dropping Kalman to bring LeCun closer. At Rosier LeCun doing tempo to get close, dropping Hamarat to bring him to the front. So big group with ~45s in front of the peloton where R4M already had to ride with Silina 60km to the final. Hamarat and Rakhimzhanov from Tuk riding and gaining time in the flat. At Redoute, the group was at 1:13 when the classics took over. LeCun, Yanez and Otakulov survived, others from the group (Dagestan/R4M) were used in the back to chase the 3 men group, but the group was strong still and Yanez siebed Otakulov on the final 10 and attacke away from LeCun at the final +6 winning LBL with 14s left. Perfect solo for Poke finally. Hoped to be able to stay with Yanez and that Poke was afraid of being caught when trying alone, he wasn't and he was right, LeCun was caught back at the final km by the big classic group where a short Drinfeld/Oppenheimer train was enough to get Oppenheimer on place 2. Great result, best LBL result for A&D

[Robyklebt]

Afternoon easy, Kwick won.
Controlled almost the whole race. Early attack caught back fast, partly by one of the escapers himself. Genius at work.

Attack after the Redoute by 2 Gipfels with 2 followers.

On the Forges the Kwick-double attack. 6 guys in front, 3 climbers, 3 classics. Marquez there.

Roches au Faucon Marquez goes. Gayle probably no fighting, not following, Sullivan yes. 18" over Fuenmayor and Hack, Montealegre was let go (could have saved him IMO, it's max 10" more) when the flat starts, caught and dropped soon after, Gayle follows.

Then Hack rides more than the much sprint stronger Fuenmayor, Gayle there. Both attack, Gayle follows the wrong one and Fuenmayor solo win. Easy. We made it rather easy too, even if the Gipfel attack at least forced him to use the third classic sort of early. Or slightly earlyish.

In the back on the Forges attack Lekubarri with a last second block, second wasn't planned. Just looked dangerous... and it was. Have the feeling maybe should have blocked with Marquez, blue or something, but somehow what for, Woldemariam just wasn't a favorite here.
In the back then from 22" up to 30", then Dontodeep with a 74 classic decided to attack out of tempo with other guys, over 1' back. Stupid and contraproductive, there's good money attacks (Gipfel did one) there's bad ones, this one was bad. Ride till Faucon go with your leader there.

At least that allowed Woldemariam and his new friend Pascow to put on a little show in the back, From the peloton to place 7-8, caught in the last km so only 11-12 for the 2 at the end. But the 2 only guys from the peloton who came back to parts of the Gipfel group. Bialetti had gone on his own further ahead a bit earlier.

Woldemariam with good form did well, maybe many others had different form? So should have blocked, blue, green with Marquez? But also it was a bit of a fight for nothing, if it's still for the win after Forges Woldemariam probably still doesn't do better. 12th, did fine, Marquez 5th, did fine as well. If Gayle decides to fight and go with Sullivan and Marquez, maybe we get until the downhill with our guys? But caught and dropped then anyway, little change.

Turned out better than expected somehow, can't complain.