attacks on tourmalet

Ullrich, of all people. He dumped Armstrong, who is fighting his way
back. Looks to be a good one today!

--
David N. Welton
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Personal: http://www.dedasys.com/davidw/
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On Mon, 21 Jul 2003 13:37:20 GMT, (David N. Welton)
wrote:


Ullrich, of all people. He dumped Armstrong, who is fighting his way
back. Looks to be a good one today!


One for the ages.

"David N. Welton" wrote in message
...

Ullrich, of all people. He dumped Armstrong, who is fighting his way
back. Looks to be a good one today!

Armstrong and Mayo are back with Ullrich.

Keith writes:

On Mon, 21 Jul 2003 13:37:20 GMT, (David N. Welton)
wrote:


Ullrich, of all people. He dumped Armstrong, who is fighting his
way back. Looks to be a good one today!

He didn't really attack he just climbs up at his pace...

Were you watching the bicycle race?

"His pace" was that of the lead group, and then rapidly got a lot
faster.

In any case... Vinokorouv (sp?) is in trouble. About a minute and a
half going over the top of the Tourmalet.

--
David N. Welton
Consulting: http://www.dedasys.com/
Personal: http://www.dedasys.com/davidw/
Free Softwa http://www.dedasys.com/freesoftware/
Apache Tcl: http://tcl.apache.org/

David N. Welton wrote:
Ullrich, of all people. He dumped Armstrong, who is fighting his way
back. Looks to be a good one today!


IMO, Jan's attack on Tourmalet was a mistake. He and his team did just
about all the work yesterday and today he blew a lot of E on the
Tourmalet -- pointlessly. Lance is a much better desender than Jan. Say
Jan picked up 30-seconds on that climb by the top. Lance could have got
all that back on the long decent.

When they got to the steep part going up to Luz, where Lance has a
natural advantage anyway over Jan, Jan could not fend off his attack
because Jan had spent more on the Tourmalet and on the previous day.
Lance was only getting stronger.

If Jan had simply marked Lance on the Tourmalet or just pushed the pace
to wear lance down, he would not have spent so much E by the time they
got to the Luz climb. He could have handled Lance's attack on the steep
better and possibly caught or even passed him when the mountain eased
off towards the top. Worst case, if they were even at the finish, Jan
would still be only 15 seconds down going into the final time trial.
Now it's over a minute and Lance has the psychological momentum.

Bad tactics.

Zeno

"zeno" wrote in message
...
David N. Welton wrote:
Ullrich, of all people. He dumped Armstrong, who is fighting his way
back. Looks to be a good one today!


IMO, Jan's attack on Tourmalet was a mistake. He and his team did just
about all the work yesterday and today he blew a lot of E on the
Tourmalet -- pointlessly. Lance is a much better desender than Jan. Say
Jan picked up 30-seconds on that climb by the top. Lance could have got
all that back on the long decent.

When they got to the steep part going up to Luz, where Lance has a
natural advantage anyway over Jan, Jan could not fend off his attack
because Jan had spent more on the Tourmalet and on the previous day.
Lance was only getting stronger.

If Jan had simply marked Lance on the Tourmalet or just pushed the pace
to wear lance down, he would not have spent so much E by the time they
got to the Luz climb. He could have handled Lance's attack on the steep
better and possibly caught or even passed him when the mountain eased
off towards the top. Worst case, if they were even at the finish, Jan
would still be only 15 seconds down going into the final time trial.
Now it's over a minute and Lance has the psychological momentum.

Bad tactics.

Zeno


It's no secret that Lance has been struggling. The idea is to get him to
crack and gain big time. Even if Lance catches up on the decent, Ullrich
attacks again until Lance can't respond. Why would Jan give Lance an easy
ride up to the last climb where Lance can limit his losses?

-T

Tom Schulenburg wrote:
"zeno" wrote in message
...

David N. Welton wrote:

Ullrich, of all people. He dumped Armstrong, who is fighting his
way back. Looks to be a good one today!


IMO, Jan's attack on Tourmalet was a mistake. He and his team did
just about all the work yesterday and today he blew a lot of E on
the Tourmalet -- pointlessly. Lance is a much better desender than
Jan. Say Jan picked up 30-seconds on that climb by the top. Lance
could have got all that back on the long decent.

When they got to the steep part going up to Luz, where Lance has a
natural advantage anyway over Jan, Jan could not fend off his
attack because Jan had spent more on the Tourmalet and on the
previous day. Lance was only getting stronger.

If Jan had simply marked Lance on the Tourmalet or just pushed the
pace to wear lance down, he would not have spent so much E by the
time they got to the Luz climb. He could have handled Lance's
attack on the steep better and possibly caught or even passed him
when the mountain eased off towards the top. Worst case, if they
were even at the finish, Jan would still be only 15 seconds down
going into the final time trial. Now it's over a minute and Lance
has the psychological momentum.

Bad tactics.

Zeno



It's no secret that Lance has been struggling. The idea is to get him
to crack and gain big time. Even if Lance catches up on the decent,
Ullrich attacks again until Lance can't respond. Why would Jan give
Lance an easy ride up to the last climb where Lance can limit his
losses?

-T

I didn't say he should give Lance an easy ride -- I said he should still
"push the pace." What you say assumes that Jan has limitless energy for
attacks and leading the first group -- he doesn't. By all accounts he
was sick earlier in the race and is still (according to him) not all the
way back from his long lay off. Up until Lances attack today, Jan had
done much more work over the last two days.

Your scenario also assumes Lance was continuing to deteriorate. There
was a fair amount of evidence to opposite the contrary the previous day
that proved out today. The place to hit him hard was on the last climb
today. Jan blew it.

zeno

In article , zeno
wrote:

David N. Welton wrote:
Ullrich, of all people. He dumped Armstrong, who is fighting his way
back. Looks to be a good one today!


IMO, Jan's attack on Tourmalet was a mistake. He and his team did just
about all the work yesterday and today he blew a lot of E on the
Tourmalet -- pointlessly. Lance is a much better desender than Jan. Say
Jan picked up 30-seconds on that climb by the top. Lance could have got
all that back on the long decent.

By opening the gap Armstrong was forced into the wind. He was also
being tested. Ullrich may have felt that the pace was too slow and that
Armstrong might jump him.

-WG

zeno wrote:

IMO, Jan's attack on Tourmalet was a mistake. He and his team did just
about all the work yesterday and today he blew a lot of E on the
Tourmalet -- pointlessly.

I tend to agree. With the results known, it is of course easier to judge.
Yesterday, I think Lance played poker (he had a good hand with Beltran).
So, there was probably not much, JU could do.

Perhaps the hate between Godefroot and Pevenage played also some role.
After all, Telekom should also be interested to not let Beltran gain many
minutes. But only Euskatel and Bianchi worked.

Today, it seemed a bit clearer. When JU had Lance and Mayo at his wheel
again, and seeing that the distance to the rest did not grow that fast, it
was very probable, that many riders would come back in the decent. Perhaps,
he had other reasons. Perhaps, he did not feel too well? He might have
remembered, that Lance only attacked in the last climb in his tour wins.
Perhaps, he thought, he could hurt Lance a bit, by accelerating in the
second last climb.

About those Vino-Jan coalation thoughts, that were mentioned. What we have
seen, was the opposite. They were fighting vs. each other.

Dieter

warren wrote:
In article , zeno
wrote:


David N. Welton wrote:

Ullrich, of all people. He dumped Armstrong, who is fighting his way
back. Looks to be a good one today!


IMO, Jan's attack on Tourmalet was a mistake. He and his team did just
about all the work yesterday and today he blew a lot of E on the
Tourmalet -- pointlessly. Lance is a much better desender than Jan. Say
Jan picked up 30-seconds on that climb by the top. Lance could have got
all that back on the long decent.


By opening the gap Armstrong was forced into the wind. He was also
being tested. Ullrich may have felt that the pace was too slow and that
Armstrong might jump him.

-WG

Yeah, but Jan was expending a lot more energy to do that than Lance
(look at the video) and came away with nothing to show for it.

It is hard to see an upside for Jan with this tactic. He used a lot more
energy jumping on the Tourmalet than Lance would need to use on the
other side to catch him. Because Lance knew that, he could afford to
ride within himself on the way up, let Jan suffer trying to break him,
then reel him in slowly, or even let him gain some time by the summit.

Lance knew he could take it all back on the descent without expending
much E to do it. (It takes a lot more E to gain 30 seconds on a climb
than it does to take it back going down hill.) So, IMO, the chances of
Jan gaining anything in terms of either time on Lance or causing him to
blow up chasing were slim in this situation. Instead, Jan used more
energy, gained nothing, and suffered on the way up to Luz because Lance
was fresher and getting his legs back.

Zeno