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Project 1T4i - Bye, bye!
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| laidbackmarc |
Posted on 15-01-2012 12:28
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Protected Rider
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fcancellara wrote:
We can speak of an incredible season! And I don't know how Van den Broeck developed, but perhaps you can go for a Top 3 in a GT!
With Pellizotti's PCM skills, he could manage a podium with Cavendish in TDF. 
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| fcancellara |
Posted on 15-01-2012 12:29
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Grand Tour Specialist
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laidbackmarc wrote:
fcancellara wrote:
We can speak of an incredible season! And I don't know how Van den Broeck developed, but perhaps you can go for a Top 3 in a GT!
With Pellizotti's PCM skills, he could manage a podium with Cavendish in TDF.
I would not be surprised if that happened...
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| vangerner |
Posted on 15-01-2012 13:00
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Neo-Pro
Posts: 256
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Amazing results this season, looking forward to 2012! And great signing with Jurgen  |
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| sutty68 |
Posted on 15-01-2012 13:24
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Tour de France Champion
Posts: 33999
Joined: 22-08-2010
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A great end to the season with Geschke topping the World Tour rankings
And the Team coming out on top in the Continental Tour rankings as well as having a brilliant 47 victories to boot, Well Done
PS ; Agreat signing in Van Den Broeck |
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| alexanderlens |
Posted on 15-01-2012 14:00
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Breakaway Specialist
Posts: 982
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Looking forward to year two!
Guess who's back?
Lets see how many friens are still around... |
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| valverde321 |
Posted on 15-01-2012 15:47
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World Champion
Posts: 12429
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Amazing! VDB is one of my favourite climbers actually, so this is a very great signing!
Its great to hear you will update the teams and db to 2012, and I loved that review. How did you get the season so close to real life? I love that!
And about the strategy, it could very well be a PCM10 thing, I just realised, so better off try that strategy in a single race beforehand
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| VladuuTs |
Posted on 15-01-2012 15:50
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Stagiare
Posts: 246
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very nice season . i didn't follow you until now, but now i've read all the season from it's begging and i'm very glad i did it  . a very succesful season with a very interestin team. Looking forward to see VDB and Bozic in action  |
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| FreitasPCM |
Posted on 15-01-2012 17:31
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Grand Tour Champion
Posts: 7784
Joined: 08-09-2009
PCM$: 200.00
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Great signing of van den Broeck. About the 2011 season, it was simply great. You've dominated nearly all of the continental races, and Geschke was the biggest star between all of the others in the team. Hope for more success in 2012.
Oh, and here's the dancing banana: because you truly deserve. |
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| Ad Bot |
Posted on 12-09-2026 01:32
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| Avin Wargunnson |
Posted on 16-01-2012 08:37
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World Champion
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Great signing in VdB, with your skill he will be attacking the podium in GT cetainly. Also great review of the season, and what a successfull season it was, congrats
Good luck for 2012!
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| andy222c |
Posted on 16-01-2012 09:27
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Sprinter
Posts: 1523
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Incredible season! Great report and good luck with the new season. PS - Great signing with Van Den Broeck
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| baia |
Posted on 16-01-2012 18:22
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Grand Tour Specialist
Posts: 5377
Joined: 04-10-2007
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FreitasPCM wrote:
Great signing of van den Broeck. About the 2011 season, it was simply great. You've dominated nearly all of the continental races, and Geschke was the biggest star between all of the others in the team. Hope for more success in 2012.
Oh, and here's the dancing banana: because you truly deserve.
+1
Really great season.
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| Kittel |
Posted on 17-01-2012 08:10
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Junior Rider
Posts: 49
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Great season Great signing of Van Den Broeck
Norway
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| tsmoha |
Posted on 17-01-2012 18:23
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Directeur Sportif
Posts: 11786
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A great season came to an end.. Skil was awesome, "skillful", if you allow me that poor wordplay Also a nice signing, this VdB-deal. I can't spell that i4r4-name correctly, but this team (with a new name) will face a - hopefully - even more succesful next season! Will be interesting to see, how Geschke will perform.. and Kittel needs to take a next step.
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| cio93 |
Posted on 17-01-2012 18:30
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World Champion
Posts: 10617
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tsmoha wrote:
and Kittel needs to take a next step.
His contract wasn't renewed iirc.
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| tsmoha |
Posted on 17-01-2012 18:36
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Directeur Sportif
Posts: 11786
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cio93 wrote:
tsmoha wrote:
and Kittel needs to take a next step.
His contract wasn't renewed iirc.
Uups You may be right, yes.. then he needs to take this step with another team
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| Pellizotti2 |
Posted on 20-01-2012 21:51
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Grand Tour Champion
Posts: 9885
Joined: 01-05-2010
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@ all: Thanks a lot for all comments and bananas! Big motivational push.
@ fcanc, marc: I've never managed to do that with Cav actually, surprise, surprise.  But I definitely think Jurgen has the capacity to hit the podium in a GT.
@ valv: Yeah, I like him too. And nice to hear the review was a good read. And I have no idea how the results got so realistic. Not all though, like the Tour for example.
@ vladuuts: Glad to see you here! New readers are always nice.
@ tsmoha: Thanks mate, for the nice wordplay and comment. And I'm pretty sure the new team will be even stronger than Skil. With all the new signings, I think we're looking at another very successful year. Without Kittel tho, as cio said, as she's not a Skil boy anymore.
After a lot of work, I've finally updated everything to 2012 form and the season is now ready to kick off! But first, let's meet the teams!
 Astana Pro Team
Lots of changes in the squad, with a big group of riders joining the team. Last year's Amstel winner Kreuziger is still the big name in the team, but on the GC front now together with newcomers like Janez Brajkovic, returning doper Tadej Valjavec and a heavily improved Tejay van Garderen.
Not only the climbing part of the team has been revamped though. Extremely talented youngsters like Simone Ponzi, Michel Kreder, Egor Silin and Adriano Malori has secured the team success also in the year's to come. They've also wrapped up a few home grown talents with by the looks of it, a strong future ahead.
Other incoming riders include punchy sprinters Francesco Gavazzi and Jure Kocjan, the Katusha duo Ignatiev and Trofimov, and some strong climbing help in the shape of Rodrigo Garcia and Nuno Ribeiro.
All those new riders compensate the loss of Kazakh hero Alexandre Vinokourov, who hung up the wheels after a disastrous season. The team has become a lot less Kazakh dominated, and turned into a better, stronger and more international team. To sum it up, Astana has changed a lot, but more to the good than to the bad. The team is stronger than last year's and more widespread. They've done a good job.
 BMC - Swiss Cycling Technology
The top ranked Swiss team BMC has turned more nationalistic and moved focus to home grown riders. Whether that choice is a good or a bad one remains to see, but losing real life Tour de France winner Cadel Evans is a loss that I doubt will pass through unnoticed when looking at the team's results.
They've found an equivalent replacement in Fabian Cancellara tho. After a year with the Luxembourgish Leopard team, the fourfold world time trial champion moves home, to what he hopes will be the place where he finally finds his way back to his golden year in 2010. That's far from impossible, and even if he doesn't, he's still a very solid rider, who'll make sure that the team scores the needed points.
Cancellara is their strongest addition, but not the only one. The most notable other ones are Grégory Rast, Oliver Zaugg and Michael Albasini, all three very decent riders. While Rast will be completely crucial for Spartacus on the cobbles, the other two will focus on the hills and mountains. Especially Zaugg will prove to be very useful I think.
But the actual "replacement" for Cadel Evans surprisingly isn't one of their new signings. Instead it's last year's fifth from the Giro, Johann Tschopp, who has improved his climbing a lot during the year, and is now ready to take over Evans' mantle as the team's big star in the Grand Tours. He made the Top 5 last year, so maybe a podium in one of the GT's for 2012?
 The BOSE Project
From the ashes of the Leopard team comes perhaps the most interesting team in the whole WorldTour, Bose. The Scandinavian / North-East European based team registered in Latvia has gathered all the top riders from the northern part of Europe, and are now looking to take the cycling world with storm.
The top names in the team are Norwegian sprinter duo Hushovd & Boasson Hagen together with the two Swedish overall riders Löfkvist and Kessiakoff. Behind them also last year's most victorious rider, Aidis Kruopis, his Lithuanian compatriot and fellow sprinter Tomas Vaitkus and Belarussian climbing star and multiple Giro stage winner Vasil Kiryienka. Just to name a few. As you hear, this is a team filled from bottom to top with talent.
Also interesting to watch will the development of the team's youngsters be. Above all, Estonia's wonderkid Rein Taaramae, along with former HTC sprinter John Degenkolb and Latvia's own prodigy, Toms Skujins.
The only bad thing I see about the team is that it might be stuffed with too many strong riders. That might create a new Leopard situation, with riders like then Jakob Fuglsang and now Rein Taaramae not being satisfied with the situation, thus wanting to leave for their own best. Still, this is a really interesting project.
Next three teams coming up tomorrow!
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| fcancellara |
Posted on 20-01-2012 21:59
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Grand Tour Specialist
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Very interesting. Maybe time for a new title?
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| valverde321 |
Posted on 20-01-2012 22:35
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World Champion
Posts: 12429
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Nice! I've been wondering how you use those flags still, because I thought the Daily db added some countries that that flag package doesn't include.
Do you just use the daily flags for the ones that don't work?
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| Teddy The Creator |
Posted on 21-01-2012 00:59
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Small Tour Specialist
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Wow! Tschopp and Kessiakoff are absolute beasts in your career! Tschopp for Le Tour? 
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| Pellizotti2 |
Posted on 21-01-2012 09:38
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Grand Tour Champion
Posts: 9885
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fcancellara wrote:
Very interesting. Maybe time for a new title?
After presenting the 2012 squad.
valverde321 wrote:
Nice! I've been wondering how you use those flags still, because I thought the Daily db added some countries that that flag package doesn't include.
Do you just use the daily flags for the ones that don't work?
Yup
Teddy The Creator wrote:
Wow! Tschopp and Kessiakoff are absolute beasts in your career! Tschopp for Le Tour?
That's what I love with random potential.
Here's part two of the team presentations.
 Caisse d'Epargne - Illes Balears
After a year as Movistar, Caisse d'Epargne returns as main sponsor for the Spanish top team, looking for new success. They might have failed to sign the returning Alejandro Valverde, but they still found two strong new GC captains in Juan José Cobo and Samuel Sánchez.
To back those two up, they have an army of strong climbers. Most important ones will be newcomers Nairo Quintana, Daniel Moreno and Ezequiel Mosquera, together with staying riders like David Arroyo, Angel Madrazo and David López. Other incoming riders deserving a mention are super talent Jonathan Castroviejo, Russian champion Vladimir Karpets and Rafael Valls.
They've also made sure to strengthen not only the climbing, but the other parts too. For the hilly classics, they've brought in former Italian champion Giovanni Visconti from Farnese Vini. But one of their better transfer moves was to wrap up former world champion Oscar Freire. Sure, he has decreased a lot. But still, he's a very useful sprinter with decent hill stat, and he also brings in tons of experience.
 Cofidis, le crédit en ligne
Cofidis marks the return to WorldTour with two really strong transfers. Home duo Pierre Rolland and John Gadret both leaves their respective teams to jump onto the strong looking red armada. With those two top level climbers in the squad, they'll be looking for GC victories and mountain stage wins rather than successful breakaways this year.
Besides the two main newcomers, they've also acquired some more strong French riders. The most notable ones are Amael Moinard, Rémy di Grégorio and one of last year's positive surprises, Guillaume Blot. But annoyingly, they've somehow also stolen our hyper talent Evan Bonnet, or maybe his twin?!
To sum up, Cofidis will be strong in Grand Tours and other stage races with Rolland and Gadret, decent on the cobbles with Scheirlinckx and in contrary to last year, incredibly weak in the sprints. Blot and Adrien Petit will be their fastest guys, both with a sprint stat of less than 75. That lack might cost them a lot of points.
Euskaltel - Orbea Cycling Team
The Basque proud, Euskaltel, did a great job in the transfer season, and has gathered one of WorldTour's strongest squads. It was at the cost of cutting it's ties to the Basque country, but I'm quite sure that the fans will forgive them when the strong results starts to roll in.
As replacement for the leaving Samuel Sánchez comes last year's big disappointment, Alberto Contador. Together with the best climber in the world at the moment, Igor Anton, Contador will be looking to finish what he was on his way doing last year, winning his fourth Tour. Anton might have something to say though, so it's not impossible that one of them goes to the Giro and Vuelta instead.
To help their two captains, also the already strong climbing help has improved even more. With new riders like Jesús Hernández, Luis León Sánchez, Sergio Pardilla, Carlos Barredo, Juanma Gárate and Daniel Moreno together with Mikel Nieve, Amets Txurruka and Juan José Oroz, they've built up one of the strongest climbing squads in the cycling history.
The greatest strength might also be their major weakness though. The complete focus on the mountains has costed them in the other parts. However, with such incredible climbing arsenal, and also a big improvement in the time trials, the team has gone more to the good than to the bad. One of the strongest I'd say.
Edited by Pellizotti2 on 21-01-2012 11:08
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