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Lisbon Classic Discussion
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| Selwink |
Posted on 08-02-2015 08:30
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Grand Tour Champion
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The Lisbon Classic is one of the newest races in the ProTour, having had its inaugural edition last year. In Portugal, a race of 205 kilometers will decide the winner of the second edition of the Lisbon Classic.
The 205 kilometers of this race offer a very varied course. The race has many short and long hills in it, but the finish is quite flat. Since the organisation has decided to call it a flat race, a sprint seems a possible scenario, but with slopes of a maximum of 11.7% included in the race, something else may also be possible. The race of today gives us four possible scenarios. 1 The sprinters easily survive the hills and the race will end in a mass sprint. 2 The pure sprinters don't survive the hills and the sprinters who can survive those will fight it out. 3 The sprinter teams can't close the gap to the early break due to exhausting its own riders. 4 A late attacker decides who wins. This happened last year, when Marcus Burghardt took victory.
For each scenario, it's important to take a look at the favourites.
1 The pure sprinter scenario. Here we see the usual suspects,  Boonen,  Bewley,  Guarnieri,  Bennati, Kennaugh,  Guerao and  Roelandts. Furthermore, there are many outsiders for this scenario, including  Stauff,  Impey,  Avelino and wild card Karcher-Adira Racing's leader Kupfernagel.
2 Undoubtedly the best sprinter who can survive a hill here is  Pozzato. Reimer should be another dangerous rider who can survive hills, just as McEvoy. If these teams want a decimated sprint, they will need to work together very hard.
3 To find a fighter who is capable of winning from an early break it's difficult. It's probably best to look at the teams that came without a real strong sprinter. Riders like  Chtioui,  DÃaz Corrales,  Moreno,  Wiggins,  Kinney or  Leezer are riders who might try to break away early. All of this is just pure speculation though.
4 This scenario provides us with one clear strong rider, who managed to win here last year. Apart from Burghardt there are other riders who might try to copy his effort last year. Possibilities are Schreurs, Kneisky, Vanspeybrouck, Summerhill or  Ballan, but apart from them nobody seems to be really capable of holding a high effort long enough.
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| Smowz |
Posted on 08-02-2015 08:49
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All I can really hope for is a guy in the breakaway and for Santos to take part in the sprint and then who knows?
Frankly this is a poor team from us so nothing is really deserved.
It is one of the more unpredictable races though - hills could make chase difficult. Boonan and Bewley have dominated these types of races (as well as flat stage races and cobbled races) so any sort of results where the BooBewbastards don't win would be welcome  I am evil like that 
In many ways you sort of root for Lotto to go out on a high. So go go go Benny.
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| beagle |
Posted on 08-02-2015 09:00
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I' m missing 5th possible scenario - top puncheurs (Ginanni, Van Garderen, Clayes, Gastauer or Costa etc.) will make their own race. But it seems you already played the race, so this scenario is not probable. 
Anyway, great preview, I' m looking forward to report!
Manager of Polar in Man-Game
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| Selwink |
Posted on 08-02-2015 09:21
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beagle wrote:
I' m missing 5th possible scenario - top puncheurs (Ginanni, Van Garderen, Clayes, Gastauer or Costa etc.) will make their own race. But it seems you already played the race, so this scenario is not probable.
I actually made the preview before the race, but maybe they should have been included in the late attackers indeed. Besides, the last hill is quite far from the line, so a pure puncheur should not have it very easy there.
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| roturn |
Posted on 08-02-2015 09:54
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Hopefully it's not Ballan chosen my the AI.
LLS should be the better option. Or my sprinters. In the end a race to forget I guess. |
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| CountArach |
Posted on 08-02-2015 10:59
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Roelandts could be a good shout on this sort of terrain.
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| ember |
Posted on 08-02-2015 11:22
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And if it's good for Roelandts, it should be good for Impey. Fingers crossed! A top 10 will be good from him if it comes down to a sprint.
And if it's indeed a sprint, it should be between the three B's, but Guarnieri has shown this season that he shouldn't be forgotten thinking about the win.
Should be a very interesting race with the challenging profile. Burghardt did it perfect last season, and I think a solo attack could be successful this time too. Ballan and Summerhill look great for the task, considering their flat and fighter stats. |
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| Crommy |
Posted on 08-02-2015 13:36
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This *should* be the ideal race for Roelandts, and he's got a team here who *should* make the race hard enough to throw off most of the other sprinters.
Obviously, this won't happen though
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| SportingNonsense |
Posted on 08-02-2015 14:06
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Hopefully Gastauer will go on the attack late on. I'd like to think hill stat would be more important than fighter stat to stay away from the pack on this terrain.
Decided against sending Swift here. Hopefully my team don't still work for Feillu or Merino Criado instead. The intention is for them to be there in case the race is easy, and not to be Plan A for the team.
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| alexkr00 |
Posted on 08-02-2015 14:29
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| Heine |
Posted on 08-02-2015 14:30
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Should be a good race for Pozatto, but who knows... This is one of the races I earmarked him for when I got him. Should have some good support aswell... Just hope the game dosen't decide that Zabel is my captain and sends Pozatto to help him...
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| Roman |
Posted on 08-02-2015 15:12
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I decided against bringing Sagan here to fully commit my team to want the sprint finish here. Hopefully my team will be strong enough to keep it all together with Bewley in a good position for the final sprint. Howard should help him a lot. Hopefully all these hills won't be too hard for my sprinters.
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| fintas |
Posted on 08-02-2015 15:12
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My first rece ever in PT, expectations are not many but I have hopes of reaching at least the top10
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| Bushwackers |
Posted on 08-02-2015 17:48
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I have no ambitions here. Getting in the break would be cool though.
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| rjc_43 |
Posted on 08-02-2015 18:48
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100% going in for the sprint. With Rowe and Blythe here, I expect to have one of the strongest lead outs. My only hope is that riders like Pozzato follow slower trains as I suspect they'll have an advantage over the less talented hill sprinters.
[url=cleavercycling.co.uk]  [/url] |
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| tsmoha |
Posted on 09-02-2015 11:00
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Pozzato doing it again!
That's anything but a good result for Rothaus though 
Thanks again for your reports, Sel! Great to see you that active with quality at the moment.
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| roturn |
Posted on 09-02-2015 11:09
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Congrats Heine.
Obviously not good for me but I always expected Pozzato pretty strong here.
Unfortuantely also Bouygues and Vueling outscored me here. So it`s pretty much impossible for me to stay in PT I guess. Would need massive overperformance in all remaining races.
Other than that I would say, my team made this race interesting with the Vanmarcke attack and this way a bit harder for the pure sprinters. So this is good obviously.
Plus being 12th and 14th is a really good result seeing that Vanmarcke`s attack did not last until the end.
Vanmarcke surely is one rider, who could get some training next year. Depending on my money and final squad I guess it`s most likely him or Keizer to get some boost if some money is left.
Thanks for the report Selwink. Really nice read. One mistake though. Ginanni and Bewley are no team mates. |
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| Heine |
Posted on 09-02-2015 11:18
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rjc_43 wrote:
100% going in for the sprint. With Rowe and Blythe here, I expect to have one of the strongest lead outs. My only hope is that riders like Pozzato follow slower trains as I suspect they'll have an advantage over the less talented hill sprinters.
He decided he didn't need a train ;-)
Reading this at work I couldn't really celebrate, but 
We needed this
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| wackojackohighcliffe |
Posted on 09-02-2015 12:18
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alexkr00 wrote:
Echoed here. Thanks for the report all the same
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| Smowz |
Posted on 09-02-2015 12:37
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Pozzato really is good at this stuff - I recall he took a 'flat' Olympics in the same fashion.
For my lot 75% of the team were here as XP suckers (two were stags) so there was zero expectations.
Nice report. As expected BooBewbastards do well, at least the flat/sprint/power gods got beat for first place.
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