Frans Maassen

Latest comments

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  maria2024202411-03-2026
  No more only UAE and Visma, this year there are a lot of very good teams. It will be a funny cyclist year.
• Ride197411-03-2026
  If he's really 12% stronger than last year (as the article seems to imply), then he's already won Milan San Remo. Maybe it's true that his numbers showed 380w over 340w, but that's just what hid "did", not necessarily what he "could". I don't know if he rode all out last year. Maybe he just did enough to stay ahead. I could easily believe a 2% improvement in capacity, but 12%???
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  Rafionain-Glas11-03-2026
  Paul Magnier should be rated above Jasper Philipsen, especially with the climbing
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  Rafionain-Glas11-03-2026
  Paul Magnier should be rated above Jasper Philipsen, especially with the climbing
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  Rafionain-Glas11-03-2026
  'We stayed at the back to save energy for the TTT' LOL. This attempt to change the trend of positioning battles certainly won't spread further than Visma. It seems that Visma are too focused on the usual type of TTT. They finished with 3 riders. All the teams that beat them finished with one rider. If Armirail had spent himself earlier they'd have been much faster. Of course they want Piganzoli to stay high up on GC to test for the Giro. I also noticed that, although Armirail and Piganzoli are good riders, Jonas finished with two new signings.
• Mistermaumau11-03-2026
  I don’t have much sympathy for whiners who need racing to be more dangerous than it already is, otherwise why impose helmets (notice how absolutely NOBODY whines about that anymore), why sweep gravel out if bends, why put barriers or why bother with signaling and protection around obstacles, why demand support and media vehicles stay at a distance, why have marshals indicate dangers? Road surface is a critical component of race safety and not always up to scratch (sorry for the weak pun), why criticise people calling it out when needed? Road safety (not just in cycling) has a really bad habit of only getting looked at AFTER incidents with only very few realising that those incidents would have been prevented if any of the persons signaling it would have been taken seriously. Haven’t we had enough crashes the last years, YOU don’t suffer the consequences, maybe think more about those who (often unnecessarily) do. NOBODY would admit such complacency in F1 and in many ways, you’re much more in the hands of fate in cycling.
• paultryan200211-03-2026
  Will be interesting to see how he copes with actually being paid to perform as a team leader. I hope he performs however so different being leader than just having carte blanche and follow wheels like in last tour.
• Mistermaumau11-03-2026
  Hurrah, Pogi for US president then is it? Did you notice how you contradicted yourself?
• Mistermaumau11-03-2026
  I’m inclined to think you’re right about the strength but wrong about the reasoning. Bridging with him would have been a major error. The gap to Tadej at the end was large enough for him to have been able to change strategy, start taking turns and fight for 2nd. If he was saving himself then we’ll see that the coming days but that’s hardly a good indication for future GT form where he won’t have the luxury of always thinking of the next stage and the one after that. Each race counts and 2nd or 3rd are always relevant in an era of points.
• Mistermaumau11-03-2026
  It’s irrelevant really, he is deciding in terms of what’s still interesting or motivating for him, not what he has to prove to a very small number of spectators wanting a definitive answer to every last detail. Obviously he feels there is nothing left (at the moment) for him in cyclocross and that there’s still room for improvement in road (and it’s quite logical considering the differences) and he wants to see just what he could achieve by focusing just on that, even if a few convenient cyclocross races can be included on the way. I have always hoped this would might happen and it could be very exciting, one reason being the precedent that is WVA that has never really been discussed in detail. In road, WVA (in shape) has shown to be a better climber and (if only slightly) a better sprinter (though MVDP might be the stronger lead-out). It is then a bit peculiar that MVDP has the better results for everything between these two extremes. They are not dissimilar in stature and by losing a few kg (probably easier and less constraining without having cyclocross to consider) MVDp would actually match Wout. Maybe Wout’s road success came as a result of taking his cyclocross less seriously but he definitely showed impressive results, if MVDP gains anywhere near the same margins, it opens up a whole range of new opportunities on the road. Hopefully Mou will be on board for this experiment ;-)