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urbantoreador
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Latest comments
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urbantoreador
There is an important aspect that surprisingly nobody has pointed out here. Go rewatch the race from the bottom of Montmartre on to the finish. Watch who is pulling between the two of them and watch the telemetry time gap to the chasers. When Pogi pulls, the gap drops 2-4 seconds. As soon as MVdp pulls, the gap jumps back up 2 to 5 seconds. Repeatedly. Now watch it again and time their pulls and you will see Pogi flicking his elbow in a much shorter interval than MVdp. MVdp is taking longer pulls and he's fortifying their lead. Pogi, on the other hand, the opposite. Don't get me wrong, I realize Tadej's brief, less intense pulls still provided some level of recovery for Vanderpoel, but to suggest he gifted the stage is utter fantasy. MVdp absolutely owned that race with his trademark tenacity, grit and fearlessness. I've NEVER seen a rider dig so deep and believe in himself quite like that. 600m sprint that saw him jump up out of the saddle to put down ever more power with 40m left is unreal. Never seen a display quite like that in 40 years of watching this sport closely. Tadej, by comparison, gave up. 650m remaining and he said, "Oh I can't do it, we're getting caught now for sure, oh well". MVdP said, "I'm not caught yet, I must try and go 100% all-in. He was willing to lose via defeat, but not via quitting. He is the real deal. Tadej is close, but MVdp is pure class in a way that sees Tadej fall a little short. His talent is at least as substantial MVdp's, more even, but he doesn't embody the same level of character as a racer quite like MVdp.
22:55
+8
urbantoreador
His criticisms of the current crop of unhuman talent racing today is ridiculous of course, but let's pause and get real for a moment shall we?: 512 wins. My God, that speaks for itself, absolutely incredible. No rider in the past several decades can touch that, outside of Merckx himself obviously. But to be fair, MVDP and Tadej aren't done either, so time will tell. Regarding his CX comments, he is just attempting to defend his brother's honor, I get it. Seeing his record beaten in the absolute, most dominant fashion has to hurt, but that's normal. At the same time however, his criticisms of MVDP are pretty weak. Last time I checked he can absolutely sprint with the best of them. Furthermore, he has zero issues dropping everyone on the 22+% Koppenberg, nevermind soloing away from the pretenders to huge time gap victories in most of his races from Roubaix to every single CX race this year and more. It leaves little doubt that the man can certainly time trial when he needs to. It's arguably a better measure of his actual ability vs creative uses of drag cheating, wind tunnel friendly, new technologies we see utilized in formal TT niche settings. I would think this fact would appeal to Rog DVMK, given the comparitively limited availability of wind tunnel tech to riders of his era. His unapologetic, outspoken, fearless defiance of the popular fanboy narratives is born of the same mentality that made him such a fantastic racer in his time. Anything less would have seen him washed out with the rest of the "also rans". He is simply frustrated by the fact that MVDP is as good as he (a classics master) and his brother Eric (a CX master) combined!
08-02-2026 23:58
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+0
urbantoreador
There is an important aspect that surprisingly nobody has pointed out here. Go rewatch the race from the bottom of Montmartre on to the finish. Watch who is pulling between the two of them and watch the telemetry time gap to the chasers. When Pogi pulls, the gap drops 2-4 seconds. As soon as MVdp pulls, the gap jumps back up 2 to 5 seconds. Repeatedly. Now watch it again and time their pulls and you will see Pogi flicking his elbow in a much shorter interval than MVdp. MVdp is taking longer pulls and he's fortifying their lead. Pogi, on the other hand, the opposite. Don't get me wrong, I realize Tadej's brief, less intense pulls still provided some level of recovery for Vanderpoel, but to suggest he gifted the stage is utter fantasy. MVdp absolutely owned that race with his trademark tenacity, grit and fearlessness. I've NEVER seen a rider dig so deep and believe in himself quite like that. 600m sprint that saw him jump up out of the saddle to put down ever more power with 40m left is unreal. Never seen a display quite like that in 40 years of watching this sport closely. Tadej, by comparison, gave up. 650m remaining and he said, "Oh I can't do it, we're getting caught now for sure, oh well". MVdP said, "I'm not caught yet, I must try and go 100% all-in. He was willing to lose via defeat, but not via quitting. He is the real deal. Tadej is close, but MVdp is pure class in a way that sees Tadej fall a little short. His talent is at least as substantial MVdp's, more even, but he doesn't embody the same level of character as a racer quite like MVdp.22:55
+8
urbantoreador
His criticisms of the current crop of unhuman talent racing today is ridiculous of course, but let's pause and get real for a moment shall we?: 512 wins. My God, that speaks for itself, absolutely incredible. No rider in the past several decades can touch that, outside of Merckx himself obviously. But to be fair, MVDP and Tadej aren't done either, so time will tell. Regarding his CX comments, he is just attempting to defend his brother's honor, I get it. Seeing his record beaten in the absolute, most dominant fashion has to hurt, but that's normal. At the same time however, his criticisms of MVDP are pretty weak. Last time I checked he can absolutely sprint with the best of them. Furthermore, he has zero issues dropping everyone on the 22+% Koppenberg, nevermind soloing away from the pretenders to huge time gap victories in most of his races from Roubaix to every single CX race this year and more. It leaves little doubt that the man can certainly time trial when he needs to. It's arguably a better measure of his actual ability vs creative uses of drag cheating, wind tunnel friendly, new technologies we see utilized in formal TT niche settings. I would think this fact would appeal to Rog DVMK, given the comparitively limited availability of wind tunnel tech to riders of his era. His unapologetic, outspoken, fearless defiance of the popular fanboy narratives is born of the same mentality that made him such a fantastic racer in his time. Anything less would have seen him washed out with the rest of the "also rans". He is simply frustrated by the fact that MVDP is as good as he (a classics master) and his brother Eric (a CX master) combined!08-02-2026 23:58