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| The Top Classic? |
| Roubaix |
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57% |
[ 66 ] |
| Flanders |
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28% |
[ 33 ] |
| Liege Bastogne Liege |
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7% |
[ 8 ] |
| Milan San Remo |
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4% |
[ 5 ] |
| Tour of Lombardy |
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1% |
[ 2 ] |
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| Total Votes : 114 |
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Wozza
Div 1 Pro
Joined: 12 Jun 2003
Posts: 9188
Location: Herts
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 Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 2:16 pm Post subject: |
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Is it Lombardy that is the ride of the falling leaves ? - cool name and i think also heard it mentioned that the race is the same age as me which is nice. 
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Des
Moderator
Joined: 19 Apr 2002
Posts: 16900
Location: Harrow
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 2:26 pm Post subject: |
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| Wozza wrote: |
| Is it Lombardy that is the ride of the falling leaves ? - cool name and i think also heard it mentioned that the race is the same age as me which is nice. |
Never realised you were that old Woz 
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lancewrite
E, Bronze
Joined: 06 Sep 2006
Posts: 325
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 2:38 pm Post subject: |
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| Tour of Lombardy first run in 1905. |
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Stotti
E, Bronze
Joined: 29 Aug 2008
Posts: 427
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 3:49 pm Post subject: |
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| Billy Boy wrote: |
| Stotti wrote: |
| Flanders is the one i would guess would have the most beneficial effect on a career. Roubaix a great race but more luck involved. |
How many Roubaix winners have been lucky? Was De Vlaeminck lucky to win it so many times?
Winning Roubaix demands so much of a rider, and one of those things is the ability to ride cobbles, which some riders can do much better than others. This is a skill alongside being able to climb or sprint in my book |
Fair enough BB but i was meaning that there is a measure of luck required compared to Flanders. You are more likley to suffer a mechanical or fall off in PR than any other race.
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will10
Elite Poster
Joined: 03 Sep 2008
Posts: 208
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 4:01 pm Post subject: |
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Flanders
Lombardy is often a great race, as everyone goes balls to the wall with it being the last race of the year. |
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Roy Gardiner
T de F Winner
Joined: 14 Jul 2003
Posts: 21249
Location: London and Essex
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 4:06 pm Post subject: |
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| Stotti wrote: |
| Billy Boy wrote: |
| Stotti wrote: |
| Flanders is the one i would guess would have the most beneficial effect on a career. Roubaix a great race but more luck involved. |
How many Roubaix winners have been lucky? Was De Vlaeminck lucky to win it so many times?
Winning Roubaix demands so much of a rider, and one of those things is the ability to ride cobbles, which some riders can do much better than others. This is a skill alongside being able to climb or sprint in my book |
Fair enough BB but i was meaning that there is a measure of luck required compared to Flanders. You are more likley to suffer a mechanical or fall off in PR than any other race. |
Yes, you have to avoid bad luck. But if you look at the winners, there are few who aren't really big stars, few 'flash in the pan' wins.
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Wozza
Div 1 Pro
Joined: 12 Jun 2003
Posts: 9188
Location: Herts
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 4:32 pm Post subject: |
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| lancewrite wrote: |
| Tour of Lombardy first run in 1905. |
Ohh dear  I retract my earlier comment then. Although has been said i ride like a 104 yr old. Which one is the ride of the falling leaves then  
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Billy Boy
T de F Winner
Joined: 11 Aug 2003
Posts: 30726
Location: Not Aylesbury
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 4:53 pm Post subject: |
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| Stotti wrote: |
| Billy Boy wrote: |
| Stotti wrote: |
| Flanders is the one i would guess would have the most beneficial effect on a career. Roubaix a great race but more luck involved. |
How many Roubaix winners have been lucky? Was De Vlaeminck lucky to win it so many times?
Winning Roubaix demands so much of a rider, and one of those things is the ability to ride cobbles, which some riders can do much better than others. This is a skill alongside being able to climb or sprint in my book |
Fair enough BB but i was meaning that there is a measure of luck required compared to Flanders. You are more likley to suffer a mechanical or fall off in PR than any other race. |
Yes, because it requires more skill and attention to detail in terms of equipment and technique, neither of which are down to luck...
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Roy Gardiner
T de F Winner
Joined: 14 Jul 2003
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Location: London and Essex
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 5:53 pm Post subject: |
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| Billy Boy wrote: |
| Yes, because it requires more skill and attention to detail in terms of equipment and technique, neither of which are down to luck... |
Yup, Van Looy apparently, I read somewhere, didn't puncture once in all the P-R he rode, a matter of riding 'matured' tubs.
All that technique is essential; the luck is on top and part of the magic, IMO.
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JohnS
E, Bronze
Joined: 20 Nov 2006
Posts: 398
Location: On the way to Cloud9
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 6:10 pm Post subject: |
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| one man army wrote: |
I wonder if in 30-40 years there'll be another one-day race that would make a poll like this? Or is that it now, that these monuments have become so engrained that nothing will be able to compete with them?
Maybe L'Eroica could develop into one? Didn't (or maybe still does)Denmark have a one-day race over cobbles?
What was the race just after the tour? was it the GP Zurich? That was alright with good parcours but it went bust.
Certainly the Rochester GP was never going to capture the imagination! |
Rochester GP was where Jim Greaves burst a tyre and stacked up with back injuries in the early 60s. Was that at the back of the castle on the cobbles?
Do you have any old programes listing the riders and events won in previous years - Ta  |
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Tucker
Tour Winner
Joined: 03 May 2006
Posts: 15722
Location: Swindon
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 7:16 pm Post subject: |
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| Id say Flanders too - the 20% cobbled climbs are more spectacular than flat cobbles IMHO, especially when someone attacks. Marvellous. |
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one man army
Div 2 Pro
Joined: 11 Nov 2003
Posts: 5898
Location: Brighton & Hove
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| Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 8:27 pm Post subject: |
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| JohnS wrote: |
| one man army wrote: |
I wonder if in 30-40 years there'll be another one-day race that would make a poll like this? Or is that it now, that these monuments have become so engrained that nothing will be able to compete with them?
Maybe L'Eroica could develop into one? Didn't (or maybe still does)Denmark have a one-day race over cobbles?
What was the race just after the tour? was it the GP Zurich? That was alright with good parcours but it went bust.
Certainly the Rochester GP was never going to capture the imagination! |
Rochester GP was where Jim Greaves burst a tyre and stacked up with back injuries in the early 60s. Was that at the back of the castle on the cobbles?
Do you have any old programes listing the riders and events won in previous years - Ta |
I'm talking about that BINFEST of a world cup race during the '90's
That race in the 60's sounds better especially if Ian St Johns side-kick was riding. I can imagine him standing there with a punctured tyre saying "well Saint, its a funny old game"
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Tucker
Tour Winner
Joined: 03 May 2006
Posts: 15722
Location: Swindon
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| Posted: Wed Apr 08, 2009 6:33 am Post subject: |
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| one man army wrote: |
| JohnS wrote: |
| one man army wrote: |
I wonder if in 30-40 years there'll be another one-day race that would make a poll like this? Or is that it now, that these monuments have become so engrained that nothing will be able to compete with them?
Maybe L'Eroica could develop into one? Didn't (or maybe still does)Denmark have a one-day race over cobbles?
What was the race just after the tour? was it the GP Zurich? That was alright with good parcours but it went bust.
Certainly the Rochester GP was never going to capture the imagination! |
Rochester GP was where Jim Greaves burst a tyre and stacked up with back injuries in the early 60s. Was that at the back of the castle on the cobbles?
Do you have any old programes listing the riders and events won in previous years - Ta |
I'm talking about that BINFEST of a world cup race during the '90's
That race in the 60's sounds better especially if Ian St Johns side-kick was riding. I can imagine him standing there with a punctured tyre saying "well Saint, its a funny old game" |
Brilliant. |
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Harmon
E, Silver
Joined: 03 Apr 2006
Posts: 753
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| Posted: Thu Apr 09, 2009 8:35 am Post subject: Re: The Top Classic? |
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| Roy Gardiner wrote: |
| Billy Boy wrote: |
| Following on from a comment Royston made... |
Harmon started it on Sunday banging on about his favourite being Flanders.
Roubaix
Flanders
Liege
San Remo
by Autumn I've kinda lost interest
Lombardy |
'banging on' ....how very dare you....... |
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Roy Gardiner
T de F Winner
Joined: 14 Jul 2003
Posts: 21249
Location: London and Essex
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| Posted: Thu Apr 09, 2009 8:38 am Post subject: Re: The Top Classic? |
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| Harmon wrote: |
| Roy Gardiner wrote: |
| Billy Boy wrote: |
| Following on from a comment Royston made... |
Harmon started it on Sunday banging on about his favourite being Flanders.
Roubaix
Flanders
Liege
San Remo
by Autumn I've kinda lost interest
Lombardy |
'banging on' ....how very dare you....... |
At the risk of being a creep I thought the commentary first class, as usual.
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Dan Souf
Div 1 Pro
Joined: 20 Mar 2002
Posts: 6472
Location: invisible to the lap-scorers
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| Posted: Thu Apr 09, 2009 9:00 am Post subject: |
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For me it has to be Roubaix.
You can't say much about it that hasn't been said before, but it's the pure spectacle & brutality that, I think, makes it the favourite. |
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van eijden
E, Silver
Joined: 02 Mar 2005
Posts: 963
Location: going downhill fast
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one man army
Div 2 Pro
Joined: 11 Nov 2003
Posts: 5898
Location: Brighton & Hove
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| Posted: Thu Apr 09, 2009 10:03 am Post subject: |
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There's something about the bleakness of the Paris-Roubaix landscape and grimness of the villages that it passes through that, oddly, gives the race part of its epic feel.
For those Villages who probably never see anyone from outside the area all year apart from this one weekend in April, it must be bewildering. Certainly, I notice people literally stop in their tracks at the site of a GB number plate.
I broke down in one a few years ago while trying to watch the race. Those few hours spent waiting for recovery are now etched in my memory. I was ABDUCTED by a mentalist mechanic & his very fat wife in an old Peugeot 205 to be taken to the next village where, I worked out, his mate had a 'camion'. His mate wasn't in, or if he was, he was ignoring the mental mechanic bellowing at the top of his voice up to his window.
The mechanic got his fat wife to take me back to my car whereby he started smashing 7 shades of sh'it out of the starter motor with a large flat-bladed screw driver. He then turned the car round to try to bump start it down the hill (I had a feeling the cam belt had gone, which it had but lacked the french to get this across) before giving up a few minutes later.
He buggered off and came back an hour later with fat wife &, this time, spotty youth only to be warned off by another mechanic that turned up with his own camion who loaded my car up and took me all over 15minutes up the road to Cambrai before dumping me off and telling me someone else would be along shortly to take me to Calais.
I never did see the race but did learn some new french words relating to car engines.
So, yeah, Paris Roubaix, great race innit...
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Joursans
Div 2 Pro
Joined: 18 Jul 2006
Posts: 4840
Location: The Whole Year Inn
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| Posted: Thu Apr 09, 2009 11:56 am Post subject: |
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| one man army wrote: |
I broke down in one a few years ago while trying to watch the race. Those few hours spent waiting for recovery are now etched in my memory. ... |
If that's the emotional strain PR can put on spectators I can't begin to imagine what it does to the riders.
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one man army
Div 2 Pro
Joined: 11 Nov 2003
Posts: 5898
Location: Brighton & Hove
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| Posted: Thu Apr 09, 2009 12:00 pm Post subject: |
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| Joursans wrote: |
| one man army wrote: |
I broke down in one a few years ago while trying to watch the race. Those few hours spent waiting for recovery are now etched in my memory. ... |
If that's the emotional strain PR can put on spectators I can't begin to imagine what it does to the riders.
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No emotional pitfalls for the riders - sore bottoms & numb hands are their bugbears.
On the subject of sore bottoms - that 'Roubaix Shower' thing is a bit h0m0-er0tic innit? Maybe thats where the 'big' George hincapie thing comes from?
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