The mithical one, gone a year ago! Could Armstrong have beaten him in 99?

[ilpirata]

True about the investment in the following year, but please enlighten me. I don't recall Pantani having near the time trialing skills, even in his best year, of the best of the peloton, namely Lance. Maybe you might point to a race or two where he demonstrates this. I haven't seen it.

As I stated earlier, he was a joy to watch in the mountains. He had a certain style of riding that made him look invincible in the mountains, yet he was about the same as Lance is on the climbs. Marco seemed to do it with more flair. If he was better than Lance, it was only marginally on the climbs.

Well certainly Marco Pantani was never a great time trialist but if you remember in the 98 tour there came the decisive time trial with Ullrich at Le Creusot, Ullrich finished first, Julich second, and Pantani third at 2’ 35” . This is superb effort when you consider also that Ekimov (an Olympic time trial champion from Sydney) finished sixth at 3’48 from Ullrich. In my opinion then, Pantani in 99 was so much stronger than 98, and therefore would be able to defend himself adequately on the time trials. And Armstrong would not have been able to hold his wheel in the mountains.

 

[babylou]

Armstrong - well we know he couldn't climb between 1992-1996 and now he's, err, an all time great.
That's of course if you take what you see at face value - which I don't.

Sheesh! You judge Pantani's performances as if they were completely legitimate though he was caught doping. Then you judge Armstrong's performances as if they are tainted though he has not been caught doping. You are so freaking biased it is comical.

 

[ilpirata]

Sheesh! You judge Pantani's performances as if they were completely legitimate though he was caught doping. Then you judge Armstrong's performances as if they are tainted though he has not been caught doping. You are so freaking biased it is comical.

Pantani was never caught doping. No banned substance, never a hint of doping. He was a great climber even as a young cyclist. Did you not read the threads? Even if he had a truly high hematocrit June 5th 1999(I give more than a few reasons for doubting that measurement), how many riders are now consistently riding above the 50 ceiling with permission slips. That is to say there was no definitive test for epo at that time.

Armstrong is for me a great champion. He does not excite me as did Pantani.

 

[limerickman]

Sheesh! You judge Pantani's performances as if they were completely legitimate though he was caught doping. Then you judge Armstrong's performances as if they are tainted though he has not been caught doping. You are so freaking biased it is comical.

So are you saying that LA could climb between 1992-1996 ?

I suppose that's why he abandoned 3 out of 4 T'sDF.

Pantani was a great climber from day one.
He didn't, err, "improve" like Armstrong did.

 

[wolfix]

Great TDF racers make for boring TDF's. Boring may not quite be the correct term to use as the TDF is a exciting race anytime. Maybe predictable is the correct term.....
...... Remember Indurain ?????? Just as predictable as the last 5TDF's.........
I do not think that Pantani would have won any more TDF"s, but he sure would have made for more exciting races...... The peloton needs more guys like him....... His life turned out to be tragedy, but he should be remembered for his fierce attacking in the mountains .. Lance Armstrong did not intimidate him and I doubt if Eddy would have either......
Pantani knew he had to attack Lance in the mountains..... He was not going to win any time in the flats. He was a champion because he understood that 2nd place was more humiliating then last place.......
I believe Pantani would have had his hands full of Jan too ...... For the same reasons Pantani had with Lance....
I hate the fact that the TT , individual or team has such an importance in the TDF........ We need the Pantani's , the Zabels, the Sean Kellys to have an more important role in the TDF...... Not the TT specialists.

It would have been exciting if Claudio Chiappucci and Pantani would have been on form in the same Tour or Giro .... That would have been a race. in the mountains....

 

[mareblu]

Great TDF racers make for boring TDF's. Boring may not quite be the correct term to use as the TDF is a exciting race anytime. Maybe predictable is the correct term.....
...... Remember Indurain ?????? Just as predictable as the last 5TDF's.........
I do not think that Pantani would have won any more TDF"s, but he sure would have made for more exciting races...... The peloton needs more guys like him....... His life turned out to be tragedy, but he should be remembered for his fierce attacking in the mountains .. Lance Armstrong did not intimidate him and I doubt if Eddy would have either......
Pantani knew he had to attack Lance in the mountains..... He was not going to win any time in the flats. He was a champion because he understood that 2nd place was more humiliating then last place.......
I believe Pantani would have had his hands full of Jan too ...... For the same reasons Pantani had with Lance....
I hate the fact that the TT , individual or team has such an importance in the TDF........ We need the Pantani's , the Zabels, the Sean Kellys to have an more important role in the TDF...... Not the TT specialists.

It would have been exciting if Claudio Chiappucci and Pantani would have been on form in the same Tour or Giro .... That would have been a race. in the mountains....

I MISS MARCO PANTANI!!!!!!

 

[gntlmn]

So are you saying that LA could climb between 1992-1996 ?

I suppose that's why he abandoned 3 out of 4 T'sDF.

Pantani was a great climber from day one.
He didn't, err, "improve" like Armstrong did.

I guess when you're 171 cm and weigh in at 56 kg, it's pretty hard to "improve" any more by losing weight, is it? He'd be losing some of the muscle he needs to get up those hills. Lance, on the other hand, had quite a bit extra muscle to lose, and with a higher cadence and still adequate muscle mass after losing something like 8 kg, he was able to shift the burden from his less ample leg muscles to his cardio system. So it doesn't take much brains to figure out how he improved so much. In America, we call this a no-brainer. Holmes might have said, "elementary, my dear Watson."

 

[limerickman]

I guess when you're ............... In America, we call this a no-brainer. Holmes might have said, "elementary, my dear Watson."

It's a no-brainer when you fail to consider that his "improvement" is more likely to be attributed to PED.

Even after reading LA's explanation for his "improvement" which you recite verbatim (see above), doesn't it make you wonder why so many people still don't believe his (your) explanation for his "improvement" ?

 

[gntlmn]

It's a no-brainer when you fail to consider that his "improvement" is more likely to be attributed to PED.

Even after reading LA's explanation for his "improvement" which you recite verbatim (see above), doesn't it make you wonder why so many people still don't believe his (your) explanation for his "improvement" ?

So what you're saying is that you cannot see that he lost a lot of weight. To me that is evident from the photos. I don't even have to see what the scales read before and after. The difference is dramatic. If you ignore this fact, then it is you who are fooling yourself. That you have many LA haters who will side with you doesn't diminish the evidence in front of your eyes. If you choose not to believe the evidence in front of your eyes, then you might as well be living in the world of make believe.

 

[wolfix]

It's a no-brainer when you fail to consider that his "improvement" is more likely to be attributed to PED.

Even after reading LA's explanation for his "improvement" which you recite verbatim (see above), doesn't it make you wonder why so many people still don't believe his (your) explanation for his "improvement" ?

I know this personally ....... I was a competitive wrestler [not the WWW kind] back in the 70's and had a heavily muscled body frame ..... I took up road cycling , worked extremely hard on my cadence, and then over a period of 2 years lost over 10% of my body weight....... This happened even though I came from a national class wrestling program where weight loss was a religion ...... When I started traing for the track several years later I gained back more then I lost ........
Lance , going through chemo lost muscle mass..... Take a walk thru a cancer ward...... And with planned training he came back to the sport with a definite improved cadence and a different muscle mass......

I believe that the euro's are far advanced in training methods and what it takes to win the TDF then what is available in the USA ......
Did he have a different training coaches to help his comeback ???? His body type can be debated , but his heart and lungs cannot be ..... And his desire ..... Remember the Worlds in 1993???? On that particular day , he was the finest cyclist in the world ....... I believe he acheived a important goal at an earlier age then Eddy , a goal that Sean Kelly was unable to ever complete, and something very few cyclists ever achieve.......
Does Lance have a work ethic ???? I do not believe that is something he made up just to sell his book ....... He is an aggressive individual ,on and off the bike, something that is pretty common in great champions ...... If you look at all the TDF champions in the last 20 years , except for Indurain , everyone of them has the personality of a dominator ..... None of them are willing to settle for 2nd place in anything in life......

 

[gntlmn]

Lance , going through chemo lost muscle mass..... Take a walk thru a cancer ward...... And with planned training he came back to the sport with a definite improved cadence and a different muscle mass......

This is also another point I should have made sooner, but you've made it first. That is, if we didn't see pictures of Lance much leaner after chemo, the posts would be different. Instead, they would be saying that Lance couldn't have gone through all that without losing body mass. He would most likely have had to dope in order not to lose that weight. However, he wouldn't have won the Tour de France without losing it. So that's a story we would have never heard because he wouldn't have had the popularity for people to take notice if he hadn't won the Tour. That he lost the weight is what we expect from a cancer survivor; it's the norm--the expected outcome. That shouldn't raise eyebrows or prompt doping suspicions.