Watch today’s ToC stage of Quickstep rider Remi Cavagna descending off Mt. Hamilton if you want to see how not to descend. His line was crazy off but, what bothered me more was how he dropped his head and therefore his inside shoulder through the corner.
In contrast Alex Hoehn (chasing) looked solid, smooth and fluid.
Stuck at work and can’t watch. But I hate descending Quimby. Tons of off-camber turns, and the road has weird bumps in it. The ToC just loooooves to send the riders down it, though… at least they can use the whole road and not worry about people coming up it in the opposite direction. Some of those turns would be a bit better if you could swing super wide.
@bbarrera I’m watching NBC Sports Gold with Bob Roll and Christian VdV commentating. Some quotes: “I think he’s crosseyed to be honest…” “every corner is an adventure…” “it’s not a foregone conclusion…(that’s he’ll stay clear)”
same. Did you like that public service announcement they just ran? You called it! Amazing he only went off the road once, on the last hill/roller down to highway 101.
NBC Sports Gold public service announcement - fast forward to 2:49:45 for a 1 minute tutorial on how not to descend. Or as Phil Liggett put it “for anybody planning on being a professional, we’ll now show you how not to go down a descent”
No way you could be that bad of a descender and be a pro, I think he blew a fuse giving it everything on the HC climb.
every time they said Remi all I could think of was the animated movie Ratatouille and that first time Remy the mouse was controlling Linguini like a marionette LOL.
Just read another article mentioning that he was so crushed he couldn’t hardly raise his arms to celebrate.
Given he’s finished a Giro in one piece, won a stage in Alentejo, and won Dwars in 2018 I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt… safe to assume he’s a decent enough bike handler compared to the any TR forum commentator.
@Tanner1280 Cat 5 to world tour pro it’s rare to see anyone point their head in the direction of the turn to the inside causing the entire upper body to be so horribly out of position. it was just so odd and rare. I’ve only seen a glimmer of it from Mike Rusty Woods last year at the pro level. Not as pronounced but it was there.
As for coming across the line I noticed he had to check his body position a bit to get his balance to take his hands off the bars. Based on what I saw today I think he is either a shitty bike handler or he was suffering from vertigo/dizzy etc…Given the level he’s at I doubt he’s a shitty bike handler so I have to assume there was something else going on. The whole upper body thing cornering was waaaaaaaaaaaay waaaaaaaaaaay off though. Not sure what to think. Very odd.