With the addition of Yaroslav Popovych and Haimar Zubeldia, Johan Bruyneel has put together what should be considered the best and strongest Tour teams in history. Popovych has finished 8th in the Tour and 3rd and 5th in the Giro, while Zubeldia has finished the Tour in 5th twice and 8th once. Team Astana now has six riders that have finished in the top 8 in the Tour at least once.
All six are strong in the mountains and will now give a decided edge to Astana in all the mountain stages.
The toughest job now for Bruyneel is to chose the other three riders for the Tour team. Six are now set with Armstrong, Contador, Leipheimer, Kloden, Popovych and Zubeldia. As of now I believe the team will complete it's line-up with Rubiera, Paulinho and Chris Horner. That will leave out Benjamin Noval and promising riders like Vaitkus, Iglinskiy, Jesus Hernandez and Brajkovic.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot Vino's coming back. Vinokourov received a suspension of only one year for a postive test of a banned blood transfusion. That suspension is up in July 2009. I doubt it will be in time for the Tour and I certainly don't think Bruyneel is looking forward to his return. Time will tell.
Now for my updated prediction of this year's Tour de France:
1. Contador - 2. Leipheimer - 3. Zubeldia with at least 5 top 10 finishers from Astana.
This will definetly make them the best ever, beating the 1986 Team La Vie Claire which finished First, Second, Fourth and Seventh. Getting excited now! Is it July yet?
Time Trialling Inspiration Courtesy of Cancellara
8 months ago
10 comments:
That would really be incredible if they could cap off that team with some of the guys you're suggesting. Unbeatable for sure.
Seems unbeatabel, but there are many good bikers who may spoil the plans! Go Astana
Not only good climbers, bu they can also do well in time trials.
Don't count your chickens yet.
Going to be much tougher than the
1986 Team La Vie Claire. More talent in the race than at that time.
it's still early to make too many predictions but if I were a betting man ;)
I love your predictions for Team Astana. He's got a strong team now, the only thing is can the tour not have a scandel attached to it yet again.
Been following cycling for well as long as I can remember. The tour is one of my fav races on the calender but I have been dissappointed so many times over the last three years.
I hope that having Armstrong back brings something special this year. We will see.
Cheers
JB
Would really like to see Lance and Team Astana kick butt in TDF..
Lance is back....nd he would tke his neighborhood back too....its when odds are really high against him that he makes logic seem futile.....Malliot Jaune would be back where it belongs....Viva la lance....
Kunal, Yes he is back, and myself being a huge Lance fan would like to see him do well, but not sure if Lance winning 'le tour' would be good for the sport. For the sake of pro-cycling and all it's future fans the sport needs a new hero.
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