Caveman

Unlike the two knuckleheads he drug to victories in the Giro and TdF. If I were SK I'd never turn another pedal or take another pull for JV or PR and I'd never ride for a team with that Director Sportiff.I was so pissed after 16 & 17.

JV is the worst with all that phony emotional BS. I bought it when it was about his kid's birthday. Instead of crying about your friend that isn't here how about working for the guy that is.

GrainBrain

slcbob

Well dayum.

Happy Sepp-tember.

BTW, Google Creeper fed me an article covering the lady who feeds him cake. He and Noemi Ferre were married in Oct 2022 in Andorra. She is a potent pro cyclist in her own right. He is her boy toy. Go Sepp, always the super domestique.

teejaywhy

Doge

He gets very little credit for it I believe because of the year/generation he won - not so long after canceling all the TdF winners. That and TV coverage and who else showed up.
I expect in 20 years the Sepp "story" will be better remembered.

Doge

Any gear heads wondering why Sepp went with the different bike head tube/stem combo? I was not aware of a bike change.

himespau 

He got a special red cervelo to honor the occasion of finishing in the red jersey.

GrainBrain

Not in that photo though, that's stage 20 (right?). Good question, is it a different climbing model and setup?

himespau 

Ah yes, of course you're right. Didn't really even look at the photo after seeing the red bar tape.

Steel Charlie

That "E" headbadge means those are the electric models, right?

Doge

That bike just has red handlebar tape and black head tube and different stem.
Oops...Guess others said that. So still unknown why the different stem / bar setup.

slcbob

He is a good bit taller than the other two. Do all his frames look like that? I may peek at that in future browsing.

I saw something a few days ago commenting on JV and Roglic using a single chainring on some stages while Sepp stuck with a double. Lots of little choices.

There was also an interview with Remco before one of the last mountain stages asking about his gear selection and why he was using a specific one unlike the others who were choosing whatever (maybe 34-34 vs. 34-36, IDK). He asked where did you get that information and then sort of smugly (in a good way) said nope, I'm not using that, I'm using the one like everyone else.

So many finicky little things to keep the mechs up at night.

Chicago Al 

Jonas V gave an interview to Danish TV where he was a bit more open about the dynamics of the team mid-race and his own feelings. A Danish lady (MatildefromJuly) on Twitter provided a translation:

Int: if you had to explain to the people who are now complaining that the decision is matchfixing because they believe you would win. What would you tell them?

JV: Well... I'd actually just ask them if they think I should stab my own teammate in the back? Because I don't think I should

Int: Do you think it's because they don't realise cycling is a team sport?

Jonas: Yes - like, it *is*a team sport and Sepp has helped me so many times, so why should I stab him in the back? That's not who I am as a person. I don't want to do that and until yesterday I was in a bit of a pickle where I felt I was between a rock and a hard place

Int: Try to expand on that.

Jonas: We had agreed to race it and of course if the other two are fighting it out, I want to join in. But if we had decided we weren't going to do that - which I would have liked us to have gone with from the start... I would have liked to see that after the rest day we should fight for it and just ride defensively. But then we decided that we were going to race it, I felt like I got put in a tough spot.

Int: Was the decision made too late?

Jonas: Well I'd like to see it had been taken earlier. But it still results in Sepp winning - hopefully.

It's all a bit more comprehensible in retrospect. The team plan was for Primosz and Jonas to be co-leaders, and if the two were the last men standing, evidently the plan was that they'd fight it out. Sure, inter-team drama, but Primosz was probably at least a bit pissed that Jonas was there at all, and would anyone have complained if those two went 1-2, having fought it out on (let's say) the Angliru? Kuss getting in that early breakaway was certainly a part of the plan, getting into the red jersey the best possible outcome. I'm sure they were happy for him to be in the jersey, for a few days, setting up Remco to take it, then a fierce battle in the third week. But Kuss had picked up a lot of time, held his own in the TT, and of course Remco had that jour very sans. When Kuss showed no sign of fading going into the third week, they had a problem. On the Angliru, that look Jonas threw back to Sepp seemed like '****, I don't want to beat you, but I sure don't want Primosz to beat me!' It's quite plausible that Kuss's claim that he told them to go on without him is true, that was the plan up to that point.

Ah well, all's well that ends well, and that was an amazing race. I suspect Kuss will go back to super-domestique duties, or at least want to. While he clearly enjoys being part of a winning team, and an important one at that, I very much doubt he wants the pressure and attention of being a GC leader. Who would? I don't think Jonas likes that aspect of winning very much either.

It’s too much to hope that Kuss could have ‘box of Wheaties’ level of fame in the US, especially since this may be a one-off GT win. But hopefully it’ll attract some interest to the sport.

thin_concrete

So, so very happy for Sepp. A class act all the way and I couldn’t ask for a better person to put the US back on the top spot of a grand tour podium. GCKuss baby!!

scottfsmith

I also heard about those comments from Jonas somewhere.. it further increases my opinion of him, a real class act. Primoz is more the classic GC rider: me-me-win-me.

Of course we all know that Sepp is 100% class 100% of the time. What a great ride these last couple of weeks!

sir_crash_alot

As a relative newcomer to the sport, I acknowledge that there are things about the European grand tours that I don't understand. With that said, even I could sense there was something surreal about the 2023 Vuelta. For me it exposed a culture of sport in Europe that I am only starting to come to grips with but still flies in the face of how I've been taught to see team sports.

Watching Jumbo-Visma's display on the Angliru was such a strange thing, as I saw two teammates attack another one, one who had made a career out of sacrificing himself for their own good. Each of Roglic and Vingegaard had their own pretext for the move (the former wanted to race, whatever that means, and the latter was racing for their child), but somehow these notions of meritocracy and family felt flimsy in the context.

It left me feeling that, while I love cycling as a newcomer, I hesitate to say that I will some day come to understand that aspect of road racing culture. After all, we are reminded every time a GC winner of a GT is declared that we only see one person, and one person alone, on the top of the podium.

It is a team sport without the team seen, and part of me just doesn't get it.

I used to feed horses, and this is where I've seen a similar circumstance: everyone gets their food, so long as the "top of the herd" gets theirs first.

My better sense orients me to resist rationalizing it beyond what it looks like: two teammates attacking the other for eating out of line.

mackgoo

I'm so happy for the guy.

GrainBrain

From Velo...
https://velo.outsideonline.com/road/...-s5-sepp-kuss/

Doge

Nice bike, but not the one in the picture. The one in the picture is not Vuelta red anything - except the tape.

downtube42

You know, Sepp could have been ordered to give up the jersey after a couple days in the spotlight, returning to super domestique duties. I'm sure he would have done that without question, and gone about ensuring Primosz and Jonas duked it out for #1 and #2. We'd be talking about what a great teammate he is, and buzzing about the race between Jonas and Primosz. That would have been a great story for JV.

Hindsight is 20/20, I guess. But there seemed to be a lack of leadership coming out of the JV team car.

slcbob

Yeah. They really screwed this one up.

Steel Charlie

I'll mention it again - professional sports are not "sports". Professional sports are a business, perhaps a complicated one but still a business.

sir_crash_alot

Too bad the "business" hurts the "sports" of it. It certainly makes me not want to support either tbh, but I can't nor am willing to speak for others.

sir_crash_alot

This article right here from Eurosport makes me irrationally angry at the business/sport of professional cycling: https://www.eurosport.com/cycling/vu...42/story.shtml.

Primoz and Jonas "sacrificing" themselves as an act of heroism for a teammates? That they trained hard for victory? That these make them special?

slcbob

Yes, it makes them special. Just like all the team sports superstars. Or maybe a little more.

There's an inherent amount of give and take in just about any sport. Target wide receiver A and that means WR B, the TE, and the RB don't get a touch and an opportunity to notch another stat that might end in a healthy payday from contract incentives.

It's a little more clear and present when Roglic wound up third after spending months living like a monk on Tenerife or wherever he was. C'est la vie? Sure. Also weird. And special.

If you want to get amazed by the business of pro cycling, start digging into the team and league structure, or lack thereof, how TV rights and sponsorship dollars flow, etc. Compared to that, a little champion ego friction on the road is child's play.