Lantern Rouge discusses UAE Team Emirates 2021 riders (including Brandon McNulty)
 

This post is mostly intended for @Doge, in case he hasn't seen this podcast, but others might find it of interest.


The young Australian YouTube bike racing analyst Lantern Rouge and his Belgian counterpart, Benji Naesen, have been doing a series of podcasts together in which they speculate on this year's pro team strategies, e.g., how the various team members might be best deployed throughout the season. For instance, the two of them agree that Brandon McNulty will probably be sent to some lesser early-season races and maybe the Giro, but they think that the smart move would be to send him to the Tour and give their reasoning.

I've been listening to them while doing BigRingVR workouts. The workouts and podcasts are usually almost exactly the same length, helpfully.

Junior and LUX alum teammates hanging out today. Winning is still hard, so we will have to wait.
This much I have been told. UAE has two GC riders. One won the TdF. The other is the leader for the Giro.

I'm excited and hopeful for McNulty, and want to see him succeed.

Technically this thread is Pro Cycling subforum material, but I think we should leave it if we wish to have the discussion among ourselves and because it's only a couple degrees removed from Doge. Feel free to PM me if you think otherwise.

how many TSS to ignore a thread you don't want to read?

To be sporting I'm going to root against him.

that's the spirit!!!

That race two years ago at Dubai or wherever where they finished on the dam and he just about came to a standstill with 100m to go...Ohhhhh, he needs to do some reckoning for that one. I want to see it, too! Hope he can pull off a big one.

So many super young talented guys to root for this last year.

To be clear, LR and Benji were talking about how Brandon McN would be most useful as a support rider for the team's GC guy(s). They agreed that his particular strengths would make him more useful at the Tour than at the Giro or Vuelta.

That thing was long. Some GC riders can be helpers and others that is not the best fit. My understanding is the UAE GC leadership for the GTs is decided. With the current roster/position, I think their two GC guys will lead their own GTs for the next few years.
I believe their reasons as to why are correct. My kid is working him pretty hard right now, so he should be fast :-)

I think we have seen this before by other pro WT riders, but they get pretty good at the Espresso. Typically the E61 group head kind that flows the water through the head, like the Rocket Espresso machines in the pic. I have no inside information on that, other than the same brand and model is used by others.

Produced yesterday by the rider being discussed.
https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...b101b0e2b5.png


https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...9434ac83fe.png

I find the funny thing about this sport is Brandon McNulty is probably somewhere around the 10th best GC rider in the world, but in almost every discipline if you're higher than the top 5, you're a domestique or basically a nobody.

Also, Pogacar is insanely talented....

Do we believe anymore that GC riders peak in late 20s?

I believe in the past people took up the sport in their late or mid teens, and now we have a lot of racers that started really early. There also may be somewhat of a talent gap at the top ranks compared to previous generations. While it seems that way from a fan perspective, its hard to tell unless one is actually involved in the sport. The Lance era more or less cratered progress in the sport, not just from Americans, as we weren't the only ones getting popped.

Also a fair chance kids are doing well because there are less substances in the races. I still think racers microdose and take passable medications, but they're not taking massive stacks of EPO and Test like in the past.

You make a good point. Males are well known to peak in strength in teens to low 20s. Their mind peak is different. With radios, do they even need to think? I posted about a lot about junior W/kg and got a lot of grief for it.
I have no question now where the max W/kg are and as much as we have seen it on U23 in the GT's there are a lot of kids that can best pro numbers in W/kg on shorter rides. The sport is not about power or W/kg. It is about winning.


They don't need to microdose. They need someone else telling them what to do in an ear piece.

Gonna start calling him Tom Danielson or something too?

No. Different time, different job, different money. The role is to win stages and win GC. I don't think that has to be done U23, but the money is nothing like TD.