Pro cyclists' mistakes...

Very exciting Tour of Flanders yesterday, and lots of good write-ups in the cycling press.  But found it interesting how worlds best professional cyclists all made seemingly very basic mistakes.  Not judgement call like whether Chavanel should have ridden with Cancellara, but more basic stuff. 

Boonen’s attack (0:31 in http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buaUpLCr5Dc).  Why did Boonen launch with Cancellara virtually on his wheel at the time (just before Boonen is 5^th wheel with Cancellara right behind, Boonen then moves up pretty unsubtly on the right and briefly Ballan is between them).  There was fair way to go, and surely plenty of time to choose much better opportunity.  With radios then do not even need to look round to check who’s on your wheel, and surely Wilfred Peters should have been screaming ‘not now, Fabian on you wheel, wait Tommeke wait…’ 

Cancellara catching Chavanel too quickly.  Pretty obvious that Chavanel was going to sit on Cancellara, so little benefit in Cancellara getting to Chavenel sooner that he needed to.  Catching Chavenel 6-7k later just before next climb would have been far more logical.  Although to be fair I think Chavanel rode to manage when Cancellara caught him, and make sure he got to ride Valkenburg at tempo. 

Gilbert’s attack up Bosberg.  I am massive fan of Gilbert and it made great tv but surely nailing it from the very bottom was not the best way to try and get race winning gap.  The result was others rode up the Bosberg at their limit, and quickly recovered to chase and catch Gilbert.  Race winning gaps are rarely about simply outpowering others up a fairly short climb – its when other riders overextend themselves that gaps really grow.