[Closed] Chris Froome

Quiet, unassuming, less likely to do an explosive press conference and swear at journo's, no Olympic history etc.

If you can make this work (proxy maybe) http://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/video/469111875731/the-climb-starts-here-froome-and-porte
it will give you an insight possibly. Nice but quiet bloke.

He just is a less interesting character, and also not of British origin which might put some people off I guess, mainly though no sideburns, doesn't like Paul Weller, doesn't come out with witty banter like 'now here are the raffles prizes' when winning the Tour de France...

Wiggo was more of a "character" and happy to ham it up for the press. check YouTube for his Q&A's they were quite entertaining.

Quote from Wiggo's wife Cath, was something like: "There's 2 sides to Bradley, the father and husband good guy and then the cyclist, whose a bit of knob sometimes" Rouleur from 2013 I think.

Quiet, unassuming, less likely to do an explosive press conference and swear at journo's, no Olympic history etc.

And he's not really British. If you recall, Tim Henman always got more attention than Greg Rusedski.

Oh good god, not this again 🙄

Kevin Pietersen & Jonathan Trott, both the same though. If he had Wiggins Swagger it would be different but it's not him. He was rolling round here fairly unassuming (apart from the Jag escort) and was out having coffee and the like for a month over Christmas.

I can't stand him due to his exploits 'supporting' Wiggins when Wiggins won. Now I'd like anyone but Frome to win.

Just a quieter, less charismatic bloke - doesn't make him a bad person. I think it's more a case that Wiggins is unusual, rather than Froome, seems like most sports folks are pretty reserved, don't let toomuch of themselves out when they're speaking to the media. Or are just too politely raised to want to cause controversy!

Don't get that Ioddrik, Wiggins wouldn't have won without his help. OK, he may have made a point, but he still did the job and basically helped the lesser rider to victory - a hard thing for any sportsman to do...

I really like him, he comes across very humble and able to take the pee out of himself. He's also fiercely driven to succeed, again something I like a lot.

The beef with Wiggo in 2012 was a raw racer wanting to race, perhaps a racer that was stronger than his team leader in truth.

However, the reason people don't like him is he's not as charismatic as Wiggo. he's also not as flawed and the British like a lightly flawed character.

nice bloke shame about the mrs

FAR more exciting to watch than an overpaid over-hyped Prima Donna who did nothing for 2 of the last 3 years other than beat a couple of espoirs in a second rate US race, and get beaten in Classics by his domestiques... 😈

Froome has been known to attack and race, both foreign concepts to the National Treasure, yesterday being such an example.

I really like him, he comes across very humble and able to take the pee out of himself.

seen the GCN video of him teaching Daniel Lloyd how to climb? "You need to stick your elbows out and stare at your stem".

I think he's just pretty difficult to warm to. And I think it's just me (well the Mrs thinks so) but I don't find him very sincere, I just wish he'd say what he actually thought.

FAR more exciting to watch than an overpaid over-hyped Prima Donna who did nothing for 2 of the last 3 years other than beat a couple of espoirs in a second rate US race, and get beaten in Classics by his domestiques...

...and win the National and World time trials.

He's got a little TV on his stem topcap. He watches repeats of Bergerac. Except for mountain stages, when he watches 1970s vintage porn movies.

#froomefacts

[quote=crashtestmonkey ]FAR more exciting to watch than an overpaid over-hyped Prima Donna who did nothing for 2 of the last 3 years other than beat a couple of espoirs in a second rate US race, and get beaten in Classics by his domestiques..

Well apart from this, obviously

[img] [/img]

oh, and those espoirs include this bloke:

[img] [/img]

Froome has been known to attack and race, both foreign concepts to the National Treasure, yesterday being such an example.

yesterday being such an example.

I have to say that was a turning point for me. He can come across as too methodical, riding by numbers. Yesterday he looked to me like he really wanted it and didn't give up even when he wasn't going to win the stage. If he rides like that more often and works on his interview technique people will warm to him. Mind you, he might not give a damn what we think about him.

My problem with Froome is that he rides like an octopus falling out of a tree. Wiggins in TT mode is an object lesson in style and control. Froome on an uphill attack is devastating, but looks like a teenage on his first bike - pedaling away like mad and glancing down as if trying to work out how to get out of bottom gear. Very effective though, not really anyone in the world who can stay with him when he does that.

FWIW his biography is an interesting read - he certainly had an unusual (for a procyclist) upbringing and entrance into the sport.

Froome turned up to ride.
Wiggins turned up to do chat shows.
Or at least that's how it seems. Either of them could rip my legs off without breaking sweat.

Also I dislike the half Australian, Belgian born one's fake Britishness. Austin Powers does it better.

If I was only talking about the 2012 Tour you'd have a point.

Oooh a time trial. Thrilling stuff, and well worth that salary.

And however you dress it up, the Tour of California is a UCI 2.HC race, entered by Sky due to the ownership structure within News Corp not the status of the race and he was a WT team leader paid millions of euros to not enter Grand Tours.

Fact is Froome is a totally different; far more attacking and exciting racer to watch, but the general public and wider media embraced Wiggins for his off-the-bike "mod" persona during the 2012 Summer of Cycling, where being British was important.

My problem with Froome is that he rides like an octopus falling out of a tree.

🙂

yesterday was entirely consistent with his riding in other races such as the Dauphine the last couple of years and more indicative of his natural style than the Diesel Sky Train they carried over from Wiggins' 2012 success.

Dauphine last year, as early as stage 2

He can come across as too methodical, riding by numbers

Froome has always been a lot less methodical than Wiggo. Or at least, he's made attacks that his team didn't expect because he reckoned it was right.

He hasn't got much of a personality but so what, he doesn't have to.

A lot of sports people haven't which makes the few that do stand out.

Like it or not Wiggo is a bit of a national treasure and his flaws only seem to make him more relatable to the general public.

Froome might be a more exciting and impulsive racer (relatively speaking), but he's just another cyclist to the man in the street - and of course he was the [i]second[/i] "Brit" to win the TdF.

The sequel is never as popular as the original.

Apart from the Godfather movies obvs.

I thought he was riding well yesterday. Very little evidence of his 'staring at his stem' Crash Froome riding style.

He properly had to stick his shoulders and elbows into a rider next to him on more than one occasion on the closing couple of climbs.

The funny thing watching that is that you know that he's desperately trying to do what he logically knows he has to do - eg hold his position and fight back - while suppressing the desire to apologise for being bumped 😆

He properly had to stick his shoulders and elbows into a rider next to him

To be fair, his elbows must be pretty damn sharp. There's not much in the way of padding on him.

[i]My problem with Froome is that he rides like an octopus falling out of a tree.[/i]

this, he rides like a nodding dog, and I feel sorry for anyone that has to ride anywhere near him, must be a PITA getting an elbow in your ear every 30 seconds. That and the spinny cadence thing really really gets on my tits, I can watch for about a minute before shouting "for ****s sake change up" at the telly

not good for the blood pressure.

I thought that the spinny thing was a bit of an urban myth from the first time he did it when he was just stuck in the wrong gear.

There was a great 1hr itv4 sport documentary on froome earlier this year.
Showed him in a totally different light to my opinion at that time.
Really warmed to him and his dedication to get to the top.
Would be happy if he won the tdf again this year..

he's suffering from a lack of sideburns

[quote=crashtestmonkey ]And however you dress it up, the Tour of California is a UCI 2.HC race, entered by Sky due to the ownership structure within News Corp not the status of the race and he was a WT team leader paid millions of euros to not enter Grand Tours.

I made no comment on the status of the race, simply your suggestion that the didn't beat anybody decent.

Him not entering GTs is hardly his fault!

I suspect you'll also find that his salary is less to do with his likely performance in GTs than the fact this thread exists (of course they wouldn't pay him to do nothing, but then he hasn't done nothing).

Yes I am a Wiggo fan, which is to a large extent actually nothing to do with his personality, but because I'm not a fair weather road cycling fan and have followed it at all levels for 25 years. I remember Wiggo coming through the system as a junior before he was even famous for winning Olympic medals. Froome doesn't have that background. Those who comment on him being Belgian or Australian seem to miss that Wiggo is pretty much as British a cyclist as it comes - he showed that it's possible to reach the summit as a British cyclist in the way Froome doesn't.

@ nickc "Calm down, dear! It's only a bike race" 😆

Also I dislike the half Australian, Belgian born one's fake Britishness.

As you know, he was born in Belgium because his father was racing there at the time. He grew up in London.

Froome doesn't have that background

from Wikiwoo
Froome turned professional in 2007, aged 22, with the South African team, Konica Minolta, withdrawing from university two years into his degree in economics.[23] He competed from April to September for the Union Cycliste Internationale's World Cycling Centre (WCC) team based in Aigle, Switzerland, in the U23 Nations Cup.[24] In May he rode his first stage race, the Giro delle Regioni, winning stage five, riding for WCC.[23][25] In late-May he won stage six of the Tour of Japan, attacking from a breakaway in the 14 lap circuit in Shuzenji.[26] In June he competed at the "B" world championships in Cape Town, placing second to China's Haijun Ma in the 26.8 km (16.7 mi)-long time trial.[27][28] In July he claimed a bronze medal in the road race at the All-Africa Games in Algiers, Algeria.[29] On 26 September, he placed 41st in the under-23 time trial at the world championships in Stuttgart, three minutes and 30 seconds behind the gold medalist, Lars Boom (Netherlands).[30]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Froome#2011:_Breakthrough

I like him.

He's embedded the reason to ride hard IMO, happy to go up hills and along the flats hard. I'd like to see him do more One Day Classics, but in all honesty this won't happen. So he'll stick to multi day events where he can excel.
As far as elbows and stems, who really GAS? He rides hard to his strengths, not everyone likes riding in the big ring pulling tarmac up behind him.

Wiggo on the other hand was more a One Day Classics guy and yet still managed a TdF win due to the Sky blanket covering the team. Not taking anything away from Wiggo because I like him too, but feel he's more a One Day'er.

For anyone watching live - nice touch by Froome with water bottle to the fan. Seems like a gent to me.

[quote=surroundedbyhills ]just because he wasn't on your radar doesn't mean he hasn't earned his place at the top!

<whoosh> well clearly every top cyclist previously competed at a lower level 🙄 The question is, could you have commented on what he did before 2011 without reference to Wiki?

Did you miss that I was commenting on coming through the British system (where Wiggo managed stuff like winning the world junior pursuit - no googling required)

Having met both of them (and Froome's missus as it so happens), Wiggins years ago and Froome relatively recently, I can say that I'm a fan of both.

They're very different people, Wiggo's public persona gives the press much more to work with but Froome's very personable in the flesh, he's a just a down to earth guy that's more into riding his bike very fast than being a 'celebrity.' I came away very much a fan and was gutted when he got taken out in the 2014 TDF.

Michelle, is for the record also a pleasure to deal with in person, like many I got the impression after the 2012 TDF that the was an uber high-maintenance trophy diva but having hung around talking to her she's nothing of the sort, again, very pleasant.

I know that kind of conclusion won't help generate many column inches but all the sniping at Froome does bug me, British cycling fans are getting spoilt, just a few short years ago we'd have killed to have someone like him riding under the Union Jack, weird pedaling style or otherwise.

My stepdad read Froome's autobiography. His verdict as a lifelong sports fan but not a cycling expert by any means was that he is "a bit of a headbanger", I think that it was meant in a good way. He just loves bike racing and riding.

I_did_dab - Member
My stepdad read Froome's autobiography. His verdict as a lifelong sports fan but not a cycling expert by any means was that he is "a bit of a headbanger", I think that it was meant in a good way. He just loves bike racing and riding.

That's a fantastic post which pretty much sums up the internet these days.

The timing of Froome's rise to the top might be a factor in his lower profile in the press. Not enough time for the public to get used to Wiggo as number 1 before Froome was knocking on the door. People want one hero at a time with a decent interval between them. Being a bit of a Zola Budd was another factor.

Froome's performance today should lay to rest some of the criticisms about him just being a lightweight climber with no bike handling skills.