A lot of people have respected him for a long time:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x64s1a_mon-tour-de-france-par-thomas-voeck_fun
The last part with his breakaway at the GP Pouay is impressive.
-ilan
something about Voeckler has always made me negative. Weird.
Nothing obvious springs to mind; he's never been connected to a doping
scandal that I can tell; works hard, plays fair, well liked, had the
yellow for longer than seemed humanly possible; I think it's that last
one.
Mind you, logic and evidence have never been needed here.
I don't think there's been a mass of negativity toward Voeckler in here. There has
been some (you admit that you feel some toward him) but I don't recall it being
particularly overwhelming. He got into yellow by getting into a good break then held
onto it for a long time (partly due to his own tenacity, partly due to the peloton's
lack of interest in riding in a way that would grind his lead down). He didn't come
across as self aggrandizing after that. Probably the one reason people might have for
casing on him is that he was often held up as a good prospect for the overall based
on his time in yellow when he really wasn't that good. I think he is good, just not
*that* good.
--
tanx,
Howard
Caught playing safe
It's a bored game
remove YOUR SHOES to reply, ok?
I'll have to find the video of him imitating his mother when she was
on the phone from Guadeloupe: "Congratulations my boy for winning of
the race to the yellow jersey" or words to that effect.
-ilan
I have been somewhat anti-Voeckler since he made all those ridiculous
fake orgasm faces when 'heroically' holding onto the yellow. Oh, the
suffering! Oh, the heroic effort! He was like some kind of crazy mime
out there with his ridiculous faces. You don't see Chavanel out there
making faces like that.
They should make a striped jersey and award it to the most mime-like
rider in the TDF. They should call this the Voeckler Jersey.
You should have seen the reaction when Voeckler sprinted at the
Plateau de Beille to hold on to yellow. One of the Tour sponsors
had planted a jumbotron at one of the earlier passes and everyone
at the pass was there watching the finish. People went apeshit
as he came in just under the gap to hold the jersey. It was
electric, and LANCE didn't get anywhere near that kind of
reaction when he won the stage.
Bob Schwartz
bing! or is it "bang" as in nail on the head.
Thanks, just what I was grasping at but couldn't nail :)