700 plus in Bend for Nationals

So, what is going on now in Bend is that the National Championships for USA Cycling are here. That means all juniors, all Under-23, all Elite (seniors, that is over 23, Cat 1's), all categories for Women, and the Paralympic (did I spell that right? I mean to say cyclists with a physical disability. Anyways...)

That is over 700 cyclists that have descended on this town. And all of 'em are in the store at some time or another because REI is the biggest store in town able to handle the crush of people to pick up packets and register. When we have registration going on, it's a zoo.

There are a few things that amaze me.

First of all, all the juniors and other kids who have absolutely gobsmackingly expensive rides. I am not kidding here. They start to put my bike to shame... I mean, I have a nice ride, a full carbon bike with SRAM Force, and Ksyrium wheels. Nice stuff. But when I see a kid come in and he's maybe 15, and he has SRAM Red with Zipp 808 wheels (and the thing about 808's is that they cost around 3 large... $3000 dollars...) I lost count of how many kids came in who had bikes that cost, at full retail, a minimum of Ten Grand.

And many of these kids had dedicated Time Trial rigs that cost as much. So, I see it as conceivable that they would fly from Arkansas or Florida or North Carolina or Pennsylvania with 20 grand in bicycles. I found that just amazing.

At a certain point, you cannot buy victory. I realize that. But I also realize that in Belgium (which is without a doubt the most bike crazy nation on the planet... above Italy, France and Spain. You can make a claim for either of these nations, but for my money I say that Belgium is the most Bike-Centric of 'em all) the juniors are all required to ride the same bike as specified by the Belgian cycling federation. They all ride steel frame bikes, with 32 hole box profile wheels. They can choose their component group, and they can even put on a carbon fork, but beyond that they all ride steel to help level the playing field. Which is actually a far cry to how it was not even ten years ago... when they had to all ride single speed bikes. At least they let the kids have gears.

You know, as I think about this... I need to write USA-Cycling and see if this problem of an arms race in the junior ranks can be abated. At what point do you price out some naturally talented riders who feel they don't have the cash to even think about competing... and I'm thinking about the future Nelson Vails' out there in the inner city or in Compton or East St. Louis. We want to have the best talent possible riding, not the richest.

So, yea, it bugs me. Am I jealous? Heck yea. When I was a kid, I knew nothing about racing or the Tour or how to train, but I loved cycling and took a beater Nishiki bike, stripped it down and painted it and then built back up again. That bike never worked right, because I had no idea what I was doing, but it was all I could afford. I would ride that clunker around, and it would get clunkier (remember, I just put the parts on as I remember they came off... and I used what ever tools my dad had sitting around) I always wished someone would have nurtured that love I had for cycling in it's infancy... instead, it wasn't till I was in college that I really took off with the sport... and there were probably five plus years I could have spent on the bike, good years of developing as a junior. But I digress.

Do I wish my dad would have bought a Gitane with Campy Super Record 6 on it, Mavic GP4 wheels, Columbus tubing? Sure, that would have been the nicest bike around in 1983... but my parents could never have afforded that.

So, yea, I'm envious of these kids and their spendy bikes they have no idea how to work on. They have no idea how good they got it. And I mean that, they have never pair their dues in this sport. I guess that is what they're missing.

I had this conversation with a gal, she was about 22 or so, in grad school (as she pointed out) and I was helping her, because every time she put on her new tire, she blew through a tube. Basically, she kept pinching the tube. This is something that she should know.... I asked her, she said that she's been racing since junior days, for about eight years. But as a vet of the cycling scene, she had no idea how to put a tire on. She told me she always had mechanics do it for her, or her dad did it. So, I show her how to do something simple like put baby powder between the tire and tube to allow the tire to slip around the tube, especially during installation.

Bing Bang Boom... for me, it took all of a minute to do this. We talked for a few minutes about bike racing. She asked if I saw any of the races during Cascade. I said I did the Cat 4's. She tells me that a good friend of hers won. She goes on to say that he's a pro cross country skier who trains for a living, although this was his first bicycling stage race.

I said that I'm at a disadvantage... that I have a house, two kids, a lovely wife, a job... I got all these things that I need to take care of, and that I do the best I can. Which is all true.

She then says (and I'm quoting here) "well, some of us just do it because we love it, because we have so much passion for the sport."

I was just taken aback. I mean, are you saying that I do this because I like getting my head handed to me every saturday ride, every mid-week nooner, every time I go out with a group here in Bend? I mean, passion and love for the sport is all I have. I certainly don't have results, I don't have a team or a manager who makes sure all my needs are looked at so that all I have to do is train... not saying that's her gig, but it sure as heck is for a lot of the kids that are in town this weekend. I don't train full time because I'm 42 and I have responsibilities and that is how it is.... I explained this to her.

She said that she's planning on racing as long as she can, and that's why she's in grad school now. Then she said that she'll do this until she can't do it anymore.

I understand the passion and the love, but passion and love for the sport can only take you so far. I mean, we all come to a point where we are faced with our mortality as an athlete, where we hit the limit, where out combination of skill and talent are topped out, and we can go no further. For some, like the Lance Armstrong's of the world, they achieve greatness and make a good living. This is a small minority. But Lance eventually will get too old, and even now he is seeing that he can only go so far. We all have to answer to the age factor, it catches up with even the most elite of the elite athletes. No one is spared.

For most of us, we sacrifice and we make commitments that very few can understand because of the passion and the love for the sport.

And then we find out that we can't go any farther. We get jobs, we settle down, we ride less, we work more... we get married, have kids, a house, and learn that we have real live adult problems and responsibilities to tend to.

Then, somewhere along the line, we find out that we can do family and adult things as well as ride the bike... you know, the whole passion and love of the sport thing... do a race here or there, and if things break ride, you can afford a sweet ride and you have fun along the way.

... Gosh, where was I? Oh yea, things I noticed during registration...

The other thing I noticed was how rude and condescending some of the junior racers were. Part of it's being a teenager, I get that. Part of it is that they get everything given to them, and they never earn their way or pay their dues, and part of it is that they have no one to tell them No. But I just got really tired of seeing these guys come in and expect me to cater to them. I mean, when I found a kid who had a problem and needed some help, and he was nice and seemed to have a good way about him, I went out of my way to help him out and get him on his way.

But I had a few kids who rude, and I just gave 'em a hearty whatcha gonna do, huh? Sucks to be you, huh. Because they were just asking for it.

By the end of the first day, I thought it was all rude little brats on spendy rides, but at least by the third night, they seemed to balance out. Maybe I got all the rude kids on day one, all jet lagged and tired. I don't know. I do know that if that would have been me, my dad would have smacked me around for acting like a jerk.

Tour Recap

There are things to wrap up on this blog, but I didn't get to it because I was so tired the last few days.... mostly from the race.
I was pretty wiped out on Sunday, but I still got a blast off. Yesterday, I had to work, and I was too tired in the evening to write anything. But here I am on a Tuesday and I'll blog about something.
First of all, the Tour. Now that it's over, I have a few things to say to put a nice little bow on that race. In so doing, I want to go over the same points I went over on my pre-tour post.
1) A Frenchman will not win.
Quite possibly the easiest prediction of all. And, for the 25th straight year, the frenchies were shut out on the top step of the tour. The highest placed frog was Christian Le Mevel in 11th, which was quite good for them.
2) This Tour is gonna rock.
And was I right? Yea. In the decisive stages, it was hot. The first week, as I thought, was quite good, and I also thought that the stages that were pure sprint stages were also good. I really got into watching the Cavendish Express set up the most dominant leadout train I have ever seen.
3) This Tour is gonna suck.
There is no doubt that the neutralization of the Pyrennes was brutal. I bemoaned the lack of hilltop finishes, too few and/or too short Individual Time Trials, and the sense that the Tour organizers were all amped for a decisive showdown on the Ventoux. All this combined to putoff the inevitable victory by Contador. There could have been more punch for this race, and at times it was brutal to continually open up velonews.com and see absolutely no change in GC day after day.
4) Cavendish is gonna win. LOTS.
Good Lord, did I nail this one. I even said "six wins," which he delivered on. This leads to the one part of the Tour that still bugs me... Cavendish did not win the Green jersey, and there was no doubt that he was the best sprinter in the race. The Green Jersey, if anything, surely proved that this is a Points Jersey, and not a sprinters jersey. The fact of the matter is that Hushovd definately worked his can off to get those craptastic intermediate sprints, and that combined with the stage where Cav was relegated, was the ten point differential for this jersey. At this point, I think the organizers need to either make winning a stage worth more than 5 point over coming in second (at least 20 points more) or they need to bring back the red jersey, which used to be given out to the winner of intermediate sprints, and the green jersey was given for points at the end of the stage. Something has to be done, because even Thor Hushovd recognizes the sheer domination and freakish nature of the Cavendish Express.
5) Lance will not win.
I came close to drinking the Kool-Aid in the first week, when he was basically dead-even tied with Cancellara for the lead... but I always get like that in the first week. Last year, it was me getting all giddy over Kim Kirchen when he went yellow in the first week, only to fade down the stretch. I did it again with Lance... but he did prove that he was pretty manly to even make the podium. And I have to give him props here, that is amazing... to go four years off the bike and then come back and podium, when there are guys out there would kill to podium even once in their career (basically, every single french rider out there would be dipped in doo if they were on the podium) and LA just ups and does it out of the blue like that? That was amazing. But, come on, you know the pre-race hype about him winning was always a fantasy. You knew he never would win... but he exceeded my expectations, in that I initially thought he would be in around eighth or tenth, and I didn't have him on the podium.
I did have the podium as follows:
Contador
A. Schleck
Menchov
Two out of three is not bad, eh? The last one, Menchov, I totally gagged on. He had one of the worst rides for a guy who was a contendor coming in. He totally left it all at the Giro, and he stumbled badly in this race... I mean that literally, in that he twice crashed in the TT. This was a guy who had no idea how to race a bike in France, and he was pathetic. More pathetic that Cadel Evans, and that's saying alot.
I wanted to see Christian VandeVelde at the end, but he was in the top ten. In the last week, he rode for Brad Wiggins, who was fourth. I think that Brad can win this race, and in the next few years, it will be interesting to see what he does.
What do I think of the tour now that it's over? I give it a B-, and I think that is because there was enough drama to keep me interested, and there was no doping that we know of. This was the cleanest race in memory, and for that I'm stoked. But I give negative marks for the lack of excitement, and I put that on the organizers who wanted it to come down to the wire.
Well, I have more I can write on, and I will some other time. But I'm pretty tired right now. I want to remark on the spat between LA and Contador... this is gonna be one epic cat-fight between these two, and I have some thoughts on that. I also have a few ideas about Team RadioShack... like I said, I hope to get to that later.
Boy, I'm tired right now... and the heat is not helping me at all here. It's pickin' hot.

CSR Wrap-Up

The final stage of the CSR was today, and it was the Awbrew Butte Circuit Race. All along, I knew this was gonna be the one stage I could do well on... and by that, I mean to be there at the end, and then see what happens.
We rolled out at around 09:45, and we had three circuits and 51 miles to complete. This was probably going to be about a two plus hour ride. And, like I said, I know the course well, and I will ride a part of it at least three times a week, and in the run-up to the race, I did full laps of the course at least twice a week. So, nothing was going to surprise me here.
The first lap seemed pretty pedestrian. We were rolling fast enough, but there was no sense of urgency and no one seemed to attack with much intensity, it was like everyone was waiting for the climb to see what happens. Guys were talking about how it was a hard climb, and it looked to go straight up.
Yes, Archie Briggs is a tough climb. It is steep, but it's not too long. And after you make the turn, it steadily flattens out and then kicks again. But it's not the epic grind that we had on Friday. The climb suits me well, and I thought that I would be OK here all day. There was not one climb all day where I thought I would panic. All the climbs I know, and they're short and steep enough for me to usually big-ring and push tempo, or follow a hard tempo, as the case may be.
Second lap, and we're all together. We did the OB-Riley/Archie Briggs climbs, and there was a small split, but not too bad, and we all came back together.
On the start of the third lap, a guy jumped off the front, and he got a good gap. I went to the front to pull it back, or at least work to pull it back, and no one... and I mean no one... wanted to pull. Not the leader, not the guys in contention, or anyone who wanted to win this stage. So, fine, I sat up, and let that guy get away.
He was really down the road, and then the second car came around us, and that meant he was at least a minute clear. Fine... you want to crap this stage away, then go ahead. Everyone was looking at each other, and no one wanted to work. That is why I hate negative racing, where all the top guys think they're so strong and can just ride away on the climb, so why bother with a guy down the road... he'll come back.
On OB, we had a problem in that our group was neutralized to let the Cat 2's pass us. That stunk, because the second half of the OB climb was slow as heck, and on the last lap, and then we soft pedaled for a long stretch and there was no way that we were gonna catch that guy now. Guys in the group started to get ticked at the those who took the rolling neutralization to get a free pass to the front... and I agree with them. Also, some were really mad at the officials... they were calling 'em names, shouting expletives. But what you gonna do? I mean, the Cat 2's were rolling us up, the rules say that we needed to neutralize. That be the rules! Why get mad at the officials, when we were the ones responsible for the slow roll out and the lack of aggressiveness on the stage, and that ended up keeping our time down. Plus, the 2's were flying. Don't mad, do something about it and ride a bit harder.
We opened up the race with about two miles to Archie Briggs. And it was on. Guys were literally sprinting for the corner, they wanted to be first there... then first on the descent and first on the climb. I was in a bad spot, about 3/4 of the way back, and I could see a lot of guys ahead of me.
But on the climb, I was pretty good. I came around a lot of guys, and I easily made it to the leaders. I mean, I was blowing guys off my wheel. I felt great.
Then, the next section, the leaders and the strong riders just made it a drag-race. They were flying... and a small gap opened up. There was about ten, then a small gap, and my group of about ten. I fully TT'd it to the leaders and shut that gap down, right as we hit the final descent into the last two K's of the race.
Through two roundabouts, we're really rolling. We had a bit of a roller-coaster of up and short downs, but nothing bad, and I just could never get to the very front of the group... I felt like was dangling off the back of the leaders... which is fine, I guess, but I wanted to be first wheel in the last turn if I had any chance. But I spent a lot of energy to get to this group, and I had just enough to hang on. I was totally on my limit.
In the last 200 meters, I just dug and tried to not let a gap open in front of me, and that way I would get the same time as everyone else. But a small gap did open up, and I was some five seconds off their time.
The guy off the front won... of course... he had to be neutralized, but they said that he won by 13 seconds.
On the whole, I liked my day. I felt that I had a card to play at the end, and that was to bridge up to the leaders.

Here is how my race went, and where I sat on GC after each stage:
First Stage: 39th., 4:45 back.
Second Stage: 29th, 7:16 back.
Third Stage: 28th, 7:16 back.
Fourth Stage: 26th, 7:22 back.
The thing is, I got better with each stage... and I really wish I had the first stage back, I would have wanted to do better there. I suffered badly, and I got it handed it to me. I have no regrets, but I just know that I'm better than that...
I must have lost three minutes in the last five clicks, and that bothers me.
I improved on GC every stage, and that was something I was looking for. I also wanted to finish with the leaders when I could. Two of the three stages where I could do that, I did. So, again, I feel like it was mission accomplished.
I gotta go now... I'm tired and I need to work now... more on this race and the Tour when I blog the next time.

CSR Recap... Stages 2a and 2b

Well, today was the time trial and the crit. Basically, I met expectations here today. I didn't blow anyone away, I wasn't expecting that, and I didn't have an epic fail. I was solidly in the middle, and for that was OK. Again, I had fun and no one got hurt.
The TT was good, I felt stronger than I did yesterday. I held aero for almost all of it, and I felt that I climbed well. I caught my half-minute and minute man, and no one caught me from behind. Again, the key word here is solid. I didn't smoke the course, and I didn't I get smoked.
I still don't know my time or where I stand on GC. I kept looking online, but there was no update. Hopefully, tonight I will get some answers.
The crit was in the afternoon. After riding home and having a big lunch, I just sat on the couch and watched the DVD of the Oregon-Oregon State game... a beat down on the Beavs that I can watch over and over and over again. I wanted to be in a fully supine position for as much as possible, putting as little stress on the legs as I could muster. I know that for some, being in an easy chair or on the couch and working the remote control comes very easy. For me, not so much. I usually find that I have some stuff to do, and the kids definitely keep me active.
The crit itself was all about staying away from any and all problems: No crashes, don't get gapped off and finish with the lead group. The crit would only be 30 minutes, so I felt that I could pull that off. There were two crashes that I saw, and they happened right in front of me. On the first, two guys slid into the barrier, and I steered away from it. The other, two guys stacked up and a third and a fourth were pulled into it. I did a rolling stop... in that I mean that I in effect stopped, but never put my foot down or came off the bike or even out of the pedals. I just lost all my Mo, and I had to chase to get onto the back of the group.
I chased furiously, and I got the tail, but I was at the back, and I had to work to get to the middle. I didn't really want to be in the front, per se, but I did not want to be on the back at all. In crits, the group has a tendency to breath... in the that in turns, there is a big bunching up, and then everyone exhales because you're so freaked out about going down and then there is a big sprint out of the corner, sorta like exhaling. Or maybe a better explanation is that the group accordions open and closed, and if you're on the back you have to chase that much more because you see gaps open up in front of you. I hate crits for that, plus the turns after turns after turns, and the sense that at any moment, the whole thing can come crashing down and everyone can stack up and then it's all broken bones and bikes.
But fortunately, that didn't happen.

Today's Stage at CSR

Man... that was the toughest ten K I have ridden in a long, long time. The last 2 K were pure suffering. But I'll get to that later
When I was handicapping this stage, I said that I was worried that the group would blast up Century Drive in order to shake out the weakest riders, and that I was worried about getting the drop right from the get go, then chasing for a long time.
As it was, it was pretty neutral rolling over the first hill. There was a wall of riders, and I was right there with them. We went over at a decent clip, but no one got the drop. Down we went, then hit the cut off for Sunriver, and we were flying.... about 44 MPH according to the computer on my bike. The good news is we were all safe, no one crashed. You stack up at 40 and it is a long recovery because you will break something.
I lingered at the front as much as I could. I figured that it was the safest place to be, and that I would be able to claw back if the pace got too exciting. Which it never really did. We went pretty fast through the first hour, but no one got the drop. The road was all downhill and flat till the first climb to the first feed station. I was worried at first that I would have no one to hand up a bottle, but it was all neutral support... about a dozen people handing up bottles to whoever wanted one. I grabbed two, because it was hot today. I ended up tossing one of my good CamelBak Podium bottles, but I had to. I needed room for the bottles. Maybe I get it back at some time, I don't know. Because they'll recycle the bottles and use 'em again for feed stations.
Anyways... on the approach to the feed, there was a climb, and it got a bit dicy. The pace was hot, and I was running my heart rate at around 190.... that should kill normal 42 year olds, but I was fine... panicked, but fine. I floated back to the sketchy end of the group as we hit the feed zone. I almost came to a stop when guy slowed way down to grab a bottle. But no one crashed, at for the 4's, that is good news.
There was a split, a big one, and I was panicked that the group was riding away from us, so we had to "work" to bring it back... work in the sense that those who were there who wanted to ride did all the pulling. Guys like me. But we brought the first group back, and then the panic subsided and we just rolled.
The middle part of the race was really slow, and it seemed that no one knew how to paceline at all, that or they just didn't want to. One guy got off the front by a big margin, we could barely see him, and it was up to me to organize a chase. I really didn't want to, I wanted to sit in, but someone had to bring him back and only about four of us would pull, and everyone else just sucked wheels.
This is what I can term negative racing, in that no one wants to work because everyone knows that the climb at the end is decisive and everyone is saving it... and then on the climb, it's on like Donkey Kong.
I take this approach, for the most part. I don't want to pull... but I also know that a hot pace will drop the weak and that we need to bring that dude back... because if he has one minute in hand at the climb, he can win.
We did bring him back, and then we had about 15 miles to the finish, almost all uphill. I was in a great position, on the front, pushing the pace. I was there at the front till about ten K to go, which is six miles. Then the group acted like a bomb was tossed in there... we exploded, we were all strung out on the road, no one was working together and it was pure atrition.
I predicted this, but even though I knew it was coming, I could do nothing. I was not in a position to dictate terms, and I did my best to get a wheel and minimize my losses, which at this point were mounting.
I just did not have it in the legs. It wasn't an issue of I didn't eat, it was older legs and less training maybe. I don't know, I just did not have it. I got the drop on the climb, and the last ten K were awful. And, like I said, the last two were the worst, most nasty two clicks of riding I have done in recent memory. My feet were sweeling up, my legs were heavy, and I felt like I could not hold a wheel at all.
The only saving grace was coming into the Bachelor parking lot for the last part and seeing the wife and kids there, cheering me on. That made my day... because even if I don't win (and I got the drop, so NO... I didn't win.) they cheered hard, and jumped up and down like crazy chickens (the Hot Wife's words...) That gave me a bit more to finish.
But at the end, I was totally tanked. I had nothing. I drank a Pepsi, some Gatorade, and just tried to recover.
It was just a hard day, and I got worked. I don't feel bad about it at all, because I gave my best effort, and I tried my best. I have no regrets at all.
No results yet.. I'll post it when I got it.
--
Update: I finished 39th, 4:30 back of the leaders... the winner was a kid named Andy Su, of Bend. I've seen him go from newbie who could barely hold onto the nooner on a Monday to playing whack-a-mole with all of us today. He was fantastic out there.
I was right in the middle of the pack of 4's...

Cascade Starts Today

Well, it's here... The Cascade Stage Race.

I'm as ready as I can be. There is nothing that is gonna change that. I had as good a spring and a summer as a working class 42 year old father of two can have. I rode lots, did lots of group riding and I feel as strong as I can be.

We'll see how it goes.

Yesterday was the packet pick up. I got there right at around five, when it started, and there was already a line and I waited for about an hour. Saw lots of guys doing chamois time... that is, standing around in their cycling kit, showing off the legs. First rule: Do not do chamois time if you don't have to, especially around other cyclists. We know you ride, you wouldn't be here other wise. We get that.

But a lot of these guys looked big, had massive legs. Now, I don't go around checking out another man's shaved legs, not in general. But I was getting nervous, I was thinking... are they in my class? Is this my competition? I started getting that nervous energy.

Had a good dinner, watched a movie with my wife and then went to bed relatively early. Got up today and ate like a hobbit... two breakfasts. Got the bike ready and loaded on the car, along with gear. I put the shoes and helmet, and then double checked.... do not want to show up with no helmet or shoes. How horrible would that be? That is the nightmare dream cyclists have, not showing up to a race naked, but with no helmet or shoes.... heck, I could show up naked at a race, wearing a helmet and shoes and I am pretty sure the officials would let me race as long as my number was pinned on the skin of my milky white back.

But, no helmet? Forget it. No way anyone lets me start. And, no shoes? No way I could stay with the group for one mile, I would be dropped faster than a greased pig (point being, if you saw a greased pig and tried to pick it up, you would probably drop it right away, since it's hard to hold..)

--

So, the final part of my look ahead on this race is stage 3, the Awbrew Butte Circuit Race. This is the one I can do well in, as far as I'm concerned. I know these roads very well, I ride them twice or three times a week. I know all the points where an inexperienced rider can get in trouble... where the false flats are, where the hidden turn with the entry to a sharp climb is, where I can relax and let others pulls, where I can hit the gas because it fits my riding style. I know all those things.

This stage fits me well, and if I can hang on through the circuits and be in the first group going up Briggs the last time, I have a chance to deliver. That's my goal.

But if I get dropped and struggle in with a small group, than oh well. I just gotta go out and do my best, try my hardest and be tactical. Either way, the stage should be fun.

Last TT at the Tour.

First of all, the really big news from the Tour today is that there will be a new team next year with Lance...
Team Radio Shack.
OK. This is huge in a couple of ways. First of all, I was certain that this was gonna be Team Livestrong (I was ready to gloss it Team Ego, because it was looking to be all about Lance, Lance, Lance... but now, it looks to be more of a serious racing team that will develop talent and Lance looks to be taking a developmental role.)
Not announced, but no doubt will be, is that Johan Bruyneel will be running it. He will be the DS, because Lance and Johan are cycling-siamese-twins.... completely conjoined.
I expect, as I said, that Levi and Horner will ride for them as well. Also, Taylor Phinney. Taylor rides for Livestrong, the team that is already being run CSC, the sports management firm that will run Radio Shack. I also think that they guys who came over from Discovery will also go to Radio Shack... guys like Brajkovic, Noval, Rubiera, Paulinho. Guys who are solid ProTour riders who don't have Discovery roots will probably join Radio Shack... guys like Popovich and Kloden, because they're smart and they won't want anything to do with Vinokourov when he comes back. Basically, that leaves Vino and all the Kazahk riders to ride as a Continental team... and they won't be in the Tour.
Contador? He'll get a big payday to ride for Caisse D'Espagne.
If this is more than a Lance Armstrong vanity squad, and that is the noise he's making right now, than this team will develop Euro-Level talent and build that team around Phinney, the most talented rider under 23... probably in the world. That would be the long term goal, I would guess. Short term, it's about getting LA one last futile shot at that brass ring known as the Tour... and I will give my analysis as to why it's futile, and that has been proven out during the Tour so far.
--
So... Lance really did badly in the TT, and he needed to top-five it, and really needed to win it to save some face and any hope at all of winning it on the Ventoux. That will not happen. The only saving grace is that he is in striking distance of the third step of the podium, as long as he doesn't gack it on Saturday.
Which is not assured, and let me tell you why.
Lance has gotten worse as this race has gone along. Look back on the last three weeks, and the best week was the first one: Top ten in the opening ITT, a win in the TTT, a great moment of opportunism when he rode so well in the cross winds, and a good (not great) placing at Arcalis.
From there, it's been a steady downhill roll.
The Pyrenean stages were neutralized, as I expected and as I described because they finished so far from the top of the mountain. The rest of the second week was spent rolling up and over pretty non-decisive stages. Nothing of consequence happened.
Then, with the first mountain top finish, he rode pretty averagely... forget that averagely is not a word, just roll with me here.
His finish of that climb was nothing to write home about, and he lost time to guys that on retrospect he should not have lost time to. The next stage, he finished with the group. But the last mountain stage in the Alps went really bad, and he lost time and placing to the Schlecks.
Now, the thing I want to mention is that Lance had an excuse ready each time... "I was caught out tactically... I'm covering this guy or that guy... we have team goals..." One time he said that Alberto was the strongest rider, and what else could he say? But other than that, he never said that he has lost his edge, his ability to crank out the juice when he needs it. Unsaid was that he had the race of truth today... and I think he implied that he could do damage here.... that he could be the Lance of old.
He didn't and he wasn't. His finish was 16th... a full minute and a half back of Alberto. Very...very... very un-Lancelike. He faded badly over the last half of the course, and he was a non-factor.
Man, I hate to bring up bad sports analogies, but I think of Willie Mays stumbling in the outfield for the Mets.... or Michael Jordan posting up lesser talent while donning the jersey of a Washington Wizard... or Brett Favre tossing INT's as a Jet.
Basically... a great athlete past his prime, looking like an average Pro all the while doing in the jersey he should never have had to put on, and in effect diminishing his once stellar and remarkable career.
Because I said it before and I will says it again... Lance went out a winner, he won his last ITT and won his last tour. Sorta like Ted Williams... hitting a home run in his last at bat. Lance winning Tour number 7 for Discovery, with the majority of his Postal team, was how he should have ended his career.
But what will be remembered, at least in the short term, is him gacking it all over the course, struggling to get into the top twenty, and struggling to get on the podium.
And I have no faith he holds off Bradley Wiggins for the 11 seconds that separate the two on GC. Wiggins is doing what good riders do in the Tour... get better as the race goes on, and he is climbing better than Lance right now. Wiggy is super motivated to hunt down that last GC podium spot... and Lance is what? Fighting to keep it? Where's the fire for him in that? This is a guy who won this race seven times. And you're telling me he has that sense of urgency to just finish on the podium? The feared Armstrong Anger is getting whipped out one more time... for the third step on the podium?
Well.... we'll see.
Final Podium prediction:
1) Alberto Contador
2) Andy Schleck
3) Bradley Wiggins
I was right about Schleck being in the two-hole, and he should hold it. I predicted he would win this race, but only because I wasn't gonna ride the Astana Bandwagon and I wanted to swim against the flow. Contador wins, Andy is the only rider able to come close, and Wiggy is the revelation of this race.

Latest Tour News

Today was an interesting stage. The drama on the Columbiere was worth the price of admission, considering the stage ended off of the summit.
Basically, Contador dropped Lance, and he didn't need to do it. He was working with the Schlecks, and he was working to gap off Lance. This was a no-no, since it moved Lance to Fourth, Kloden to fifth, and sorta made any effort to sweep the podium a non-starter. Plus, Kloden would have been set up for a nice stage win if Contador didn't drop the hammer there.
Basically, Contador gave Lance and Kloden the finger...
And he didn't have to do it. See... this is why guys like myself get angry at Alberto. He doesn't need to do things like this, and he does and he comes across as petulant and not a good guy.
And that is why he won't break Lance's record.
See, Lance was a consumate teammate who knew how to get the best out of his support riders. Alberto, this move is gonna bite him in the butt in the future. There won't be guys coming to knock on his door to play the super domo if they think that given the chance, Alberto won't return the favor. Lance always returns the favor, and he always was there to help teammates get a bit of the glory.
Alberto is coming across as the glory hog... and that does not sit well.
Is he the greatest right now? Oh.... no doubt. But what you need to know is that to be a great rider, the type of guy who wins seven of these races in a row, you don't pull stunts like this. I was sorry to see him do that.
Anyways...
Tomorrow is a time trial... looking forward to that. Lance races the best when he races angry. And if Lance can win tomorrow, then that will be a bit of vindication for him. I'm pulling for Lance to bring the upset, and to win the stage. That would be cool.

CSR, Stage 2a and 2b... Looking Ahead.

Well, Stage Two is a pretty straight ahead stage: A Time Trial.

This is going to be in the morning, and I will go off before 09:00. I don't look forward to this stage, because I am not a TT guy.

I'll just use my regular bike, set up with Aero Bars, and that's it. I'm not going to use a disc wheel, ultra light carbon wheels or an aero helmet. That's for the Pro's and the Masters who have tons of cash to toss around.

I think the TT is about 18 miles long, an out and back course on Skyliners Road. That means you climb up, descend back, and have about two miles total of flat road. That actually suits me. As long as I'm not the first guy off, then I will have someone to chase, and the climbing part is more than being aero and low, it's about pure climbing power. I can climb with all the fours I know, so I don't see losing time on that part.

But when we turn around, then it is about being low and aero, and I can lose time there. But, then again, I need to keep my perspective and realize "we're amateurs here, weekend warriors." Coming back, I just need to smack the biggest gear on my bike and hope for the best.

Best result? I just finish in the middle of the group, nothing special.. nothing to write home about, but nothing to hang my head over. Average. Because I'm an average TT rider just trying to have fun in this race.
--
That afternoon, we race again. We have the downtown crit.
Basically, this is the one that scares me. I fear crashing out because some squirrelly rider in front of me takes a nasty line into a corner and I fly into the barriers, a bloody mess, bike all broken up.
I have one goal in this stage: Finish in one piece.
If that's at the end of the main group, in the middle, or top ten... I don't care. I need to stay upright and out of the nasty stuff.
The way to do this is to ride at the front as much as possible. First fifteen guys. Because after that, your line is decided for you, and all you can do to not get dropped is to stay on a wheel.
What I have going for me is the course is designed better than last year. There are four corners, not six, and the the course is laid out like a long oval for the most part. At the north and south end of the course, you have a corner... one block... then a corner. So, what that means is that you only go one city block till the next corner. Guys won't be sprinting from one corner to the next, and momentum will carry you through these paired corners.
Between the corners, you have long, long straights. That mean the speed will be ramped up and the need to be on a wheel will be a premium. The downside, as I see it, is the group bunching up as we hit a corner, and that could be a big accordian effect. Guys bunched into a corner is a disaster waiting to happen, as the space is less for more riders.
I just gotta get through this stage and make it to the stage that suits me the best.... Sunday's Awbrey Butte Circuit Race.

More Tour Stuff

Today was another day in the Alps. It was not a decisive stage, because it ended off of the mountain top. But it wasn't like two hours from the summit, like it was during the gawd awful Pyrennean stages after Arcalis. It was only a half hour or so of jammin' the big ring. There was good riding, and there were moments of drama and splits along the road, but I had to think that everyone saw this coming back together in the end. There was a remnant of a break, an Eusakatel rider, who won the day, but all the GC guys stayed with each other.

That was, except for Cadel Evans, who was the only guy to lose time. He has totally come undone in this race. Totally.

He won't even finish in the Top Ten.

Tomorrow will be a better day, as there is an HC climb with a proper dosage of Cat 1's as well. The finish is off the summit, again, but I have a feeling that tomorrow's finish will have more drama than today did... mostly because the sheer volume of climbing going on.

--

There was other news in the race. The chief being that it looks like Astana and Bruyneel will be parting ways next season... and that means that I am certain there will be a new team that will be led by Armstrong, DS'd by Bruyneel, and will have such guys as Chris Horner, Levi Leipheimer... and probably that Phinney kid. I hear he has some potential... and also going over will be most of the Discovery guys who went over to Astana... leaving who to race for the outfit known as Astana? Well, Vinokourov... and that might be about it. I saw this Astana split coming along when Vino came out and said that this team is his baby, and that he will be back.

From the beginning, I saw that announcement as doing nothing other than blowing up the team. Congrats, Vino, you have officially become the turd in the punchbowl... ruining the party.

Along with the news, it seems that Armstrong is going to announce a new sponsor on Thursday for 2010... Here is my guess who it will be: Livestrong. That's right, Lance will sponsor Lance next year.

CSR, Stage One... Looking Ahead.

For the Fours, which I will race, this stage is probably the hardest. This is 70 plus miles, on a big loop of the Cascade Lakes Highway. The climbs are long and hard, and there will be a thin group at the end.

The thing about this stage is that I have never done it before. I never do this road since it's about 20 miles from Bend just to do the start, then you have three hours of riding in one big loop. So, other than the section from Meissner to the Sunriver cutoff, which I have done, it will all be new.

What to expect? First of all, the Fours race will not be like a pro race with tempo riding, breakaways, chase groups, etc. This will be attrition, pure and simple. Guys who are strong will ride at the front, and they will ride away from the not strong. I hope to be there in the first group.

I usually get better as a race gets longer. The first part of this race is straight up, and probably the second most steepest part of the ride. There is about five miles of climbing, then a descent, then flat, and then more climbing at the 25/30 mile mark. At about 30 miles, I should be climbing the best on the day. The start might be a bit of a gap for me, I might lose contact with the leaders, but if I pace myself, I should be able to stay close enough to the leaders to ride with them at the end.

I don't plan on using a lot of energy early on. I want to sit in, alot. I don't plan to pull unless I'm chasing. If I'm in the front group, and I can ride with these guys in the front, I know it... then I will save it for the last climb, which is at mile 60 or so. Then blast that last climb, sprint like heck into the Bachelor finish area, and see what happens.

This stage doesn't scare me the way the Crit does, but I am concerned because I have never ridden this road. What I do know is that my fitness is good, and I am climbing as well as I have ever climbed. I just have to get past the first 20 miles, recover and ride within myself.

The other concern that I have is eating and drinking. There are two feed zones... which is nice if you have a team and a bunch of support personnel to hand up bottles, but I'm on my own out here. Who's gonna hand up a bottle to me? No one, that's who.

So, I need to eat a lot, and on my own. I'll probably pack my own food, bars and gels, and have both bottles with the GU drink in 'em.

If I eat well, then I have a better chance at the end.

The weather is supposed to be hot. But the race starts early, and is entirely in the high Cascades, so the temp should be pretty manageable... even if the Bend temps are in the 90's, we should only get in the high 70's. That is not a worry. The hottest stage will probably be the Crit on Saturday.

So, I'm on my own... that means I have to drive out there, take care of my own bike, and my own support, and I have to drive back when I'm dog tired. I have two strikes against me already... the other strike being that I'm 42 and I'm racing against a buncha kids.

The thing in my favor? Wicked Smarts on the road. Don't mess with old racer guy who knows the tricks of the trade... because I'll make 'ya pull and then drop yer bad self on the climb. No regrets. I only worry about squirrelly kid who can't hold a line crashing me out. That would be The Suck.

Decisive

Today, the stage ending in Verbier was all that and a side of fries.

Decisive.

Today was a day where the Tour was decided, and we have a very clear picture as to who will win this race. Alberto Contador is clearly the best climber, and his attack (explosive is the word I like to use, and this attack put such a huge gap into the group that no one could respond) has changed this race.

Alberto is the clear leader of the race and of team Astana. No one can follow him, and no one will match his skill on the Ventoux. the TT is something he can give back some time on, but even then he can top five it and put more time into others. The rest of the Alpine stages are not going to shake up the top of the GC, maybe the down GC guys, but probably not the Podium guys or the jersey wearers.

So, do I think this race is over? Pretty much. Alberto is going to win. Lance will podium. Schleck is the only rider to make a run at Contador, but he does not have the juice to win it.

It was a good stage today. I enjoyed it. I think the team work was excellent, it was awesome seeing guys ride hard at the front, then pop off... totally spent, legs barely able to move. That there is a universal feeling for all cyclist, they just do it for a longer stage and at a faster pace and higher wattage. But the sensation is the same... I've been there and I know the feeling that Voigt and Cancellara went through. And watching it, that sorta adds to the fun.

Maybe later today I can make some comments on the stage and look forward to the rest of the week, as well as the CSR (Cascade Stage Race) coming up starting friday. I'm starting to get nervous... but in a good way.

Hincapie... So Close, Yet So Far.

Today was a good day in the Tour: Lots of drama, and all from a small breakaway that got off early on. There was no real shakeup in the GC, but the entrance of George Hincapie in the two hole as a result of being on the break all day was a nice addition.
I would have loved to see him grab the Yellow Jersey, at least for a day. I don't think he has it in him to stay on tomorrow's climbs, but to have leadership for one day would have been sweet. For Columbia, the main guy for them remains Tony Martin. He still has an outside shot at the top five, as well as the White Jersey for best young rider.
I wonder how Hincapie responds to the stage tomorrow. Will he have the legs after such a huge effort today? I think it is realistic to see him ride into the top ten, but that will mean an extra huge effort in the TT and on the Ventoux.
I think that the thing that makes me the maddest is that on ESPN, they report the stage as "Lance falls to fourth place." That's the headline. Nothing about George, nothing about how he had such an epic effort, nothing. That is so weak, and the continuing focus on Lance, Lance, Lance is really annoying.
There is more than one guy in the peleton from the US, but you wouldn't know it. I mean, the idiots at Espn wouldn't know Tyler Farrar if he walked up and kissed Suzy Kolber. But the focus is on Lance, at the expense of other great riders, live Cav and Contador.
Will tomorrow be good? Gawd, I do hope so. I think that it will play out a lot like the Arcalis stage, in that the decisive attacks will not come until the last five K of the last climb. I think a group gets away, they might have one or two make it to the line, but that will be it. The current leader is done, he probably drops all the way out of the top ten. I also don't see any real successful attacks from the down GC guys... Evans, Sastre, etc. Not hard enough climbs, not that decisive. But I think it can be decisive in the Lance/Alberto showdown. This would be stage one, and then stage two will be the TT, and the final stage is The Ventoux. The mountain stage between tomorrow and the Ventoux are good, they end off the summit, but not too far away and could shake the down GC guys a bit. But we'll see...
Firt of all: Tomorrow. I'll be there to watch.

Tour, etc.

The Tour went to Colmar today, and it was a good stage, but it didn't have the fireworks and drama I wanted... mostly because this was supposed to be a radio free day, and they had the radios on the stage after all.
In the end, the break stayed away all day, and there was no change in the top. Except for Levi, of course. Levi breaking his wrist was a huge blow for Lance. Levi was the most reliable Lt. that LA had, and his departure puts a bit more pressure on Lance when we hit the mountains.
Levi was not gonna win this race, but he was gonna play a role in the decisive stages. This hurts. Does it open things up a bit? Maybe. Will the other teams exploit it? I don't know, because there is a big time gap to guys like Evans and Sastre and Menchov... those guys are out of it. Maybe Andy Schleck can do something, he does have a strong enough team. Also, Liquigas. They have guys in striking distance... but, boy, those guys are green (and I don't mean the jersey) and experience counts for a lot in this race.
I still think it comes down to Lance and Alberto... and it looks more like Alberto. Lance, and by extension Astana as a whole, lost the Ace in the Hole, the X Factor. And it hurt Lance more than Alberto. Alberto will win this race, and I am more convinced of it with the absense of Levi.
--
I will not be able to watch the decisive stage to the Ventoux. I will be taking part in the Cascade Stage Race, which is the amateur version of the Cascade Cycling Classic. I will be racing in the Cat 4's, and the race starts a week from today.
I will try to go over each of the stages, covering what I expect to happen for myself. There are two hard road races, a TT and a Crit. Three days, four races. I'll try to break it all down this next week... we'll see.
The truth is, I have low expectations for this race. Not because I think I suck, but because I want to be realistic. I think that when compared to other Cat 4's out there, I'm solid. I can finish in the top ten, I think that is doable. But I also think I can have a bad Crit and that's that. I mostly want to have fun, because I love racing and I love cycling. This is gonna be a fun race, the first time I have ever done my home town race and I want to have a good time. Bottom Line: I want to finish and I want to not crash. If I come out on Sunday all in one piece, than everything else will be gravy.
--
OK... I sorta vowed to stop any blogging about political stuff, because it totally depresses me. But I have a few comments about bills winding their way through congress, as well as the so-called Stimulus. Here are my thoughts, for what it's worth:

*The President says repeatedly that the so-called Stimulus "saved or created" X amount of jobs. Here is an illustration of how Washington "saves or creates" jobs:
Let's say that you want to buy a tent that normally costs $300.00, but it's on sale for $250.00. As an added bonus, you get a mail in rebate for $50.00. Sounds like a good deal, so you buy the tent. But your spouse ain't so happy about it, so to justify it you say that you "saved or created $100.00 with the purchaces of this tent." Because you saved fifty with it being on sale, and you created fifty when you got the check for the mail-in rebate... irregardless of the fact that you spent $200.00 on the tent. That is the math of Washington D.C.
And, don't forget, this is the same way we're gonna save money with any medical insurance reform.

*I have said it before and I will say it again: The Carbon Tax bill (AKA Cap and Trade) is going to do to this recession what the Smoot-Hawley protectionist bill did to the recession of 1929: That is, turn it into a Great Depression.

*Insurance reform is great... as long as you never get sick. Look, of all the bills going through Congress these days, this is the one that worries me the most. The fact of the matter is that we are a family that is living with MS. I received an e-mail from the National MS Society, and they were all gung-ho about this bill, and were practically singing hosannas for Obama and Socialized Medicine.
Do they really thing that all the MS patients are going to get Tysabri? Really? Let me tell you what MS patients will get under the ObamaCare plan: They'll get a pat on the head and they'll get hospice. There won't be and 3rd generation treatments, and all research will grind to a halt. It will be a disaster for all those who suffer with a chronic condition, have no doubt.
You really thing this will be free? The only thing free will be the pasture that they set all the old and sick people into for them to die. This bill is a disaster.
Yes, I think it's terrible that so many people don't have insurance. But the fact of the matter is that a large part of the uninsured are illegally in this nation. Another large part of the uninsured are in no need to shell out a lot of money for health insurance, since they're young and fit and don't need it.
Lastly, the two biggest problems with medical insurance is 1) rampant and runaway costs from litigation and 2) we expect all our insurance to pay for everything all the time.
About the last thing... do we expect our auto insurance to pay for an oil change or a tune up? Who are we to think that medical insurance should do the same?
Why don't we do small step reform of medical insurance and see where that goes, why do we need to overhaul what is without a doubt the greatest health delivery system in the world... or, at the minimum, the least worst of all the alternatives. The reason why the Democrats need this massive overhaul is because they want to control the behavior of Americans. Once you have the national government in charge of health costs, everything becomes a health issue and every part of our behavior can be regulated because it affects the bottom line... not just smoking, but what you eat and when and what you do on a daily basis. Make no mistake, the allure of controling the lives of individuals is to tempting a target for many in DC.

*I am convinced that the Democrats not only like a minimum wage, they absolutely are agitating for a maximum wage. And that wage would be the much talked about $250,000. I am convinced they want to have every penny that people make above that amount. The thing is, I don't begrudge the rich. The "rich" are also known as employers and small business owners. When you soak the rich you end jobs, pure and simple.
And I hate to say it, but the policies of the president are not going to succeed. Not because I say this and I don't like him and I'm a hater and want to see him fail, it's not that... it won't succeed because everytime that Socialism is tried, it has failed. And we're trying Socialism on a massive scale.
It will fail.

*Any energy plan, may it be cap and trade or a carbon tax or whatever, that does not include Nuclear Power will fail. Nuclear is the safest, greenest, cleanest, most reliable alternative to Oil. And that we won't even consider it is criminal.
France is 60% Nuclear.
Also, why can Iran have Nuclear Power but we can't?

Hard Ride Last Night...

I pretty much never do the Tuesday night Hammerfest ride out of Sunnyside. Mostly because I want to spend the night at home if I can, and I try to do the Nooner for that reason. But the fact of the matter is, this ride is the biggest of the week, and it usually has more pro's come out than on Saturday morning from Hutch's.
I decided to do the ride since I worked yesterday during the day, and the kids were at the grandparents. So, I rolled out for the ride.
Saw Robert there, saw a few others that I see on Saturday. I saw Chrissy Ruiter, she's a pro that rides for Value Act Capital. We worked together for a while, then she left to go do the racing thing. She's a strong rider, knows to ride at the front, and she takes her pulls. I was glad to be able to ride with her one time.... we worked together alot and we talked cycling, but I never rode with her.
So, this ride is the same as all the other Tuesday or Thursday Nooner rides, as we head north and do the Bridges loop, and then come back in on the road to Shevlin. I've done this road a zillion times, and I should know it as well as the back of my hand.
The ride is super hard. Crazy Hard. It is flat out the whole time, at least it was the last time I did this ride. We hit the climb out of Shevlin going flat out... I had a good position, and I went right to the front because I was thinking that if I got dropped, I would drift back about 20 places and catch the tail of this group. But I actually led this climb over the top, and I then tucked into the group and rode tempo, took my pulls, and stayed at the front.
I noticed that guys tried to sneak off the front, and breaks would try to get away. But they got reeled in.
We rolled along, and we hit one hill that was not too hard, a real sprinters hill, that has a climbing turn going up and to the left, and then the right, and then an immediate descent onto a flat and fast road. I sorta got gapped on the climb, and there was a bit of work to be done to get back with the group. I got a small group, and we bridged, that was good.
But just as I got to the group, there was a bad crash. My friend Robert went down really hard. I guess he misfired a shift, his chain skipped, and he went over the front of the bars hard, barrel rolling on his right side and then ending up in a heap on the road. His jersey looked like was put through a shredder, his right elbow like it was through a meat grinder. There was a lot of blood, but no broken bones. He looked dazed as he sat there, but he was lucid and was talking with us the whole time. Someone had a cell phone, and we called his wife to come pick him up.
That could have been a lot worse than it was. As it was, it was bad. I hate crashes, everything about them. It's been a long time since someone went down on a training ride, and this one was bad... bad memories will linger... the smell of skidding tires, the sight of a twisted body flopping to the ground in such a violent manner, the splatter of blood. I wince thinking about it.
For me, it is as close to war as I will every hopefully see.
I'm just glad Robert is gonna be OK. He's a big strong guy who looks like a linebacker when you see him, and I think his body mass helped to keep from any bones breaking. I hope he makes it back out for the race, as I think he is going to do Cascade, and I hope it doesn't stop him.
It took about fifteen minutes to get going again. The group slowly rolled out, and there was a light tempo until the highway, and then when we crossed. Basically, a half dozen plus got gapped off by the traffic, and we waited on the other side for them, which meant that we were going pretty slow for another couple of miles.
Innes Market was slow the whole way, in that we were around 25 and no one was under stress to stay on. We were headed for Bridges, and I was second wheel at the time... and I missed the freaking turn. I was so mad. I was with Omer Kem, a pro who rides for Bissell. He doesn't know the road, so I can't blame him. I know the road, and I should have known better. I basically didn't see the sign since we were going into the setting sun.
Omer and I turned around. At this point, you see the difference between a plunker like myself and a pro... Omer rejoined the group before the descent, and I chased my butt off and didn't get back on for a long, long while.
And I really am no fan of this hill, either. Bridges has a way of kicking my butt. I don't know what it is... I get suckered by this hill everytime. You fly into it, going from a descent, and running right into the hill off a descending corner, and I totally want to big ring that climb. But on the hill, as it turns up an to the right, the steepness kicks in and there is no way to finish that in the big ring, but by then I'm stuck in a bad gear, and I get gapped off so many times.
Today was no different. The group rode away from me, and by the time I got to the top, I was way off. So, I was in chase mode, and I needed to do what I can to get back on.
On the straight and flat section, I was totally in TT mode. I felt like I was going OK, but there was no way to catch the group, they were too fast. On the descent, I made some time, and I saw the group go into Tumalo, and I thought that if they get stuck waiting for traffic, then I can get 'm. They did get stuck, and I had a clear path to them across the highway, and I was able to just get on as they were on the road toward OB Riley.
That was fortuitous. On the Johnson climb, I went right to the front. I felt bad, and I didn't think I could make it over with 'em, but I was gonna fight the whole way. I was gonna get dropped from the front, not yo-yoing off the back.
But I stayed with 'em over the first two climbs, and the hardest part, I just made it. I was feeling pretty happy to do that, and I could feel the rush of being on the front with a good group just pulling me along.
At the last hill before descending into Shevlin, I pretty much felt like I was playing with the house's money, and that anything beyond blowing up like an overwound top would be sweet. I got a few pulls in, and then I took a big one, gave it all I had, and I just popped. I came right off the group, and I was about 200 meters from the top, but the group just rode away from me. There was nothing to do about it, it was my time.
I soft peddled back in with a few others, but I was thinking of Robert. I hope he's OK. I really like riding with him, he's one of my favorite guys in the group riders here in Bend. That was a tough break to go down like that, but I think he'll be fine.
Any crash you walk away from is a good crash... and we've all been there and had bad crashes, it's part of being a cyclist.

"Trust Me.... I'm A Blogger..."

I actually said that at work today.
Someone asked me how I think the Tour will go, and we talked about how the next week is going to be pretty pedestrian and that there is nothing really decisive for a few days, and that everything will probably come down to the Ventoux and this Tour will be all about one awesome stage... my co-worker said "are you sure about that?"
That's when I busted out the above mentioned line.

Anyways... I need to get back to blogging the Tour. What have we had since the disappointment of the Pyrenean Stages (and they were disappointing, because there were too many flat roads before the finishes, except to Arcalis, and that was only lively for the last five or so clicks.) We had a rest day, and that was the best Rest Day in years... because no one was hauled away in handcuffs, escorted by the local cops. Like last year. The fact that I woke up on monday, and all we had were boring pictures like this......

Basically, that's a green pair of shoes. And I got nothing.

...is a good thing. Boring is good on the Rest Day in this tour. I don't need exciting Rest Days. No Thanks.
The above shown shoes belong to Mark Cavendish, and he is all about the green these days. Not in the money sense, but in the sense that the color designates the leader of the sprints competition. But I guess it will bring him a lot of money in the long run... hopefully not to the point where he bails on Columbia, and I don't think that will happen, because he talks about how much the team management has helped him out to be the sprinter he is today. I know he needs to be paid, he needs to make his coin. But I hope he doesn't roll to some flashy outfit just for the money. He will make his money mostly on endorsements, really. The annual salary for cyclists is tiny compared to Football or Basketball, but they make up for that in endorsements, and there will be plenty of cheese for Cav when the big companies come calling... and they will.
I read an article on VeloNews.com that was headlined as follows: Cav Responds To Racist Allegations. I sorta gulped and had a knock in the stomach as to what that would be... well, it was a whole lot of nothing, but here is the nut graf:

Cavendish also said he was a bit anxious during the stage Wednesday when he saw several top sprinters seemingly conspiring on how to beat him.

“I saw all the big sprinters talking and it was worrying me a bit,” he said. “But I said to the guys, all we have to do is to what we do best, and that’s stay together, stay confident and stay focused, and the guys did it.”

The Columbia rider’s morning also started off on the wrong foot with an article published in French sports paper L’Equipe quoting an anonymous French rider who claimed that Cavendish had used derogatory terms towards French riders in the race, and that
 his arrogance was getting on their nerves.


“Cavendish is racist, he's anti-French,” the anonymous rider reportedly said.
 “He should be careful. We're not going to put up with his attitude much 
longer.”

However Cavendish laughed off attempts to discredit him, saying those who couldn’t beat him on the bike might be attempting to defeat him using other methods.

“It was an anonymous French rider and an anonymous author,” Cavendish said. “I just had to laugh at that. I’ve got to take it as a compliment that they keep on criticizing my riding. They are trying to make shit for something else. You know, I have a lot of friends who are French. I made an effort this winter to learn French so I could do interviews. I’m still not confident to speak it, but I can understand it perfectly to answer the questions.

“I just have to laugh about this,” he continued. “I don’t know where it’s come from. I don’t know why it’s come about. What can I do but let people read it how they want to read it? You can’t stop it. I can’t apologize for something I haven’t said. If they want to make shit up, at least have the decency to have the name of the rider who said it, and the author of the article. I just brush it off.”

Cavendish didn’t hesitate to admit that he rubs some riders the wrong way, but said that’s just his personality, and it might be personal, but it’s nothing nationally motivated.

“I get a little hotheaded sometimes, but it's irrelevant the nationality
 of the rider when you get arsey at someone,” Cavendish said. “When you're a rider with a public profile, you can't be friends with
 everybody, it's going to be like that. For sure
 I'm going to get arsey at some lad, because I'm an asshole. But their nationality, and what they look like or where they come from, is 
irrelevant.”

This is so dumb. Since when is being a cheese-eating surrender monkey a race? Are the french a certain race? Really? You frenchies are such dolts. Part of it is whining from the French because, really, they suck at cycling right now. Well, they did have two stage wins, but these guys have not won this race in almost 25 years, they are really an embarassment to the sport that they helped to start. That's part of it, and Cav is right that they're whining because they can't touch him. And I sorta like Cav for these comments. Basically, he wants to win in the worst way. He gets an attitude that no one will come around him if he gets the right leadout, and I like that. As a fan of the sport, I like that he tells the truth when asked a question, and he just speaks his mind. Does what he says bother me? Heck no. Cav will be Cav... and the guy backs it up out on the road, and that is all that matters.

First Week Wrap-Up of The Tour

The first week of racing is over, and I was gonna take the time to look back on it all.
First of all, I didn't do a review of the last two Pyrennean stages since, as far as I was concerned, they were basically the same. There was nothing decided, there was no shaking out of the GC, and there was very little drama. The reason for that is the same for both stages: The finish was too far from the last summit.
The mountains, and particularly the Pyrennes, can be very dramatic and decisive, but except for one stage, that was not the case. Yesterday, the climbs were all good ones, and the were three that were rated. But the finish was 45 clicks from the end. There was a regroupment, and those who were on the break early on survived to contest the stage, but the challengers just looked at each other.
And then today, the stage had two epic climbs in the Aspin and the Tourmalet... the latter being a pure monster of a climb. But, it was about 70 clicks from the finish... all downhill or flat. Again, everyone regouped, the leaders and the contenders and those who are place-holders (I'm looking at you, Nocentini) all finished together and nothing was decided. Nothing.
The thing is when you have the Aspin and Tourmalet together with, say, Luz Ardiden you have something awesome... they call it the ring of death. They used it in 2003, 2001, 1990 and 1986 for some amazing results. But today, those climbs were neutralized because they distance from the finish. Pro's can make up that distance, even sprinters... which is why you saw Oscar Friere leading home the main group of finishers.
When I gave my Tour preview, I said that this Tour would be awesome.... and that it would suck. This is why I said it would suck. The Pyrennes were going to have very little outcome on this race.
Why did the Tour designers do this? I think they want everyone guessing till the last big stage, the one up the Ventoux. This is why you have one summit finish in the Alps, and two that finish off the top, but not nearly as far as they did today. The guys who drew up this race wanted to have a final battle on the Ventoux, and right now it is starting to shape up that way... and that sorta sucks, because you have three weeks of so-so racing (and, let's be honest here, the Arcalis battle did not do it for me. Not at all. That should have been high drama, but the decisive attack came with only three K to go, and it did not sort out the race. The thing that stage sorted out was Cancellara, and we knew that was gonna happen.)
So, where is the GC as we enter the Rest Day? Let's go over that with a fine tooth comb and see what we have:
10) Vicenzo Nibali (Liquigas) +1:54
I think that Nibali can keep his top ten, and that would be a good result for him. Look for him to try to leap over Tony Martin for the White Jersey competition. Basically, all that Nibali has had to do is follow wheels to this point, and he has done a great job of that. He has no chance to win, but he can win this race someday in the future... like, three or four years down the road. Because he's gonna have to wait for Contador to fall off his peak form. And when that happens, there will be a lot youngsters to take his place... Nibali, Martin, Wiggins, Schleck and a kid from Colorado who might be better than all of 'em. Kid goes by the name of Phinney. Maybe you heard of him...
9) Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank) +1:49
Andy has animated the group in this race, and he has proven that he could be the second best climber out there, as he was the only one able to respond to Contador at Arcalis. Andy is my prerace fave to win this race (and I really picked him because he was not named Contador or Lance) and he is in a good position for this race. This is his first year in team leadership, and I think he has hadled it well. I think he will podium in this race, and that he can win this race in the future. He has a bright future in this sport, and he has too much talent to be denied eventual greatness... just not this year.
8) Christian VandeVelde (Garmin) +1:24
Christian is where he should be, all things considered. I think he is looking to get on the podium, and so far he has shown he can follow the right wheels. His TT and TTT were solid, and he is looking to leapfrog a few guys, and I think that is totally possible. He won't win, and I don't see him ever winning this race, but he is good enough to be in the top three, maybe snag a stage win some year... maybe this year. He could animate a stage like the one to Colmar. That will be a good stage because the Colmar stage is gonna be held without radios, and it's hilly and hard and the day before a stage with a mountain finish. Lance is already pissing and moaning about the lack of radios for that stage. This is where I get annoyed with Lance.. he is too plugged in to the team car, and he is too robotic of a racer. Race radios have to go, and if things are lively on the Colmar stage, than maybe they will go.
7) Tony Martin (Columbia) +1:00
The term they use right for Tony Martin is revelation. He has been one of the revelations of this race, and you have to think that for Columbia, they are gonna rally around him, not Kim Kirchen. Tony has proven skills: Strong TT, Strong climber. He doesn't have the explosiveness of the great climbers, but for a rookie in his first Tour, he shows grace and calmness out on the road. He can podium, that's how good he is. But I mostly see him in the fourth or fifth hole, wearing the White Jersey at the end of the race. He can win this race, as he is one of the future stars of the sport, without a doubt. In two to three years, we'll be calling this the Tony Martin era...
6) Andreas Kloden (Astana) +0:54
Kloden is on the downside of his career, and his best years are behind him, but he is having a great Tour so far... mostly because he benefited from a strong TTT and ITT. Kloden will be the super domo for Astana in the last week, him and Levi. The future for both of them is the same in my opinion: On the outside looking in. Podium is attainable, but I don't see it. Basically, they have a front row seat to the greatest battle in this sport since the 86 Tour, and that's about it. Kloden will never win this race, he was caught up in the Armstrong/Contador era, and his time has come and gone.
5) Bradley Wiggins (Garmin) +0:46
What I said about Tony Martin and Nibali, you can say about this ex-trackie. He has nothing but a bright future ahead of him. The only thing to think about now for him, is how does he and CVV work it out so that they get at least one Garmin rider on the podium. They have a card to play that has to be of concern for Astana. Because of that, I again look to Colmar and think that Garmin and Columbia are both savvy enough teams to do damage there. But for Bradley now, I think that battling for the top five is a good goal. In the future, there will be a battle royal with him and four other guys, and he is someone who can come out on the top step after three weeks in July.
4) Levi Leipheimer (Astana) +0:39
What I said about Kloden you can almost cut and paste into Levi. As much as I like him, he is not gonna win this race... now or any other time. He's a great rider, but he is a guy destined to ride for other, greater riders.... like Lance, like Alberto. He can podium, that is attainable. That, of course, would secure his nickname for all time... Mr. Third Place.
3) Lance Armstrong (Astana) +0:08
Lance is starting to make a believer out of me, only in the sense that he has been there and been very strong when it counts. I still have this aching suspicion that he will blow up spectacularly at some point, and tumble all the way out of the GC... maybe to Verbier? I just have my doubts about at guy who is four years removed from this race.
But Lance will not dominate a single stage in the way he did at Sestriere in 99, or at Hautacam in 2000, or at Alpe D'Huex in 2001. Those days are over. He has lost the edge off his explosiveness on the climbs, and just barely is able to gap guys off right now... not drop them, not blow them away and totally humiliate them, not ruin their careers. But I will say this about Lance: He is the hardest man out there. Alberto is the best rider, the best climber, but he can be owned by Lance's sheer force of will and mega-ego. That is where Alberto is lacking, the killing drive to destroy on the bike. Because of this, and because the Tour is starting to look less decisive in the run up to the Ventoux, Lance can win. I don't think he does, I think he podiums. And I also think he never wins this race again, even if he comes back next year. He ain't getting any younger, the last I checked.
2) Alberto Contador (Astana) +0:06
Alberto is the best climber, the best time trialist of the climbers, and the most explosive climber. He has all the tools to win this race... unless Lance gets in his head and does some cleaning. That said, I still think he wins this race, and I think that when it's all said and done, we will say "well, of course it ended that way... did we really think it would end any other way." I also think that Alberto has two or three other good looks at this race before his climbing legs lose the Super Mario Brothers Turbo Boost effect. And when that happens, and it will, he will be a very savvy rider, and he might get by on guts and willpower alone... in the same way that Lance is right now.
1) Rinaldo Nocentini (Ag2r-La Mondial)
You know how well I know this guy? I had to flip to the results screen at cyclingnews.com threre times to get the correct spelling of his name. Nocentini is career worker bee type rider who, although he is 31, has never ridden a race till this year. He is out of his league, he has a team that is out of it's league, and he basically playing with the house money at this point. At some point in the third week, it will become crystal clear that he has been swimming in the deep end for far too long, and he will come undone in a very spectacular way... and he will tumble all the way out of the GC. This probably happens at Vittel, or Colmar, but definately at Verbier. But until then, he gets alot of PR and alot of press and his team rides at the front all day and they defend that jersey as long as they can. Rinaldo knows he's just renting it at this point....
But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe he guts it out on Verbier and then delivers the ride of his life at Ventoux. But if that happens, and don't bet tomorrow's eggs on it, then it would be the most shocking upset in Tour history... greater than LeMond in 89. Greater than Periero in 06. The single biggest upset in our sport. Which is why won't happen.
this ain't the Milan High School of Hoosiers we're talking about... no super tight short-shorts and black hi-tops, as a bunch of country boys go to the wire to beat a team of future NBA players in the Indiana State Championships. The Ventoux is too long to be able to ride above your pay grade for 21 clicks, holding off the combined forces of The Dark Side.... er, Astana. At some point, you're Anaerobic Threshold takes over, your own natural wattage capacity kicks in, and you realize that you do not have the talent to pull this off... at which point he will explode like an overwound top.
But it will be a good ride until then. Soak it in, because you will never be here again. This is your career at this point, Rinaldo. This is what you will be talking about when you bounce your grandkids on your knees and point to a faded yellow jersey above the mantle.

Bloggin' Idaho Style... And a Recap of The Tour Today

So, I'm in Boise today. We drove over for the weekend to visit the in-laws. My kids love grandma and grandpa, and this was a good time to go out... other than missing Tour updates and hilights, we're taking the weekend easy. I will try to get out and ride. I remember the shoes this time, so I plan on a couple of rides.
The drive out is long, about five hours. Five hours of long, hot driving. I got AC, sure, but it still sucks to cross the desert. Some people think that there is a beauty in the simplicity, but I find it a boring and featureless chore to drive.

Anyways... The Tour. I went to Thump, a coffee house in downtown to watch the race. I don't have cable, or I would just roll out of bed and watch it wearing the jammies. The place was packed, there was standing room only. That is total Lance Effect, because last year, it was just die hard roadies, and I bellied up to the bar for stages. Not today. I was lucky to have a booth with a partially obstructed view and very little volume. I could see what was going on, but I could barely hear it. Fortunately, I know the riders by face, and I don't need a scorecard to tell who's who and what's going on.
I arrived with about 40 miles to go in the race, and with the group of nine off the front. I had no idea how long they had been there, but I could tell right away that no one from Astana was there, and then the main group had Astana, Garmin and Saxo-Bank chasing. They were all strung out, the group snaking down the road as they were trying to bring it all back. The gap was around 12:00, and it seemed to stay there for about an hour that I saw.
I then found out they had been on the attack since about 20 clicks in. Maybe Astana was thinking that this would come back on it's own, that once they hit a decent climb, the lead would shrink. I don't know. But I really think it was idiotic to not have at least a Rubiera or a Zubeldia or a Popo in the group. Just when I think that Bruyneel is the Phil Jackson of Cycling, this happens.
So, Astana was in chase mode. On the Arcalis, the gap came down pretty fast. Ten, then eight, then five minutes. Pretty rapid closure, and I thought it was gonna be over soon. But the group seemed to dangle out there. The tempo being set by Astana seemed pretty mild, sure guys were getting the drop, but it was not a wholesale whittling of the group as I thought it would be. Popo was setting the initial tempo, and he seemed pretty comfortable.
I guess the idea was to have a strong enough tempo to shed a lot of guys, but not strong enough to drop a lot and to lull the others into thinking they can attack. Then Astana would counter, hopefully launching a small group of Lance and Contador with one or two others. But the expected counter attacks didn't come till too late.
When the needed counter came, it was Cadel Evans. But his attack was really weak, and it was closed in a hurry. The next attack was Cadel's domo, I forget his name, and that was a dump move... he got out there, dangled a bit, and then Contador just ripped past him.
This was about three clicks to go, and I could sense that Contador had enough of this and his acceleration was fierce. His gapped off everyone immediately, it was a huge gap. His ability to suddenly change tempo and to force the pace is why he will win the race.
My guy, Andy Schleck, tried to counter Contador, but it didn't work. Andy floated back to the group.
What was Astana thinking? I think they wanted to have that dude in the Yellow jersey. He's a total no-hoper, he won't win this race. But Astana doesn't want to protect the jersey until the next uphill finish of stage 15. They want another team to be caretaker of the jersey, so that they do all the work of chasing every little break and keeping the group together in the long, rolling intermediary stages before the Alps.
I guess this is a good strategy, and it plays in to the tried and true method of resting and preserving the guys till you really need them. I get that. But the thing is, Astana looked timid out there, they didn't look like the American League All Star Team out there (I was going to say the New York Yankees, but the fact of the matter is that the Astana team is made of nine guys who would be leaders in their own rights, and this team is as close to an all star team as you will ever see in cycling. Plus, I hate the Yankees)
Timid losses races, timid is not what you want to see with the Greatest Show on Pavement. We want to see Lance and Alberto going one-two to the summit of Arcalis... like LeMond and Hinault one-two at Alpe D'Huez. Maybe that happens in week three on The Ventoux, maybe not. But right now, the showdown in Andorra was a bit underwhelming.
I won't second guess Johan, he is a great DS.
What does tomorrow hold? Three rated climbs, but not HC's and it finishes 40 K from the last summit. I don't expect a big shaking out at all, and I think that the top ten will look the same.

Tour in Barcelona.

Or, as it is pronounced...Bar-thel-lona.

Today was a good day in The Tour. Many thought that it would be a bit so-so with the real race starting tomorrow, at Arcalis. But the weather, and just enough hills, made it dramatic.
It was finished off by a really good rider, Thor Hushovd. He's not the pure sprinter that Cav is, but he's a very smart and strong, and played a very strategic hand today. Today ended on a hill, in Barcelona (the same finishing circuit as at the 92 Olympics, on Montjuic.) but that pitch was not enough to be decisive, and the strong sprinters were hanging around at the end.
There also wasn't a decisive split in the group, as most of the contenders were finished together with the first group. There were stragglers, guys who hit the deck during the race. Guys like Boonen and Michael Rogers. Which sucks, because I wanted to see Rogers do well this year. Rogers is a good guy, a strong rider who has Tour potential, but a guy who has poo for luck. He crashes or has an injury or something happens, and his Tour has gone south once again. Sucks for him.
A guy I really like this year, Tony Martin, is still hanging around the GC, and I hope he makes a bit of noise tomorrow, that would be nice.
But tomorrow, on the whole will be just awesome. The finish on Arcalis is being billed as the most decisive stage so far. Absolutely it is. For sure Cancellara is done wearing yellow, and for sure there will be a showdown, and I will bet what is left of my kids college savings that an Astana rider will be leading this race by the end.
Here's what the stage looks like:
Who will be the last guy standing? That remains to be seen.
What does Astana do? They basically have this race in control right now. Definately look for Astana riders to go in every break. There will be an early break, and expect either Popovich, Zubeldia or Kloden to be in it. If it's a late break over the cat. 2 Serra Seca, look for Leipheimer to get in it.
What this will do is take the pressure off of Astana to chase any breakaways. That means that Silence-Lotto, Saxo-Bank, Liquigas and the others will need to chase. Then, at Arcalis, Astana will take over and they will roll the most amazing Pain Train all the way to the top.
You will see whoever is left of Astana mass at the front, and they will lay down the most rediculous tempo, that guys will fall off the back, their Tours all over. I mean, it will be so hard, guys like me watching it on TV will be redlining the HR...
Then look for a small group of Armstrong and Contador and whoever is left to finish the last five K... and expect Contador and Lance to go the last two K, battling till the end. Expect Contador to win, he is the stronger rider, but either way, it will be a battle. I think Lance is gonna be there, I do.
(at this point, I haven't yet drank the Kool Aid, but it is sitting in the glass on the table, next to the dinner plate... it is iced and refreshing, and I am reaching for it at this point... )
A couple things about today:

White jersey's look terrible on rainy days:That is dingy grey. And it looks bad.

Guys were looking shell shocked at the end: That means that guys were killing themselves to stay with the lead group.

I'm looking forward to the stage tomorrow... and I'm going to a coffee shop to watch it with a friend from work. Should be epic.

Tuesday Nooner

Another nooner with a small group. We rolled out with just three to start, and I was thinking that was gonna mean a lot of work. Alot of pulling, alot of sitting in the wind. And it was a bit windy today. Alot of cross wind was on tap as we headed north.
So, heading out to Shevlin, we picked up two guys, and one was a teammate of Matthew's... and these two guys were really eager to pull today. They were on the front alot. I mean, I would pull a bit, feel the legs turning really good, and before I knew it, one of 'em would come around me going a couple mph's faster, and I was groveling to get back on his wheel. And it went on like this all day. I never felt a moment of rest.
I felt like I was climbing well today, all things considered. No ill effects. I again tackled OB Riley and Archie Briggs, instead of coming back through Shevlin. I need to ride Briggs so often because it will be so crucial during the CSR.
Not much else to report right now... man, I'm tired. I just finished working on a bike for a friend, something I had been putting off for a long time. Yes, I was procrastinating. I hate that. But I just didn't want to start because I hate to think of all the time and effort involved, and I start to think of how it will be so much effort to get it done, and that it might not get done in less than two hours, and that I'll have a mess to clean up, and that my hands will get dirty, and that my clothes will stink, and basically all the other lame excuses one can think of. So, I think of other things I can do, and I don't start the project.
Mostly because I know that when I start a project I don't want to stop until it's done. I throw myself into, mostly because I want it to be done. For me, the flip side of procrastinating is that I'm super focused when I'm doing it.
But I need to get to bed. I'm tired.

The Team Time Trial

Wow... there was drama in the TTT in a way that I did not see.
I predicted an Astana win... check.
But I also predicted that LA would be in Yellow by the end of the day.... eh, not so much.
Basically, Lance and Fabian Cancellara are tied for the lead... with a fraction of a second going to Fabian. I don't know how the race officials determined that, but they did. My inner hater thinks that this was a dork move toward Lance. I would not be surprised to find out that Fabian somehow got gifted a half second. Would not surprise me a bit. Remember, the Tour organizers like Lance about as much as I like Benny Beaver (who, by the way is the mascot of Oregon State. I guess I could have gove with as much as I like *___________* but I couldn't think of anyone that I dislike as much as the Tour organizers dislike Lance. The Tour organizers, ASO, burn with dislike for him. They have done all they can to discredit his victories, to tarnish his lagacy. Of course, it doesn't help that the last time a Frenchie won the Tour was 1985... the year I graduated from high school. But I digress)
I'm also not a conspiracy theory nutjob... but this smells like a dork move.
So, here was the breakdown of the top five on the day:
1) Astana
2) Garmin
3) Saxo Bank
4) Liquigas
5) Columbia-HTC
I'm only going five deep since after fifth there was a huge drop off in terms of time.
Here's GC:
1) Cancellara (Saxo-Bank)
2) Armstrong (Astana) s.t.
3) Contador (Astana) +00:19
4) Kloden (Astana) +00:23
5) Leipheimer (Astana) +00:31
Of course, when you win the TTT, you get to lock up a large chunk of front end of the GC. Here are the significant GC challengers as of today. And it shouldn't change that much before Friday:
12) VandeVelde (Garmin) +1:16
16) Rogers (Columbia-HTC) +1:32
20) A. Schleck (Saxo-Bank) +1:41
29) Sastre (Cervelo) +2:44
35) Evans (Silence) +2:59
72) Menchov (Rabobank) +3:52
It's over for Menchov, he lossess time in bunches, and doesn't have the ability to get it back in bunches, that ain't his game. Same with Evans. These two are grinders when it comes to the mountains, they get into a gear, and they grind it all day at the same rate and they hope to wear guys down. The plus side to that kind of riding is that if you are on form, you ride hard enough that no one can attack you, and then you thump guys in the TT's. The downside is what you see now: Losing time in the TT's, without being about to make up the difference in the mountains. The greatest grinder of all time was Indurain, and he was able to grind his way to five straight Tour wins. It's an ugly, mechanical style that can be effective with the right rider. Just not this year. Other grinders on this list are Leipheimer, and Kloden. But since they will act as support riders in the mountains, their GC plans are not negotiable.... they'll be grinding away for LA and Contador, not for personal glory.
The others... LA, Alberto, Sastre, Schleck... are more explosive in the mountains, having the ability to violently change tempo in the mountains. That is why the winner will be one of those guys.
More on this stage and what to expect as we move on... I gotta take the kids swimming.

I Have Readers?

I guess I do... I mean, other than my wife. This is nice... thanks to all that read for my "insights."
I had one question that I will answer. Here it is in part:

So, tell me one thing, what do you think of Boonen? BTW I was on the edge of my seat today, quite unusual for a flat stage.

What do I think of Boonen? Well, I think he shouldn't be in the Tour, as I think his drug use is a real concern. He has a problem, and he needs to address it. I remember reading another guy who said that when you do recreational drugs like coke, you're probably open to doing other drugs as well, such as performance enhancing drugs. Do I think that Boonen is doing CERA or EPO? I don't have any proof, and I would not go so far as to say that he is. I do think that his lifestyle is troubling, and that he needs to check himself.
Let's just say that if I heard he was busted for doing a performance enhancer, I would not be too surprised. (I mean, his hero is Johan Museeuw who was a total doper... but, let's be honest all those racers from the 90's to the mid 2000's were on the juice, and Johan was one of 'em. The reason that Boonen went from US Postal to Quick Step was for Museeuw.) I'm just saying that Boonen is wasting alot of talent with his problems, chief among them being the coke. Boonen is without question the greatest Northern Classics rider of his generation... but he could be so much more. A Boonen not distracted with his legal problems can also challenge Cavendish.... challenge him, not beat him. No one is beating Cav.
Today was a great day, and that moment when Columbia is driving away from the rest of the group, and you see a few hangers on, and one of 'em was Lance... man, that was a special moment. This is why this race is so awesome, and it's also why seeing Lance in it can be so cool. I said before, he has the bike sense, the ability to read a race, that very few have. Certainly not Contador, because where was he? Today was probably one of my all time favorite non-mountain, non-TT stages in memory... and credit Columbia, as they took the race by the scruff of the neck and shook it around a few times. That was awesome.

Awesome Day At The Tour

Another win by Columbia's Ace, Canvendish.... ho hum... Nothing to see here, move along...
Oh wait... a lead group got 41 seconds clear? Are you kidding me? That was great bike racing today.
Just when you think that this is all figured out, that you know that all Columbia has to do is sit on the front and ride tempo and then set the Pain Train up with about ten clicks to go, then things got odd...
With a small group off the front, about twelve minutes clear, Columbia got to the front and just railed. They went hard, and tagged back a small escape group in a hurry. That was pure power on display, right there.

But they didn't stop with that. OH NO. They kept the tempo really high... crazy high, in fact, and there was a split when the group was all strung out and hit some side winds with about 30 clicks to go. What happened was that the entire Columbia team, plus the yellow jersey of Cancellara plus Lance Armstrong and a few others, all went clear. You call that a break? Now this is a break.

These guys were able to stay clear in the confusion left behind. What kind of confusion? Basically, every other team leader missed this one. Including Contador.

So, all of Columbia delivered Cavendish for the win. Probably his easiest win, since all the other sprinters were totally outnumbered, in terms of support riders. Yes, he phoned it in.

So what does all this mean?
First of all, for a stage that was supposed to be short on drama and long on boredom, it was anything but. That right there, is the Lance Factor. I will give it to Lance for this one thing, he is a smart rider, and he knows the safest place to be in a race is at the front. Remember the '99 Tour, and how he got clear over the Passage Du Gois, when there was a stack of 25 riders piled up and he went clear by five minutes... and alot of leaders were left behind, guys who were challengers but never had a chance after that? I think of that stage today, because today was Lance being Lance, in that he was at the front and had his head on a swivel and took advantage of sheer brute force (Columbia's Pain Train) and Circumstances (nasty cross winds) to get 20 seconds in front of Contador.
Secondly, it also means that tomorrow's TTT (Team Time Trial) is gonna mean Lance will be in Yellow. Seriously, you think Contador likes the taste of that one bit?
Astana has the best team, they put four guys in the top ten of the ITT, and they are probably gonna win the TTT. That means LA will be in Yellow. Write it down. You read it here first. Even if they come in second to Garmin (who really, really, really want to win that stage... and can.) he will be in Yellow since they have a minute and thirty over VandeVelde and Millar. Garmin can smoke Astana tomorrow, and Yellow will go to Lance... like I said, you read it here first.
That is a huge coup for Lance. Contador is steaming over this, you know it.
how does the rest of the week shape up? Mostly flat till friday, then the action is on like Donkey Kong when they hit Arcalis, an Out Of Category climb to finish an awesome Pyrennean stage. That will be awesome.
Basically, if LA can hang on there, if he can pull of a miracle and gain time on Alberto, then this race can be won by him.
I've been a big hater of Lance lately, and I am on record as saying he cannot win this race, that he is too old and too out of shape and not the climber he used to be... that this is Alberto's team, and that he is the guy to beat. But then Lance does this today, and he goes out and grabs time when no one else thought you could, and that is what makes Lance so special. He might not be the better climber or total package that Alberto is, but he might be the better bike race.
Irregardless, having a day or three in Yellow will be vindication for Lance, so even if he doesn't win this race, wearing yellow for one last time might be enough to tell all his haters to eat it.
Man... this race is awesome. I love the Tour.

Stage Two is For The Sprinters

I won't have nearly as much to say about today's stage in the Tour, basically because it's a sprinter's stage, and the winner was Marc Cavendish of Team Columbia.
I will say that I am stoked he won. Everyone saw this one coming, because he has the best sprint in the business. He waylaid all the other sprinters, and it wasn't even close. Seriously, he should be able to take a half dozen stages this year, because he is that good.
The thing about a day like today, the first day on the road for the group, is that you need to stay out of trouble, and make it to the line without using up any resources. Mission Accomplished for all the serious GC contenders. There were no real big crashes where a guy losses a minute plus, and everyone finished with the main group. The name of the game is survive and move on, race again tomorrow.
And what about tomorrow? Should be another romp for Cavendish. The stage is the flattest of the Tour, and everyone should be together in one big happy group at the end.
Expect something looking like this:Which is to say, Cavendish showing the others a clean set of wheels.

The Art of Time Trialing.

Why is Fabian Cancellara, the winner of Stage One and the wearer of the Yellow Jersey, such a good time trialist (and I have made the statement that he is the best of his generation, maybe the best ever: 2 time World Champion, Olympic Champion, Two time Winner of the opening TT, Two time wearer of the Yellow Jersey) Sure, he's big and strong (6 ft 1 in, 180 pounds) and he can crank out 500 watts at will, but it's more than that. He also has a very, very good technical team. This is becoming a very big part of winning a TT these days at the highest level, especially at the Tour, where a millisecond of drag can be the difference between victory and ruin. The fact of the matter is, this...
Is not a lot of bike for the wind to look at. That is about the most sleekest set up I have ever seen on a bike. Here's another shot:
(and the guy behind him is Denis Menchov, the winner of the Giro D'Italia, a guy who started a minute and a half behind Fabian. Yea, he was caught for a minute plus...) Compare this with another, Bradley Wiggins, who finished third on the day...The thing is, that there is not a lot to notice to the untrained eye. But that brakeset sitting out in front, the exposed cables, the clunky hood set up, the "higher" profile aero bars, all of that can potentially mean the difference between first and third on the day... the difference of 20 seconds.
Here's a perfect example of a total mess up front for an ITT set up. We have Oscar Friere, a sprinter who's riding his regular road bike with bolted on bars: Seriously, the problem here is that Oscar could care less about his result, he only cares about making out of the day so he can start tomorrow and be there at the end for the sprint finish. But his set up is a total disaster. He started with his regular bike, as I said, drop bars and all, cables everywhere, lots of stuff out front for the wind to be caught up in. Just a mess.
One more example, here's Ballan: Again, cables are exposed, among other things, like the brakeset. Go back and compare that picture with Cancellara... and you see how he spent so much more time paying attention to his setup... or, I should say, how his tech's spent that time. Attention to detail was the difference for victory for him. No doubt.
One last look at Fabian:Not much to look at from the front, and then his job is to just rail this TT and deliver the goods... his tech's did a great job of getting him into the right bike and the right position for the win.
Half this victory goes to them.
OK... I saw this picture at work, this is the winning TT Bike from a different angle.
this is the cycling equivalent of a hot knife slicing through warm butter.

Today's Ride

I went out for a solo ride today. It was baking hot, in the mid 90's. But I wanted to ride... and I was thinking when I left that I should have ridden at six AM today... it was so much cooler. But whachagonnado?

I did the Archie Briggs stage of the Cascade Stage Race again. Basically, what I did no Wednesday. I am starting to get a feel for AB, and the feeling I get is that it's my kind of a climb... steep and hard. I feel comfortable riding it with power. Now I just need to ride it with someone else to see if I'm just fooling myself or what.

Not much else to say here... can't really do a ride report when you're the only one riding, eh? Did see a lot of other riders out, that was nice... till I got downtown.

I rolled through downtown because I wanted to see the festivities. They're having the usual there: Food booths, hay rides, etc. I came up to the downtown area... and then saw about three hundred dirty hippies on bikes, just sorta taking over. I think it was a flash-mod sort of ride. Totally organized, but totally not organized (in that there was no police escort, that they were running lights and pissing off passing motorists) I estimate 300 hundred because they went curb to median across Franklin, and as far down Bond and Wall as I could see. They were doing a loop, shouting "woo hoo... freedom!!" (because American colonist fought and died so that dread locked slacker 20 somethings can ride through Bend, breaking every known law as it regards bicycles) It was all cruisers and fixies, no one wearing helmets, most of the guys had no shirts on, more flip flops than not, the air was sick with the stench of pot and patchouli.

And here I was... Carbon fiber racing bike, matching racing kit, helmet, socks, tanned because I ride all the time, and just irked that they're slowing me down as I go home.

Note to you dirt head scumbag hippy dolts: Go back to Eugene. They love you there. Or Berkeley. Crawl back under that rock from whence you came.
Probably the biggest issue on the day, really, was the noise from the chain. I, like all true roadies, aspire to have my bike be downright silent when out on a ride. Any noise, any click or whirr or sundry interruption, is an offense. And today, my bike was downright offensive. I have switched lubes twice this year. I started with the dry White Lightning lube (The Clean Ride formulation), mostly because the only thing worse than a noisy drivetrain is a dirty one, and with WL the the drive stays very clean. I just find it totally worn off after one ride, or about two hours. This is annoying. And by worn off, I mean you hear a chorus of birds eminating from the drive, from the where the pulley wheels wrap the chain. I hate that chirping.
I don't know if it's the dry, dusty air of the High Desert, or what. But I need to make a change.
So, this last week I tried the White Lightning Epic Lube. It's a wet formulation, not wax based like the White Lightning Clean Ride. The first ride, by the end, it was chirping. But today, by about an hour, it was the worst sort of cacophony of chirps and squeaks. And that I was alone and that was all I could hear was the worst of it. At least with a a group, your sound blends in sometimes.
So, I don't know... maybe I need to dump more on, wipe less off. If anyone has a recomendation, I'm all for it.

The Tour Opens...

The Tour is officially underway now. We had the first stage (too long to be a prologue, it was a full on stage) today, and it was not disappointing. Here is the top ten, with the time back and the group the guy rode (R = SRAM Red, D = Shimano DuraAce, C = Campy Record 11)

1 Cancellara 19:32 R
2 Contador +00:18 R
3 Wiggins +00:19 D
4 Kloden +00:22 R
5 Evans +00:23 C
6 Leipheimer +00:30 R
7 Kreuziger +00:32 C
8 Martin +00:33 D
9 Nibali +00:37 C
10 Armstrong +00:40 R

Here are my thoughts:
*The first amazing thing I see is that Astana has Contador, Kloden, Leipheimer, and Armstrong in the top ten. Amazing. There is no doubt that they are the strongest team, and by the time of the Team Time Trial, you will see all four of those guys in the top five. I'm stunned by the strength of that team. You have to be.
*Kruziger and Nibali put in good rides, but don't expect them to challenge the top of the GC, and in fact a top ten by either guy is asking alot.
*Wiggins is a great rider, comes from the track, and a stage win here would have been stellar. But you gonna top Cancellara? The best TT rider of his generation? No way.
*Contador is so for real. He was second, and that was as good as a win for him. He was basically racing to tell his team: Get behind me. I'm the guy. And they will, because he is.
*Wanted to see Zabriskie (13th +00:47) or VandeVelde (17th +00:57) in the top ten, but not happening. VandeVelde might be riding into form. Basically, Garmin needs to be second to Astana on the TTT. They can do it. On form, based on today's result the TTT goes Astana, Saxo Bank, Garmin. No, not Liquigas... they're 3 and 4 guys were no where.
*Biggest surprise: Wiggins. He could win one of these one day... maybe this year at the end of the race, who knows? The word is he can climb and he could be in the top ten at the end.
*Tony Martin... stud.
*Biggest disappointment: Armstrong. Yea, I know he's just happy to be there. I heard that. BUT... you know he wanted to have a time that made Contador doubt himself, make him eye Lance with suspicion across the dinner table. But Lance's time just said I will be the best domo in the history of this race. And nothing more.
*Pretty much every other team would love to have Kloden, Leipheimer or Armstrong leading the team, not playing superdomo. For real. You think that Ag2R, Lampre, Milram, or Katusha (just to name a few off the top of my bald dome) wouldn't sell their collective soul for a Kloden? I know they would.
*Menchov is done. He was 53rd, and a Led Zeppelin song back of Fabian.
*Oscar Pereiro. Remember him? The winner of the '06 tour? He was 58th and a bus ticket behind. I have said it once and I will say it everyday till the day I take a dirtnap... Oscar is the most undeserving Tour "winner" in the history of this race. The '06 Tour should be scratched from the record books, just totally forgotten about. And he knows it. Oscar knows that he is not deserving... which is why no one but him thinks of him as a contender or a victor... goodness, that Tour was the worst.
*And here is another known fact: Last year's winner (a guy I actually really like) Carlos Sastre was 21st at +01:06... and does anyone doubt that he is almost as lucky as Pereiro? If Astana was in last year's race, he doesn't win. Circumstances. Yes, I know. But he at least is deserving in the sense that his body of work shows he was always there, always in the top five, always near the top. But you know Contador would have rolled him up.
*SRAM put 5 guys in the top ten, and won the stage. Make no doubts, there is a war in components going on right now, and has been all year long. In the old days (just a couple of years ago...) it was probably 60/40 Campagnolo v. Shimano. Now, two years into the SRAM introduction, they have turned the road component group upside down. Campy put three guys in the top ten, Shimano two. SRAM has half the top ten and the stage wins. They are busting out the bubbly in Chicago, the worldwide HQ for SRAM... but they have a couple of cases of it, becuase they foresee many stage wins and a complete dominance of the GC. Count on it.
*Monte Carlo is such a classy place to open a race... so much better than the so-called theme park of Futuroscope. What a dump.

Tomorrow is a sprinters stage. And if Cavendish does not win, it will be a total disappointment.

That's it for now.... good lord I love this race. What a good start to what should be a fine Tour.

OK... one last thing. Would you rather have a million dollars...
Or Contador's helmet filled with quarters? (that is the biggest, ugliest helmet I have ever seen... that's all I'm saying...)

Friday's Are Easy

Today was supposed to be an easy nooner... yea right.
We started with five guys, three of whom I have only seen sparingly, and I have not caught their names. I will call 'em Giant Force Guy (as in Giant bike with Force components) Giant Campy Guy (Giant bike with Campy components... you don't see Campy too much out on the rides, and this bike was looking sweet) and Bianchi Guy. These three guys did most of the pulling.
Then there was me and Eric... I believe that's his name. He's a couple of years older than me, skinny as a rail but strong like an Oxen. He can hammer. I've been hummed off his wheel many times.
So, we rolled out to Dodds. Man, it was smoking hot out there. I pulled a few times, relatively short ones, but I let the other guys do most of the work. They seemed to want to ride really hard into the wind and heat, so I let them. But I was getting tired as we turned onto Alfalfa Market.
Literally, I was tasting the heat. I felt that every bit of water I took on was warm, and was having no effect on me. One time we came around a parked truck, and I could taste the heat coming off the van... or was that exhaust fumes? It just felt hot and awful for the most part.
I was struggling to stay on. I did not like the heat today.
When we crossed the Powell Butte Hwy, I thought we would slow down a bit, but the others got right back on their gear, and were in the process of mowing me under. That felt very below average.
I'm starting to rethink the whole thing about riding when it's hot, and maybe I should only go out when it's cooler... like early in the morning. I could do a seven AM ride, and be home by nine and everyone would be happy. Right? I just know that I was not finding the legs or the gear or anything today. It wasn't working for me... and it didn't feel like an easy Friday ride at all.

*no title*

When we went camping last week, we were sitting around the campfire, telling stories. Of course, this is standard camping fare… we’ve all been sitting around shooting the breeze while camping at one or another, but what made this different was that we had the kids with us, and they really enjoyed this time of story telling merriment. I still have my son or daughter say to me “remember when uncle Kevin said he shot mommy in the butt?” They love that.
Anyways, I told a story about when I was in high school, and at one point my brother-in-law (the wicked smart PhD in Geology, the aforementioned Kevin) and his wife (the also wicked smart PhD in Geology, who goes by Jodi) somehow enquired about my hair, and how I wore it in High School. I don’t know how this came up, but it did.
Of course, since I graduated in the mid 80’s, I was totally rocking the mullet. I have pictures to prove it as well. And at one point, I had a perm. (this is where the hair thing came up… because they didn’t believe that I ever had hair long enough to need a perm) Indeed, I did have a perm… curly hair, everything.
The thing is, my mom and my sister told me that having a perm would do wonders to cure my intolerable bed-head, that it would tame my hair, and make it more manageable. Of course, this was the late 70’s (79 to exact) and I guess this is what you did at that time… you got a perm.
My sister and my mom neglected to tell that this meant curls.
So, here I was… a junior high school kid going to school one day with crazy hair…. Long, but crazy. Then the next day, it’s curly. Do you think my classmates noticed at all? Do you think this caused a bit of trauma… sure did. To this day, I will never forget that I had a perm for a long time… long curly hair. I cannot believe it at all.
The thing is, if you know me, you know that I am almost all bald now. What little hair I have now is kept pretty tight, and I shave my head pretty regularly.
Jodi said that she would love to see me have a perm again… and I said that I would be rockin’ a skullet, which is the skull-mullet. Of all the mullet’s, the worst of all. This is because I can’t grow hair in front anymore.
Jodi wanted to know what it would take to grow my hair long, to roll with the Skullet. I told her it would take a new bike.
This is when my Hot Wife freaks out… and she shot me the what the heck are you talking about, we just got you the dream bike you always wanted look. And she just glared at me…
Well, she’s right. I just did get the dream bike, and I love that bike. I mean, I absolutely adore it. In fact, tonight I was cleaning it and getting it ready for whatever ride I have planned for tomorrow (probably gonna do the Archie Briggs stage again… I need to get Archie down. I need to figure out that road.) So, I was cleaning the bike, airing the tires, putting lube on the chain… just giving my bike some lovin’…. and I thought about what I said that day around the campfire.
The thing is, I love my road bike so much, I would love to have the mountain version of this bike, which would be the Scott Scale RC
That is the hard tail mountain bike version of what I roll on the road. That bike is all carbon, with an integrated seat mast.
So, my darling wife… whom I know reads this… what I meant was that if you want to see me wearing my hair long, rockin' a nasty lookin skullet with curls and all, I want to have the all-carbon mountain version of the all-carbon road bike I dearly love.
That’s all I meant.

God Demonstrates His Love For Us...

God demonstrates his love for us,
In that while I had a one inch long cut in the sidewall of my tire,
I didn't have a blowout while ripping a descent at 40 miles an hour.
For surely that would have been The Suck.
(merckx 3:16)

This is how The Bible would have gone if cyclists would have written it. But this is my story of the day.
I started off on the wrong foot (can a cyclist do this?) when I rolled out of the garage and I felt the obvious sensation of riding on the rim. You cannot mistake this, you know it right away. So, fortunately, I was not far away from a new tube and the floor pump. The tube change took all of five minutes, and I was back on the bike, headed for the nooner.
No one was there. That was bad. So, I was on my own. I decided to do a stage of the Cascade Stage Race, the circuit that goes up OB Riley and Archie Briggs (definitely the hardest climbs in the race) I started up Archie, and then did a full circuit, so that I could hit Archie in the mouth twice.
And, yes, I was ripping descents. The descent into OB Riley is fast and curvacious. And the fact of the matter is, a blowout there is a disaster. You're calling in the Life Flight and hoping that you only have a year a of PT ahead.
The second flat was actually very lucky. Seriously, as lucky as flats go. I was at Third and Greenwood, and I was soft pedaling to the light, and it just blew the heck up on me. I was just peddaling along, and BOOM... empty. I was one block from a bike shop. Nice.
I fixed that flat pretty quick as well. That is when I saw the tube sticking out of the tire by about a half centimeter, at least. A piece of tube sticking out is a terrible thing. Just touching it on the pavement is an immediate blow out. Not a slow leaker as all, but a very sudden emptying of the tire that makes for bad handling and nasty consequences. So, to have that blow out as I slow-rolled to the light was very fortuitous.
Like I said, I was totally counting my blessing. All things considered.