TDF is over. Looking forward....

Clasica Ciclista San Sebastian - San Sebastian
This Saturday 8/2/2008. This one day classic has a hilly 239km route. It should be interesting. Favorites are: Contador, Bettini, Friere, Sastre, Gilbert, Chavanel. Who I'm cheering for: Bobby Julich, of course. Haven't found a free site to watch the race, but you could watch it live with a subscription to cycling.tv

Rochester Omnium
8/8 - 8/10. Check it out here.

Olympics
Starts 8/8 for rider info, check out this site.
Aug 8 11:00pm ET Men's Cycling Road individual road race - Finals
Aug 10 2:00am ET Women's Cycling Road individual road race - Finals
Aug 12 11:30pm ET Women's Cycling Road individual time trial - Finals


National Criterium Championships
8/16 - 8/17 Downers Grove, IL. Check it out here.

The Colorado Stage Race
8/22 - 8/24 here.

USPRO Cycling Championships
For the third year in a row, the USPRO Cycling Championships will be held in Greenville, SC. August 30th, is the Time Trial and August 31st is the Road Race. The official site is here. To see the race live, try going to this site. I was there last year and my brother will be there this year. I'll post his pics as soon as I get them. Damn, I wish I was going, Greenville is a perfect town for the race.

Cop Decks Cyclist

Clearly this video shows unprovoked, unnecessary police violence by this NYPD Officer. What a piece of garbage! Now that the cop has been reassigned to a desk job, I hope he gets fat, gets tons of horrible paper cuts, develops carpal tunnel syndrome, and suffers from boredome, which leads to depression, which leads to the need to medicate himself to be happy, which leads to.....well you get the picture.

2008 Tour de France Recap:

That damn crash cost Christian Vande Velde (USA) (Garmin-Chipotle) a podium spot in the Tour de France.

Let’s rewind a bit so I can explain. Vande Velde, while always a strong domestique, was never a favorite for a podium spot going into the tour. I don’t think anybody (that matters) picked him for a podium spot. Some didn’t even have him on their radar. However, on stage 4, a 29.5km TT in Cholet, he proved he could time trial, 8th best, only 37 seconds behind Stefan Schumacher’s 35:44.

He proved he could hang with the favorites (and the dopers) in Stage 7: Brioude - Aurillac, moving up on GC to 4th, 44 seconds behind Kim Kirchen. He proved it again in Stage 9: Toulouse - Bagneres-de-Bigorre (224km), when he moved up to 3rd on GC, still only 44 seconds back. He was able to hold that placing during Stage 10: Pau - Hautacam (see above picture), sitting only 38 seconds behind Cadel Evans.

On Stage 15: Ebrum - Prato Nevoso (185km), Vande Velde, was leap frogged by Denis Menchov and Bernhard Kohl and dropped to 5th, but only 39 seconds behind leader Frank Schleck.

Crash
On Stage 16: Cuneo - Jausiers, Vande Velde was dropped on the days final climb. He was forced to descend like a mad-man. He was gaining on the GC group and was only 35 seconds behind when he crashed. He could not regain his rhythm and finished the day 4:04 behind the stage winner, and lost 2:36 to Carlos Sastre and Cadel Evans, 2:01 to Denis Menchov. At the end of the day, he was 6th on GC 3:15 behind F. Schleck, 3:07 behind Evans, and 2:26 behind Sastre.

Sastre rode into yellow on Stage 17: Embrum - L’Alpe d’Huez (210.5km), while CSC shut down the other GC contenders on L’Alpe d’Huez. Sastre put 2:15 into Vande Velde pushing him to 4:41 behind the eventual GC winner.

So, everything came down to the final TT, Stage 20: Cerilly - St. Amand-Montrond TT (53km). Schumacher powered to a stage victory, completing the course in 1:03:50 at 49.817 kph or 30.95 mph!! Vande Velde turned in an excellent time, finishing 4th, only 1:05 behind Schumacher and beating Menchov by 50 seconds, Evans by 1:00, and Sastre by 1:29. He moved up from 6th to 5th leapfrogging F. Schleck’s 54th place TT.

So in the end the top 5 was this:

1. Sastre
2. Evans (again....yawn) 0:58
3. Kohl 1:13
4. Menchov 2:10
5. Vande Velde 3:05

Had Vande Velde’s crash not happened, and he rejoined the GC guys on the descent in stage 16, which was about to happen, the top 5 would have looked like this:

1. Sastre
2. Vande Velde 0:29
3. Evans 0:58
4. Kohl 1:13
5. Menchov 2:10

Of course, if we played what if’s, then we have to remember that the returning champion and his super strong Astana team was banned this year. If Astana was not wrongfully disbarred from this year’s tour, the top 5 would have looked like this....

1. Contador
2. Leipheimer 1:15
3. Sastre 10:00
4. Vande Velde 10:29
5. Evans 10:58

On that note, I’m officially renaming this year’s winner: Carlos Sasterisk. We all know why.

JC

Tour de France - Live Update Humor

From Velonews, Stage 15 TDF 2008, 7/22/2008:

03:49 PM: Reader question, speaking of *&(#!
Reader Sean in Denver writes in to ask:
Hey LUG,
You've talked a lot about nature breaks and the courtesy of waiting for the yellow jersey. But I'm assuming all of this has to do with a number 1. What happens if a rider has to do a #2. Do they find the nearest bush or do the support cars carry TP?
Well Sean,
Now there's an unusual question. Generally riders don't find themselves in that position. A light breakfast and a morning constitutional generally allow riders to avoid that problem. Nonetheless, it does happen. Most often, when we hear about it, it involves a rider suffering from stomach problems. Most recently, Ivan Basso lost 48 minutes in a stage that went up the Stelvio. He had to stop three times on the way up that climb after suffering from what was some form of food poisoning. He was afforded a degree of privacy by a team car that would stop and block the view of the tifosi along the course.
One of our favorite stories from the old days on that topic involved Tom Simpson, as told by one of his domestiques on the old Peugeot team. Riding in his first Tour, the young rider was resplendent in his team kit, with his while cap perched perfectly atop his head. Suddenly his team leader dropped back and demanded his hat.

"You got your own hat!" the rider exclaimed.

"I know, I know," said Simpson. "but, I need to take a @$%^ and need something to wipe my &$$."

Ahhh, the life of a domestique.

Toledo death.

Horrible story. A horrible P.O.S. caused this. When the suspect is found, I hope that suspect is fucking dead.

Future of cycling....

She really does enjoy watching le tour....

Training & Landscaping Safety Lessons

If you haven’t seen me on the road it’s because I am was told to stay off the bike until my fingers heal. Lesson #1: Do not place your fingers on the mower exhaust when you are done mowing - ouch! Stupid, I know. This pain was much worse than when I weed wacked my toes earlier this year! Lesson #2: Don't wear sandals while weed wacking. I burned the fingers, luckily on my left hand, on July 4th, so I think the ER people only half believed my story and probably thought I was playing with fireworks.

I have, however, been ramping up my training for the Bellefaire JCB Biathlon (3 mile run, 12.9 mile bike) by running and riding the trainer. I’ve also been hitting the gym much more and working on my core (beer gut). Since I haven’t run competitively in 17 years, I’m not expecting much out of the run, but I hope to get a decent bike time.

I slacked off July 4th weekend, by sitting around, eating, and drinking, eating, and drinking, repeat again for 4 days. I even joked that I was erasing an entire month’s fitness level in one weekend. Which may have actually happened!!! Ugh! The extent of my cycling was watching Ray zoom past me and my family as we walked around Shaker Lakes.

Anyway, this week I’m taking it serious and have settled into a running and biking training routine that should bring me back to previous levels.

Monday Evening: 22 minute run - 30 minutes on trainer - Race Pace (if you could call it that)

Tuesday Lunch: Gym: legs - 5k Run - 28:24 an 8:49 pace - Route: Through Malls, left on Lakeshore, right on W.3rd around Browns Stadium, Out to end of Pier, N. Marginal to the bend, Up E. 9th, right on Lakeshore, Malls. HOT, humid and SLOW - Couldn’t extend.

Tuesday Evening: 60 minute trainer bike 3 x 1:30 powerclimbs

Wednesday Lunch: Gym: Chest/Bis/Tris/Abs (hi reps low weight) - 1.5 mile treadmill run with 1 mile @ 7:30 pace

Wednesday Evening: 27:40 run - approx. 5k - followed by 15 minutes of sprint drills/hill sprints. Instructed two kids to not ride their bikes against traffic. They argued with me, I told them to Google it. Yeah, that’s my comeback “Google it!”-I’m a real tough guy. Anyway, I did see Dave cruise by near GESU. Nice Kazahk Railways shorts.

Thursday Lunch: Gym: Abs/Legs - 10 minutes on Elliptical

Thursday Evening: 60 minute trainer 3 x 1 minute Sprints, 3 x 5 minute Fast Pedals

So it looks like I’m back on track. I’ll be out on the road next week to get some real miles in.

JC