Pro Tour/ Euro/Whatever road thread

Spectacularly well timed launch of the sprint by Pettachi, just the right moment to block Cavendish against the barriers. However second day in Pink for him so it isn't all bad.

and Boonen gets caught on the gak again....

I think he must like having july off.

Anyone know if the Tour is doing bonus seconds for stage wins this year?

dunno - but the route sucks, they need to be going through north east France some more so we can go see it with free accomodation, they haven't been in 4 years or so.

Next year is your year then, grand depart in holland and lots of flat through belgium and luxembourg.

this is my year though, Finish in Perpignan and Barcelona on consecutive days and that's where I can get free accommodation. (Also trying to get school to pay for the flights as I am going to a conference in Barcelona on the preceding weekend).

Also for this year, Valverde out because of the one stage that passes through italy where CONI have banned him.

http://www.cbc.ca/sports/indepth/landis/instantmessage.html

remember when? ha, good times yall good times.

I am eternally amused by the block of cheese riders get with their spumante for a stage win.

I loved scarponi's slow down to the line and cheeky grin as he looked behind for the chasing group.

http://www.theurbanshop.co.uk/multimedia/catalogue/images/OTHER/ynm0031.jpg

^crazy. in the wet too

http://cyclingnews.com/photos/2009/giro09/?id=/photos/2009/giro09/giro097/2_0038632_1_thumb2

lol meant that

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/cycling/8053657.stm

His bike was reportedly found around 60m away as paramedics recovered him from deep in a ravine.

Bradley Wiggins is still hanging on in there.

http://cycleto.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=973

i still think this is the best anglophone rider out there for race assessment.

im interested in hearing who's better tho.

Not pro, but pretty shitty:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/tayside_and_central/8054215.stm

i love chris horner

http://www.livestrong.com/lance-armstrong/video/lance-and-levi-talk-to-dave-zabriskie/bef12e89-651a-48fb-875a-ebbfe0b03389/rms/

juan pelota has better sense of humor about it than i figgered

di luca trying to break away from menchov here on the vesuvius climb is pretty entertaining!

Menchov looked pretty chuffed at the end there.

I normally find Cadel Evans to be the Prince of Boredom in the mountains, just defensively grinding his way up at a steady pace, following wheels and limiting his losses, but he was fantastically aggressive and attacking in the last two stages of the Dauphine Libere (trying to shake off soon-to-be-banned Valverde).

Yeah he's looking good hey.

happy moncoutie got that stage, always liked him.

http://i44.tinypic.com/j5gy01.jpg

everyone is expecting moncoutie to be nailed real soon

do ur sources say millar is back on the sauce because garmin needs a gc rider?

has VDV not recovered?

ive a hard time believing he'll be ready in time, but maybe. dude sounded like a train wreck.

columbia high road is srsly unstoppable this year

serious bullshit right here:

http://blog.oregonlive.com/horner/2009/06/astanas_chris_horner_explains.html

mmm. i like horner, he's a PRO. he does as ordered and spends 100% as asked. if contador wanted the strongest team with a guy who follows management's orders, he'd demand horner. i think horner's take is right--and contador doesn't trust bruyneel. with paulinho, ac will have a guy who'll follow his own commands. and if ac jumps teams, he'll take his flunky too, anyway.

cant help but believe that if youre serious about winning gc, you take a team to back one guy 100% to win gc, no concessions.

I've started this:
Tour de France 2009
As it's the one race a year that people who don't look at this board might actually want to post about.

i'd venture to say anyone that cares about the tour, except ned, already reads and posts here!

why was dekker doping in december? is that like the auto doping layaway plan? if he were to bag blood in january, how long would it keep, doc gbx?

that's a good question, actually. i'm sure google could answer this, but: if he's banking blood, it's usually because the banked blood has a higher hematocrit (more RBCs), right? like from training at altitude or a course of EPO or something, yeah?

so basically the question is how well do RBCs age? their oxygen binding ability will degrade with time, as the hemoglobin denatures, which may be retarded by refrigeration (blood banks work, after all), but i dunno about 8 months. and freezing ~shouldn't~ work because the cells would lyse, i'm guessing. flash freezing, maybe?

basically i have no idea

getting caught aside, i can't believe these guys are ok with putting blood that's been frozen for so long back into their bodies \(O_O)/

it's just blood

yuh true. do these dodge doctors typically have "commercial" (or whatev) grade storage for these guys' blood tho?

I'm guessing that if you are providing an illicit service to professional athletes with money or sponsor's money to spend then yes you have institutional grade storage available.

yeah and i think it was Kohl amongst others who was putting up his own cash for a centrifuge

from what ive heard, the coaches will ask their riders to buy their own spinners so they can monitor easily. no facility needed for that.

serious bullshit right here:

http://blog.oregonlive.com/horner/2009/06/astanas_chris_horner_explains.html

― cutty, Friday, June 26, 2009 12:12 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

mmm. i like horner, he's a PRO. he does as ordered and spends 100% as asked. if contador wanted the strongest team with a guy who follows management's orders, he'd demand horner. i think horner's take is right--and contador doesn't trust bruyneel. with paulinho, ac will have a guy who'll follow his own commands. and if ac jumps teams, he'll take his flunky too, anyway.

cant help but believe that if youre serious about winning gc, you take a team to back one guy 100% to win gc, no concessions.

― iro with the brown bag (Hunt3r), Friday, June 26, 2009 9:31 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

can't believe that horner was dropped for a dude that probably won't finish the tour (scroll way down):

http://www.letour.fr/2009/TDF/LIVE/us/400/classement/index.html

Watching Cancellara do his TT run at the worlds and he is in a completely different league from everyone else 38s in front at the first split.

Wiggins looks done, I think he just had cancellara and Larsson come past in quick sucession.

Although that still puts him in a fight for third with Tony Martin. the fact that cancellara is a minute ahead of a guy who is a minute ahead of everyone else is staggering.

And that's it for Wiggins, bonked.

OK, not him the bike, damn the lack of commentary on the universal feed.

u watching this on eurosport ed?

On Universal Sports in the US. I expect you can get the whole phil ligget experience on eurosport.

Cancellara is amazing, he beats the guy who beta the rest of the field by a minute thirty by a whole other minute thirty. In a race that they consider it necessary to time down to 1/100th second. This guy is absolutely amazing. Looked so composed and in the groove. Roll on sunday.

Prolly on drugs :(

I am counting on his swissness to make that not true.