Giro Stage 17 finish

Three thoughts when seeing this for the first time.
1) High Road looked like an old Saeco leadout train
2) What the heck was Milram's Ongarrato doing? Maybe there is an explanation but, to me, it seems that all he accomplished was giving High Road a little break and giving Zabel one less teammate in the finale.
3) Bettini totally fooked the last corner

More extended videos of Stage 15 (Passo Fedaia) and Stage 16 (Plan de Corones)

Giro Stage 16 - Plan de Corones TT

Ooof! This looks so steep near the finish.

Giro Stage 15 - through the gorge of Sottoguda

Toward the bottom of the climb up Fedaia is a narrow little gorge of Sottoguda. The camera views did not do justice to this section of road. When you ride through, the walls of the gorge seem much closer. Perhaps, it is because you are looking up at a couple hundred feet of rock. It is a very pretty ride and it just gets steeper and steeper until you join the main road, where it does not get much easier.

Giro Stage 15 - atop Passo Fedaia

Di Luca is tough. Dropped earlier on the climb, he comes back and then attacks for fourth place. Not a bad job by Contador on a bad rear
wheel, either

Giro Stage 14 finish atop Alpe di Pampeago.
(the video goes black a few times but only for a few seconds each)

Giro - Stage 13

The race gets serious tomorrow

Yesterday, I wrote that today's stage would go past the walled city of Cittadella and then loop north of town for the finish.  That is not true.  They loop north of town and then charge right at the old city and finish with a big 7/8th circle around the walls and moat.  That will be a non-technical and extremely fast finish. 

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Why do so many photos of Boonen make him look effeminate?






Remember David Millar's tossing his bike after breaking his chain a few days ago? He very efficiently cleared the road of his bike. However, he forgot about the chain.

Tuesday night I skipped the Worlds yet again. While I didn't race, some training actually took place. The neighborhood hills were tackled aggressively as I worked my way down to the Bottoms for some sprint work. Surprisingly, the Bottoms are still flooded when you get closer to Hwy 21. At first I was disappointed but soon realized that the barricades being placed well before the floodwaters gave me free reign of the road with no cars to interfere. After cooking my legs pretty well, I began the trek back home. At the last moment I decided to drag my butt up Hagemann and the rollers on Keller.

Random observation: Mr. White 4WD Ford Explorer Guy, the low profile tires on your truck look very stupid.
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Personally, I have found this year's Giro has been very entertaining. There has been no lack of aggressive riding and the very nature of the stages has brought the GC contenders into play from the very start.

Compare the the first week to ten days of this year's Giro to the typical, formulaic Tour de France. The Giro had a 4km uphill finish at the end of a very up and down Stage 2. The Tour has its first uphill finish on Stage 6 this year and that is considered early in the race. Up until then, you will have many pictures of sunflowers and horses running along the road.

Friday's stage ends in the town of Cittadella. The stage is pancake flat so it will be a big sprint. Despite my complaining in the last paragraph, I don't mind flat stages. They have their place in the Grand Tours. The problem comes with putting five or six of them in a row at the start of racr. B O R I N G! But, I digress. Cittadella sits on the flat plains located between Venice and Verona and maybe 20km due south of Bassano del Grappa. Bassano sits at the base of the mountains and was our first stop of last year's trip to Italy.

Our first full day of riding had the group do a bowtie shaped route around the hills that surround Bassano to the east and west. After reaching Marostica, Giuseppe and I skipped the last little leg back to Bassano and opted to venture out on our own to see Cittadella. We did okay navigating around completely mysterious roads despite a missed turn or two. As I noted earlier, the roads are VERY flat in this area. As flat as the roads are, it took a while to actually see the town of Cittadella. That is surprising because of the massive walls that completely surround the old town.


From what I have read, the course is supposed to circumnavigate the walled section of town before a short loop north of town. It should provide for some nice video. Too bad we won't see it unless you watch on the 'net or a posted video.

Speaking of video, here are the finishes from the last several days.

Giro - Stage 10

Giro - Stage 11

Giro - Stage 12

It has been six hours since my post on Bernie's Press Box at stltoday.com. My post was observational and open to comments.

All this ball and stick talk. What about the Giro?

Ricco is looking really strong, so far. The question is whether he can TT well enough to fend off Contador, Kloden and Leipheimer. DiLuca is looking like he will crack when they reach the big mountains. Discuss.

As I suspected, the forum members were puzzled by a post not involving a sport where the athletes sit or stand around for 75% of the game. One funny boy had the guts to post a reply.

Uh...I don't like "Magic the Gathering"

While there was relative silence regarding the Giro, at the time of this post nineteen people were willing to chime in with thoughts on "What you give for Dan Uggla?"
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Sunday's Stage 9 of the Giro. This is Eurosport's British coverage. Commentary, of course, is provided by David Harmon and the dulcet tones of Sean Kelly.

A few minutes ago I began a test of the fine sporting fans of our fair city. 
 
How will the beer-swilling (not that there is anything wrong with that) fans that inhabit a baseball heavy message board react when a post is made about professional cycling?  This isn't a strictly baseball message board so I am not intruding in off-limits territory. 
 
Will these sports loving fans be stunned into silence and confused with the foreign sounding names?  Will they be hostile with the talk of lycra wearing freaks from Europe that are not exhausted after running 90-180 feet?  Will they prove to be enlightened and offer insightful commentary?  We shall see. 

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Another race, another less than inspiring performance. 

Giuseppe and I set off for Newburg a little after seven.  A brief stop at the neighborhood Bread Co. was on the agenda before setting off on the wonderful and sometimes bizarre trip along I-44.  The sights along the highway always provide amusement.  There is the Branson tourist info center located 200 miles away from Branson, the collection of old gasoline station signs that I guess are for sale, the Jesse James Museum next door to the Antique Toy museum, the giant farmer "sign" with the rotating arms, the flying moose, the big chicken in the back of the red pickup.  Lots of good stuff.  There even is the lovely Trooper Shanika that pulled Giuseppe over for being a little aggressive with gas pedal.

Aside from the unfortante meeting the MO Hwy Patrol, it was a spectacular day for racing.  The races started a little behind schedule and we off and riding 25 minutes late.  The neutral start was more brisk than I expected and the small ring was proving to be a spin-fest.  Seeing myself slide backwards, I figured it would be wise to shift to a bigger gear until we reached the hill.  Patience was important and eventually a lane opened up and I moved up to the top 5 or 6 riders.  At least, I felt I contributed in some small way in this race.  I chased a small early break attempt and took a few pulls at the front.  An attack by a Mesa rider shuffled me back through the pack and meant I was going to have to work my way through the pack again at some point. 
 
We rolled through the river valley and approached the more important of the two hills on the course.  We seemed to come at the hill a little slowly.  At that point, I should have tried to be more aggressive in squeezing my way forward in the pack.  As it was I started near the back.  I am not sure it would have made a difference but if I had room to slide through the pack, maybe I would have been in better position at the top.  There is no getting around the fact, however, that I climbed the hill like a snail.  I have no explanation for that other than the steeper a hill gets, the more I seem to struggle.  And, this is a rather steep hill.  
 
At the top I was gapped pretty well.  I caught a Momentum rider and Jose hooked on as well and the chase began.  Jose dropped off and we then reeled in Jeff Yielding while Vinnie was up ahead, then Marco and unknown rider and then the pack.  Vinnie fell into our clutches and the four of us worked hard.  We all seemed to think catching back on was still possible.  Marco managed to integrate into the small caravan of cars and then into the pack.  If we could reach the cars just ahead we would likely make the junction too. 
 
We came fairly close but then all hope went away when a truck with a trailer in the line of vehicles decided to brake and back into his driveway.  What the @#$%!!!  We all virtually stopped and squeezed through tiny portion of road on the right, hoping that he saw us and didn't start backing up.  With his wheel turned the truck likely would have swung right and taken up what little road we had.  We made it through safely but the delay essentially put paid to our hopes.  We kept up the efforts.  Our Momentum rider began dangling off the back of our rotation.  Then Vinnie blew up and the Momentum guy managed to get back into the rotation.  Then Jeff popped.  Momentum and I continued the futile chase.  It was a good workout but we called it a day after one lap.

Congrats to Kyle Rackers for the big win.

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The State Road Race is tomorrow and I have no idea what to expect. My races of late have been anything but encouraging so I go into the race with no expectations. The last time I did this race was 2005. My memory is a little fuzzy about the course but the main features are in my mind. The main thing I don't recall is the severity of the hard parts and how to pace my efforts.

Friday, after dinner, I went out for some hill repeats on the Hadleyberg. My stomach felt all bloated and riding was very uncomfortable. I felt slow and it felt like the air was thick with pollen. After five repeats, I cruised home.

This morning the phone rang at 5am. It was work and they were having problems with some programs. Four hours later, everything was normal. *sigh* So, I missed the usual Columbia stuff and headed out on my own about ten o'clock. I felt so lousy on the hills last night that I felt the need to do some more practice. For a change from Friday, I rode toward the steady grades of Old Gravois. Along the way, I took a detour and went up Mentzberg once. From there it was up Old Gravois three times and then back down to Hwy 30 to West Watson and up the two Weberberg hills.
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The final 3.9km of today's Giro stage 8. This was an uphill finish but it did not look very severe. It must have been hard enough though because everyone in the leadout was smallish. Piepoli, for instance, was a workhorse. Nice finish.

Good view of Millar's chain problems and bike toss.

Stage 6 of the Giro finish

Not the finish but a decisive part of Stage 7 as DiLuca attacks the peloton.

Looks like some competitors are a little concerned about Contador.

From Gazzetta dello Sport...
A brief survey of opinions at the finish line of the sixth stage. Franco Pellizotti, "Now the others have to prove something. Some people want to win the Giro, but you’ll see that they won’t even get to wear the pink jersey. Contador and Klöden have saved a lot of energy, you’ll see that in the time trial they’ll leave everyone minutes behind.” Paolo Bettini, "Contador is in great form, he’s getting better every day.”

My wheels are ready! Without getting weight weenie-ish, Mark says they are 14oog. Good enough. Tomorrow I plan to pick them up.

Up 'til now I have not mentioned my fantasy Giro team at Velogames. There are 1217 teams registered this year. Last Friday I threw the team together at work. In my rush, I made a mistake when selecting my riders and chose Sylvester Szmyd instead of Christian Vandevelde. I am not terribly disappointed with the choice of Szmyd but, with Vandevelde doing so well, that move has not helped my scores. Szmyd has tallied a big ZERO points while Vandevelde has 140. Vandevelde's points would put me in 301st place. But then I wouldn't have the 54 points from Wegelius. Not much is gained by playing the "what if" game.

My GC positions after each stage so far have been...
St. 1 - 960th
St. 2 - 901st
St. 3 - 538th
St. 4 - 493rd
St. 5 - 549th

My team is geared more toward the mountains so hopefully I will move up as the race enters the latter stages. Team members are Kloden, Petrov, Simoni, Contador, Bennati, Nibali, Gusev, Szmyd and Wegelius.
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The breakaway group in Stage 5 managed to stay away. The story of the stage is Millar breaking his chain with 1km to go. The man is a damn fine impersonator. When the chain breaks he does his Armstrong on Luz Ardiden impression and almost loses his manhood on the top tube. He the climbs off the bike and doing his best Bjarne Riis bike toss imitation.

While riding the trainer last night I watched Stage 14 of the 2006 Giro.  It was a very boring stage with an eleven man breakaway that CSC had no interest in chasing because there were no GC threats.  No other team was interested in chasing either.  Ultimately, the breakaway group finished about 8 minutes ahead of the peloton.
 
With five kilometers to go Francisco Perez attacked.  He was followed by Luis Laverde.  They managed to hold off their fellow breakway companions.  Perez led out the sprint and Laverde came around him, as expected, for the win.
 
Why do I mention this?  I am reading the live ticker of today's Stage 5 of the Giro and who is in the breakaway with 100km to go and a 9 minute lead?  Luis Laverde and Francisco Perez.  I doubt the peloton will let them stay away today.

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My meteorologic senses were on target tonight. The five o'clock showed no rain anywhere nearby but when I looked at the sky, the sky seemed to say that it would rain. Trusting my senses, I chose not to attend the Tues Nite Worlds. To be perfectly honest, I was probably going to blow off tonight's race anyway. Here lately I have no ambition to race on Tuesday nights. Rain, or the threat of rain, has proven to be a handy excuse lately. Maybe I am just bored with these races or maybe it is the start of my fade into retirement. I still like to race and look forward to this weekend so boredom is the most likely reason for skipping Tuesdays.

Regardless of the reason, I jumped on the trainer and got in a good workout. Just as I was winding down about about 6:35, little pieces of hail began to fall from the sky and within a few minutes we had a full on downpour. The rain and hail made my decision to not race seem worthwhile. I still got a good workout and stayed dry as a bonus.
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Giro Stage 4

What an odd finale to today's stage. Milram had everything lined up and, thanks to a big crash, the number of competitors were whittled down to a select 10 or so riders. Despite having three riders lined up ahead of Zabel on last wheel, Milram's leadout just looked sluggish. Everything was set up and the sprint went pppfffftttt like a leaky balloon. Zabel never even had the chance to have his leadout man pull off. Everyone was comfortably sitting until the right moment when Bennati jumped for the line. Despite his best efforts he was no match for Cavendish who blew by him rather easily. Cavendish has proven to be a very impressive sprinter this year. Much like McEwen, he has a very quick and sudden turn of speed and takes wins in fine fashion. He has a big future it seems.

One thing the Italians do better than the French is televise a bunch sprint. They seem to understand that story is told from above and they spend a good deal of time above the fray trying to capture what is taking place in the big bunch. Accelerations, swerving, bumping and all manner of mayhem as the riders fight for wheels.

Stage 3 of the Giro was such a stage. Check it out.

Sunday I woke up feeling sluggish.  After eating breakfast, my body like it had been whipped mercilessly by a dozen wet rotini noodles.  For all the world, I felt like I was coming down with a whopper of a cold.  The weather was crappy outside so at least I didn't feel bad for not going out and riding.  I laid down and tried to rest my body.  Then at 11am, the lights went out.  Earlier in the morning there was a very brief power blip but all was well.  Not this time.  We had been having strong winds all morning so a tree branch must have succumbed to the gusts and knocked down a power line.

There has been a disturbing trend with the last three major power outages that I have encountered.  Each time, it corresponds to a cycling related event that I ended up missing.  Back in July '06, the power went out the day before Floyd Landis's dramatic stage win.  Doping issues aside, that was a very dramatic stage that I never have seen.  Power remained off for 48 hrs.  Then, in Dec '06, I was scheduled to leave the cyclocross state championships when we had a massive ice and snow storm that knocked out power for 36 hrs. 
 
That brings us to yesterday when I was really looking forward to watching the first Sunday of Versus' coverage of the Giro d'Italia.  Stage 2 looked to be a stage with the potential for an exciting, short uphill finsh.  Once again, power issues foiled me when the lights went out at 11am. 
 
As of this morning, when I left for work, the power had been out for 18 hours.  Next Sunday is a boring flat stage in the Giro.  I guarantee, there will be no electrical issues for that snooze-fest.  All I ask is that there be no problems two Sundays from now, when race finishes atop Passo Fedaia at the end of a brutal stage.

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A group of five rode from Columbia on Saturday morning. The usual band of suspects showed up but we were graced with the presence of Giuseppe Walsh. The plan was to ride from Columbia to O' Fallon. This would be something a little different with the added bonus of checking out the new O'Fallon race course.

Since this is a route we had never done before, the majority of the roads were completely new to us. There was the occasional checking of the map and few missed turns but, for the most part, everything went smoothly. One risky decision I had planned was not going climbing Imbs Station Rd. I had been looking at online maps and saw what looked like an interesting diversion. Imbs Station is a good, longish climb. The road I found was not going to be that way. The topo maps made it look steep and it did not disappoint. Even I was a little surprised when we made the left turn onto the Suikerbroodberg and looked at the road shooting up.

The trees hung close in a foreboding manner. Upward we went. Round the bend and the road only went up further. If you stayed within yourself the hill was not all that bad. It would not be fun to try and race up, though. Finally the road leveled off to reveal a big metal gate holding a large Road Closed sign.

Now that we were up on top, I did not see much point in going back down the hill and then climb back up Imbs Station. We scurried through and around the metal gate and hopped back on the bikes. The others seemed hesitant about going forward but I had looked at satellite images and was confident the road went through.

At first glance the road looked like a slightly overgrown grass path. There was a fair amount of grass but the base of the road was a combination of gravel and small cobblestones for about a half mile of fun before we reached a second gate. After the second gate we back onto paved roads. The rest of way up to O' Fallon proved to be a decent route. For the most part, roads were good and traffic was pretty light.

This new course has an interesting layout in that it loops back on itself several times. The other interesting thing is the varying surroundings and social strata. The start is nestled amongst typical subdivisions. After a few turns, you pass a new subdivision with some nouveau mansions that the owners likely can't afford. From there you pass through farmland, lower income country housing and even a slightly industrial looking area. Roads varied from wide main roads to tiny country lanes. All the while, there are lots twists and turns and little hills that are just long enough and just steep enough to make the legs burn.

The number of dogs that we encountered was a little disconcerting but hopefully they will be under control on race day. This race course is slightly reminiscent of Hillsboro-Roubaix. The hills may be a little smaller but they sting and not quite as rural but it has that same feel in that it has lots of twists and turns. Even more than Hillsboro really. There are no dramatically hard features to this course but everyone one on the ride seemed to think that there will be quite a few people that suffer and splintered pelotons.

Time is running late so I need to make some Giro selections.

- Thirty-two riders have scored a top 10 in the last five years.
- Only fourteen of those thirty-two are in this years race.
- Eight are simply not participating.
- Three riders have retired.
- Seven riders are currently under suspension or left the sport because of drug involvement.
- The man to pick if you want a solid finish is Simoni, who has been top 10 in each of the past five years.  In fact, if you don't count the 2002 expulsion because of cocaine-tainted candy from his mom, 1998 was the last time Simoni was not in the top 10.
- Two other participants in this years Giro have made top 10 in three of the past five years.  My guess is that very few people could name them.   They are Franco Pellizotti and Juan Garate.

Time for some picks.  The race organizers made my picks easy this week with the last minute selection of Astana and insisting that they bring their stars.  They might not be on ideal form since the Giro was not part of the training plan but my picks in alphabetical order are Contador, Kloden and Leipheimer.

If I were forced to not vote a straight party ticket.  I would go with...
Contador
Piepoli
Nibali
 
Contador probably isn't in ideal shape right now but when he has raced this year he has been lights out.  Maybe by the second half of the race he will be in good form for the mountains.  I look at some of the stages like the finish on Passo Fedaia at the end of a brutal day of climbing, the Plan de Corones time trial and then the Gavia/Mortirolo stage and they seem like stages that he could go nuts.

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Received the phone call today that my hubs are in and the new wheels will be getting built up soon. They should be ready early next week. Time to get the some new tires bought. Leaning toward the Vittoria's.

Speaking of wheels, I ordered the disk wheel last night. Soon I will have wheels out the wazoo. With all the new wheels on their way there is now a little urgency for me to get the bike put together. Starting to look forward to a ride on the 'new' old bike.

Light rain was falling at the time I would normally leave for the Tuesday Nite Worlds. There was a green on the radar, too so I stayed home and tested myself on the trainer for a while. It can occasionally be boring, but I do like the trainer for a good solid workout. My legs are feeling like they got a workout. Maybe more than if I had raced.

There was a time not all that long ago that I actually knew how to race a crit. Those days seem long gone.

Giuseppe and I drove out to Washington Sunday for the "new" crit. Most of the course was part of last years circuit race so it was not entirely new. The main difference being a short, steep uphill that followed a winding descent. After a few practice laps I was not sure if I would like the course or not. It seemed pretty evident that you didn't want to get caught at the back of the pack as the pack strung out before the two hills.

Realizing this, I snagged a decent 2nd row spot at the line. The guys around me didn't exactly take off like rockets and neither did I. Five seconds into the race and there I was, virtually at the back of the pack, chasing. I went up the hill fine but things strung out up top, then down the hill and chase, chase, chase up the second hill. At that point, I had a chance to move up some and I didn't seize the opportunity and chose to catch my breath a little. Down the winding descent and the pack strung out again.... repeat the last lap. The last straw was getting cut off at the top of the short climb on lap four by he who wears yellow and white and then having to chase even more than the previous laps.

That was all there was to the day. Short and not so sweet. I rolled around and did a lap of last years course before heading back to the car and changing clothes. I grabbed the camera for some moving pictures and was headed to the course when I heard folks telling the officials there was a wreck. The pack came by one more time and then I looked across the lake and saw that the race had been neutralized with 5 to go as a cop car and an ambulance drove onto the course.

Unfortunately, the man down was frequent training partner Ken. Accounts from a few racers getting free laps were that it was an bloody scene and Ken didn't know where he was or what happened. After a lengthy stoppage, they ran out the final five laps. Eduardo snagged a decent 4th place and Giuseppe won a prime that he didn't even know about, but most people's thoughts were on Ken.

We stopped by the hospital on the way out of town. Ken was still in the emergency room but we were able to go in for a little while. His face was swollen, bloody and generally looked worse than any prizefighter that you can imagine after a fight.

He managed to avoid any serious injuries, thank goodness. But the healing, both physical and mental, will probably take a while to get over.

If I figure out this whole 'movies on the internet' thing I will upload the finish of the race.

In my apparent quest to lose fitness during the race season, I managed to ride once this week. Wednesday I was feeling ambitious and hopped on my bike right after work with the idea of doing some longer intervals down along the river bottoms.

My legs were feeling good and I was attacking the little hills on my way down. I reached Meramec Bottom and was faced with a road flooded sign. What? Somewhat disbelieving, I rode beyond the sign and wanted to see how far I could ride before the waters stopped me. As it turned out, not that far. Maybe a quarter mile. Frustrated, and unsure what I wanted to do for a workout, I headed through the subdivision streets and over to Suson to climb the hill in and out of the park several times.

I must have been more aggressive than I realized. My first time climbing out of the park I was woozy and gasping for air at the top. It freaked me out a little. I likely would have quit right then if there had not been a picnic table of about eight very attractive women to look at in the park. So, I repeated the hills another couple times. The other times were a little better but I was still gasping at the top. Maybe there was something in the air. Three times of that unpleasantness was enough and I headed home, disappointed with how I rode.

Yesterday, we were back over in Columbia. Like every weekend lately, it was uncomfortably cool and cloudy with a strong wind to add to discomfort. I started the ride very modestly because of today's race but also because of how I felt on Wednesday. After a looping route through Columbia we worked our way back past Lago di Gilmore, past the awful section of road when Giuseppe decided to attack. I followed but was breathing hard and had no desire to try and go around him. He finally let up, thank you very much, and Patrice countered. We both looked at each other but I had nothing.

After regrouping, we went on to Country Club where I snagged a cheap City Limit sprint before we went onward though Waterloo. We turned onto Andy Rd which means only one thing. Build speed on the downhill and go balls out up the other side. I had been on the front and about halfway down Patrice, Giuseppe, Ken, Marco and Gina all streamed past. I wasn't in a big hurry and was a good 30 ft behind the last person when I figured I had better go hard after all or be left in the dust. I was in a big gear and began passing the others. Two-thirds of way up Giuseppe let out a gasp and popped, leaving only Patrice still going pretty well but slowing a bit. Near the top, he grunted and was done as I went pushed onward. Rather than wait, I decided to push on and see how I recovered. I did okay and kept pushing and didn't stop until reaching the Columbia city limit sign a few miles away. It was a reasonably good effort.

Just as my spirits were lifted by the climb of Andy, Astana has had their spirits lifted by a last minute invite to the Giro d'Italia. One of the conditions seems to have been participation of Contador, Leipheimer and Kloden. That's a big asking price but Astana wasn't about to deny them despite their riders not having ideal preparation. In recent days, I had been thinking about how light the Giro field seemed. No Cunego, no Schleck and an aging Simoni. Astana's invite certainly lifts the level of competition.