18 thoughts on “‘Doping meant red wine with eggs’”
Wow. Great Times article. Thanks.
For the last ten years or so, my wife and I have already left our place in Toscana by the time L’Eroica is held – usually missing it by just a week or so, much to my dismay. Next year though I REALLY want to participate in the event, even though I’m not a “joiner” kinda guy, preferring to ride either alone or with good friends. I’ve even got a Serotta stored over there that just squeaks under the pre-’87 rule and I think I can at least do the 75K route without too much blood, sweat and tears shed. I’ve spoken to a few folks who have ridden it, mostly Italians, and they all say you gotta do it, at least once. I’ve driven over all the roads the “race” goes over and it’s no picnic, that’s for sure. Thank god the Serotta has an old Campagnolo Racing T triple on it. [You may even remember that white Serotta Larry]
“One of these days” for us will probably mean once we retire to Italy and are there in the fall. This year the nice folks at l’Eroica saved my sorry ass, which you can read about here – http://cycleitalia.blogspot.com/2010/05/saturday-in-hell-or-heaven.html
if you like.
I’ve got a Bianchi old enough at the in-laws but it might be cooler to wait until we live there full-time and find “bici di epoca” (bicycles of the era) as they say, and go all the way.
I’ve been thinking about a CycleItalia itinerary in Toscana where we’d ride the marked l’Eroica route as the highlight and focus of a longer tour, probably breaking it into two pieces over two days with other gorgeous rides before and after. I figure most folks would not want to beat up their own nice road bikes on the dirt and gravel but we have plenty of Torelli rental bikes over there, all with low gears (30-26 on the triples or 34-29 on the doubles)so they could beat up our bikes instead. The brains of CycleItalia poopoos the idea, saying she doesn’t think enough crazies are out there to make an itinerary like this viable, especially since it would not be during the event. While I can see the interest in the event itself, I can also see interest in doing this like we do the Legendary Climbs….just us on quiet, peaceful, uncrowded roads rather than joining the mob during La Maratona delle Dolomiti. Like Davide, we’ve driven over quite a lot of l’Eroica’s route and it’s certainly gorgeous scenery.
My friend Maynard Hershon’s trying to talk me into doing Crooked Roubaix next year. Kind of the same idea in an American-style, you can ride whatever you want so my LeMond Poprad “winter bike” can get pressed into service for this one, all I need to do is yank off the fenders. Whether this old dog can enjoy 95 miles at altitudes from 7-10K feet is another story — and I doubt the food stops will be ANYTHING like those in Toscana!
Where is the Crooked Roubaix? Given that Maynard lives in or near Denver, it sounds like a ride in my neck of the woods.
K, it’s up around Winter Park. Here’s the link. The entry fee put me off — that and the drive to Winter Park, which involves some driving along the I-70 Industrial Tourism Corridor.
A guy could put together something similar in south-central Colorado, up around my old stamping grounds in Weirdcliffe. My favorite rides in that neck of the woods were a blend of chip-seal state highway, gravel county roads, BLM roads, jeep trails, horse trails and deer paths. Scenic as hell, and with a low point of about 8,000 feet. The high was, well, high.
I had the perfect bike for that sort of thing back in the day. It was a titanium Voodoo Loa cyclo-cross bike with a one-off Marzocchi suspension fork, a USE suspension seatpost, 700×40 tires and a low gear of 34×30. Basically a drop-bar 29er before anyone had ever heerd tella sech a thang.
I’m back from Bancroft, Iowa. I drove about 2,200 miles. God, some parts of Iowa are breath taking! I want to do RAGBRAI.
Larry T: I want to be a part of your Raviolipalooza. Take it on tour! I’ll be a roadie (for leftovers and an official t-shirt)!
Patrick: I’ll gladly pay for your meals. Just tell me when Chez O’Grady is open for business.
As for Contador, with all the plastic used to store bikie food/gels/drinks, I wonder if plastic doesn’t contaminate that stuff.
BTW, I ain’t defending him. I’m pretty sure Bordry saw the results and retired early, deciding not to go through the fallout.
Yours truly can drive to Winter Park from Sioux City easier than he can drive over to Toscana, even though the food, drink and lodging will certainly be substandard compared to l’Eroica
I could be in what is for me my mid-life crisis mode, thinking I’d better do this kind of thing BEFORE I get too old — which is something I try to convey to potential CycleItalia clients. Don’t postpone your dreams/desires, especially if they cost far less than Ferrari’s or adultery! (think what those skanks eventually cost Tiger Woods in his divorce settlement!)
$5 or 10K less in your retirement account won’t make much difference if you retire too old or physically unable to realize those dreams you put off for “someday”. Over and over again, first-time CycleItalia clients tell us how they wished they’d discovered “pedala forte, mangia bene!” with us sooner — they realize they could have been enjoying an Italian cycling vacation many times in the past, had they known just how great one can be.
The only thing keeping me from telling Maynard to “sign me up” for the Crooked Roubaix is wondering if a 95 MILE (95 kms is about my max these days) ride at that altitude (the 5K of elevation gain spread over that distance doesn’t sound too bad) will be fun enough…or turn into a “death march” where after 50 miles I’ll just want it to be over, since unlike l’Eroica, there are no shorter distance options available.
I’m too old to want to be totally wrecked nowadays, moderately beat up (as in struggling up Passo Stelvio or Gavia) is still OK but that’s my limit. If it’s gonna hurt more than that I figure someone should be payin’ me rather than vice-versa!
Larry sez: “Don’t postpone your dreams/desires, especially if they cost far less than Ferraris or adultery!” Troo dat, my brutha. My sis and I tried to convince our mom of this truism, and instead she just hung around her house here in Bibleburg, waiting for some fatal ailment to show up. It did, in the form of Alzheimer’s, and she got to spend her money on that instead of (or in addition to) fun stuff.
Ride across IOWA in JULY? Not me! Riding around in Iowa in August is rarely pleasant unless you enjoy stifling heat and humidity mixed with howling winds now and then. We’re in the mountains of Italy in July anyway so there’s no freakin’ way I’d ever leave there to come back HERE. Ravioli party starts Saturday around 4 pm and goes on until we run out of fillings or vino, whichever comes first.
South Colorado would be a nice ride from the sound of it. My other idea is to think up a nice, multiday course here in N. New Mexico. Something like Los Alamos to Abiquiu to Coyote to Cuba, down to San Ysidro (or cut overland on a cross bike on NM 126 directly from Cuba to La Cueva) and back to BombTown. Several of us have thought of doing that from time to time but as Larry said, there is always a reason to put it off. The food would be BYO as there ain’t much up there.
Khal: Is it possible to hire a chef (O’Grady?) for the Northern New Mexico trek? I have no idea how much something like that would cost, but it might be worth it. The route sounds really good.
Larry T: Good point about the weather. I was completely distracted by the amazing weather we had this weekend in Bancroft. I forgot it’s not always like that. As for having something else in your schedule in July, I get it. Ride in Italy. Eat amazing food. Enjoy good conversation. Repeat daily. Yeah, it’s a job, but someone’s gotta do it. (That loud thump you just heard was me passing out with envy.)
He sounds like a good chef to me, based on his posts. Would Shannon recommend him?
Reminded me of this joke.
Heaven and Hell
Heaven Is Where:
The French are the chefs
The Italians are the lovers
The British are the police
The Germans are the mechanics
And the Swiss make everything run on time
Hell is Where:
The British are the chefs
The Swiss are the lovers
The French are the mechanics
The Italians make everything run on time
And the Germans are the police
Someone gave me a t-shirt with “Heaven is…” on the back, I still have it! A note on the super-organized Swiss folks. An Italian guy explained to me once about how the Italians have managed to give the world so much wonderful stuff like food, wine, Campagnolo, Ducati, Ferrari, wonderful music, art, architecture, etc, etc. all while being invaded or occupied by pretty much everyone over the centuries.
The Swiss, with relative peace and prosperity for hundreds, if not thousands of years have managed to give the world………..the cuckoo clock!
Those chef gigs can be tough. I took over the kitchen once during a winter training-camp type thing in San Diego a few years ago. They put us up in a condo and the kitchen was decently equipped. A few runs down to Trader Joe’s had us pretty well set. We’d get back from the daily rides around 3 pm so I’d shower and get started right away on the night’s dinner. Each night an antipasto, a hearty first (carbs) and reasonable second (protein) plate plus a contorno of salad or cooked vegetables. Dessert was usually gelato affogato al caffe (vanilla ice cream “poached” in espresso) since we had an Italian-style coffee maker. There were only 6 of us altogether and they did mnost of the dishes, but taking care of dinner each night PLUS riding as much (if not as fast) as the others had me pretty worn out at week’s end. Or perhaps it was the couple of cases of vino our group consumed during the week?
This Crooked Roubaix thing has me thinking of doing the same at Winter Park, getting a condo and hauling up some stuff from Whole Paycheck so we’re not at the mercy of the local eateries. I’d bring my own espresso maker so we could avoid “Fourbucks”. Maynard and his crew might be conned into participating and sharing the expense and it would help me get used to altitude before I try to ride 95 miles up there!
Fun article – thanx OG.
Jeff In PetroMetro – RAGBRAI is a permanent fixture on my calendar. The Fun-O-Meter pretty much stays at 11 the whole week. Myself and several “Gym Teacher Friends” have been discussing the plasticize issue at length. There’s a little bit in the literature, but one of the main papers seems to have issues in our opinion.
I don’t “get” RAGBRAI even after living in Iowa for almost 15 years. Never have, probably never will. Nobody has ever explained to me the attraction of this event unless it’s the guzzling beer every night and passing out in your tent part..that’s pretty much all I hear about from the folks here in Iowa that do it every year. The frat-boy aspect is of zero interest to me. I’ve always wondered why the hell they do it in JULY when the weather is so often terrible. I came back from Italy this year just after the RAGBRAI party had left Sioux City and remember the gawdawful heat and humidity and hearing the stories of folks puking along the road. When I’m here in Iowa I want to ride on roads uncrowded with hungover folks who can’t ride a straight line. As Petro Jeff discovered, parts of Iowa are pretty, especially right now when we have some rare FALL weather with cold nights, warm sunny days and zero humidity. Most years fall is over in a matter of days but we’ve been paid back I guess for the torrential rains of the season with some truly delightful weather for the past two weeks or so!
Hey Larry T
I have been considering RAGBRAI for my first organized ride, but decided like you, that it’s WAY too friggin’ hot in Ioway that time of year! I am instead looking at the third of the triumvirate of the Bike Wisconsin rides, the Bike Northwoods. http://www.bikewisconsin.com/
Northern Wisconsin in mid-June is in a sane temperature zone not conducive to retching and crying like a little girl, and I hear they take great care of you. And i might actually be able to wrangle the time away from work in June without having to play catch up.
Can’t remember what the entry fee was, but all racers got a sweet deal at one of the swankier hotels. And I think the swag included a pair of $60 tires.
Mad Blog Media 
Wow. Great Times article. Thanks.
For the last ten years or so, my wife and I have already left our place in Toscana by the time L’Eroica is held – usually missing it by just a week or so, much to my dismay. Next year though I REALLY want to participate in the event, even though I’m not a “joiner” kinda guy, preferring to ride either alone or with good friends. I’ve even got a Serotta stored over there that just squeaks under the pre-’87 rule and I think I can at least do the 75K route without too much blood, sweat and tears shed. I’ve spoken to a few folks who have ridden it, mostly Italians, and they all say you gotta do it, at least once. I’ve driven over all the roads the “race” goes over and it’s no picnic, that’s for sure. Thank god the Serotta has an old Campagnolo Racing T triple on it. [You may even remember that white Serotta Larry]
“One of these days” for us will probably mean once we retire to Italy and are there in the fall. This year the nice folks at l’Eroica saved my sorry ass, which you can read about here – http://cycleitalia.blogspot.com/2010/05/saturday-in-hell-or-heaven.html
if you like.
I’ve got a Bianchi old enough at the in-laws but it might be cooler to wait until we live there full-time and find “bici di epoca” (bicycles of the era) as they say, and go all the way.
I’ve been thinking about a CycleItalia itinerary in Toscana where we’d ride the marked l’Eroica route as the highlight and focus of a longer tour, probably breaking it into two pieces over two days with other gorgeous rides before and after. I figure most folks would not want to beat up their own nice road bikes on the dirt and gravel but we have plenty of Torelli rental bikes over there, all with low gears (30-26 on the triples or 34-29 on the doubles)so they could beat up our bikes instead. The brains of CycleItalia poopoos the idea, saying she doesn’t think enough crazies are out there to make an itinerary like this viable, especially since it would not be during the event. While I can see the interest in the event itself, I can also see interest in doing this like we do the Legendary Climbs….just us on quiet, peaceful, uncrowded roads rather than joining the mob during La Maratona delle Dolomiti. Like Davide, we’ve driven over quite a lot of l’Eroica’s route and it’s certainly gorgeous scenery.
My friend Maynard Hershon’s trying to talk me into doing Crooked Roubaix next year. Kind of the same idea in an American-style, you can ride whatever you want so my LeMond Poprad “winter bike” can get pressed into service for this one, all I need to do is yank off the fenders. Whether this old dog can enjoy 95 miles at altitudes from 7-10K feet is another story — and I doubt the food stops will be ANYTHING like those in Toscana!
Where is the Crooked Roubaix? Given that Maynard lives in or near Denver, it sounds like a ride in my neck of the woods.
K, it’s up around Winter Park. Here’s the link. The entry fee put me off — that and the drive to Winter Park, which involves some driving along the I-70 Industrial Tourism Corridor.
A guy could put together something similar in south-central Colorado, up around my old stamping grounds in Weirdcliffe. My favorite rides in that neck of the woods were a blend of chip-seal state highway, gravel county roads, BLM roads, jeep trails, horse trails and deer paths. Scenic as hell, and with a low point of about 8,000 feet. The high was, well, high.
I had the perfect bike for that sort of thing back in the day. It was a titanium Voodoo Loa cyclo-cross bike with a one-off Marzocchi suspension fork, a USE suspension seatpost, 700×40 tires and a low gear of 34×30. Basically a drop-bar 29er before anyone had ever heerd tella sech a thang.
I’m back from Bancroft, Iowa. I drove about 2,200 miles. God, some parts of Iowa are breath taking! I want to do RAGBRAI.
Larry T: I want to be a part of your Raviolipalooza. Take it on tour! I’ll be a roadie (for leftovers and an official t-shirt)!
Patrick: I’ll gladly pay for your meals. Just tell me when Chez O’Grady is open for business.
As for Contador, with all the plastic used to store bikie food/gels/drinks, I wonder if plastic doesn’t contaminate that stuff.
BTW, I ain’t defending him. I’m pretty sure Bordry saw the results and retired early, deciding not to go through the fallout.
Yours truly can drive to Winter Park from Sioux City easier than he can drive over to Toscana, even though the food, drink and lodging will certainly be substandard compared to l’Eroica
I could be in what is for me my mid-life crisis mode, thinking I’d better do this kind of thing BEFORE I get too old — which is something I try to convey to potential CycleItalia clients. Don’t postpone your dreams/desires, especially if they cost far less than Ferrari’s or adultery! (think what those skanks eventually cost Tiger Woods in his divorce settlement!)
$5 or 10K less in your retirement account won’t make much difference if you retire too old or physically unable to realize those dreams you put off for “someday”. Over and over again, first-time CycleItalia clients tell us how they wished they’d discovered “pedala forte, mangia bene!” with us sooner — they realize they could have been enjoying an Italian cycling vacation many times in the past, had they known just how great one can be.
The only thing keeping me from telling Maynard to “sign me up” for the Crooked Roubaix is wondering if a 95 MILE (95 kms is about my max these days) ride at that altitude (the 5K of elevation gain spread over that distance doesn’t sound too bad) will be fun enough…or turn into a “death march” where after 50 miles I’ll just want it to be over, since unlike l’Eroica, there are no shorter distance options available.
I’m too old to want to be totally wrecked nowadays, moderately beat up (as in struggling up Passo Stelvio or Gavia) is still OK but that’s my limit. If it’s gonna hurt more than that I figure someone should be payin’ me rather than vice-versa!
Larry sez: “Don’t postpone your dreams/desires, especially if they cost far less than Ferraris or adultery!” Troo dat, my brutha. My sis and I tried to convince our mom of this truism, and instead she just hung around her house here in Bibleburg, waiting for some fatal ailment to show up. It did, in the form of Alzheimer’s, and she got to spend her money on that instead of (or in addition to) fun stuff.
Meanwhile, Charles Pelkey, wearing his ’Splainer hat, weighs in on the plasticizer issue.
Ride across IOWA in JULY? Not me! Riding around in Iowa in August is rarely pleasant unless you enjoy stifling heat and humidity mixed with howling winds now and then. We’re in the mountains of Italy in July anyway so there’s no freakin’ way I’d ever leave there to come back HERE. Ravioli party starts Saturday around 4 pm and goes on until we run out of fillings or vino, whichever comes first.
South Colorado would be a nice ride from the sound of it. My other idea is to think up a nice, multiday course here in N. New Mexico. Something like Los Alamos to Abiquiu to Coyote to Cuba, down to San Ysidro (or cut overland on a cross bike on NM 126 directly from Cuba to La Cueva) and back to BombTown. Several of us have thought of doing that from time to time but as Larry said, there is always a reason to put it off. The food would be BYO as there ain’t much up there.
Khal: Is it possible to hire a chef (O’Grady?) for the Northern New Mexico trek? I have no idea how much something like that would cost, but it might be worth it. The route sounds really good.
Larry T: Good point about the weather. I was completely distracted by the amazing weather we had this weekend in Bancroft. I forgot it’s not always like that. As for having something else in your schedule in July, I get it. Ride in Italy. Eat amazing food. Enjoy good conversation. Repeat daily. Yeah, it’s a job, but someone’s gotta do it. (That loud thump you just heard was me passing out with envy.)
He sounds like a good chef to me, based on his posts. Would Shannon recommend him?
Reminded me of this joke.
Heaven and Hell
Heaven Is Where:
The French are the chefs
The Italians are the lovers
The British are the police
The Germans are the mechanics
And the Swiss make everything run on time
Hell is Where:
The British are the chefs
The Swiss are the lovers
The French are the mechanics
The Italians make everything run on time
And the Germans are the police
Someone gave me a t-shirt with “Heaven is…” on the back, I still have it! A note on the super-organized Swiss folks. An Italian guy explained to me once about how the Italians have managed to give the world so much wonderful stuff like food, wine, Campagnolo, Ducati, Ferrari, wonderful music, art, architecture, etc, etc. all while being invaded or occupied by pretty much everyone over the centuries.
The Swiss, with relative peace and prosperity for hundreds, if not thousands of years have managed to give the world………..the cuckoo clock!
Those chef gigs can be tough. I took over the kitchen once during a winter training-camp type thing in San Diego a few years ago. They put us up in a condo and the kitchen was decently equipped. A few runs down to Trader Joe’s had us pretty well set. We’d get back from the daily rides around 3 pm so I’d shower and get started right away on the night’s dinner. Each night an antipasto, a hearty first (carbs) and reasonable second (protein) plate plus a contorno of salad or cooked vegetables. Dessert was usually gelato affogato al caffe (vanilla ice cream “poached” in espresso) since we had an Italian-style coffee maker. There were only 6 of us altogether and they did mnost of the dishes, but taking care of dinner each night PLUS riding as much (if not as fast) as the others had me pretty worn out at week’s end. Or perhaps it was the couple of cases of vino our group consumed during the week?
This Crooked Roubaix thing has me thinking of doing the same at Winter Park, getting a condo and hauling up some stuff from Whole Paycheck so we’re not at the mercy of the local eateries. I’d bring my own espresso maker so we could avoid “Fourbucks”. Maynard and his crew might be conned into participating and sharing the expense and it would help me get used to altitude before I try to ride 95 miles up there!
Fun article – thanx OG.
Jeff In PetroMetro – RAGBRAI is a permanent fixture on my calendar. The Fun-O-Meter pretty much stays at 11 the whole week. Myself and several “Gym Teacher Friends” have been discussing the plasticize issue at length. There’s a little bit in the literature, but one of the main papers seems to have issues in our opinion.
I don’t “get” RAGBRAI even after living in Iowa for almost 15 years. Never have, probably never will. Nobody has ever explained to me the attraction of this event unless it’s the guzzling beer every night and passing out in your tent part..that’s pretty much all I hear about from the folks here in Iowa that do it every year. The frat-boy aspect is of zero interest to me. I’ve always wondered why the hell they do it in JULY when the weather is so often terrible. I came back from Italy this year just after the RAGBRAI party had left Sioux City and remember the gawdawful heat and humidity and hearing the stories of folks puking along the road. When I’m here in Iowa I want to ride on roads uncrowded with hungover folks who can’t ride a straight line. As Petro Jeff discovered, parts of Iowa are pretty, especially right now when we have some rare FALL weather with cold nights, warm sunny days and zero humidity. Most years fall is over in a matter of days but we’ve been paid back I guess for the torrential rains of the season with some truly delightful weather for the past two weeks or so!
Hey Larry T
I have been considering RAGBRAI for my first organized ride, but decided like you, that it’s WAY too friggin’ hot in Ioway that time of year! I am instead looking at the third of the triumvirate of the Bike Wisconsin rides, the Bike Northwoods. http://www.bikewisconsin.com/
Northern Wisconsin in mid-June is in a sane temperature zone not conducive to retching and crying like a little girl, and I hear they take great care of you. And i might actually be able to wrangle the time away from work in June without having to play catch up.
Can’t remember what the entry fee was, but all racers got a sweet deal at one of the swankier hotels. And I think the swag included a pair of $60 tires.