Busy, busy, busy. It was amusing watching Saxo Bank try to croak the Astana boys today, especially when the apparently shelled Texus Maximus went rocketing up the hill as if he just couldn’t wait for another dope test.
But seeing poor Jens Voigt hit the deck at speed took a lot of the fun out of the workday. An “inherently dangerous sport,” as the USA Cycling release puts it, and sometimes a guy doesn’t just leap up, remount and ride on with his bloody ass hanging out of his shredded shorts. Here’s hoping the big German heals well and quickly.
All the cube farmers following the stage on VeloNews.com slowed the site to a crawl, so loading stories and photos afterward has been like trying to push volleyballs through a garden hose using a pipe cleaner.
Still, it beats getting a brain scan in the Grenoble hospital while nurses buff the gravel out of your face with a wire brush.
In keeping with our new Tour tradition, we're drinking a Spanish red this evening in honor of El Pistolero.
‘Berto Contador laid a patch about 6km long en route to Verbiers today, leaving everyone — including Texas Maximus — choking on the burning rubber.
The old fella looked like he’d thrown a rod by the time he finally crossed the finish line, more than a minute and a half later, and no wonder. Chasing that skinny Spaniard uphill, a guy must feel like Wile E. Coyote galloping after the Roadrunner. Meep meep — ka-pweeeeeng! Cue the eyeballs hitting the asphalt, ka-plunk.
Saxo Bank had a hand in Big Tex’s undoing, and they claim to have more of the same waiting for Super Spaniard, but they’ll have to catch him first. One dude unlikely to stand in their way is Cuddles Evans, who apparently had the legs of Olive Oyl on stage 15.
He was still better than Tex, though, which must leave Old No. 7 yearning for a cold Shiner Bock and a hot blonde. Tex was huffin’ and puffin’ at the back of the bus, getting a good strong whiff of Andreas Klöden’s farts — that is, until Klöden dropped him too.
In honor of the pissing match between Columbia-HTC and Garmin-Slipstream, we have abandoned traditional Tour practice here at Chez Chien (which is to drink only French wine) and quaff an American rosé, from Walla Walla, Washington.
The Tour of the Living Dead rolled on toward the Alps today, and I’ll be damned if I have any idea what the hell was going on. So many stories, so little time. Tell you what, though — these guys can’t be too tuckered out, ’cause a bunch of ’em were anaerobically jacking their foaming jaws post-stage.
Columbia-HTC’s George Hincapie got into an early break and just missed taking the yellow by five seconds; depending upon whom you read, he was screwed out of it by either Ag2r, Astana or Garmin-Slipstream. Teammate Mark Cavendish, meanwhile, got relegated for slamming the door on green jersey Thor Hushovd (Cervélo) in the bunch sprint.
Hinc’ initially blamed Astana for chasing before stalking into the team bus and refusing to speak to the press. But Big Tex and Johan Bruyneel say they wanted Hincapie in yellow so that Columbia would have to defend against the Schleck brothers, Cuddles Evans, et al., in the Alps. The team was on the front, yes, but merely riding tempo with the goal of getting Tex’s former chief lieutenant into the maillot jaune with two minutes to spare. So much for Tex’s policy against granting gifts in the Tour.
Tex and Bruyneel, along with a very irate Columbia honch’ Bob Stapleton, blame Garmin for spoiling Hincapie’s party, though Tex adds that Ag2r shares some of the blame for saying it would not defend Rinaldo Nocentini’s overall lead, then abruptly starting to ride as though their shorts were on fire.
Garmin’s Jonathan Vaughters, meanwhile, says it looked to him as though his boys were merely rotating through at the front of the peloton, trying to protect the GC positions of Bradley Wiggins and Christian Vande Velde. I like JV, but I’m not buying that one. I was watching TV, too, and that didn’t look anything like a casual rotation to me. The argyle boys were drilling it, along with Ag2r, and I don’t imagine director Matt White will have a whole lot of pals in the peloton going forward.
The Cavendish-Hushovd deal was an easier call. Cav’ simply tried to ride Hushovd into the barriers on a slight bend. Case closed. And now he’s gonna have a tougher time getting that green jersey back from the big Norwegian. Cav’ may win the points, but I bet Hushovd wins the fight in the parking lot afterward.
Tomorrow brings the 207km stage from Pontarlier to Verbier, with four Category 3s, one Cat. 2 and the Cat. 1 climb to the finish. Think that might get the big dogs to stop their monotonous barking and finally jump off that comfy porch? VeloNews editor at large John Wilcockson predicts that Nocentini will finally lose that yellow jersey — but he’s not expecting much in the way of an early challenge to the nut-lock Astana has on the GC.
Ho hum. Paging Bernard Hinault … Monsieur Hinault, to the yellow courtesy phone, please. . . .
• Late update:VeloNews Euro’ correspondent Andrew Hood advises via Twitter: “ChaseGate continues to churn; circus outside Garmin bus tomorrow; by 5 p.m. tomorrow, all will be forgotten. AC-LA duel is real story.”
• Even Later Update: The NYT gives Garmin-Slipstream a little positive press with a slideshow on how (and what) the team eats.
John Wilcockson says this Tour has not been easy, and he should know, having covered 40 of them. Hell, anyone who’s ever raced a bike over any distance knows there can be no such thing as an “easy” Tour. Twenty-one stages covering 2,200 miles? Puh-leeze. That’s a job of work, is what that is.
But just because something is difficult doesn’t make it entertaining. If such were the case, ditch-digging, coal mining and bricklaying would be on TV instead of football, basketball and baseball. And while this Tour has had its obvious difficulties, it has been less than entertaining for those of us who like to follow the fight for the yellow jersey.
We’re two weeks into this Tour and the maillot jaune has yet to adorn the shoulders of anyone expected to have a chance of taking it home from the Champs-Èlysées. Just two men have worn it — Saxo Bank’s Fabian Cancellara and Ag2r’s Rinaldo Nocentini — and the only reason Nocentini has kept it for six days is that nobody wants to battle Astana for it.
Astana had four guys in the top 10 until Levi Leipheimer crashed out, and for them Nocentini is a rolling coat hanger, holding the jersey for them until they’re good and ready for it. It’s like an extended version of the coronation stage into Paris. The only thing missing is the obligatory shot of a grinning maillot jaune toasting himself with a glass of champagne.
No wonder Bernard Hinault is so cranky. This Tour isn’t about working men earning a living — it’s about a rich one awaiting his inheritance.
• Extra-Credit Friday Foolishness: Jefferson County, apparently eager to out-dummy the bike-hating feebs in Larimer County, has announced plans to seek statewide legislation that would let counties ban bicycles from county roads as they please, warns Bicycle Colorado. According to a story in the Columbine Courier, the county attorney will draft the proposed legislation, and then Jeffco will try to find some brain-damaged geek in the Statehouse to sponsor it in the 2010 session. You may send NastyGrams® to the Jeffco commissioners by clicking here.
Logged onto the Versus video this morning to catch the final kilometer of today’s Tour stage. Cav’ wins again; ho hum. GC unchanged. Close the laptop. Move along, move along, nothing to see here. More of the same tomorrow.
It was refreshing to read Andrew Hood’s interview with Bernard Hinault, who clearly is as bored as the rest of us. Asked what riders should do to break Astana’s stranglehold on GC, the Badger replied succinctly: “Attack! It’s necessary to attack. There are not 36 solutions, just attack!”
I followed Hinault’s advice and attacked, sprinting to the garage, grabbing my second-best Steelman and riding north along the New Santa Fe Trail into the Air Force Academy. The trail exhibits some erosion from the recent heavy rains, but it’s still easily handled on a cyclo-cross bike, though I saw plenty of sissies on mountain bikes. Army types, no doubt. Or maybe swabbies.
Just short of the North Gate, I veered right and tunneled under I-25 to Voyager Parkway, then hung a right to Highway 83. Lots of cheesy Rancho Pendejo-style shitboxes in that neck of the peckerwoods, along with a few half-built shoppettes. If it weren’t for the Zoomie Zoo, Pikes Peak and Nude Life Church you could be anywhere — SoCal, Phoenix, Cleveland, you name it.
I rolled along 83 until just past Academy Boulevard, then took a side street behind a struggling strip mall, crossed Woodmen and picked up the bike path again just past the Nissan dealership, southbound this time. It made for about two hours in the saddle, 30 miles or so, and an interesting study in contrasts.
The wingnut fucktards who rail against the feddle gummint while praising the private sector to the skies ought to take this ride sometime. ‘Cause if it weren’t for the feddle gummint and its Air Force Academy, the private sector would’ve covered that beautiful trail and the 18,000 acres surrounding it with Rancho Pendejo shitboxes about 30 years ago.
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