Velochimp

Hopefully the craziness from Operation Puerto dies down long enough for some racing to take place in the next few days. I am all for stopping cheaters, but the way El Pais, and the Spanish authorities have run this latest scandal it is very irresponsible. The who scandal is being played out in the press and the A.S.O is willing to go with the innuendo and press reports rather than wait for cold hard evidence. It is also very contradictory that the A.S.O would give Jan Ullrich the green light to compete in the Tour while at the same time keeping out Astana-Wurth.

A.S.O, CAS, El Pais, LeMonde, L’Equipe and other organizations have been busy acting on drug stories ranging from reports on Lance Armstrong saying he used EPO to the latest list of implicated riders associated with Operation Puerto. All of these stories help to sell newspapers, especially as journalist are hungry for cycling related news as Tour time approaches.

What is disturbing is that the A.S.O is basing decisions on press reports that are not totally substantiated. El Pais seems to be the judge, jury and executioner as far as Jean Marie LeBlanc is concerned. They say most of the Astana-Wurth team is dirt, then good enough for him. There is plenty of circumstantial evidence from the past, but any decision to ban a team should be based on something more substatial.

Meanwhile, names of riders such as Jan Ullrich, Ivan Basso, Alehandro Valverde, Franciso Mancebo and more are having their names associated with the scandal. Should they all be excluded from the Tour based on the latest news?

At this point unless it is a story about someone who already tested positive such as Tyler Hamilton or Roberto Heras, the press and Spanish Authorities should keep the info to themselves and wait until they have a case or actual charges. What is the benefit of throwing names out to the public when there are no formal charges?

Jan Ullrich’s waistline is a huge issue each year. Here is an inside look at Jan’s early season training. You can see just how much weight Jan has lost from the spring time until now.

Video from http://www.tourdefrancegids.nl/

Ouch, the Paceline has links to some very bad commercials featuring Bob Roll all decked out in Disco gear. OK, it is not as bad as having Phil Ligget and Paul Sherwan goofing off on the set of OLN TV while trying desparately to win Trek gear. At least this time Bobke keeps his clothes on for the duration of the commercial. What ever happen to the cool Bob Roll? Here he is just being plain goofy.

(Damiano Cunego will scope out the Tour course just to get a taste)

The Italian contingent looks fairly strong in a race that traditionally is not a high priority. Twenty four Italians ranging from the oldest Giovanni Lombardi at 37 years old to Ricardo Ricco at 23 years old. Paolo Savoldelli and Ivan Basso are contenders for overall victory and several Italians such as Danilo DiLuca, Paolo Bettini and Stefano Garzelli will be hunting for stage wins. Sprinter Daniele Bennati will try to contest the sprints and possibly go for the Green Jersey against the like of Boonen, McEwen and Hushovd. Here is the list of Italians.

Discovery Channel
Paolo Savoldelli

CSC
Ivan Basso
Giovanni Lombardi

T Mobile
Giuseppe Guerini e Eddy Mazzoleni

Lampre
Damiano Cunego, Alessandro Ballan, Daniele Bennati, Marzio Bruseghin, Salvatore Commesso, Daniele Righi, Paolo Tiralongo

Quick Step
Filippo Pozzato e Matteo Tossato

Credit Agricole
Pietro Caucchioli

Cofidis
Cristian Moreni

Saunier Duval Prodir
Riccardo Ricco e Gilberto Simoni

Liquigas
Danilo Di Luca, Stefano Garzelli, Luca Paolini, Manuel Quinziato

Milram
Mirko Celestino, Fabio Sacchi, Marco Velo

http://www.tuttobiciweb.com/home.htm

(photo courtesy of Photoradius)

Last Saturday I raced in the Rochester Twilight Criterium. The race circles around downtown Rochester with several corners, and uphill and downhill section that are not very difficult, but get worse as you are going around at full speed. My race was the Cat5 over 30 competition which had a field of around 50 guys. The Cat 5 field was split between over 30 and under 30 probably to keep the fields smaller especially for Cat 5 fields which tend to be sketchy. The race started out with a bang as I was near the front of the group at the start of the race.

Through the first set of S turns a crash unfolded right in front of me as two guys touched wheels. The result was a mass pileup as riders were riding into the crash. I was able to avoid the crash and was lucky enough to not be right behind it. Unfortunately, the crash caused enoug of a gap that I had to chase back on in the downhill section, but the CCY team was controlling the front and keeping the pace resonable for a few laps as a three man break formed with a CCY guy in the mix.

This even pace allowed me to be in the front group for a bit. I was surprised after the first two laps to be in the front group which was down to around 25 or 30 guys. The crash and initial pace cut down the field to a resonable size. On each lap I was in the group, but could not stay near the front. Being in the back was tough as the accordian affect makes you use up more energy than necessary because you are either speeding up or slowing right down.

In the back section there is a figure 8 where I would be able to gain position which is just before the hill. Each lap, the hill would wear on me a bit and I would be dangling off the back of the group. Finally after I don’t know how many laps the rubbar band snapped. I just felt that I lost power at that point. Maybe I needed a breather, but I was just not fit enough to go the distance with the front group. I kept chasing, and was within sight of the front group for a few laps, but could not manage to get enough speed to get back on.

The race was eventually won by Brad Crosby a potential new Colavita teammate. His win allowed him to move up to Cat 4, a move that could have come much sooner since Brad has been tearing up the Cat 5 ranks this year placing no less than 3rd or 4th in most races.

As for my season, I feel like I am getting fitter, but am not anywhere near my best cycling form. This is the first season of full racing as the most races I’ve ever done in one season was two. This year I’ve done four races with mixed results. The form is coming along, the weight is going down, so it is only a matter of time before the ftiness comes together for a good result.

Next up may be the Glenns Falls Criterium on June 9th. Before then I may ride a century this weekend with my club to get a few miles in between the short Crits.

The Abs Diet Update
The Abs Diet is going well as I am into the second week. The weight is coming down, but it is hard to gauge since I use different scales which give me various results. The scale at the gym shows I lost about 5 pounds. I got a body fat scale which is all over the board. Overall, my pants fit looser and I did get some compliments on looking thinner. My belly seems to be a bit trimmer too. Watch for more info on this soon.

I raced the Rochester Twilight Criterium this past weekend. The course is lots of fun, the competition is fast, and the crowds are gigantic. 40,000 people lined the streets of downtown Rochester to see pros ride over 30mph. Many of the spectators were new to cycling and the speeds were impressive.

Rochester Twilight Criterium on Vimeo

El Pais is churning out stories from Operation Puerto on a daily basis and Tuttobici web has some translations to Italian. Velochimp kindly translates it for you while providing some insight.

Seems like information is starting to come out and names are being tagged with the documents. In all due respect, it is not fair to the cyclist in question to have their names drawn out in public especially if they have not been officially caught doping. There are rumors that Jan Ullrich’s name can be extrapolated from some of the documents. But without a positive test and simple speculation, it is not wise to throw accusations at Der Kaiser until all of the facts are conclusive.

One rider that did test positive and shows up in the documents related to Fuestes and Merino Batres is Tyler Hamilton. Among the documents are a 2003 season schedule for Tyler Hamilton and a fax number for Haven Parchinski who is Tyler’s wife which included a bill for services rendered. The bill included 35,000 Euro for medical services and 8,500 Euros for products. The 2003 season calendar shows that Tyler was to start administering two units of EPO daily starting on December 21st until December 24th. Then he would take doses every other day until January 9th. On January 14th before the winter training camp Hamilton started with the first extraction of blood and on the 24th he would begin the anabolic steroid treatments. In March Hamilton would take HMG as he would reduce the use of anabolic steroids. HMG is a hormone that promotes the creation of insulin.

The schedule shows that Tyler won Liege-Bastogne-Liege and the Tour de Romandie six days after taking a reinfusion of blood in April. In the month of May, Hamilton resumed the use of anabolic steroids and EPO. In June Hamilton drew blood, took growth hormone and IGF-1 and reinfused blood a few days before the start of the Tour. So the broken clavical that Tyler suffered during the 2003 Tour probably did not mean much since he was already juiced up beyond belief.

Be aware that these are documents seized by Spanish authorities and leaked to the press. The validitiy may be in question until there are either charges files or something official is done. But, with all of this current evidence and the positive test results it is very difficult to still Believe Tyler.

TuttoBici Web

Believe Tyler

With a little more than a week to go for the Tour de France, cycling news and cycling blog sites are getting a bit overzealous with their pre Tour analysis. It is a long two week run from the end of the Tour de Suisse to the start of the Tour de France next Saturday. In the meantime speculation about duels between Bjarne Riis and Johan Bruynel are running wild.

Podium Cafe a fine news/blog site has some overanalysis based on the most recent issue of Cycle Sport.

..has Bruyneel been using the entire season to lay a trap for Basso and Riis at the Tour? Consider, the two biggest weakness for Basso are his never having been in yellow (and taken responsibility for it), and his need to expend himself in the Giro. For his part, Riis had never won anything much before this year as a DS, and had blown his first real shot at a grand tour in last year’s Giro… to Discovery.

Meanwhile, Discovery are being extremely cagey about their own plans, giving Riis no real target to aim at. They have four plausible leaders, with little leaks aimed at giving the impression that Hincapie is their first choice. Could they be playing possum again? Is Popovych — whom nobody talks about — quietly building his form for the real run? Did Savolodelli back off in the Giro, claiming “allergies,” when in fact he was holding back from a futile effort to save some strength for the Tour, a course that suits him?

Not bad points at all, but consider that Popovich has not done very well in any Grand Tour overall. Lance Armstrong at least had a test run at the 1998 Vuelta before deciding to win the Tour de France. Popovych still needs to experience riding as a team leader. The Tour de France is not the place to learn, but the wide open competition could give Popy an opening. I don’t believe for a second that Hincapie is a GC contender. I agree that he is mostly a prop. One mountain stage win does not make you ready to take over as GC leader. Jens Voight gave away a victory to Juan Manuel Garate in the Giro’s toughest stage, but you don’t see Voight talking of going for a GC win in the Giro next year.

Salvodelli is probably the secret weapon in the Discovery stable. Bruyneel mentioned during the Giro that the Tour fits Savoldelli abilities better than the Giro. Savoldelli has been very low key since the Giro and he does know how to handle the role of team leader.

Next Pez Cycling News a very fine cycling news site has a different take on the Ullrich TT win in the Giro.

But Ullrich’s win had many astonished cycling fans overlooking an important detail – Ivan Basso actually beat Ullrich in both of the last two time checks clipping 14 seconds off Jan in the final 22 kms. Did Ullrich lose form in the second half of the TT? Or did Bjarne Riis, knowing that Basso had the Giro won, have something up his sleeve? Something like giving Ullrich a false sense of confidence with respect to Basso’s TT abilities, setting Jan up for a takedown in July?

Continue reading →

The process for the change of sponsorship from Liberty-Seguros to Astana has cleared the investigation by the UCI. This allows the team of Alexandre Vinokourov to be allowed to participate in the Tour de France. This is a big relief for Vino since there was a very real possibility that the team would not be cleared by the UCI thereby rejecting the ProTour license. That would make it easy for Jean Marie LeBlanc to reject Vino’s team from the Tour.

Now Vino and his Spanish climbing support team can relax and get ready for one of the flattest Tours in recent memory.

These jets are made for radio controlled airplanes and helicopters. But no one said you can’t strap them onto an old mountain bike? These turbines cost around 3k each. Not a bad price considering a sweet carbon bike will run you about as much. You will leave the competition in your after burners when you show up at the next criterium with these strapped to your road bike. Ale Jet stands no chance against a real jet.

Check out http://www.jetcatusa.com/ for the turbines.