Velochimp: Astrochimp on Cycling

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Team Milram is in a groove at the Vuelta. They have the big train rolling along and some of the pesky train breaking sprinters such as Oscar Friere are gone. So that just leaves new Italian Sprinting Alpha Male Daniele Bennati to contend with. His Lampre team is good, but not Milram [...]

(AFP/Jose Luis Roca)

Oh, AleJet. Your afterburners have not roared in a while. Not since the ban from the Tour de France for Sabutimol has AleJet been able to show the rest of the peloton the backside of his shorts. Not until today. After being involved in a doping issue that combined with Zabel’s EPO admission [...]

(photo from ALBERTO PIZZOLI/AFP/Getty Images)
No Ale-Jet putting on the afterburners in the sprint stages this year. The high levels of Salbutamol
during the Giro caused a non-negative test result. Milram suspended Petacchi pending the outcome of the case. Today Ettore Torri a CONI anti-doping prosecutor recommended to a one year ban for Petacchi to the Italian [...]

(Alessandro Petacchi of Fassa Bortolo wins in 2005)
Scroll to the end for the full start list for Milan-San Remo from tuttobiciweb.com
Filippo Pozzato gets the number one for being defending champ. Danilo DiLuca will not be lining up at the start due to the flu. Liquigas have a strong lineup featureing Enrico Gasparotto and Franco Pellizotti.
Tom [...]

Alessandro Petacchi si the King of the Etruscans. This makes no sense unless you are talking about the Gp Costa degli Etruschi one of the first races of the season in Italy. Alessandro Petacchi won the race for the third consecutive year and for his 120th win overall. Petacchi did have the usual bunch of [...]

Tom Boonen is clearly a step ahead in the first face-off of the season winning four stages in the Tour of Qatar. Boonen took the bunch sprint over Petacchi three times and was able to get into a break and avoid cross winds for a fourth stage win. Boonen missed the podium only once when [...]

(pic from letour.fr)
The sprinters battle is leaning heavily to Tom Boonen as he took his second consecutive stage win ahead of arch-rival super sprinter Alessandro Petacchi. The sprint was almost an exact repeat of yesterday’s stage win minus the brutal crash by Tom Steels which resulted in a broken collarbone.
The two wins so early [...]

Boonen Congratulates Team: pic from letour.fr
The “battle of sprinters” is taking shape as Tom Boonen took the first round in the Tour of Qatar. Boonen took the overall lead after winning the stage beating Alessandro Petacchi in a mass gallup to the line.

The Tour of Qatar is the first showdown between Alessandro Petacchi and Tom Boonen. Last year the two had some head to head battles leading up to the first big classic of the year. Milan San-Remo was supposed to be a showdown of the two sprinters, but Boonen’s Quick-Step teammate spoiled the battle with a [...]

David Millar completed his comeback from a two year drug suspension by winning the stage 14 time-trial stage. Millar beat TT specialist Fabian Cancellara by a split second to claim the win. Millar made a point to say that you can win clean in this sport.
Those that use the Millar line to determine who [...]