A short note to observe the contract position of Vincenzo Nibali. The rider known as “The Shark of Messina” has a contract with his Liquigas team that expires at the end of the year and he and his agent are busy trying to get the best deal by looking at other teams.
Today’s stage starts with a moment of remembrance for Wouter Weylandt who lost his life during Stage 3 last year.
The last day in Denmark, today’s stage is a circuit race with the start and finish in in Horsens. Riders start and do a 100km loop, then another 45km loop, then they return to Horsens to face three finishing laps of 15km in and around the city.
For the daily previews I’ve included the stage profile diagrams to illustrate the day’s racing. But Stage 1 is better depicted by the aerial map of the course, especially since the course is quite flat. Riders start at the green point on the map above. The route looks like the path out of a maze.
It’s hard to pick a clear favourite for the Giro d’Italia. There’s no obvious star name. Instead there are several contenders on a similar level and then a collection of outsiders, mainly mountain specialists who could also shine. To make forecasting even harder many of those taking part have not had the best run of results recently which makes it tougher to judge their form.
But if these reasons make predicting the outcome even harder, all the better. The uncertainty should make for a more open race where riders could be battling to win seconds, as opposed to Alberto Contador’s victory lap of Italy in 2011.
You’re probably male and aged between 25 and 45. No, this blog doesn’t have some high-tech way to monitor readership, it’s more that men in this age group are the biggest followers of cycling in the US, UK and Australia and other English speaking countries so there’s a good chance you fit into this category as you’re reading an English-language niche cycling blog.
Regardless of your age, gender or location, I’m pretty certain you’re a big fan of cycle sport. A casual fan might visit cyclingnews.com from time to time, a blog like this one is more specialist. But in both cases we’re talking about some actively seeking news, results and more. And this is quite different from the vast majority of those who watch races. When it comes to watching bike races, cycling fans are a minority.
A bicycle race is a simple affair with some riders, a start and a finish. But the organisation and management of professional cycling is complicated by rules, law, money and business.
The news that pro cycling teams could get a share of the TV rights money paid by broadcasters would mark a significant change to the way business is done today. Here is a look at some of the issues surrounding revenue sharing. For now we don’t have much detail so it remains to be seen whether this is just some extra cash for the teams or a structural change to the way the sport is organised.
| Rider | Team | Kilometres Raced in 2012 |
| Andrea Guardini | Farnese Vini – Selle Italia | 6,214km |
| Cristian Benenati | Farnese Vini – Selle Italia | 6,015km |
| Tom Boonen | Omega Pharma – Quick Step | 5,638km |
| Luis Leon Sanchez | Rabobank | 5,586km |
| David Arroyo | Movistar | 5,579km |
| Thomas Voeckler | Europcar | 5,484km |
| Kenny Van Hummel | Vacansoleil | 5,466km |
| André Greipel | Lotto – Belisol | 5,451km |
| Martin Kohler | BMC | 5,301km |
| Alessandro Ballan | BMC | 5,282km |
Today is International Workers’ Day and a good time to look at the hardest workers in pro cycling. Thanks to Cycling Quotient we can see who has raced the most this year.
The Giro d’Italia guide is now online. There’s a concise preview of every stage as well as information on the jerseys, the start list, TV viewing and more. It is posted on a separate page of the website: https://inrng.com/giro. To dip in and out during the next four weeks use the “Giro d’Italia” link available … Read more
Bradley Wiggins sprints to win Stage 1 of the Tour de Romandie. There’s rarely a single winning moment in a stage race, instead a series of consistent performances. In plain arithmetic third place in the prologue and victory in the final mountain time trial delivered the result. But so did the sprint victory with the 10 second time bonus and above all the sign of confidence.
As well as watching Wiggins we also saw Luis Léon Sanchez in action and Andrew Talansky confirmed his talent too, more of which below.
Thomas Voeckler got played yesterday. Shortly after finishing Liège-Bastogne-Liège the Frenchman made his way to Frankfurt airport to fly out to Gabon. Once a French colony, today an oil-rich state on the west coast of Africa with exceptional wildlife, Gabon also has an annual bike race, the Tropicale Amissa Bongo. Named after a member of the Bongo family that rules the nation, the race has a diverse field of teams with Europcar.
Sadly the results are hard to come by. I can’t see them on cyclingnews.com but instead the superb AstanaFans.com has coverage (in Russian) because the Astana development team are riding, and with some success. The photo above by Elena Ryabovol shows the conditions for one of the stage transfers with riders, staff and media loaded into a military transport plane.