A rest day still means riding

Team Sky rest day ride

It’s a rest day in the Giro d’Italia today. With two weeks of racing you’d imagine there are some tired riders by now but yesterday saw riders doing seven to eight hours across the mountains, with 6,500 vertical metres in one go. I think it was the most mountainous stage of any race ever seen at pro level.

Add in the cold weather to mean even more calories get burned up, not to mention the previous day’s leg busting climb of the Zoncolan and if there was every a welcome day of rest it’s today.

But what do the riders do? It varies. Many simply have nothing to do. Used to a daily routine of eating, racing, travelling and sleeping, suddenly there’s a change, a lot of time to waste. It’s welcome but can feel awkward too as time can pass slowly, stuck in a sleepy hotel in a ski resort normally that’s more at ease in winter.

Read more

On amnesties

Pro cycling struggles to escape the past. As much as we want to look to future races, scandals from a decade ago rumble on. Even watching live coverage of a race means noting riders linked to ongoing investigations, appeals as well as those previously banned and maybe some you just can’t bring yourself to trust.

So the idea of drawing a line under a colourful history is attractive, a way to distance the sport from events that are getting pretty old. Some are calling for an amnesty, for cycling’s version of the “truth and reconciliation” hearings that helped to heal a post-Apartheid South Africa. In return for coming forward and confessing to past mistakes, those who go public could get an amnesty from prosecution. Only I just don’t see this working.

Read more

It’s not about the bike rider

60 minutes

Just a short post to say with all the talk of Lance Armstrong’s former team mates singing to the media and the ongoing investigation, one thing to remember is that this isn’t the trial of Lance Armstrong. Instead it’s an investigation into a potential misuse of public funds in the US.

Obviously Lance Armstrong is very prominent, he is a celebrity whose name goes well beyond the sport of cycling and few know about Johan Bruyneel or Bart Knaggs. But this isn’t about Armstrong, or rather it’s got the potential to involve a much wider cast of characters.

Read more

A long week ahead in the Giro for riders and fans alike

Contador and Rujano

If Monte Crostis is off the menu following a ruling from the race jury last night, today still sees the climb up Monte Zoncolan. This is probably the hardest climb used in any major race. It’s just 10km long but averages 12% and has sustained sections of over 20%. But for all it’s difficulty, it looks like Alberto Contador and José Rujano are on a higher level than the other contenders.

There’s still over a week to go in the Giro and as exciting as today’s stage looks on paper, I worry the result is a foregone conclusion. The climb up Etna saw Alberto Contador take the lead, with José Rujano clinging to his wheel. Yesterday saw the same scenario, with Contador attacking and only Rujano could follow. In the end Contador appeared to gift the win to the Venezuelan.

Read more

It’s almost impossible to write about Armstrong

Tyler Hamilton Lance Armstrong Floyd Landis

This might appear contradictory but I struggle to write about Lance Armstrong each time a new controversy blows up… yet here’s some words on the subject. Today’s allegations by Tyler Hamilton are the latest instalment of an ongoing saga. It’s not that the subject matter lacks ideas, angles to explore or it’s irrelevant to the sport. Quite the opposite, Lance Armstrong’s name reaches well beyond the sport of cycling and it covers everything from sport to business to law and more.

No, it’s the way everything goes around in circles. Someone accuses Armstrong of doping. We get the “most tested athlete” response from the man. Then cycling fans rally. Many loyal ones point out that no court and no sporting body has ever convicted him. On the other side fans dredge up a variety of circumstantial evidence. We go nowhere.

Read more

Sprinters quit the Giro d’Italia

Cavendish
Finished line

Yesterday saw the last flat stage for the sprinters in the Giro and predictably Mark Cavendish won. Perhaps equally predictably several sprinters have left the race overnight, Cavendish included. Every single remaining stage of the Giro now contains some serious climbing… except the final time trial stage in Milan.

Blunt truth
What’s most surprising for me is not the departure but the open way riders talked about this. Sprinters are unsuited to the high mountains in the same way mountain climbers struggle with cobbles. But there’s long been a tradition of waiting to be eliminated by the broom wagon or, whisper it, citing illness or injury. The TV interviews with Cavendish and Alessandro Petacchi were quite different with both saying “I’m going home this evening”.

Read more

The official Giro song

The clip above is of Italian singer Paolo Belli, supported by the band QBeta, and his song “Faccio Festa” (“I party”) which is the official song of the Giro d’Italia. If you’ve been watching the free live coverage by Italian broadcaster RAI on the internet then you’ll have heard it.

Read more

UCI to ban doped directors?

McQuaid Valverde
Prizes, yes. Management role, maybe not

I was alerted by a reader this morning to the BBC’s two-part look at doping in cycling. The second part features a brief interview with UCI President Pat McQuaid where he mentions the prospect of banning riders involved in doping scandals from working in the sport. Here’s a snapshot:

“I’m not happy there are team managers who have been doping as athletes themselves… …Any cyclist who is involved in a doping infraction in their career cannot come back into management of a team in the future”

This is an idea that McQuaid will present to colleagues at the next Management Committee meeting in June, the UCI’s high-level decision making forum. It would mark a big change. But would it work?

Read more

+ More