the season has started

So here we are at race season again. w00t!! I get to obsess and wax poetic about a sport that even participants in find a bit hard to watch. So, goings on in the Tour of Qatar; Team Slipstream continues to impress. Even with the loss of "Big Maggie" to a broken collarbone Slipstream continued to put their young sprinter Chris Sutton in the top 10 everyday, eventually landing him just off the podium for 4th place in the stage race. Congratulations Chris and Team Slipstream.

Maggie says he'll be ready for Paris Roubaix.

Go Slipstream

Does this mean I gotta go buy a burrito now??

I haven't been talking much politics recently mostly because I've been getting over saturated with all the coverage of the primaries and the last state of the union. (thank god! only 350 or so days left) But as it stacks up now it is essentially a 2 horse race on either side. McCain/Romney and Clinton/Obama.

I would perfer to see Romney run only for the fact that I think he is more obviously insane and more likely to melt down under the national spotlight. McCain, just 8 years ago was pulling conservative dems and is a far more savvy politician, far better at fooling people who dont listen carefully.

Now that Richardson is out, as is Edwards and Kucinch (sp?) it's down to who we all knew were going to be there at the end. Clinton and Obama. I have a hard time with Hillery for a number of different reasons. Bush-Clinton-Bush-Clinton is the first. I think that we should have more than 2 families in the white house over the course of 36years (George the 1st was VP in 1980, if Hillery were to serve 8, she'd leave office in Jan '17) That and the fact that as a women in a man's world, I'm afraid that she would make overly aggressive decisions in order to prove that she was every bit as tough as all the guys. Also her vote on the Kyle Lieberman amendment, naming Iran's Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization, after the Iraq authorization 4 years earlier she should have known better than to allow GW that kind of authority. He immediately ratcheted up the saber rattling until the NIE came out disputing the fact that Iran was seeking a nuclear weapon. And at the end of the day we can still talk about the fact that she has taken more money from the industrial military lobby, the pharmaceutical lobby, and the insurance lobby than anyone else democrat or republican. Did I mention the fact that she is probably the most divisive figure in the race on either side??

Yes I know there are other contenders still in on both sides, but none are going to affect anything, not even Huckabee.

So Super Tuesday is 4 days away, lets hope the democrats havent shot themselves in the foot (again)

All this and Mrs. Culimerc has already said I get to go riding both Sat and Sun. w00t!!

John Doe and Slipstream to the Giro

So, its been a week now and guess who's in the news again!! That's right, our boys over at Rock Racing.

So here's the deal; a couple of days ago a story comes out that a rider identified as "John Doe" is suing the USADA in order to stop the test of a "B" sample, after the "A" sample came back clean. Everybody's first question is "why" and the second question is of course "who is John Doe". Now why is the USADA testing a sample that has already been deemed negative. That's a fair question, especially when taken with the fact that teams need to submit their rider list to the Tour of California by Mon. and one of the new rules is no riders allowed who are even under investigation. Could this second test be viewed as an investigation?? And how many times should a rider have to pass screening with the same sample?? Are they testing for different agents?? Then again, if you've already passed the screen and you havent been doping, because we all know that cycling is all cleaned up now with the new attitude going around and all the testing being done, what are you afraid of?? So that is Thursday's news.

Friday's news?? Rock Racing's Kayle Leogrande is John Doe. Shocker Huh?? Kayle is probably literally the most colorful man in the peleton. He owns a tattoo parlor and is completely covered neck down in tats'. Dont get me wrong I like tattoo, I've got a couple and will be getting more and I think we need more people out there with tattoo so it ceases being some sort of discriminative choice. But between that and Michael Ball's antagonistic tirades you gotta know something like this is gonna happen. I do really hope the guy is clean. He's fun to watch, and I'm not ready for Rock Racing to implode quite yet.

In other happier news; Slipstream got an invite to the Giro in May!! Yay!! Go Slipstream!! And today was the start of the Tour of Qatar. An 8k team time trial was used as a prologue. I like team TT's and I wish ASO would put them back in the TdF. Anyway, Slipstream was holding on to the top spot with only one team to go. Quickstep, last years Tour of Qatar ended up finishing with the day's best time by just 2 seconds. But Big Maggie and David Millar drove the team to quite the impressive first showing. Beating 15 other teams including 7 pro tour teams. Way to go guys. Oh yeah, who runs the tour of Qatar?? ASO. Who was in the stands?? Tour Boss Christin Prudhomme. And while Mr Prudhomme hasnt actually said the Slipstream will be invited, he has said that he wants an American team there and that Slipstream's doping policy's and controls are in line with what he wants to see at the tour this summer. The ASO are really tired of scandal and are hoping for a comparatively quiet July.

Go Slipstream!!

Oh yeah and I got to haul my fat ass out for a ride today. 39 miles and my legs were starting to soften. Its gonna be a long early season at this rate.

Cipo joins the Circus

So apparently Michael Ball is easing up a bit. It took a whole 9 nine days for Rock Racing to show up in the news again. News this morning was that Rock Racing was close to signing none other than Super Mario to its ranks. As the rumor goes Mario will being doing a little bit of both racing and director sportif'ing. In the absence of Frankie they needed someone who know what they were doing to drive the car and direct the team. As a continental racer you cant ask for much better than Super Mario. Dont get me wrong this is great stuff for American Racing. A true cycling Rock Star showing up across the country even as director sportif will help draw crowds. It just seems, .....like Michael Ball is determined to buy himself some credibility no matter what, rather than doing it the old fashioned way. Earning it.

Cipo on the other hand was told that he owes the Italian Govt 1.1 million bucks. So everybody's got something out of this. Michael Ball has a shiny new toy that no one else has, as well as, a sprinter that even at the age of 41 can probably finish at the front of the American Crit scene, a director sportif, and a new buddy that will attract even more HOT chicks than he does. Cipo gets a well paid cush job, and a closet full of designer jeans. I swear 'Vegas ought to sponsor this team.

Are we taking bets on when the wheels fall off this sideshow??

Polls vs. Reality and more Rock Racing

So here it is and another week is gone and another primary and another Rock Racing scandal.

So New Hampshire votes. The media picks Obama by double digits. Hillary pulls it out in the end by 3 points. Couple of things here to mention. First the media is beside itself with "how could it be so wrong". "But this isnt what the polls showed". Know what the polls did show? As many as a 1/3 of voters were either undecided or not completely sure. Not sure about your fuzzy math, but mine puts that at 30+ points. That would make the outcome well within "the margin of error". Also there were a couple of other things to take note of. The press is now wondering what does Obama do with this stunning upset. News flash folks, before Iowa, Obama was 12 points down on Hillary, a week later he is in a basic draw with her (both took the same # of delegates). 12 points in a week, that's not a loss, thats a good week. Also, Obama finished with almost the exact percentage given to him in the polls on Mon. before the primary (lo 30's), Hillary took more of the "undecided" than expected thats all.

Two other notes, first Bill Richardson had announced he will withdraw from the race starting tonight. Too bad, I would have liked to have how he did once the west started voting. And less than 1% of registered voters have expressed who they would like to see in the general election. Lets hope we dont know for sure who is going to be nominated by the time we get to Denver. That would be a great show.

New week, new Rock Racing scandal. Joining Tyler and Santiago Botero at Rock Racing is fellow Operation Puerto veteran Oscar Sevilla. This one week after Frankie Andreu left due to "managerial differences". Also in the rumor mill surrounding Mike Ball and his merry band in none other than Floyd Landis. Apparently Floyd has been invited to the training camp and to join the organization in any manner that would not violate his UCI ban, which is none. Somebody tell Michael Ball that no means no. Still Floyd has been invited to hang out with the guys etc etc in with no official responisbility. Michael Ball has said that he likes to give people a second chance, and I for the most part agree with him. But loading your team with unrepentant dopers at the end of their career just smacks of stupidity. Whatever. Sponsors are running for the hills with this one. Rock Racing had stated that they wanted to be invited to some of the premiere races in Europe this summer , yet somehow they overlooked the fact that they applied for the wrong license. Nice attention to detail. Oh yeah, he also tried to talk Super Mario into a US comeback while they were in Vegas. Nice.

Benazir and Tyler

So its been a while since my last post, what with the holidays (fill in cliche excuse here.)

So much has happened and yet I find myself trying to figure out what exactly I can write about.

The first and most obvious choice is the news of the day; in this case the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. This is a tragedy whose repercussions will be felt for years to come. She was the one truly humanist person who could actually lead Pakistan out of the custerfuck its in. Wildly popular and uncommonly pragmatic, she posed a serious threat to the interests of many throughout that part of the world. A threat to Musharraf in the fact that her party would probably have been able to enough people in office to vote her in as Prime Minister. A threat to Islamic extremists and Al Qaeda because not only was she a woman of power, but she was educated in the west and would have increased liberties and education of women and the population as a whole, which would lead to losses for their causes.

This said; I wont go on, because I dont really know enough about the situation and this part of the world to speak with any kind of confidence or offer any sort of insight. What I do know is that it is a loss of immense proportion for the people of Pakistan, for the United States, for the stability of that part of the world, and for Democracy world wide.


On to something of for less import. BIKE RACING!!!

Michael Ball, the bombastic owner of Rock Racing, of whom I've spoken here before, has hired Tyler Hamilton to race here in the US. Now let's get this straight, Tyler has served his time and deserves the right to be able race his bike. Racing organizations in Europe aren't going to let this guy race on any kind of real stage, so welcome home Tyler. It'll be good for American Racing, it'll be good for both the domestic teams and the promoters. Michael Ball and his strategy of hiring the best "doping orphans" will certainly raise both the level of the racing and the profile of those races. If this is how we get more people on bikes and more bikes on TV, I'm all for it. Good on Ya' Mike and Rock Racing!! If Rock Racing implodes in an avalanche of doping scandals, I'll be the first one in line with my "Dopers Suck" shirt looking for the Rock Racing team vehicles.

And no I'm not buying a Rock Racing Jersey (yet)

Go Slipstream!!

End Of an Era

Its the end of an era in Cycling. Team T-Mobile is done; stick a folk in 'em its over. Too bad really, I've got fond memories of watching big german guys dressed up in pink riding rough shod over everybody else in the mid 90's. They came from almost no where. At the end of the 80's there no german cycling teams at all. By '95 not only was there a solid team, that team had chalked up a big pile of race wins including multiple green jerseys (courtesy of Eric Zabel) and the first of two tour de france yellow jerseys. Thank You Bjarne Riis and Jan Ullrich.

Ullrich had the unfortunate timing to run directly up against Lance Armstrong. Jan finished second to Lance 4 times, and second to Riis in '95. Quite possibly the most bittersweet palmere in the history of cycling.

Either way starting in 2005 and coming to a head in June '06 with the firing of Ullrich, T-Mobile was plagued by doping allegations dating back to the good ol' days. Most of the major players from that time have coped to doping and the German press has been quite happy to hammer away at them for it. Dont get me wrong DOPERS SUCK.

In 2006, after the firing of Ullrich and Godfroote (team director since 92) the now T-Mobile hired American Bill Stapleton as team director. Bill made significant changes. He fired the team doctors, who both later ended up being charged by the german authorities for distributing doping products. He hired a bunch of new young talent, and he did pretty well this year. Some good solid wins, inc. a mountain top finish at the tour thanks to the baby faced Linus Gerdemann.

But there were more doping convictions, Patrick Sinkewitz being the final straw. Even tho T-Mobile reaffirmed their support for the team in Aug. The new CEO Hamid Akhavan could continue to risk negative exposure and terminated T-Mobile's sponsorship effective immediately. Such is life

Bob Stapleton has promised that the team will continue without its title sponsor under the name of "Team High Road".

Thank You Bob Stapleton!! Good Luck Team High Road!!

I'll still be rooting for Slipstream this year.

Dopers Suck.