Pro Cycling Darwin Award

First off, I'd like to apologize for not posting this earlier. I have to admit that between being called off to all parts of the globe for work and having to read all the votes cast myself, it's been a hectic month. Thank goodness for email, otherwise I'd be buried underneath a Mont Ventoux of correspondence. Thanks to all who voted.

Reading these responses reinforced some of the frustrations I've had with the cycling media surrounding the most beautiful sport in the world. Opening any magazine to any page, readers will find lengthy laments on the woes of drugs in sport and how it's headed to the outhouse due to multiple positives and cheating in general. Letters to the editor are full of those who are now looking for another sport to confide in since their heroes have turned out to be farces on tubulars [I'm dying to know which one they choose]. "Journalists", like the gold digging David Walsh, have helped cycling reenter the headlines, not by writing about the epic conquests of multiple Tour winners or mud splattered exploits of breakaway kings, but instead through unveiling unethical behavior in the sport and have made a small fortune off the various scandals in the name of healthy skepticism. 

This future Journo World Champion's steadfast confidence and adoration of bicycle racing is unfazed. Guys like David Walsh and his fellow, French tut-tutters should focus on actual scandals that affect the lives of people, instead of cashing in on the woes of cycling. Imagine if Walsh had squinted at the 2000 presidential election, that saw redistricting and ballot inconsistencies in Florida bring Bush the American presidency, or if he'd interviewed and cross examined the heads of Enron, who have plunged the state of California into debt. Maybe it doesn't pay as well. Journalists through the ages have seen their careers dissolve for whistle blowing, and guys like Walsh may be considered genius for sticking to the soft spots in the news like diversions in sport.

Perhaps he could discuss the allegations that T-Mobile spied on a journalist and many of its board members. Der Spiegel reported in May that the telecommunications giant and former cycling uber sponsor had unlawfully surveilled business journalists and Telekom shareholder Blackstone through their land and cellular telecommunications. These allegations could bring indictments ranging from violation of the secrecy of telecommunications to bribery and extortion. In November of last year, I, and many other cycling journalists, received the official notice from T-Mobile announcing their withdrawal from the sport as a team sponsor. Citing a will to "...separate our brand from further exposure from doping in sport and cycling specifically...,", T-Mobile unamercedly backed out of a contract set to last into the next decade.

These allegations are certainly more unethical than the use of performance enhancing drugs. One can understand the will of a corporation trying not to look bad when they're doing bad things. Invisibility is key to a criminal getting away with murder, and T-Mobile was busy covering their butt when they decided that sticking to their team commitments might bring the company bad press. Since this story broke, T-Mobile has enjoyed mass customer exodus [including myself] and a full investigation from the German Finance Ministry and public prosecutor. 

Imagine if they'd been able to present a few Tour stage wins as compensation for all the bad press they've deservedly received through illegal business practices this year. Think of the defense for the common good they'd have been able to cite by rewarding Bob Stapleton's efforts for fairness in the sport by maintaining their sponsorship. If they had honored their contract, it would have been T-Mobile enjoying the tifosi's attention and customership instead of being shamed as this year's, last year's and current through their broken contract's expiration date, December 31, 2010, Pro Cycling Darwin Award.

ProTour Darwin Awards Prelims

The leaves are starting to turn color in anticipation of the end of the long road racing season. With just a few days before the Giro di Lombardia, I'm hoping that no more serious gaffs will be made by anyone in professional cycling. We've seen some doozies this year, so I would like to put it up to the people to decide which glaring error should win this year's ProTour Darwin Award.

The Contenders.

#1 The ProTour.

Who isn't sick of the UCI telling everybody what to do? Hein Verbruggen's legacy oversteps the bounds of cycling government and it's pricey. This year's dismissal by ASO et al. was an excellent reply to the Bushian, expansionist policies of the UCI. The UCI's threats to ban everybody who rode the Tour was comically megalomaniacal. The governing body should go back to ranking and bike restrictions and forgo being a race organizer. Leave it to the pros at ASO, RCS, Unipublic and the others who have created the stages for the world's greatest sporting showcase. Viva le Tour. Death to the ProTour.

#2 T-Mobile.

I was fortunate enough to be on the junket T-Mobile had on Mallorca a couple of years ago and was able to interview Jan Ulrich, Walter Godefroot and others during that trip. I was a huge fan of the team, and felt that the roster and organization was the most inspirational since they won back to back Tours. When they withdrew their sponsorship citing disgust for scandal, I thought it was bad timing and the results prove it. Last year, T-Mobile finished 13th in the UCI team standings, in a system that included the Tour and Classics. This year they are ninth in its new Columbia incarnation without counting Cavendish's Tour sprint clinic or Kirchen's stint in yellow. It might have been pretty in pink for the team whose only negatives came up at the drug testing lab.

#3 The Other German Team

When your national television station is threatening to stop covering your sport because of doping scandals, it might be time to stop using drugs. Schumacher's positive test for EPO CERA was a shocker from someone who'd just been acquitted from a doping case. Gerolsteiner's Holczer was devastated to hear the news, and has threatened to leave the sport. German cycling may have received its death blow with this careless effort from Schumacher. Interviewed for Procycling last year, he said, "I welcome the aggressive approach to doping...." How about now?

#4 Caisse D'Espargne

Why is Alejandro Valverde going back to the team car for a windbreaker? Last I heard, there was a team leader, his lieutenant [or two depending on the terrain] and domestiques who go and get stuff for the team leader from the team car. I'm going to capitalize TEAM LEADER and other important nomenclature for the rest of this entry so you can read it in Spanish. When the TEAM LEADER needs a jacket, the DIRECTEUR SPORTIF hands one off to a DOMESTIQUE to bring it up to the TEAM LEADER. The TEAM LEADER is busy marking his rivals so he doesn't get caught out like he did in the Tour. Having DOMESTIQUES to do this work ensures the TEAM LEADER'S Grand Tour contention. So, Sr. Unzue, next time Alejandro Valverde needs anything, have Xabier Zandio bring it up to him, OK? That way the other teams won't pounce on him and he won't lose four minutes on a descent in your home tour. 

#5 Drug testing faux pas

In March, Kevin Van Impe was a little busy arranging the cremation of his son when the vampires showed up for a drug test. Citing the delicate and sensitive nature of the death of his child, he asked them politely if it might wait a few minutes. No. They forced him to give a sample on the spot. Can we exhibit a little dignity in our dignified approach to fighting doping in the sport, please?

#6 ASO denies Astana

Disinviting the Tour's reigning champion was just so, well, galling. It can be argued that after the legacy of disaster within the Astana camp, Bruyneel's purge was as thorough as Bob Stapleton's at High Road-Columbia. The pristine ASO should have acquiesced and rewarded the team for it. Astana is the best tour team in the world at the moment and tifosi suffered not watching Alberto Contador confirm that he is L'Homme.

Having been following professional cycling for nearly two decades, I am very aware that this can only be considered a partial list of stupidity exhibited by our heroes and their adversaries. I welcome all suggestions for contending imbeciles. Results will be posted after the season closing Giro di Lombardia.

Comeback Kid

The day is an abysmal terror. One that would make even the hardest bike messenger rethink his career. Raining and cold, the worst conditions for any rider. Snow is preferable. It is Oct. 11th, 1998 in Valkenberg, The World Championships road race, when Lance Armstrong would blow me away for the second time.

The first time was when he won the world's as a neo pro in 1993. A friend of mine had called to tell me with more than a hint of incredulousness in his voice that Armstrong had, somehow, become world champion. In those days, we had to wait around for the new issue of Winning or Velo News to get the lowdown on the Euro scene, so it was a month later that we found out the whole story. The rain, the crashes, the favorites' eyes glued to the superlative Miguel Indurain and Lance Armstrong's corridor of victory salutations. In an enduring opportunistic pattern, Armstrong, a ridiculous underdog in the small group of favorites, would attack at the top of the climb and survive the treacherous descent for the greatest win of his young career. He was easily my last pick for victory. His humpback style wasn't popular with the eurocentric bike snobs in my clique, though hard riding was always appreciated. My eurocentric, pundit predecessors would say the same thing and question the quality of the, until then, footnote American, but he would have a notable year in the rainbow jersey. 

If you were going to show a neophyte a moment of cycling to turn them into a rabid fan, the stage to Le Grand-Bornand in the 2004 Tour would be an excellent manipulator. Armstrong, already having won the two previous stages, is away again with his teammate, Landis, Jan Ulrich and his teammate, the upward bound Andreas Kloden, and former Junior National Champion, Ivan Basso. Armstrong sends Floyd Landis away, but the team rivalry with T-Mobile is too compelling. The Germans reel him in. Attack after counter attack later, Kloden bursts out of the group. The aerial footage shows god speed, but Lance Armstrong closes him for another one of cycling's 'Holy crap! Did you see that!' moments. Pure, destructive, hateful bike racing. 

As tifosi, that's what we live for. The will to win, and the endurance to live through the losses. Armstrong's fourth place in the 1998 World Championships was, in this future Journo World Champion's opinion, his greatest performance. A month earlier, he'd come fourth at the Vuelta, inseparable from all but the finest climbers and third in the final time trial. Again an underdog in cruel conditions, we see the American national team jersey with the unfortunate Boogerd, Michele Bartoli trying to confirm his great talent, the amphibious Belgian, Peter van Petegem and eventual winner Oscar Camenzind hammering through an otherwise monochromatic deluge. Without commentary, and Boogerd's trademark grin, it would be nearly impossible to discern their identities. Camenzind makes his bid and Armstrong, back from the grave, chases first. There's a photograph of him in these closing kilometers. It's more of his helmet, as his face doesn't reveal much identity. It's a hollow death mask gasping, 'The horror. The horror.'

The news last week of Armstrong's comeback was not as dramatic, though it received a lot more press. Whether he wins or loses this year's Tour, or any of the races he has threatened to enter, doesn't matter as much as the publicity it draws for the Livestrong Foundation. Or so we're led to believe. In 1998, I predicted that he would win the '99 Tour and he won me a dollar. I'm not going to make that prediction here, but I will bet on another bloody moment on the roads next year instigated by Lance Armstrong.

Viva la Vuelta!

The Vuelta's Pyrennean excursion has shown some exciting racing. Aberto Contador, the best tour rider in the sport at the moment, battling his compatriot, friend and most watchable rider in the peloton, Alejandro Valverde for psychological advantage over the second half of the race. Call me a bicycle racing coverage deprived American, but buy me a sympathetic tinto afterwards. The United States is transitioning into the most tedious of seasons. While cycling winds down its beautiful carnival, American football has opened its preseason. Any coverage will be directed at the sidelines, viewing cheerleaders obstructed by fat guys yelling at fat guys.

For now, tifosi focus on Spain for this final month of daily racing. It brings out the best, worst and the worst of the best, like Manolo Saiz. Despite the rumor, innuendo and eye witnesses to his malefic temper, the former director of ONCE maintained a headlock on the UCI number one team and individual positions for most of the nineties.

In his most recent interview, Saiz talks about staying involved from afar. He is concerned that cycling is 'dirtying itself too much.' It could sound like sour grapes from the Jim Jones of cycling caught with the Kool Aid in his briefcase, but when watching the mutant, athletic incarnations of American football players, or the elitist tirelessness of tennis and soccer players, I wonder why Operation Puerto findings were so secret, but for the few, nailed cyclists.

Of course, American football is not an Olympic sport and it would probably bankrupt the NFL to bribe through any drug testing. FIFA is the only Olympic organization to not have signed on to WADA's anti-doping Federation Agreement- a cagey move. Cycling is now on the black list of sports because of multiple positives, while the IOC doesn't threaten FIFA with exclusion because soccer players are not accountable for using drugs. FIFA has decided not to risk sullying themselves with pesky, dawn raids of WADA officials armed with pee cups and lifetime bans.

American football certainly acclimatized me to the fact that athletes do drugs. For Saiz to imply that the embarassed UCI, blushing ASO and teams like T-Mobile who dropped out of the sport over this should instead demand tabular scrutiny is a great application of the furious arrogance that drove Saiz to take his stack of victories. 

Maybe he's been working that out in therapy, but for it, I would like to award him with the Unlikely Savant/Pariah Channel Surfing Spaniard of the Week crystal globe. There's a little bit of Saiz in all cyclists, if not more harmless than an inner, red-faced,  directeur sportif threatening to kill your rivals and giving them the finger. More likely, tifosi worldwide channel the part that's unable to go to the races, but catching coverage wherever we can.

Crow

Saturday, I watched the final time trial of the 2008 Tour de France  and plucked a crow. I had been ridiculing Carlos Sastre's chances of winning the Tour, and here he was holding on to the maillot jaune through the final time trial. The guy is the most boring bike rider in the world. A reticent Alberto Contador [under]stated, '...not spectacular, but efficient....' about his Tour win. Contador was probably thinking that he eats up guys like Carlos Sastre while standing in line for an espresso, never mind fearing him as a Tour contender. And who can blame him. I'd rather watch meat on a rotisserie. His stage win in 2003 made him look like an aggressive Spaniard, the kind we love like Bahamontes or Freire, until, coming over the line, he popped a pacifier in his mouth like he was late for siesta. There is very little sparkle in his style. Unlike an ever present Ulrich or indomitable LeMond, Sastre is the Ferdinand of the Tour, seemingly content to roll through flowered French fields, unhindered by ambition.

To be fair, none of this year's Tour contenders stood out. Evans lacks the arrogance of many Tour winners, and seems fragile. Menchov is  too unlucky. Frank Schleck, too weird. Even Alejandro Valverde seemed an unlikely Tour winner this year. His inability to chill negates the patience necessary to survive a three week tour.

Here is the key to Sastre's win this year. It was a matter of patience, waiting seventeen stages before letting go his Tour winning escape. Some pundits will talk about his team creating a smokescreen of skinny Luxembourgers to confuse the others into complacency, but the performance of Denis Menchov shows what really happened. He initially attempts to hang with the Spaniard, but is dropped. He blows up so hard trying to hang on that the other contenders ride through him. Phil and Paul called it 'Menchov's bad day', but he would recover and finish with the rest of the shelled elite. A bad day is when you get dropped and lose minutes after getting a bad massage. Menchov didn't have any bad days, every day as solid as any isolated team leader. It was Carlos Sastre's effort that made him [and the others] look bad. Even if he hadn't had the Schlecks, his plan would have been the same. He's been using it his whole career. Sit in and wait for your time.

Now, I have to sit in on some crow. No cranberry sauce. No gravy.