spare cycles

I'm hastily writing some software to do the link roundup for me, so this is hopefully the last of the hand-made roundups. I flew in this morning at 9AM, so today will be slightly less attentive.

Versus Highlight Video:

SAAB Fly to the Finish Codes: SAAB, Brittany

Stage Summaries:

• VeloNews Stage 1
• VeloNews Stage 1 by the Numbers
• VeloNews' Andrew Hood Stage 1Notebook
• CyclingNews Stage 1
• Pez Stage 1
• RoadbikeReview Stage 1 Roundup
• CyclingNews Stage 1 News

Photos:

• Graham Watson Stage 1 (VeloNews)
• Graham Watson Stage 1 (gw.com)
• CyclingNews Stage 1 Gallery
• Casey Gibson Stage 1

Teams:

• Team Columbia Stage 1
• Bob Stapleton: Kirchen beaten but we're not (VeloNews)
• Garmin-Chipotle Stage 1
• Silence-Lotto Stage 1

Riders/Experts/Blogs:

• Liggett Stage 1
• Will Frishkorn Stage 1
• Chris Carmichael Stage 1 (Pez)
• Sylvain Chavanel Stage 1
• Stuart O'Grady Stage 1

Bloggers:

• Masiguy Stage 1
• Lanterne Rouge Stage 1
• TdFBlog: Where are they from?

Video:

• Steephill.tv Stage 1 Video Summary and Links
• Versus Stage 1 Highlights
• VeloNews: Bob Stapleton Post-Race
• VeloNews: Danny Pate Post-Race
• VeloNews: George Hincapie Pre-Race
• VeloNews: Magnus Backstedt Pre-Race

Podcasts:

• The FredCast Stage 1
• SBS Cycling Central Stage 1

Related:

• VeloNews: Robbie McEwen forgoes an 11-speed bike

Posted by kwc at 12:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I'd like to pretend that my Valverde overall prediction last night somehow applied to the results of today's stage, but the fact is that I hardly expected the GC contenders to come and play today. Valverde's win today had little to do with time gains as he was already sitting up and celebrating far before the line. Instead, it was a mental strike at Cadel Evans and the rest of the GC field. I worried that the lack of a Prologue would leave less room to make a statement about form, but there are already three distinct groupings in the standings: Valverde up top, Evans, Kirchen, Ricco, and Cobo one second back, and Sastre, Menchov, Sanchez, and Cunego seven seconds back. Poor Soler, who crashed and then had his chase slowed down by poor turning. His sights will be readjusted onto the polka dot mountain jersey now that he lost 3'04" today.

On a snotty note: those Columbia jerseys suck -- you can hardly tell if it's a Milram or Columbia train up front, and it's even worse when you have Erik Zabel riding in the Columbia train. I thought I didn't like the High Road jerseys, but the legion of the light blues does it.

Posted by kwc at 12:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I'm out of town until tomorrow morning, so expect more coverage here once I'm behind my own computer. I wanted to lock in some quick predictions before I got back as there's not much point to making predictions after the fact -- even if that does improve their accuracy.

Much is being made of the new rules and layout to this year's course -- no time bonuses, no prologue, early but short first time trial. The peloton has been risk averse in the past when confronted with new strategic options in the past, so I'm guessing that we're going to see some pretty tame GC racing to start things off. Instead, I'm expecting the likes of Fabian Cancellara to don the yellow jersey once more by either taking stage 1 on a flier (an art he's continued to perfect this year) or winning the first time trial. Garmin-Chipotle could also try and enter the this fray. The team faded quite a bit during the Giro, so I'm expecting their strikes to come early. David Millar may not be the final 5K master that Cancellara is, but he can run a break and laydown a time trial, so early yellow jerseys are within his reach.

It won't be until stage 10 that we'll get a real look at our GC contenders, which should create trouble for teams trying to protect both GC and sprinter interests -- McEwen and Evans for Lotto, Freire and Menchov for Rabobank, Kirchen and Cavendish for Columbia, Hunter and Soler for Barloworld, and so on. Hushovd could have a nice run early on.

My crystal ball is increasingly hazy in the middle weeks but at the end I see Alejandro Valverde emerging with the overall. He hasn't had the best record at the Tour, but unlike the other big favorite, Cadel Evans, he does have a better instinct for the top of the podium. Evans always seems more content to follow and hope that the person ahead will falter. I see Carlos Sastre taking the final spot on the podium, mainly because he has that sort of consistency. I'm hoping the lack of Sastre news means he's been saving himself well for July. I'm tapping him over Menchov mainly because I see CSC/Saxo as the stronger team.

That's all the pontificating I have for now. Hopefully I've laid down enough text that I can at some point in the future pretend to have been right.

Posted by kwc at 5:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

As you can tell from the previous posts, I was down at Manhattan Beach Grand Prix with the Roadbikereview crew. Rather than waste my fingers typing about what went on there, you should read Lyne's coverage of the event. I will add one funny moment: I was setting up to photograph the finish of the Men's Cat 2 race when a Rock Racing rider comes through, arms raised in victory. While I'm busy thinking, "WTF? Isn't there another lap?" the rider gets this panicked look on his face, realizes his mistake, and punches the accelerator again.

• Sights and Sounds from Manhattan Beach Grand Prix Men’s Race
• Photos from the Women's race at Manhattan Beach Grand Prix
• Photos from the Men's race at Manhattan Beach Grand Prix
• Brooke Miller wins bunch sprint at Manhattan Beach Grand Prix
• Post MBGP comments with Rock Racing's Rahsaan Bahati and Fast Freddie Rodriguez
• Rahsaan Bahati wins Manhattan Beach Grand Prix - again
• Rock Racing Announces Creation of Catastrophic Injury Fund

FYI: if you haven't been checking out Lyne's Podium In Sight blog, you've been missing out on the real North American scene, i.e. not just the touristy stuff when the international teams drop by.

Posted by kwc at 2:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

USA Cycling announced most of the Olympic roster today. Several womens' selections won't be announced until July 15.

Men's Road Race

• Levi Leipheimer
• George Hincapie
• Jason McCartney
• Christian Vande Velde
• Dave Zabriskie

Men's TT

• Levi Leipheimer
• Dave Zabriskie

Women's TT and Road

• Kristin Armstrong
• Two more TBA

Men's MTB

• Todd Wells
• Adam Craig

Women's MTB

• Georgia Gould
• One more TBA

Men's Track

• Michael Blatchford
• Bobby Lea
• Taylor Phinney
• Adam Duvendeck
• Michael Friedman
• Giddeon Massie

Women's Track

• Sarah Hammer
• Jennie Reed

See the USA Cycling press release for more.

Posted by kwc at 11:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Photo by Cleaveran O. Law

Jelly Belly's Nic Sanderson took the notorious final turn a bit hot and ended up taking out Fast Freddie. In didn't interfere with his leadout for Rahsaan Bahati, who jumped onto Brad Huff's wheel and sprinted for the win. Despite a full flip over the handlebars, Freddie didn't look any worse for the wear when he showed up at the finish line to congratulate teammate Rahsaan Bahati. Cleaveran Law was there to snap the photos while everyone else was off shooting the tame finish line.

Crash Photo Sequence, via Marco Off the Front

Posted by kwc at 10:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Photo by Ken Conley

Photo by Ken Conley

Apologies for the brief post. We flew into LAX at 9am this morning, had fun at the Manhattan Beach Grand Prix, took some so-so photos, and flew back at 6pm. Photo upload is now in progress and on autopilot. I'm off to bed.

• Manhattan Beach Grand Prix Photos: Pro Women's Race
• Manhattan Beach Grand Prix Photos: Pro Men's Race

Posted by kwc at 10:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)