Monday Roundup
One year ago today Floyd Landis won the 2006 Tour de France.
Landis Lends Vino "Goddamn" Harley
(Fake headline inspired by Spike's comment)
News
The Guardian Unlimited has Pat McQuaid saying that he'd prefer that Michael Rasmussen NOT win the Tour de France this year due to his failure on two occasions to let officials know his whereabouts. In other news, no news on the Landis decision, and the UCI has now given teams a longer grace period to return their doping charter signatures, only two teams have done so thus far.
Bloomberg reports that despite doping scandals and bad press the TV ratings for the Tour de France are up, in Europe anyway.
Media Post Publications ,registration may be required, notes that TV ratings for the Tour de France on Versus in the US are stable if not up a bit despite all of the turmoil of the past year in cycling:
Given all the concerns over doping scandals--and the fact that an American cyclist is not among the favorites to win the overall title--total live program viewer impressions are up 5% to an average 219,779 homes on the network through the race's first 11 days. Live household impressions are down 3% to 172,869, with the race's live household ratings down 8% to a 0.24
CyclingNews talks with Axel Merckx (end of the page), who is about to retire. He lists riding into Paris with Landis on the winning Phonak team as maybe his best memory.
Blogs
Podium Girls are soooo sick of kissing ugly American winners in the Tour de France and now they currently root for the hunky Alberto Contador to beat Dane Michael Rasmussen. They felt that last year Floyd Landis did not meet their standards either:
France drew the line with American Floyd Landis, who French tour fans say looked like he should be staring in the sequel to “Grumpy Old Men” rather than winning the most beautiful bike race on earth. In reference to the ongoing doping scandal surrounding Landis, a female French tour fan said, “We’re still hoping Oscar Pereiro will be named the official winner the ’07 Tour. He’s so much better looking.”
Rant writes about anniversaries, and about Pat McQuaid and the UCI's problems with Michael Rasmussen
Flahute (a few days ago), wrote that Landis is getting screwed even if he was doping.
Hernando go lightly reviews things, and says of last week's flap:
[I]f you add in the weird ass NPR interview with FLandis where he straight up shitkicks Lemond in the teeth as a lying drama queen ...
Signals, Calls, and Marches thinks that each July we see the best that athletes can give in the Tour de France, and that no matter what the outcome of the Landis arbitration hearings there will always be an asterisk next to the 2006 Tour winner's name.
Lifestyle 13 tells us about many of the things that have occurred in the past on July 23.
Cycle in Seattle tells us that Floyd Landis was there, and has photographic proof.
PJ notes that Vino's recovery today to win the stage after finishing 30 minutes back yesterday is a lot like Landis' phoenix-like recovery last year. A magician by occupation notes the same similarity, and so does Velogal, 20 million minutes,
"Morning Paper", representing a jingo/yahoo constituency, thinks nobody should care about the Tour because there's no Americans he knows about in contention, and the French were out to get Landis because they couldn't get Lance.
Olson's Observations read "Positively False" and found it a quick, interesting, and insightful read with lots of points made in Floyd's favor.
Wilder Days is glad to know that she isn't the only person who doesn't read the Harry Potter books, though she is reading "Positively False".
Glendora is still waiting for a decision from the arbs, and is tallying predictions.
Brawl Sports says UFC fighter Steve Sherk has hired Howard Jacobs to contest a nandrolone charge.
15 comments:
"One year ago today Floyd Landis won the 2006 Tour de France."
I'll ride to that!
How monumental, Landis achieved one of the highest podiums in cycling and goes on to champion for truth, justice, and transparency for all athletes subject to USADA and WADA et al.
Good Work Floyd!!
Ok now off for my 23 morning miles. cheers..........
Interesting couple of days in the Tour...yesterday in the first day in the Pyranees Vino trailed in, a broken man, 28 minutes back.
Today, at the 15K mark, Vino and others break away. At 18K Vino attacks the breakaway. Several riders join him, the peloton threatens to gulp them up, so Vino attacks yet again! Finally on the last climb of the Queen stage Vino breaks free of everyone and solos to a win.
Hmmm, have we ever seen a such a spectacular turnaround in the mountain stages of the Tour before?
I am happy to see that the ratings on Versus are holding steady. I was worried that this would be the last year of full coverage if the ratings dropped too far.
This has been a thoroughly entertaining Tour so far. It looks like that will continue with Wednesday's last mountain stage, and that the winner will still be in question for the final ITT on Saturday.
Still I would like to have seen Floyd defend his title. I think he would have had a pretty good chance of winning again.
Mr Strbuk also notes Vino's "miracle" recovery this morning. It will be interesting to see how the media plays with it.
str
I disagree with the comparisons.
I don't think we can compare the two stages and the recovery of FL and Vino. We surely know the FL was trying to minimize his time loss when he blew. Therefore he gave it all up to the finish. We can't assume this with Vino yesterday. He surely sat-up and took it easy (as easy as you can anyway) at some point yesterday knowing the GC gone.
On another note (and just to continue the speculations) can we read anything into the time it is taking for the ruling to come out? Doesn't this length of time seem to favor FL?
Jason
Media calls WADA's Richard Head.
Their headline: LANDIS LOANS VINO HARLEY
Work done for day.
Spike
I love the headline Spike.
Edward Wyatt reports in Monday’s NY Times: “Pat McQuaid, the president of the U.C.I., told the Reuters news agency on Monday that he would rather that Rasmussen not win the Tour de France. “From an image point of view, it would be better if it was not Rasmussen but one of the youngest riders winning the Tour,” McQuaid said.”
So he's attracted to the image of young boys is he?
“………..Christian Prudhomme, the director of the Tour de France, has also said that if the race organizers had known before the Tour about the missed tests, they would have tried to get Rasmussen’s team to exclude the rider from the race.
What a prick!
“…………..French customs officials stopped and searched the busses of four Tour de France teams on Monday as they traveled from the raced start in Foix to the finish. The busses of the Discovery Channel, Rabobank, CSC and Astana teams were pulled over at a toll area and customs officers searched the busses,……..”
Where was customs when those busses came across the border?
Maybe it’s time for July bike race somewhere else……… outbursts and tactics like those above will cool my enthusiasm for the Tour de Fabrication, as it seems set to implode on itself.
nahual, I agree with "Maybe it’s time for July bike race somewhere else..." The TdF is beautiful, the race is exciting, and the competition great. But I've had it with its organizers. Prudhomme's comments are just what we've come to expect. Is Rassumssen caught up in something? Maybe - but shouldn't we "trust but verify" during a race? Shouldn't the rules be established and followed to avoid this sort of thing during a sporting event?
Where could we have a July event to compete with ASO/TdF? What could that race offer to make it more attractive than Le Tour?
Jason,
It didn’t look like Vino pedaled in easy yesterday. It looked more like he had been out of gas for quite a while and it also looked like it was a painful effort for him just to finish the climb. It’s all subjective. Your pick, I saw it differently.
WRT the time it is taking for a ruling, most of the speculation I have read or heard is of the view that a longer amount of time before a ruling is good for Floyd as it may be an indication that the arbs are looking at the evidence seriously rather than acting on preconceived notions that could result in a relatively quick ruling.
The thing is that the arbs are required to support their individual opinions in writing the ruling. Given the evidence presented, it could be taking a long time for one or two of the arbs (that appear to be at least somewhat beholden to WADA) to come up with rationale that would support a pro WADA/USADA/LNDD ruling. Sometimes creative writing takes a long time.
Let’s hope that’s not the case and that at least two out of the three arbs takes their professional responsibilities as an arbitrator seriously.
I don’t think you can read too much into the timeline for a ruling, pro or con, being delivered.
Cub,
+1. I would have liked to have seen Floyd defend his title too. Here’s to Floyd having the chance to claim another TdF title!
Nahul and EightZero
Funny thing, we had a discussion with Floyd at the Pasadena Book Signing. He recommended that the Amgen Tour of California be moved from February to July. California has a town called [Lake] Paris California and we could build an Eiffel Tower as well.
How funny, Amgen, the maker of Epogen sponsors a bike race!
As for Vino today, He had to be up to his eyeballs in testosterone, didn't he????......what about the virgins!
Obviously, none left after last year
a race could spend 3 weeks going up or down the east coast one year go out to the west coast the next year and set a routine. Then every third year a race across the nothern tier states going into Canada for that foreign flavor.
Perhaps the attraction to the TdF, for most of us without poodles, is that we're just used to it.
Q: "Where could we have a July event to compete with ASO/TdF? What could that race offer to make it more attractive than Le Tour?"
A: Texas
Its bigger than France and we like to keep a rather large stash of yellow jerseys right here in the capital.
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