This saturday sees the start of not one but two cycling Grand Tours. If you can cast your eyes temporarily away from the capital of remotest Hicksville, Northern France (did you see what I did there, bethie?) and look instead to the Italian lakes and the beautiful town of Mantova, you can watch a GT made for traditionalists, one that starts in the proper way, with a prologue round the station carpark. Not the best of starts, but don't worry the 2008 Girodonne should improve as the week goes on. The route seems to mirror the old fashioned TdF ones too, starting off with 3 flat stages around the Po valley before heading northwards in search of some hills. There are seventeen teams starting out, but the GC will probably come down to a fight between the usual handful of suspects, a first victory for Judith Arndt in Colombian Blue. Cicloweb have a Davide Cassani style preview up of stage 4 on YouTube (something for you Californians to be planning for next year?). RAI3 will be running a half hour or so of highlights each day after their coverage of the French race ends, so anyone with a dish should be able to catch it in Europe. If you want to pick up RAI over the Atlantic then you will need one of these. I don't know if they are streaming it or if CyclingTV will have it too.