Right to it...
- While there are always 25 different places to get your race report, check out VeloNews if you want to see who looked injured coming in. Or don't.
- Chris Carmichael is dispensing his coaching wisdom all month at Pez, and today points out how the slight uphill finish changed the sprint. Or would have, if everyone had been there.
- As distressing as today's crash is, the one rider not starting in Dunkirque was Eduardo Gonzalo, who has an even worse story involving a stopped car and a rear windshield.
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Update [2007-7-9 16:29:19 by chris]: Lots of one-time McEwen leadout men in the news today... aside from Steegmans' win and Fast Freddy's unlucky turn, Henk Vogels made news at the Cougar Mountain races this weekend with his own nasty injury. Vogels hit a fence post on the car track portion of the Crit and snapped his collarbone. Unlike 99.999% of collarbone victims, however, Vogels stayed on his bike despite the violent impact, and even managed to
finish the raceride back to the staging area, before heading off for six-weeks of rehab. There's your hardman of the day... read more at the Toyota-United website.
- Turning the page back a day, there are several articles not to be missed from Britain's weekend of celebrating the Tour. Cycling Revealed, which has daily takes anyway, writes from stage 1's finish, a/k/a the author's hometown. Not to be missed Fabian Wegmann complaining that the crowds were so unrelenting, there was no place to pee.
- H/t reader Monty... the Guardian has a few interesting pieces. Mark Cavendish's tearful diary gives an up-close look at a dream ride gone horribly awry. For a more fun recap, ride along a moto through the race with a Guardian writer. Also, their photo gallery from stage 1 has some nice shots.
- Had enough of the present? Check out Professor Wilcockson's description of the Best Tour Team Ever, conveniently posted at the Paceline.
- Speaking of Discovery Channel, want to answer the question "how green is my Pro Tour Squad? Read all about it... but the money quote is: "By purchasing carbon offsets generated by energy efficiency projects and tree planting initiatives from GME's "Be Green" (begreennow.org), the team has offset about 62 metric tons of CO2 so far this year." While you're there, try your hand against the Virtual Squad at the Disco Dream Ride, sort of like Computrainer with your face pasted into the helmet.
- And lastly, our bizarre doping note of the day. The UCI is asking the support staff of the Pro Tour teams to sign the Pledge, or at least a tailored version having to do with not facilitating or encouraging riders to dope. Like the riders, they'd cough up a year's salary if they violate it. Sure, it's probably even more unenforceable than the riders' version, and the idea ranks right up there with firing the House pageboys because pedophile Congressmen can't keep their hands off them. But at least the UCI's anti-doping resume will be nicely padded.