Since I've already exhausted all things running, swimming, and triathlon (read below for those posts), this one is all Pro Cycling...with Lance, Canadian cyclists, and Cavendish finally starting to look like Cav of 2009...
I always like to lead off with World Records or World Championships, and the big news yesterday came out of the World Track Championships, where 20-year old Taylor Phinney defended his world championship in the individual pursuit. Yep, 20 years old, 2-time world champion! How cool is that? A little background on individual pursuit...2 cyclists start on opposite sides of track, and go all out for 4000m trying to catch the other guy (at least try to do the 16 laps before the other guy finishes his 16 laps). It's a marquee event in track cycling, and Phinney is the superstar. Previous winners of the individual pursuit include Chris Boardman (who was a epic time trialist/prologue rider on the road) and Bradley Wiggins (who has now transitioned to being a Grand Tour contender). What will the future hold for Taylor Phinney? Will he become a time trial specialist like Fabian Cancellara? A one-day classics rider? Only time will tell...here's the highlight video of this week's individual pursuit final.
Continuing with updates...last weekend's first spring classic was Milan-San Remo. Although expected to potential be another shot at glory for Mark Cavendish, the Columbia star continued his slow start to 2010 when he fell back after a wheel change, then a crash on a late descent, before getting dropped for good on the last crucial uphill. Regardless, the race did result in a classic finish, as Oscar Freire continued his magnificent habit of winning big races with his third victory in Milan-San Remo, edging out Tom Boonen at the finish line. Freire has now won 3 world titles, 3 Milan-San Remo's, 4 Tour stages, and a Green Jersey at the Tour. It's a very impressive career...
Cyclingnews.com had a great gallery of pictures from this 298 km race, and with the bad weather and tough course - the pictures are superb. Here's a couple and click here for the entire selection...
The decisive hill (the Cipressa) during Milan-San Remo occurs just before the finish, and is described as one of the most dangerous downhills in pro cycling. Juan Antonio Flecha wore a helmet cam during a training ride of the descent, and you can see how steep, twisty and narrow this road really is. Great video!
I talked about how disappointing the season so far has been for Mark Cavendish. He finally won a race in 2010 when he won stage 2 of the Tour of Catalunya after winning 24 races in 2009. He has his share of bad luck in 2010, with dental problems and crashes aplenty, but cycling needs the brash and over-confident Cav to get back to his sprinting best. Can he still dominate like he did last year?
The other noteworthy part of the Tour of Catalunya is the great riding of Ryder Hesjedal from Canada. He's currently tied for 5th overall after 4 stages, and a large reason is his ever-improving time trialing. His Garmin team provided video footage of his stage 1 effort, so i've added it below. Go Canada!
The week ahead - the big news this weekend is the Criterium Internationale, a 2-day, 3-stage race which will be held in Corsica this year. It has a long mountainous stage on Saturday followed by a mid-length stage
on Sunday morning and then a short time trial on Sunday afternoon. It is especially noteworthy this year since it marks the first time that one Lance Armstrong and one Alberto Contador go head-to-head. Except when they were teammates. Other big names who could challenge Armstrong and Contador include Cadel Evans, Mauricio Soler, Samuel Sanchez, and Alexander Vinokourov. It should be a great preview of the Tour!Regardless, it seems as though this race is more important to Contador than to Lance (he almost never tries to win spring races as he revs up for July). But if Contador takes off during the mountain finish, will Lance try to go with him?
Phew. That's all for today. Hope you enjoyed it!
1 comment:
That TT video of Hesjedal is awesome... Talk about a scary course! For some reason I really want to ride my bike right now.
Post a Comment