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myshkin

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Been dipping in and out of the Giro this year, mostly at the weekends obviously. Last Saturday's stage on the dirt road in the rain and today's mountain top finish were fantastic.

Cadel Evans is looking really good this year, Vino looks as if he is getting it back together and even Ivan Basso looks good again.

What is Contador up to at the moment anyway? Not seen him since Fleche Wallonne I don't think.

contador will just be in training then heading for the dauphin.

the giro has been brilliant this year due to the a difficult route, shite weather and a lot of the stronger riders not being there (there's zero chance of radioshack or saxo letting a 56 man break go in the tour). i fancy basso to win it now, he looks the strongest in

the big news in cycling is the landis allegations and the prospect of a federal investigation in us postal and lance. i think the livestrong brand is heading for a fall.

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basso won the giro and this time he appears to have done it clean. a deserved victory imo for some impressive performances in the mountains and a great effort from the full liquigas team.

valverde has banned for two years due to his involvement in operation puerto, i don't doubt for a second that he was doping but the way the italian authorities got stolen bloodbags to test seems very dodgy and not due process. i doubt he'd have won the tour but i think he'd have been a factor in the mountains this year, it's a shame for caisse d'espergane as they have a lot of great domestiques without anyone to ride for, luis leon sanchez will probably be their leader now. hopefully contador heads their next year and they can be a proper powerhouse team.

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i'm already developing a deep loathing for team sky.

the assumption that track success will just transfer to the road does my head in. team gb is succesful on the track because they have by far the most money and the best cyclists from other countries all concentrate on being pro road riders. aprt from hoy and pendelton the british track team seemed like an arrogant bunch of p***ks, if team sky take that attitude into the peloton they'll have an uncomfortable year.

there was a bit in one of the papers with brailsford banging on about how their high tech bus, lightweight bike paint and kit and other techinical nonsense was going to give them a competitive edge. if the guy thinks mood lighting and sports psychology is what you need to compete with contador, schleck, valverde, sanchez, hushozd, cavendish, cancellara ect then he's in for a big shock.

thoroughly agree with you,theres a real unjustified arogance there,reminiscent of the english national team.I think brailsfords a bit of a cock and,as you say,talents going to trump gimmicks any day.I noticed during the giro they put up screens by the bus so riders could warm up in private instead of being seen like riders in other teams,quite what "edge" alienating and annoying the tifosi was going to give his team is beyond me.Sport in general is being coached to death by people who like to tinker just to be seen to be proactive and i suspect this will be our memory of team sky in 2010-all the gear and no idea.

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i don't think contador was too bothered about winning the dauphine.

good to see bruynel getting pissed about not being invited to the vuelta. it serves them right for not taking part in the giro. i also think it might mean we see the armstrong/bruynell downfall before the end of this season. there's not a doubt in my mind radioshack are running a program this year, horner and brakjovic's wins in the basque country and the dauphine looked very suspicious.

cavendish has been making more friends in his own way in switzerland this week. he cut in front of haussler in a sprint and caused a crash that sent several riders to hospital. the peloton staged a two minute protest against him at the start today, let's hope they make things as difficult for him as possible in the tdf.

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Contador building up nicely for the Tour with 2nd in the Dauphine. Armstrong already saying that he`ll be very difficult to beat. Only Andy Shleck might be able to trouble him.

Is Basso riding the Tour? Not that I`m sure a Giro-Tour double is even feasible thesedays.

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it's clear as day it's cavendish's fault on that video, he cuts right over towards haussler. he got a time penalty from the jury for it, the full peloton started late to complain about it and the director sportif's of caissie, francais du jour and cervelo complained about him in public.

contador does look very hard to beat, his biggest challenge might be the cobbles in stage 4. what i think will keep the race competitive is that liquigas, saxo and radioshack have ridiculously strong teams so contador won't be able to dominate as much as he did last year when astana had most of the radioshack riders.

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http://www.cyclingnews.com/races/tour-de-suisse-upt/stage-6/results

A nice little TDF warm-up for some of the contenders in Switzerland today. Will be interesting to see if Gesink can make a mark at the Tour this year, he`s been a bit unlucky in the past. Andy Shleck attacked with Gesink, but faded. Armstrong, Kreuziger & Frank Shleck all near the front.

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Contador building up nicely for the Tour with 2nd in the Dauphine. Armstrong already saying that he`ll be very difficult to beat. Only Andy Shleck might be able to trouble him.

Is Basso riding the Tour? Not that I`m sure a Giro-Tour double is even feasible thesedays.

I thought Basso was back to his best in the Giro. Especially impressive on the stages that climbed the Mortirolo, Zoncolan and Gavia.

The problem I see him having is that his team isn't going to find it as easy to dominate Le Tour as they did the Giro but he's the main danger to Contador on that performance.

it's clear as day it's cavendish's fault on that video, he cuts right over towards haussler. he got a time penalty from the jury for it, the full peloton started late to complain about it and the director sportif's of caissie, francais du jour and cervelo complained about him in public.

contador does look very hard to beat, his biggest challenge might be the cobbles in stage 4. what i think will keep the race competitive is that liquigas, saxo and radioshack have ridiculously strong teams so contador won't be able to dominate as much as he did last year when astana had most of the radioshack riders.

I think his biggest challenge might be trying to get Vino to accept that he isn't the team leader!. As long as they get that sorted from the off then it's difficult to see who will beat him.

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  • 2 weeks later...

So the big day is here, & I`m sure Rotterdam will be in party atmosphere after Holland eliinated Brazil at the WC yesterday. I think today will come down to a straight fight between Wiggins & Cancellara, with David Millar perhaps having an outside chance?

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No real surprise that Cancellara blew everyone away. What did surprise me a little though was Armstrong getting a better time than Contador. The organiseres seem to have designed it to keep the race close until the mountains so I thought Contador would try to edge ahead a little today.

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Not really sure I agree with the non-sprinting at the end. Chris Boardman summed things up reasonably well, saying that it was just like many stages in the past. I can clearly remember Armstrong putting major time into Alex Zulle in similar circumstances one year. Hushovd certainly looked a bit peeved at missing out on the green jersey points. Cracking ride by Chavanel, he could hang on to Yellow right until the Alps with todays performance

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Don't know about that what with the cobbles tomorrow. Bit of rain there, who knows what will happen, especially now that Cancellara won't be able to control the pace to bring back the Schleks.

It's no wonder some people have difficulty understanding professional cycling after that today though.

By the way, is Sean Kelly the most serious man in the world, apart from Mhak, obviously?

Edited by bairnagain
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smart riding from cancellera to go to slow to bring the schleck's back into the peloton. he'll probably get a lot of abuse and praise for it but he did what had to be done and i don't think many riders could complain. after the biggest crashes rabo (menchov), euskadi (sanchez) and bmc (evans) had the chance to push it but they choose not to and after they waited to let the main group with shack, liquigas, astana and sky back on no one could really complain about waiting for the schlecks. they maybe should have sprinted but at the same time half the peloton was banged up and it was probably best to go safety first.

f**k knows what's going to happen tomorrow, if it rains the cobbles will be murderous. the fact that quickstep have the yellow and will be on the front means the pace will probably be quite fast as their riders are all used to riding on them. hopefully everyone (or at least all the contenders) make it through unscathed but i've a feeling we'll be seeing a few abandons and some whining about the peloton not waiting.

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