Let the Season Begin
Omloop het Nieuwsblad is fast approaching on March 1st, Strade Bianche goes off the next weekend; finally, ladies and gentlemen, we have a season. For me the racing season really has to start in cold, wet Europe. I like the Tour Down Under just fine, I watch it, but it’s too early, too sunny and too hot to signify the start of the racing season. The races in the desert, though I’m sure they are windy and tough, hold no interest for me. Camels and embrocation do not compute. The endless speculation about Faboo’s lack of perfect February form only means every reporter is bored and has no real stories to write.
The most interesting thing about the racing in the Middle East was seeing that Tom Boonen is whippet thin and ready to bring the pain in 2014. Knowing that Boonen is back lets me sleep better at night. He is lining up for Omloop, his team is ready to rumble on the Taaienberg, all is right with the cycling world. Please let it rain, but don’t let Tommeke get hurt.
I need to see some racers with every bit of wet weather gear on, riding into a hell storm off the North Sea. Cold and wet and in Belgium; that is the way we start the season.
The other thing that is great with the cycling world is the Strade Bianche the following week. A gravel race for the professionals? The race is new, not even ten editions have been raced, but it seems so right. San Gimignano to Siena, rolling up and down across the Tuscan countryside, many secteurs of white gravel, this is a stroke of Italian genius.
Another reason to be excited is Peter Sagan. The wheelie poppin’ curb jumpin’ bad boy comes into this season a year wiser. He has watched both Fabs and Tommeke ride away from him in different editions of the Ronde but they aren’t getting any younger and Sagan is only getting better. The younger generation of riders would like to topple the reigning twin kings of the Spring Classics but Boonen and Cancellara are still there because they are the two best Spring Classic riders of their generation. They aren’t going to go without a battle.
If no one breaks bones in the feed zones or gets infected elbows, this all portends a beautiful spring.
Image of Strade Bianche looks like an artist’s painting.
The best 6 weeks of racing of the year are about to start.
http://fuckyeahcobbles.tumblr.com/
Even though this winter was unusually cold and snowy for this region, the hope of spring cycle racing still made it seem pretty short.
Rode on Saturday, three hour solo loop on the #1, warm enough to get away with just bibs, baselayer, and jersey. Damn, after pulling on all the winter gear for a few months, how damn nice is it to pull on three things and head out?
Both of those photos are incredible. They make my skin tingle with anticipation for many great races, and a spring and summer of long rides!
Agree, even though the TDU is our own home grown race, theres nothing like the smashfest that cobbles, rain and white dirt bring to table.
Mr Boonen appears to be on a mission and Fab and Co best be on guard.
This past Saturday I was as cold as I have ever been on a bike. I don’t even know why; I’ve ridden further, colder, and, if possible, wetter, but for some odd reason a mere 50 k in 1C got to me on Saturday.
The cover photo above gave me an involuntary shiver.
Ah yes, two months of late starts on Mondays thanks to the consumption of 7%+ Belgian brews late on a Sunday night hunched over some dodgy internet stream of men destroying themselves on the other side of the world. Giddy up!
@Jamie
Last weekend was a suckfest over here. I’ve been colder and I’ve been wetter, but I’ve never been colder and wetter.
Gianni, you forgot to mention my man Stybar who is on a roll even before the cobbling season has started and is about to put all kinds of shame in the game that Boonen’s got.
Did I mention that he turned down €800,000 to ride CX so he could train for the Spring Classics instead?
http://www.cxmagazine.com/stybar-turns-down-million-dollars-cyclocross-steve-tilford
@G’rilla +1
Is it almost time for 2014 Super Prestige?
@Tobin Hopefully. I have my picks ready for Saturday!
@dancollins It should be a good year – you set the bar pretty frigging high last year!! I hope that crystal ball of yours is good and ready as you will have a few of us trying to tug on Supermans cape this year.
@Tobin Sven just won that
@G’rilla
It really should be a killer spring of racing. Stybar has his work cut out for himself but he has the mad skills for P-R. Bring it all on.
@Gio I am talking the Velominati Super Prestige where @Dancollins laid a Sven-like beat down on the rest of us hacks.
@Tobin
Oh Heck Yes! Oh my goodness. Rumors abound in the Velominati bunker, a great spring of races and a great VSP could awaken the Beast Master. Rivers of blood, yadda yadda yadda, someone gets two aprons.
Things have been too quiet on the VSP front. Hopefully this is because the Keepers have been trying to figure out how to impose a handicapping system on @dancollins for eating the field’s lunch before starting on his own last year.
@Gianni Good. Our posts crossed.
Bring on the racing!!!
….including my first full race season of my own, I can’t wait!
@Tobin
Favorite part of Super Prestige is the half-time show and a bunch of creative commercials.
Or this.
Milano-Sanremo 1984 from Galliolus on Vimeo.
Is the cyclingrevealed trivia like a dangerous stimulant to our love of cycling, cycling history, and how much fun it is to ride bicycles fast?
@G’rilla
Let’s talk about this. My memory says – 4th rider (finisher?) in his first P-R. And he had that diversion. Seemingly has the guns and the race-reader mindset to figure out races that are different every single race. Snow. Rain. Wind. Dust. Cold. I think that cross background prepares you very mentally well for 1-daze.
My first thought was Oi! TDU, Oman etc you oaf. But then I read the article.
TDU an pre-season apetizer? Yeah, you’re probably right.
@Gianni
Please, Grimpeur Keeper, don’t make it sound inconsequential that there are not one, but two, jerseys (aprons) on the table this year.
That makes me fuckin pumped up about spring cycling season.
@Puffy
Never read the article unless you are commenter 1-5. 6 is right out.
@Ron
Wait for it youth. It might get better.
Some of the desert racing has been good. Interesting to note a fit, motivated Abandony turned up at Oman ready to restamp his credentials and came….72nd. Another long year for those afflicted by Dirty Schelck Love me thinks.
Our season of old bugger road racing started last weekend as well. Managed to get myself in the break and second place by laying down a bit of hurt on the opening climbs. Much fun after crit season where I am simply domestique to our sprinters and have the policeman role at the head of affairs to make sure no-one gets away who shouldn’t.
Should be a cracking Spring, hope Eurosport get us some of those second string classics this year. Dave Harmon has hinted he will be back behind the microphone.
I always know it’s spring when I hear Sean Kelly on Eurosport talking about a group of tirty or tirty-five riders.
@Gianni
What article?
@ChrissyOne
Thank you
Merckx let this be the year that Tommeke and Faboo fight it out to a punch-drunk standstill. Was never a huge fan of Frandy, but still less a fan of watching someone’s life disappear down the gurgler of depression and pain, so I really hope Schleck the younger finds something, somewhere this year. A repeat of the galibier would do nicely. Bon chance for the VSP, hopefully I manage to get it together this year for a full season…as in life, etc…
Sigh. Got all nostalgic watching that MSR clip, Roche bridging up, then Millar, and finally Moser riding them all off his wheel and holding them off with that combined raw power and patented position. If ever there was a rider whose position I wish I could emulate, it’s Francesco Moser. Soooo awesome.
We’re on day 3 of solid snowfall here in suburban Vancouver. It’s almost MARCH for fuck’s sake. I’m itching to ride, the days are slowly growing longer, and cobble season looms. Goodbye, Old Man Winter, and FUCK YOU, too.
@starclimber
You said a mouth full right there. Moser got down to it with his position. I agree, I’d like to look like him for just a ride or two before I expire. That would be cool.
@Daccordi Rider
Last year I could watch Oman and Qatar for free but this year it was on a premium channel, so it’s even easier for me to say it’s rubbish.
Abandy, jesus, he is so not built for those races, huge crosswinds, flat. Hey, he finished so there is something. But yeah, durty schleck love shall remain dirty and depressing for 2014.
@Gianni
Even on the summit finish stage he finished 34th, behind such noted climbers as Daryl Impey and Cameron Meyer. Cancellara appears to have paced him up the mountain. Trek must desperately be hoping Faboo delivers.
As for the desert events, even though I got to go to one of them and see it at close quarters I can’t disagree. The whole thing felt like a bit of a training ride for the teams. Which is not a bad thing – it means they turn up for the spring classics with some decent racing miles in their legs and makes it more competitive.
@Gianni
Just checked the listings and Omloop Het Nieuwsblad is only on Sky Sports (Premium) rather than Eurosport. Bit of an arse, I’ll have to make do with Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne and the Tour of Langkawi to lift me out of my February Bloating.
@Chris
you two are aware of this thing called the internet, and on this internet people are able to access streamed versions of sports being broadcast on channels you don’t have access to?
@Mikael Liddy
The racing is inside the computer?
@ChrisO
I wish all training rides were as exciting as the opening Qatar stages, and as photogenic as the echelons OPQS seemed to produce at will. At least the views were a bit closer to what I’d usually see on a ride.
Anyone got a guide to what’s on UK TV or good Internet links for live streams?
While we’re on the subject does anyone subscribe to cycling.tv? Looks reasonable for the money but wondering what the coverage is like.
@Mikael Liddy
You’re shitting me, surely.
Oddly enough, I do have internet but it isn’t exactly what I’d call quick. Between that and the generally shitty quality of the free streaming coverage, I can’t really be bothered.
If it’s pissing down and blowing a gale in Belgium I want to be able to see that and resultant suffering in full HD not blobby vision. I have to suffer in minute detail so that’s what I want to watch.
Besides, as beautiful language as Italian, or even Belgian is, and no matter how enthusiastic the commentators get compared compared to King Kelly, I’ve no idea what a suitcase full of courage is in either language.
Yes! Time for real racing to start with Het Volk . About the only thing I’ve seen that has reminded me of the spring classics has been Russia’s “Gewissing ” of the Men’s 50k cross country event in Sochi.
@Chris
Yes Flemish, when spoken, sounds just like an angry, drunken Englishman. It seems to make more sense to the non-speakers too when there are a few Trappist ales in you.
My favorite Kellyism from last year’s campaign: his understated “Yessss” when Dan Martin won L-B-L.
Agreed! Let the season begin! You’ve got to hand it to the Italians with Strade Bianche – 10 years in and a race that truly deserves to be labelled a classic. Very hard to do these days when shit gets called “classic” if it’s only a year or two old.
Love the 1984 MSR clip. I had forgotten Millar was right up there at the end – generally not a classics man, but could dish it out on the day.
@Gianni you had me at rivers of blood…
Sagan hop (video)
I also got all nastolgic watching the MSR clip. Call me a Luddite, but I think the racing’s more exciting and unpredictable without race radios. Too often now it’s watching how the script plays out, and hoping it doesn’t!
@Harminator ,
@Mikael Liddy
Damn, that made me laugh.
I’ll maybe get up at 2 am to stream Strade Bianche but I’ll be sleeping through Qatar and Oman.
I have a devil machine called Tivo, he lives in his box and records shows at 2 am so I can watch them at a civilized time. Unless they are streamed. And the genius who designs that box, a tivo for streaming video, he shall be hailed as a stud.