It is a telling sign of the state of our sport that picking the Anit-V moment of the year was a more difficult task than picking the V Ride of the Year. Best ride of the year? Clean, unanimous vote among The Keepers on that one. Low point of the year? Dissention in the ranks as email traffic filled our inboxes to overflowing.
Veino in Liege. Piti continuing to rack up wins even as his suspension was imminent. The defiance of the Spanish Cycling Federation. The UCI’s thinly veiled “fight” against doping, as long as I’m naming governing bodies. The Landis Allegations. The Cavendish/Haussler crash in the Tour de Suisse. The neutralization of Stage 2 of the Tour. The threat of the rider protest prior Stage 3. FedEx’s expulsion for irregular sprinting. Bjarne Riis’ constant complaining about the mass exodus from his team. The Motorcus Myth. Alberto Contador’s positive test for Clenbuterol.
Which brings me to my nomination of the lowest moment of the season: Chaingate. The incident was more than a moment of poor sportsmanship, but marked a new phase in Cycling’s steady departure from the great traditions of our sport. Not to mention that the Grimplette’s chain needs a stern talking to. There is no higher honor for a chain than to get jammed onto the big ring while carrying the Maillot Jaune away from the bunch on its way up some fabled climb in the Tour de France. The fact that it cocked it up is inexcusable. Into the trash heap with you, Chain. But I digress.
There was a time when the sport was headed by great personalities who recognized they were but a chapter of a great epic that spanned generations. They understood that one of the things that distinguish cycling from other sports is the rich history and time-honored traditions; Cycling’s icons – the Great Races, the Cobbles, the Mountains, the Jerseys – are made up of much more than any one athlete and are to be respected as such. Their actions are the mortar between the stones of our sport and form a foundation for later generations. Coppi, Bobet, Merckx, de Vlaeminck, Zoetemelk, Hinault, Fignon – these were riders with personality and strength of character, who understood their place.
Like small fluffy dogs chasing a passing car, Chaingate marked the moment when the top riders of our sport forgot their place in the misguided notion that the time gained at the finish is the stick by which we measure their greatness when in fact it is how they get there: with no one else in the picture.
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You forgot to talk about the NOOB change that made Andy, it was his fault to get the chaingate... As Sastre said.. this seems to be a tour for kids, and old doped glorys
Hear, Hear.
Great read Frank! I agree completely, Clenbutador attacking when Andy's chain dropped just shows that he knew he didn't have the V to match the Younger Grimpeur strength to strength.
oh, the yearning for a time of greater character and simplicity...the great personalities of cycling's past made their mark with the best they could attain at that moment - equipment, technology and sponsorship - and believe that if more and better had been within grasp, they would have garnered it and used it for every advantage. Their real mark and impact upon us has been made in their demeanor since retiring from this great sport. I dearly love and respect the history and tradition of this sport. Recycling nostalgia can be fun and a wonderful way to pass on the history and tradition...but, not at the expense of today's competitors or chapters in this great epic.
I liked Ryder's reaction to chaingate. "You draw your sword and you drop it, you die" I trust his reaction as he was in the race and saw it unfold. Like Oli said,
@All
This is exactly why Chaingate is the Anti-V moment.
Personally, I'm with Red Ryder: "If you draw your sword and drop it, you die". But the way Contador looked right at Grimplette's chain line, then attacked was pure puss-wad. Was he wrong to attack? No. But it was unseemly. And it had absolutely no class. Especially when he denied even knowing Andy was fucked.
It overshadowed the rest of the Tour, which had some great rides (personal favorite: Sylvain Chavanel taking yellow on a neutralized stage, losing it the next day with punctures,, then getting it back. Fucking awesome!)
Too bad. And now with Clentador surfacing, we have another marred Tour win. Too bad. As Johnny Rotten said, "Do ya ever get the feeling you've been cheated?"
Yep.
Shit happens. Sometimes it means you lose the TdF. :'(
Most of the defenses of Conto miss the point being made in this article.
Was it legal to attack when he did? Of course. Completely legal.
Was it within the rules of cycling? Without a doubt.
But did it exhibit sportsmanship? We're not talking about war or business, but about putting your name in both the history books and the record books.
Imagine the repurcussions if, after Andy dropped his chain and Veino sprinted by, Conto had stopped and helped him reload the chain. Completely unnecessary, but also far exceeding the requirements of sportsmanship.
He would have been cheered at the finish, not booed. He would have evened the clock in the time trial and it would have come down to a LeMan-style sprint on the streets of Paris, which he would have won handily. It would have been one for the ages.
Probably not enough to atone for topping up with a few quarts of nitroglycerine a few days earlier, but nothing could cover for that.
That's what he (and we) missed out on.
Wow, lots of new names; welcome all. And, of course, Happy New Year to all!
I knew I was opening a can of worms here; like I said in the beginning, we couldn't even agree on this one amongst a group of writers/enthusiasts who for the most part see pretty eye-to-eye. I think @Geoffrey Grosenbach's analysis of what the reverse might have been strikes pretty closely at the heart. There wasn't anything wrong with what he did per se, it just lacked any class or respect for the sport beyond the very moment in which the events were taking place.
That to me is the definition of class; being able to navigate on a level that transcends the present events. Fault as to the incident misses the point; for me, it's a question of class, not blame.
@Pablo
Very, very well said, and something that we need to bear in mind as we have a tendency to glorify the past. Point well taken.
@Geoffrey Grosenbach
Classic!