Velominati Super Prestige: Critérium du Dauphiné

I'll have mine medium rare with extra clenbuterol, please. Photo via Cycling Weekly

The Tour de France looms on the horizon, and those riders planning to race are putting the final touches on their form – or going into last-minute panic mode, final exam cram-style. The Critérium Dauphiné has long been a favorite preparation race serving both purposes rather well.

It’s a favorite of the Tour’s GC contenders as it usually features stages that, if not identical to key stages from the Tour, will at least feature many of the same climbs; habitual Tour winners like Indurain, Armstrong, and Clentador have traditionally used this race as their preferred method of final preparation; riders seeking additional form will take the beating taken from a week of suffering and have just enough time to recover prior to the Tour. And, of course, riders who have aspirations in July may also find they are a few kilos heavy yet and may indulge in some ultra-lean Spanish beef in order to get to fighting weight.

It’s also a dangerous gamble: ride too hard at the Critérium and you could fire off the Guns of Navarone and enter the Tour in a state of fatigue, as Pharmy did in 2003. A delicate balance, this.

The challenge in predicting the results of a preparation race such as this is that the favorites for the Tour are (hopefully) peaking in one month, not during this event. But they’ll be good – maybe good enough to win. But probably not. Combine that with that the notion that a rider with little hope in July may be looking for glory and will be in peak form, leading to an unexpected result – a review of last year’s race with Jani Brajkovic is a great example of this case.

With that we kick off into the first minor-stage VSP for the Critérium Dauphiné. Being a week-long stage race, the points on offer are 7 for first, 5 for second, 4 for third, 3 for fourth, 2 for fifth, with the usual allotment of bonus points for getting the rider right but the place wrong. Also, there are no rest days, so no rest day swaps, but we will have our usual approach for riders who drop out. Piti Principle applies as always. Also review the guide, being careful to note that the rules have changes a bit this year, and we may not have completely updated the guide yet, so if there’s a question, ask.

Best of luck to all.

frank

The founder of Velominati and curator of The Rules, Frank was born in the Dutch colonies of Minnesota. His boundless physical talents are carefully canceled out by his equally boundless enthusiasm for drinking. Coffee, beer, wine, if it’s in a container, he will enjoy it, a lot of it. He currently lives in Seattle. He loves riding in the rain and scheduling visits with the Man with the Hammer just to be reminded of the privilege it is to feel completely depleted. He holds down a technology job the description of which no-one really understands and his interests outside of Cycling and drinking are Cycling and drinking. As devoted aesthete, the only thing more important to him than riding a bike well is looking good doing it. Frank is co-author along with the other Keepers of the Cog of the popular book, The Rules, The Way of the Cycling Disciple and also writes a monthly column for the magazine, Cyclist. He is also currently working on the first follow-up to The Rules, tentatively entitled The Hardmen. Email him directly at rouleur@velominati.com.

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View Comments

harminator says:

Jun 5 2011 at 5:07 pm

Balls to dope? Are you people delusional?

It doesn't take balls to dope - it takes balls to be clean.

And add to that: busted dopers who make cry baby confessions and admissions indicate the reverse is closer to the truth.
Ron says:

Jun 5 2011 at 5:09 pm

Oli - right on. One must not assume all PROS are doped up.

Uhh, I don't like seeing man nipples either. Call me crazy. I don't foresee buying the Leopard kit anytime soon. I'd rather look good & take the wind drag penalty of an awesomer, less mangerie-like jersey.
Marko says:

Jun 5 2011 at 5:11 pm

@harminator
Who said anything about balls?
harminator says:

Jun 5 2011 at 5:15 pm

zzzzzzzzzzz
Erik says:

Jun 5 2011 at 5:36 pm

@Frank Thanks on the log-in. I'm registered now.
Sprider says:

Jun 5 2011 at 5:36 pm

@Karolinka
Oh, good call, don't think I want to see Wiggo "keep it up" in a skinsuit.
Karolinka says:

Jun 5 2011 at 5:57 pm

@Buck Rogers
@frank

Um, I wasn't going to say anything in case I was the only one seeing it - the now universal italicization of posts...

especially, um, since it seemed to start in my post (#128). And I did attempt to use the ITALIC button to italicize a word. Just ONE word.

I try to keep my superheroine powers in check, but sometimes I get distracted; one time Lake Tahoe filled up with parentheses when I took a sip of some particularly ethereal Turkish Coffee.

I think we need to call the Cleaner on this one. Send up the BatMofrankRonSiteDeveloper signal!!!
Steampunk says:

Jun 5 2011 at 7:35 pm

frank:
@Buck Rogers

I agree. Not to turn it into a doping debate but I would not give Grimpito a free pass at all. These days I even question Cuddles at times. Difficult to trust anyone.

Yeah, it's tough to say - it's deeply engrained and at all levels of the sport - all the way up to the UCI. You've got old riders who mentor the young ones, they retire and become management, the young ones take on their own youngsters...the circle continues.
Some riders seem to have a more clean reputation than others, and it's possible some of the one-day racers are truly clean, but the Grand Tour riders? It's not that they have to dope, but they do if they're going to average 40+kph for 2500kms. Which they don't need to.
Who's clean? Evans has a cleaner reputation than most, but that doesn't mean he isn't doping. Balls to dope? It's all managed by the team. Easy peasie, lemon squeazie. Those are just vitamins, you see.

Didn't Michael Barry once say something to the effect that he would never ride the TdF because he insisted on riding clean? Pretty damning indictment indeed...

(Yes: I know he rode it last year.)
Karolinka says:

Jun 5 2011 at 8:55 pm

@il ciclista medio, @Ron,
@Steampunk, @Pedale.Forchetta, @frank, @Marko, @pakrat...

@Buck Rogers:

Buck Rogers :

Oli :
The so-called cycling "fans" who smear all the riders with the same doping brush are killing the sport as much as the dopers. No matter who is doping they've never all been doping, no matter how much you'd like your pessimistic and cynical worldview to prevail. How about a bit of respect for the clean riders?

I LOVE cycling and have followed it faithfully since I started racing in the late '80"²s. I have stayed with it through all the "fun" and still love it. There are definitely clean riders but this last stuff, esp the reports of Big George admitting, has shaken my trust level. I'll still follow cycling closely and continue loving it, but I will not blindly trust anyone in the sport. Cynical yes, but I still love the sport and continue to hope that it gets cleaner.

What he ^ said.

@Oli,
How can you really say those of us here, your fellow Velominati/ae, who are simply and non-confrontationally sharing our views... cynicism, opinion, disappointment, whatever you want to call it... are "wanting our cynical and pessimistic worldview to prevail"? Worldview? That's a pretty wide one-brush, don't you think?

And wanting it to prevail????? Nothing could be further from the truth! I'd LOVE to find out that there are gazillions of clean riders at the top level of competition in the European peloton (or in the USA, for that matter). I don't at all assume riders LIKE the doping, though I'm sure THEIR opinions are as varied as ours.

All each of us can do is interpret the information our senses take in to the best of our ability. I think I'm a fairly open minded person (of course, don't we all); my playing devils advocate and trying to examine all facets of an issue can cause me problems in life, in fact! (loooooong decision making, lol).

The conclusions - I hesitate to even say "conclusions;" who knows what will happen in the future that may re-shape my thoughts; nothing is static and good lord the older I get the less I know - ok, so: the semi-conclusions I've personally come to are not snap judgements made overnight; I didn't start out thinking this way about the extent of doping, who's doing it, the reasons, etc. And along the way of coming to semi-conclusions, I was unsure about many things regarding the issue, and still am.

However, after taking in information over the years, the way my grey matter interprets it is as described ad nauseum in previous posts.

It doesn't make me think less of cycling, or really of anybody involved in doping; my feeling is that everyone is caught up in a vicious cycle.

Sure, there are bound to be true cheaters who will do anything to get ahead. But I think one reason doping is so widespread at the highest levels of competition is not because people WANT to "cheat;" it's because it is unfair to have to play on a horribly un-level playing field when the pressure to succeed is so great.

I don't think any of us are doing a dis-service to our sport, the Professionals (and I mean that in the truest sense of the word) in it on every level, or to other fans by, despite our love, saying:

"HEY, THE EMPEROR DUDE IS BUTT NEKKID, damn that sucks."

And now can we all please shut up about this for five minutes? :) Bring on the nuddie [sic.] girls!
Karolinka says:

Jun 5 2011 at 9:00 pm

Sprider :
@Karolinka
Oh, good call, don't think I want to see Wiggo "keep it up" in a skinsuit.

Jeeeeeeezis, I hadn't even thought that far... chrystallmitey let's not bring that image up again, eh? ptewwwie. blecchh. ;-P