Velominati Super Prestige: Giro d’Italia
In the 1990 Giro, a relatively unknown cyclist named Gianni Bugno lit the cycling world on fire by winning the first stage, thereby taking the Maglia Rossa. That wasn’t so surprising in itself; what was surprising was that the little bugger managed to hold the jersey all the way to Milan, a feat previously only accomplished by Binda and Merckx postwar, and prewar legend Costante Girardengo.
This all happened in the age before smartphones and social media; while these days a stealth strike on the World’s Most Wanted Dude gets live-tweeted, in 1990 it took until well after I knew Greg LeMond had won the Tour de France before I found out that Bugno had won the Giro. Reading about the feat in Winning magazine, Bugno instantly became one of my heros and went on to cast himself into a bronze statue of Rad by being one of the few riders able to challenge Indurain in the following years. (He also possessed the mental frailty that seems to be common among my favorite riders. There’s something Shakespearean about heros with flaws that I simply can’t resist.)
The Giro d’Italia is just prestigious enough to be the maker of champions. It’s isn’t made up of a downgraded field like the Vuelta, but it also ins’t as popular as the Tour where only the best riders on the best teams seem to stand a chance. Every Giro produces a revelation that goes onto great things; that’s one of the key reasons this is my favorite Grand Tour: the field is strong enough to have serious contenders, but weak enough to let an outsider play. It’s perfect.
Aside from a well-balanced field, the geography of Italy lends itself to a better three week race than do France or Spain. Many European companies are defined by natural borders such as mountains or water, which generally means the mountains and great bodies of water lie at the borders with plains in between. (Or, as is the case with the Netherlands, beneath.) Italy is unique in that it is narrow and has mountainous terrain in nearly every region. Whereas the first week(s) of the Tour and Vuelta feature mostly flat stages suited for the sprinters and little else, the Giro’s first week generally contains several mountaintop finishes. The difficulty of a typical Giro’s first week means that riders who ride strongly there typically fade towards the end, while riders who were weak on the first climbs may come on strong as the race closes down. The result is a tight race from start to finish with regular changes in leadership. Except in 1990. And whatever years those other three guys who did what Gianni did.
This year’s Giro will celebrate the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy by making strong men cry. Forty major climbs, and 7 mountain top finishes, one of which involves climbing Mount Etna twice. (Welcome to Sicily, assholes. You get to ride up the most active volcano on Earth twice.) I have it on the excellent authority of a man down the pub that Contador is stocking up on extra drugs even as I write this in an attempt to quiet the rattle of his skinny little bones in his spanish boots.
With that we kick off the best Grand Tour of the year, and the first test of our Grand Tour VSP Software. The other VSP editions have been a piece of cake. Grand Tours include free “swapping of the picks” logic whenever a rider in a contestent’s pick list drops out. We have rest day swaps for 2 or 4 points each, depending on which rest day it is. Our system is supposed to handle all of this smoothly and seamlessly. We’ll see.
Read the scoring guidelines, work out your strategy, dope up on clairvoyance drugs (alcohol) and chuck your picks up. As usual, the winner of this VSP edition will earn an “Obey the Rules” bumper sticker and all reader’s points qualify towards the final prize of the free personalized Velominati Shop Apron. If you are inclined to enter, simply post your predictions for the top five placings in the designated area above the posts section, bearing in mind that entry/modification of picks closes at 5am Pacific time on the day of the race. You are eligible to swap picks at no penalty for your picked riders who drop out; rest day picks each come at a 2 point penalty for the first rest day, 4 points each for the second.
Good luck.
@Steampunk
Welcome to Serpa-ville, we have been waiting for you since the prologue…
A day of conflict. Scrolling through the list of results for the stage looking for my VSP picks and lo! No Fucknuggat Di Wanka. Fucks my picks until the rest day, but oh! The joy at seeing that he lost over six minutes.
VSP PICKS:
1. Nibali
2. Pinotti
3. Sastre
4. Scarponi
5. Rodriguez
I just realized I am going to miss the Etna stage on Sunday do to work. ugh.
And Petacchi? ¢5000?
@all
We’ll post a VSP for the Etna stage on Saturday. Merckx-willing, the VSP software will hold up to having two simultaneous VSPs happening. What’s the worst that could happen? Oh, just that everything will be irreparably buggered.
For those of you who missed the entry, this will be your chance to gain some extra points in the VSP to make up for the penalties you’ll be getting for late entry.
(I’ll make a backup of the database before launching the VSP and if everything goes katywampus we’ll nullify the Etna VSP and restore the database. Just so you are prepared.)
Pettachi’s legs must’ve been totally shot… or perhaps not?
@harminator @ZachOlson
Yeah, what was up with the Jet?
@G’Phant Blazing Saddles was speculating that perhaps he was interested in dodging the doping control. Maybe.
Uphill finish and Ventoso is no slouch by any means. Sometimes a thing is just a thing, dudes.
I think the Etna stage will be crazy. Should I call out of work to watch it? Maybe.
Jeez – is there a secret beer and sausage sanger car supplying the gruppetto? Aussie party at the back – Graeme Brown, Brett Lancaster, Cam Meyer, Robbie McEwen, Mark Renshaw all finished together, 17 minutes down yesterday.
Will have to drop Meyer – my roughie pick failure. Wouldn’t be surprised to see him in the break come week 2 though…
@Oli Brooke-White
Yeah, it’s just that he didn’t slump exhausted Jens-like. He just sort of sat up. It did look a bit odd. Then again, I ain’t ever been a sprinter. (Or a grimpeur, rouler, puncheur or any other sort of ‘eur’ – with the possible exception of poseur…)
@harminator
No biggie, I do have the feeling that GarVelo will have a rethink of their strategy this week, given their sprinter is out of the race.
I heard that he did take a few minutes to be able to answer any questions from the Press as he was so out of breath. Apparently Lactic Acid stops your legs from going around, and Ali-jet had too much in the last stages.
Oh and WooHoo I’m 9th…:P highest I’ve been in the VSP.
So, this morning I stumbled across this link (well ok, @inrng tweeted it, but I’m claiming that I found it…)
Apparently the UCI rated the riders in last year’s tour according to level of suspicion of doping and then tested accordingly:
click it here
I hope y’all can read french (or have google chrome)
@inrng has written this list up a bit now
click click
makes some pretty good points
Doesn’t make great
Doesn’t make great reading as an Australian.
di Dopers blown my top 5 wide open. No doubt he’s riding clean now then, eh???
This UCI ‘suspicions’ index is a disgrace and yet another demoralising own goal.
Got to see some action on the GC today….mountain finish, flat day tomorrow. I reckon Rodriguez or da Mensch might try and smash it. Whyowhyowhy did I not include Rodriguez? Too much beer, not enough pain recently has clearly clouded my judgement. May Merckx condemn me to a weekend of hill repeats and turbo intervals in the vomitarium without a fan.
Here we go! Bring on the climbs.
Alright, lets make this exciting. Free Velominati Logo decal to whoever guesses the winner of the stage today. I’m going for J-Rod.
I like this break. It has my boy Pineau is in there. Visconti is representing, but he has his sleeves rolled up(face palm) I apologize for my fellow Sicilian.
Nibali today!
@andy
Thats an interesting list. At least Faboo doesn’t have a supercharger on that motor of his.
You got to it first. I dont see any of the main GC guys going for a win yet. I wil go with Pineau.
I think it is Fucked up this list got out. I wounder what the Carbon Wheel thinks about being ranked 10 and Menchov?
I agree 100%. Amazing how the UCI can’t ever hold on to its confidential information. Nonetheless, it is interesting, and unfortunately leads to many unsubstantiated assumptions.
If I’m not too late (he’s not in the break anyway).
Arroyo. Contador, J-rod and Nibali are just going to mark themselves into ennui. Despite what I said earlier, da Mensch ain’t got the legs. DDA…DDA…DDA!
I like the suggestion by the commentator who is not Sean Kelly that they introduce a “Strangely Entertaining” classification for riders who are “bonkers”. Like Johnny Hoogerland.
It must be those super long socks tht are making him a nutter
@frank
Yes. Does Sebastian Lang and his half-attack qualify?
Hmmm, like too. Could call it the Utterly Futile Endeavor award. As a Brit, there’s nothing we like better than a overwhelmingly fruitless gesture, grounded in failure and suffering. Magnificent.
Ah, Lars Bak just blew up. Done.
Omega Pharma Lotto is, yet again, strangely entertaining.
I really should have left to work already.
Serious Climbone on this finishing climb here. Looks almost identical to Glendora Mountain Rd. in SoCal that I used to do almost weekly. Same gradient and same endless, glorious hairpins.
that was close. nice to see a young rider get a win.
Wow so close.
Now THAT was a finish… Che bella tappa! looks like Scarponi and Nibbles put some time into Clentador too…
“finali splendido”
Phew! What a finish! Can’t get a narrower margin than that. Glad to see the favorites blow it by starting to race hard too late.
Really good stuff. Sunday’s stage is going to be awesome.
Unknown Ganglion Belgique FTW! Wicked. Bertie-Meat-Sweats looked poopered at the end too. Looks like Nibbles is set for the big omerta showdown on his home turf for Sunday….Batti lu ferru mentri è cà udu!
@RedRanger @pakrat @Nof Landrien
absolutely shouldn’t have been leaked, as it pertains to blood passport and other confidential medical information. Whoever at the UCI/WADA leaked it will most likely be fired, if any of us was working for a company and leaked data that revealed personal data about anything we’d be sacked in an instant.
However, it does give an insight into how anti doping is run at a major event and further into anti doping in general. I assume they have a similar list for out of competition testing too, which might explain why faboo complained he was tested twice weekly outside of competition last year.
Having said that, I’ve just seen a tweet from @festinagirl which basically says a 10 scored rider was not tested at the tour…
I’ll definitely be keeping a look out to see if anything more develops from this.
Frank, how did aerolegs score a point? He has Le Mevel in 5th for GC and on the stage he scored a point, Le Mevel came in 4th. I am confused.
Looking forward to Sunday’s VSP stage. This tweet from Gerard Vroomen earlier today:
@ramenvelo
Because Le Mevel is 4th in GC atm
Great finish today, and a great response straight from the School of Belgian Legs:
“‘Why did I attack with 8km to go?,’ he said. ‘The speed wasn’t very high, so I tried to attack. It turned out quite well. Maybe riders should try to attack a little bit more. If you feel good, you have to attack.'”
From: http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/video-neo-pro-bart-de-clercq-takes-giro-ditalia-by-surprise
Haha. In honour of Bertie, I’ve just wolfed down nearly a whole cote de boeuf. Clearly I’m going to rule in the hills tomorrow, non?
UCI should almost be open to defamation claims from some of the riders classified as most suspicious. They are such idiots.