Velominati Super Prestige: Giro d’Italia 2012

Vittorio Adorni crosses the snow-covered Stelvio pass

After a winter of long training rides that offered more in the way of numb extremities than it did in acute enjoyment, I have to say that the warming of the air and brightening of the skies have served to remind me that while I love riding in bad weather, I certainly don’t have anything against riding when its nice out.

But dont think for a minute that this quells my desire to watch the Pros battle the elements as well as each other and, quite frankly, after a Spring Classics campaign that gave us only fleeting tastes of Rule #9 Glory, I welcome the arrival of the 2012 Giro d’Italia which holds the distinction of being held in the worst weather and over the worst roads. Come July, I’ll get just as wound up as anyone about the biggest racing spectacle of the year, but in my heart, the Giro d’Italia is the best Grand Tour of the three.

All that said, I’m a little disappointed to see that the Giro starts in Denmark. Not that I have anything against Denmark – lovely place – it’s just that this choice takes us away from the classical Giro opening week involving a mountaintop finish or two and gives us a Tour de France-style opening week of flat stages and crosswinds. We’ll have to wait almost two weeks before we start seeing the riders cross the highest passes and hitting the uphill finishes, though the final week does appear to set us up for considerable fireworks as the second-last stage will see the riders cross the Mortirolo and finish atop the Stelvio.

What does this mean for the VSP? Quite a bit, actually. Bearing in mind the changes we’ve made to the Rest-Day picks from the years past, it means that as the race settles out, those who have made changes to their lineup on the first rest day will not have the opportunity to do so again on the second rest day. And, those who wait for the second day will see steep penalties tallying up against their totals. But on the line is a Symbol Pack, the chance to post for the rest of year with the Maglia Rosa VSP Badge and, of course, the grand prize of the personalized Shop Apron. Check the start list and with any divine beings that you might be able to influence, and then get your picks in by the time the countdown timer goes to zero at 5am Pacific on the 5th May.

For reference, please review the new Grand Tour scoring and penalty guidelines. Also note that since these new rules required new coding and this represents the first Grand Tour, there is always the chance that there are defects in the code. Watch your picks and your points as we move through the event and alert us of any anomalies. If your points seem wrong, use the dispute function to alert us of the matter; complaints in the posts feed to this effect will be ignored. Finally, don’t leave anything to the last minute so we have time to fix any problems before its too late. Good luck.

Scoring:

Readers who wish to enter shall enter their predictions for the top five placings on General Classification of each Grand Tour by 5am on the day of the first stage or prologue.

Points

Points will be scored as follows: 20 points for first place, 15 for second, 10 for third, 7 for fourth, and 5 for fifth; plus 3 points per rider in the top five regardless of the rider’s placing, but riders are not scored twice.

Changing of the Picks*

Contestants are allowed to make line up changes on one of the rest days of the Grand Tours but not both. These changes will come with a point penalty. You will be allotted one (1) rest day to make swaps in grand tours. You pick either the first or second rest day. The penalties for swapping will be lower for the first rest day than the second. This will allow you to swap out a rider(s) who gets caught in some first week nervousness with a 5 point penalty for each swap. Or make some go for broke/doomed to fail break-away swap on the second rest day for a 10 point penalty per swap. You make one swap or five on either rest day for the corresponding 5 or 10 point penalty per swap.

Additionally, if one of your riders crashes out, DNF’s, or DNS’s, you may swap them out on a rest day with corresponding penalties if you haven’t already used up your one rest day swap. The only exception to this is riders who are booted from a race for a positive test; if your rider is on the juice and gets chucked off the race, you get a free swap of that rider within 24 hours of the disqualification.

[vsp_results id=”15814″]
[/vsp_results]

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

Marcus says:

May 15 2012 at 4:55 pm

@RedRanger

@sgtHave you had Italian beer? proof that not everything Italian is good. but to your question, no I never had it since im not an ice tea fan to begin with.

Shirley you cant be serious? Moretti, Peroni Nastro Azzurro, Castello - all great beers. To my knowledge (which is fucking considerable in this area) they don't do the heavier beers too much, but that is probably reflective of the beer drinking climate down south.

And before you say it, yes Australian beer isn't generally too flash - but good to drink in volume.
Daccordi Rider says:

May 15 2012 at 5:53 pm

@Steampunk

@wiscotPippo goes up and down in my books. As you said, too much flash, but he does look good on a bike. There are few smoother riders in the peloton when he's in form. The man's pretty fast, though. He had every right to be where he was. Crashes happen, and it looks as though Goss had misjudged the turn before Pippo ran into the back of him. There seems to be a fair amount of Anglophilia in the English cycling media (not hugely surprising), but if Goss had run into the back of Pippo, it would have been Pippo's line that was at fault...

See I reckon Goss had it right, go wide, avoid the carnage and get out of the corner quick. Was going to work until Pippo forgot what brakes are and t-boned him.
sprider says:

May 15 2012 at 6:29 pm

Great ride by Purito, too bad it was time bonuses that took the Maglia from Ryder. On the plus side, all my picks are still in it to win!
Mikael Liddy says:

May 15 2012 at 6:59 pm

@Steampunk

@wiscot
Pippo goes up and down in my books. As you said, too much flash, but he does look good on a bike. There are few smoother riders in the peloton when he's in form. The man's pretty fast, though. He had every right to be where he was. Crashes happen, and it looks as though Goss had misjudged the turn before Pippo ran into the back of him. There seems to be a fair amount of Anglophilia in the English cycling media (not hugely surprising), but if Goss had run into the back of Pippo, it would have been Pippo's line that was at fault...

not so sure about that, here's the shot from the footage that I was talking about yesterday. You can see Pippo's already lost the back end before he's anywhere near Goss, the shape he's in there, he's going nowhere but straight ahead, which takes him in to Goss (entering the frame) when he turns in.
Steampunk says:

May 15 2012 at 7:07 pm

@Daccordi Rider & @Mikael Liddy:
I withdraw the previous comment about trying to absolve Pippo.
Erik says:

May 15 2012 at 7:41 pm

Off topic, but anybody else completely amazed by the fact that Peter Sagan is apparently untouchable in California. Three stages = three wins.
RedRanger says:

May 15 2012 at 7:42 pm

@sgt

@frank
You keep telling yourself that.

@RedRanger
Full disclosure. I'm not a drinkin' man (any more), so no. I've figured out that l'acqua gassata is so cheap in Italia, I rarely drink anything but that or cafe when I'm in country.

Basically what I lived on for the 6 months I was there. And coke.

@Marcus
I wouldn't drink Moretti of you paid me. I drank very little while I was there. Don't drink wine myself. Didn't leave he with many options. Plus my fam isn't the drunk American kind. No eye patches for me.
Bianchi Denti says:

May 15 2012 at 9:09 pm

@Erik

Off topic, but anybody else completely amazed by the fact that Peter Sagan is apparently untouchable in California. Three stages = three wins.

Yep. Even with his problems on the first 2 stages, he looks like he can't belive how easy it is easy to win. I can't wait to see him at Le Tour, even if it's as a lone wolf stage hunter.
Netraam says:

May 16 2012 at 4:08 am

@frank
I would love it if other races did that too, but they should make commentaries available in multiple languages then. Because I can imagine the Tour and Paris-Roubaix feeds being French.
frank says:

May 16 2012 at 4:38 am

@Daccordi Rider

@Steampunk

@wiscotPippo goes up and down in my books. As you said, too much flash, but he does look good on a bike. There are few smoother riders in the peloton when he's in form. The man's pretty fast, though. He had every right to be where he was. Crashes happen, and it looks as though Goss had misjudged the turn before Pippo ran into the back of him. There seems to be a fair amount of Anglophilia in the English cycling media (not hugely surprising), but if Goss had run into the back of Pippo, it would have been Pippo's line that was at fault...

See I reckon Goss had it right, go wide, avoid the carnage and get out of the corner quick. Was going to work until Pippo forgot what brakes are and t-boned him.

True enough, but I think Pippo didn't forget what brakes are - he forgot how to use them. Check out the slip-out happening in @Mikael Liddy's post; he's hitting the brakes hard in the sharpest bit of the corner. Big no-no.

I forget which cycling rag I read it in, but there was a nice piece on Richard Bryne and his bike handling classes that he teaches to Pros. Absolutely amazing how bad many pro's basic skills are. They get good at going fast, but that doesn't mean they get good at going fast around corners.

The Schelecks should take that class. Or, scarier yet, maybe they already did and what we see is actually already the improvement.