Thursday update

Elections for USA Cycling trustee positions are underway, with voting open until Aug. 15. According to the USA Cycling website, "The trustees are representatives of the USA Cycling membership whose mission is to help shape governance policy, association bylaws and racing rules." There are several categories of trustees, but this is the list of candidates for the USPRO (Men’s Professional Road Cycling) category:

Trade Team Trustee: Jonathan Vaughters, Ken Mills
At-Large Trustee: Michael Ball, Ed Beamon
Athlete Trustees: Dylan Casey, Will Frischkorn, Nicholas Reistad
*One trade team, one at-large and two athlete trustees to be elected.

Rock Racing owner Michael Ball wants to become an at-large trustee, and here is his candidate statement. He talks a great deal about rider's rights and improving the riders' working conditions. Yet, this is a guy who threatens his riders that if they don't win they will get fired, cannot get along with potential sponsors or his own directors, and when trying to hire Chris Horner refused to even offer him anything other than a highly unstable day-to-day contract. As Horner explained, "The deal was never done because we had originally discussed a three-year contract for x amount of money, but what he offered me was a day-to-day contract that was good for three years, meaning he could fire me whenever he wanted, just like he fired Sebastian Haedo and threatened to fire Rahsaan Bahati." Does this sound like a guy who cares about riders' rights? About good working conditions? How are day-to-day contracts and threatening riders helping their working conditions? Then there is also the whole doping issue, which I am not even getting into. Oh, yes, and last but not least, consider that Rock Racing is now rumored to be in negotiations to try to sign none other than Jose Enrique Gutierrez aka the Buffalo, of Operacion Puerto infamy. Ball talks a big talk in his candidate statement, but his own actions towards his riders and the sport as a whole do not support his words.


Sastre has a Tour diary at his website. He takes a funny little jab at Riis when he writes about the rest day ride, "Today we were accompanied by our sports directors, who joined us on their bikes. I hope that this outing will help them make decisions in a calmer way when they're sitting in the car."

Symmetrics announces the long rumored news that Christian Meier will be a stagiare for Garmin-Chipotle. This makes me very happy, I must say. It will be a bit confusing however, as Garmin-Chipotle will have two stagiares, one named Christian Meier and one named Cameron Meyer (from South Australia.com/AIS). I'd say some new nicknames are in order.

Not just in cycling...


In an article by SI's Austin Murphy, anti-doping expert Michael Ashenden talks about the ongoing controversy of WADA's criteria for declaring an EPO test positive, stating that "I would love to see those EPO gels on all of the athletes, because it would tell you who's doing something suspicious and who's not. Even when the blood profile looks relatively normal, you're still going to see these unusual patterns in the EPO gel. These gels exist, they're collected every time, but the labs refuse to disclose them. There's all this information sitting there that could help us identify who's suspicious and who's not. And it's not being used. To me it's nonsensical. We're in this uphill battle, but we're not using everything that's available to try and help us." Also, on the topic of bio-passports, Ashenden warns that micro-dosing is still a possible problem, saying that "Because they know we're looking for these sudden, large fluctuations, they've become more clever in the way they take their drugs."

Speculation abounds about which corrupt lab offered to doctor a rider's B test to get them off the hook. Maybe it could be the Spanish lab that Jesus Manzano talked about when interviewed by L'Equipe (June 5, 2007): "I want to give you an example, something I've never spoken about except to the police up until now. It concerns one of the four Spanish laboratories accredited by the UCI. This laboratory, which is in charge of sending the UCI ‘vampires' to take the samples during the Vuelta and other races, is the same lab that's in charge of the doctor visits to the cyclists, they follow the cyclists and give them the stamp of approval on their licenses. The owner of this clinic, a renowned hematologist, called Walter Viru, is one of the doctors for Kelme, to alert them the day before the UCI vampires were coming to take the samples from the cyclists. And he did the same thing with Del Moral, the doctor for the U.S. Postal team and then Discovery, a good friend of his."

Charles Dionne, former rider for Saunier-Duval, says that he is not surprised by the doping scandal at his former team. After Dionne chose to leave Saunier-Duval and return to domestic cycling (currently with Team Successful Living), he says that many people questioned his decision, and did not understand that he was unwilling to stay on a team like Saunier-Duval, where he saw well enough what was going on. Dionne now says that he is proud of his decision, because he can look himself in the mirror in the morning.

Interesting Riis interview by Bonnie Ford: "I feel bad that so many people feel they cannot trust me. That's a problem for me. I'm struggling with that in my work. But I just have to be patient and keep on doing the work I do."

"There is anger everywhere in cycling right now."

"Don't give up yet, the best part's just beginning."

The two Alps stages after the rest day were truly amazing to watch. Just the scenery alone was awe-inspiring. Very sad that Vande Velde had the one crash and sort of bad day, as otherwise I think he would really be in the yellow jersey hunt on Saturday. I think that CSC, for all their strength, will probably lose the Tour again, which is too bad as I would like to see Sastre win. Plus, this year is his last chance, as next year I can only imagine it will all be put on the line for Andy Schleck. I was trying to start to like Cadel Evans, but I have to admit that it is not as easy as I hoped. He has a prickly demeanor with the media, and seems to have a tough time dealing with the pressure and demands made on the yellow jersey. While in some ways all that matters is his riding ability, in another way, the yellow jersey is the ultimate ambassador for the sport of cycling as a whole, and one would wish that it might be a person who could present some class and grace in the interviews seen around the world (not that we've had that very often in the past years). The yellow jersey represents the sport as a whole, and flying off the handle and screaming and yelling is not exactly helpful. Then again, sometimes I think that the crazy scrum of aggressive and pushy reporters and photographers that the riders have to deal with at the Tour are only getting what they deserve if the riders get annoyed with them, often rightfully. Saturday will be a spectacle to behold. With everything to play for, I wonder how much the nerves and pressure of the moment will influence the contenders? Also, I really hope that Garmin-Chipotle gets a rider in the breakaway tomorrow as otherwise it might be as boring as today, which was a snoozefest except for the ending, and poor Cunego's terrible travails.