The First 100 Miles

WTF?

Why did I not know that Rory Sutherland was this hot?!?!

Thank you Nikki for enlightening me.

Extra, Extra

My mom's latest book, The King's Daughter, is out today!  It's the sequel to The Queen's Lady and if you're a historical fiction buff, or you know anyone who is, you must check it out. 

This Sucks!

Poor DZ had his home robbed while we were all watching him race in California last week!  The creeps took his cars, computers, flat screen TV and all the usual.  But they also took his Giro d'Italia medal, his Olympic ring with his initials inscribed in it and 12 bikes (including his Olympic time trial bike).  That is just not cool!

On Twitter he says "If anyone out there sees anything that you think might be mine let me know."

And while we're over at Twitter, George Hincapie comments on the colossally stupid move on Stage 7 of the ATOC by Chris Baldwin  who got in George's way coming into the feed zone and caused GH to miss his food!

Congrats Levi!

What a great Tour of California it was to watch.  It takes a lot of time doing the race reports but it was also nice to have an excuse to watch the race each day.  I thought the coverage on the Amgen Tour of California site was really good - even if Frankie Andreu never figured out how to pronounce Svein Tuft properly.

It was so cool to see Lance and Floyd riding again.  And I have to say that, after watching the way Lance worked over the past few days, I think I'm finally starting to get the point of his comeback.  I think what was holding me up before was my assumption that he had this huge ego that would never allow him to be anything less than the king of all things cycling.  But I was thoroughly impressed by the amazing effort that he put in for Levi.  He was a dedicated worker bee all week, putting everything he had into protecting his team leader.  I have never seen this side of Lance and I have to say that I like it very much.  Also, there's no denying the impact of the LiveStrong message on the fans out there.  So, I have to say that, after this week, my questions about Lance's return to cycling have been answered.

Yawn

Long, boring stage yesterday.  I felt so sorry for all the poor commentators on Versus and the AToC site trying to fill the hours with nothing to talk about.  I knew it was bad when the guys doing the live play-by-play at Cycling News said, "So let's learn a little bit about these six guys in the break," and proceeded to give bios and palmares for each of the guys.  It was a little painful.

Another nice set up by Columbia - High Road for a second win for Cavendish which was great to watch.

Looking forward to the ITT today for some excitement.  Go Levi!

Go Go Cavo

Nice work by Columbia-High Road's Mark Cavendish yesterday.  I really thought it was going to be Thor the way the Cervelo team was charging to the line to set him up, but those Columbia boys know what they're doing and the comparisons between Cavo and Robbie McEwen are certainly warranted; the guy just comes outa nowhere!

Once again, great interviews over at Velo News, especially with good old Chris Horner who always gives the best insight into the tactics behind the race.  I'm telling you, when that kid retires from cycling Phil and Paul better watch out.

Moving on to American Idol - am I the only one watching?  I cried both times that Danny Goeky (sp?) sang Hero.  I love that guy!  I also loved Alexis Grace who won the girl's slot last night - great voice.  In fact, I was thrilled by all three pics last night - good job America.  I thought Tatiana was going to have a full on break-down before the show ended. I'm so glad she's gone.

I'm about halfway through the first edit on the first draft of GEORGIA right now.  I'm really trying to power though it so that I can sit down with the whole thing and read it through from beginning to end before starting my second edit.  I'm so anxious to get this book done already!

The Levi Train

Great stage at the Amgen Tour of California yesterday.  Wow, Levi was on fire!  I can only imagine what Barrado, Peterson and McCartney thought when they saw him catch and then pass then yesterday on that final climb.  And in that weather!  Just fabulous bike riding.

You can check out my full report over at US Cycling Report.  Even if you watched the stage yourself, check out the site because they've got some great coverage going on over there including an interesting profile on yesterday's stage winner Tom Peterson.

Back to work today.  We had a holiday up here too yesterday - Family Day.  Two years ago the Ontario government caved to public complaints that there was no holiday in between Christmas and Easter.  They created Family Day which now falls after the second weekend in February.  Of course my husband had to work for Family Day so it was just me and the kids but we went to the zoo and had a fun day.  This is a re-enactment of my six-year-old daughter at the zoo yesterday:

Grace: "What's that?!"

Me: "A Tarantula."

"Can it kill you?"

"Yup."

"What's that?!"

"A Massassauga Rattle Snake."

"Can it kill you?"

"I'm not sure."

"What's that?!"

"A Guinea Pig."

"Can it kill you?"

"No."

Woo Hoo!

So happy to see Mancebo get that stage win today.  Boy did he earn that one.  Out in front from the 5km mark in the freezing cold rain, attacked at the end by two riders with reasonably fresh legs.  But he wasn't having it, they weren't going to take that stage win from him after all that.  That was great!

Sad to see Fabian Cancellara have to abandon, I hope this isn't the beginning of the same kind of devastating bug going around that we had at this race last year.

And Cat, I didn't know about he and Amber getting divorced, that's really sad.  I'm sure that everything that they've gone through puts an enormous pressure on a marriage.  I hope for the best for both of them.

I read over at Velo News that authorities are now saying that the thieves who stole Lance's time trial bike may not have known whose bike they were stealing.  Well, they do now and I'd just love to have seen the reaction on their faces when they found out.  Too funny!

Prologue

It was so much fun to watch the prologue of the Tour of California yesterday.  I still wish they carried Versus up here so that I could get comfy on my couch and really enjoy it, but even sitting at my desk it was still a thrill.

Watching Basso, Floyd, Lance and Tyler Hamilton come out of that starting house I felt at times like I was watching old cycling clips on You Tube, it was sort of surreal - but so much fun.  And how thrilled was I to see Canadian Svein Tuft place one spot ahead of Lance in the top ten?  Although someone really needs to teach Phil and Paul how to properly pronounce his name.

Was anyone else watching the first half hour or so of the video coverage on the Amgen Tour of California site?  They had started out having audio problems so you could see the race, but couldn't hear anything.  Then they got the audio feed going but no one told Phil and Paul so they were just shooting shit with each other and we could hear everything.  I was so worried for them that they'd say something totally inappropriate and it would be on the web forever.  It was very amusing.

As you guys know, I'm doing race reports over at US Cycling Report so stay tuned over there for the highlights and some great interviews and photos that Cathy's running.

I have to say that I'm still a little confused as to what Lance hopes to get out of all this.  You win seven back-to-back Tours de France and then come back to place 10th in the prologue at the Tour of California?  Behind the Canadian dude? 

I've never truly bought the "bring awareness to the fight against cancer" thing.  I don't think that Lance Armstrong - mega super star celebrity - needs professional cycling to help him bring awareness to anything.  I get that cycling is in his blood and that he loves to compete, but this just all seems a little sad to me.  Like watching Michael Jordan come back and finish halfway up the pack in the college basketball standings.

It's Getting Exciting

I'm officially drooling over the line-up for the Tour of California.  Now if Jan Ulrich would just show up I think we'd have just about everyone accounted for.  I'm so jealous of all of you who are heading out there in person when I can't even watch the damn thing on TV up here but I'll try to keep my bitterness in check.  I'm happy that I'm doing race reports for US Cycling Report so that I'll at least have an excuse to watch it online.  It's exciting to me to see so many Canadians on the start list for this race too.  I'll be very interested in seeing how my boys do out there amidst the sun and sand.

I read some of chapter two of GEORGIA at my writer's group last night and it got a nice reception.  People seem to be eager to hear what happens next and, as a writer, I can't ask for more than that.  I need to make a few edits based on the feedback I got last night and then this chapter will be ready to go.  I may not keep posting it here as it makes me a little nervous to be putting so much of the book up in cyberspace, but if anyone's interesting in being a reader for me and getting chapters by email as they're ready and sending me feedback I would be hugely appreciative.  Just let me know if you're interested, either in the comment section or by email.

I noticed that some people were commenting on the Phelps photos that came out this week. I was actually going to do a whole post on this but just didn't have the time.  When I saw the picture on GMA the other day I was reminded of his drunk driving change a while back and the whole thing really pissed me off.  Imagine someone comes to your house and says, "You have a skill that no one else on the face of the planet has.  You have the opportunity to use that skill, not only to win the world's top awards but also to inspire people and make yourself filthy, stinking rich and all you have to do is NOT BE AN IDIOT." Do you think you could do it?  Because I really think I could.