Velogal's Blog

Monday, February 28, 2005

Lance Armstrong Live Strong Sirius Radio was live from Los Angeles last night, with the Grant Lee Phillips band “live” as special guests. Lots of music played and several phone questions. Lance and Higgs were great, as usual. Grant played Lone Star in Lance’s honor, but it wasn’t written with him in mind.


Lance talked about George’s win at Kuurne Brussels Kuurne and said that he thinks this is gonna be George’s No Chain year. Of course, they are all delighted that this is the first win for the D-Team, and Discovery Channel is really happy. Lance had a lotta praise for Stijn’s hard-working attacks that wore out most of the remaining riders. Lance said (and I didn’t know this) that Dirk Demol is from Kuurne, so the win meant so much to him, in his hometown... Especially since he swore that he was going to get sporting revenge for the Het Volk loss.


Lance said he is leaving Wednesday and will do Paris-Nice on Sunday - said he hasn’t been on a TT bike since last year’s Tour. Higgs suggested that maybe Lance just might consider riding this TT bike today when training... They talked a bit about this year’s TdF, and Lance pointed out that there are three uphill finishes....


A caller question was what sport is Lance not good at - La replied that he sucks at basketball, golf, baseball and football. Higgs didn’t think that Lance sucked at golf, but Lance says he’s given it up.. Another question was did Lance have a third book coming out, and he said right now there are no plans for a third book. Higgs did say that there could possibly be some kind of mini version of the Lance Chronicles this year, but nothing is officially set up with OLN yet.


Since next Sunday, Lance will be doing Paris-Nice, they are have to figure out what they will do about the Sirius show. There’s about a nine-hour time difference from here in the West Coast, so from Austin or NY, showtime is in the wee hours in France. (it’s at 6pm where I live).


OK, gang, that’s all I remember about the show. Next Sunday, I’m gonna be driving back from the McLane (every time I type this, I type McLance - duh) Pacific in Merced, but I’ll tape the show and give it a listen when I get home.


I saw another fansite, or rather a blog, that is using a photo from my smugmug gallery. Notice I didn't say "stealing", but some photographers call it that. Most folks know that if you want to use a photo, common courtesy is that you write to the photographer and ask first, and then you give that photographer credit by putting their name under the photo. Most of us will say OK to fans or team riders who want a freebie, but most of us get a little annoyed to find our photos strung all over the Net without at least a credit to our work.


I send my photos to the D-team guys for their sites - it's the right thing to do, and I would never expect them to pay or anything. It's my way of saying thanks... But this site was a French Lance fan site, and there was one of my Solvang photos of Lance (plus a lot of photos lifted from other sources). Last year, another personal site took a whole bunch of my 2004 Tour de France Village Depart photos and gave them cute names that had little or nothing to do with cycling. So.... I just bought a watermarking software program and guess I will have to go that route this cycling season.

Sunday, February 27, 2005

It was so cool to watch George win at Kuurne Brussels Kuurne! Stijn rode a great race - he just fried Boonen on that last climb and last kilometers. He is a great rider, too... Keep your eyes on him... Leif and Hayden and Jurgen all did their share, too - all the guys worked hard for that win. And great tactics by Dirk Demol. He vowed before the race that the D-Men would win and get revenge for Het Volk.


It was just great on cycling.tv - I am going to become a crusader for them. Maybe if we all wrote to them, they could get the Vuelta or Giro, too. I wrote and told them that I thought all of us cycling fans in America would gladly pay $10 to watch - Hey - I’d pay $10 a stage viewing - what the Hell - that’s what credit cards are for! How else would most of us see it? And I am now getting used to Anthony and the tech guy, Simon, as announcers. They are OK to me.


So Lance’s show will be on in less than an hour. I’ll give you all a recap of the Sirius Radio Live Strong Lance Armstrong show tomorrow. He and Sheryl were flying out to Los Angeles to appear at a cancer event, either last night or tonight. So I don’t know if his show will be live or taped... I don’t think they will be at the Academy Awards, but maybe - who knows? I do know that he is flying out to Europe right away.


Planning meeting for the Sea Otter went well. Heads up to all fans who live in the Monterey, Carmel and Salinas areas. They are looking for folks to be Host Families for the racing teams. It is a great thing to do - you can have one or more of the team riders stay with you. Puts you right behind the scenes, and it’s a great thing if you have kids. The riders are all great people and very appreciative and thoughtful guests. You usually end up with some great team schwag and great stories to tell. Call 541-822-9845 and press the extension for Kendra if you can help out. Please pass the word along.


The good folks at Redlands have a great Host Housing program. The same riders stay with the same families year after year, and really become a part of that family. Trent Klasna stayed with the same family for years and years - they were great people and so involved with his racing. I’m sure that they will miss seeing him this year, since he has retired.

YESS! George wins at Kurne Brussels Kurne!! Go D-Team! More later....

Saturday, February 26, 2005

Got to Het Volk late. Unfortunately, I was one of the “few” who had pin number access problems and kept getting error messages and being showed some little kids on trikes riding a mini playground cross course and falling on their faces. Cute, but give me the damn race! I actually sent them an email, and they responded! Wow - real live-time customer service..


I guess the pay server screwed up on some pre-paid accounts. How many? - Not just me, I hope. So I missed about a half hour of the race. But, when the race did come on, I thought it was great. A couple of freeze-ups, but other than that, I’d pay $10 any day to get this kind of coverage. I’d rather listened to Phil and Paul, but hey, the guys did an OK job. I want to see it anyway, not listen.


The thing I noticed was that the Discovery team kits were almost indistinguishable, on the long and even semi-long shots, from the two or three other teams with the same bright blue and white/grey color theme. At least Rabobank has the bright orange on the blue that lets you spot them right away. The yellow band on the D-kit sleeve isn’t that visible until the cameras get closer, either. And the D-Team helmets are not visually distinctive. At least you could spot the Postie kits and helmets.


The guys were looking good and riding well - not sure what happened in those last 10 or 12 kilometers. When Nuyens went away at about 8k or so, everybody was just looking at everybody else, waiting, and nobody did anything, including George, Max, Roger or Stijn. Max came in at 8th. Boonen looked kinda fried, but came in second and was knocked down by another rider right after the finish line. He fell really hard on his shoulder, but seemed OK.


All in all, I liked the cycling.tv coverage. I liked how the cameras went right back behind the podium to show the podium guys getting cleaned up and interviewed, etc. I hope that the cycling.tv organization makes it and we can see European races just like the rest of the world! The announcers said it was being broadcast to 59 countries. And for the couple of people who wrote to me during the race - what you have to do is click on the little 4x4 inch live screen and it maximizes the size to your full monitor. Hit escape to go back to the teeny, mini screen... You’re welcome..


Tomorrow's blog (Sunday) may be later in the day, or evening. I'm gonna watch KBK on cycling.tv and then drive like mad to the Sea Otter meeting. No time to blog in the morning, for sure....

Friday, February 25, 2005

Brrrr.. Omloop Het Volk weather sounds like it’s gonna be cold and dangerous on the cobbles. Zero degrees and light snow overnight - foggy, freezing weather over those climbs and cobbles. That pavé is gonna be slick and dangerous. Especially that one narrow climb...


Those guys are all so damn tough - imagine how they suffer in that kind of weather. No matter how hi-tech the material they are wearing, those guys are damn cold. When see these guys after riding in this kind of weather, I often think about some dumb sportswriter saying that cycling is not a sport, or that the riders are not athletes, or how they are not tough. Watch a Spring Classic and then see how stupid that comment is....


I’m heading over to my web guru’s place to tweak the Discovery site a bit. I have really been neglecting the poor little Podium Girl site - It takes so much time to stay on top of all the sites and keep up this blog. Definitely a labor of love...


A reminder - if you shop online for books, etc at Amazon, please click through the Amazon icon on one of my sites - every little bit helps cover expenses for maintaining my Lance and D-Team websites.

Thursday, February 24, 2005

Well, I am going to watch the Omloop Het Volk and Kurne Brussels Kurne this weekend. Yes, I am... In my jammies with java and junk food.. Uh-huh .. that’s right... The Spring Classics begin.


Nope - I’m not doing a time warp to Belgium... I just signed up at www.cycling.tv and authorized 6.92 euro on my plastic money. Het Volk is a pay-for and KBK is a freebie. I ran the little equipment test and The Sufferfest flawlessly streamed in at 412 kb or whatever it was. Anyway, the reception was smooth, loud and clear. YESS...


OMG - Het Volk live! My calf muscles tensed up, and my credit card started rattling in my purse. In a flash, I was turning off the pop-up blocker and putting up with a bunch of pop-up windows from the UK. Pop-up: register, Pop-up: credit card info, Pop-up: pin number. Pop-up: Thank You. Valiantly battling the Earthlink red fist and the Zone Alarm firewall, I persevered to the top of the climb - I mean hung in through the “Print this receipt, write down your secret word, write down your hint in case you forget your password, and here is your Pin Number” end. I am now registered for Cycling.TV.


Now I have these great expectations for Saturday and Sunday morning. Rats - I just remembered that I have to drive down to Laguna Seca on Sunday morning for a Sea Otter team meeting. Bummer timing, but I gotta go. Maybe they have wireless at the Laguna Seca Communication Center (Duh - they should - but they are kinda shut down this time of year), and I can watch it on my laptop or on my T-Mobile Ipaq. Or, when the meeting is over, I can drive like mad to the Starbucks on the corner of Hwy 68 and 218 and catch the end of KBK. I love T-Mobile Hotspots... I love cycling....

Wednesday, February 23, 2005

Since all the buzz now is about getting to France to see Lance go for The Big Seven, I want to make sure that you all know about Ted Arnold’s Self Guided Tour de France 2005. This is, I think, about the fourth edition of the guide, and this is the first year that Ted is having it printed and selling it on his www.velotainment.com site. Ted decided to try cafepress.com, after hearing from me about how they are handling the sales of my Podium Girl Gone Bad merchandise. (Insert powerful, compelling, irresistible subliminal blinking messages to buy Podium Girl Gone Bad merchandise: thongs, pillows, etc at www.cafeshops/pggb). And, as I was saying...



Ted is a buddy of mine in Austin, and he worked for the bike shop that takes care of Lance’s bikes, so he knows Lance and worked on a couple of team sponsor advertising spots. Ted has been a tour guide during the Tour for four or more years, so he really knows his stuff. His little book is just the right size to carry along, and is so full of information. Even if you are not going to go over to the Tour, it has great insights about the 2005 stages. It is well worth reading even if you are doing the Tour on OLN! And be sure to check out Ted’s forum for Q&A about doing the Tour.



Speaking of the Tour, a good, generous buddy of mine tried to give me a RT to the Tour using his frequent flyer air miles, only to find that any return flight from Paris was booked up until mid-August! I could get there, but not back... We all know that in order to use FF miles, you have to book a year ahead, and then it’s iffy. And that airlines only allow extremely limited space for free flights. So I was so stoked and jumping around: Yess, yess, yess -- and then greatly disappointed, but not surprised... Bummer, ‘cause flight and rental car expense are two huge costs that I really have a hard time handling on my budget.


Allrightiethen, Where's There's a Will, There's a Way, as my old Grannie used to say. But... wait a minute, maybe all of my childhood, Grannie really meant "will" as $$$ from an inheritance, and I've been a mislead optimist all this time since I was a kid...


Tuesday, February 22, 2005

I am finally getting a chance to look through the January issue of Cycle Sport mag and their tribute to Eddy Merckx. It’s beautifully done, with the greatest collection of photos - The two-page image of Eddy riding in the rain/snow, climbing the Tre Cimedi Lavaredo in the 1968 Giro is priceless. In almost all the images, Eddy is totally focused, in the zone - his face impassive, expressionless. Makes me think of Lance and his incredible focus when he is riding...


Also, in Graham Watson’s column in that issue of Cycle Sport, there is a retro look at the USPS team - nice history of the team. Cool GW photos of the USPS 1997 Louis Armstrong postage stamp jersey, of Frankie Andreu and George Hincapie riding together, Eki riding in the yellow jersey at the 1997 Dauphine Libere, and in the Focus On section, several color two-page spreads of Le Train Bleu in action.


There’s a soft spot in my heart for the Posties - the nickname, as well as the guys on the team, and those who have been on the team and gone elsewhere. I don’t think anybody called the USPS team “Posties” until my postiefans site went up. Everybody was calling them Postal. I still get letters about finding the right nickname for the Discovery team. I ran a contest for a long time on the Postiefans site for a nickname - so many people sent in the name Disco Boys, or DC’s, but you know, these guys are incredibly tough athletes, not the Village People. It just wasn’t the right fit for a cycling team. So I call them the D-Men until something better comes along.

Monday, February 21, 2005

Monday morning - that means a recap of the Lance Armstrong Live Strong radio show last night. I’ve heard from several of you who don’t get Sirius, and for sure, I’ll let you know what went on as long as I’m around here to listen. Yesterday, Higgs was at the Austin office with the broadcast equipment, and Lance was at his ranch with Sheryl and the kids. So LA was on the phone with Higgs.


Lance said he was gearing up starting now with his training and being a “monk” - that means no more Shiner Bock and Mexican food. Lance said he had trained about four and a half hours that day, with Dave Bolch motor-pacing him. He said Dave had a heavy foot - Dave wrote a message on the back window of the Subaru that said something like “Get Going” - I can’t remember exactly what it was.


When asked about his decision to do the Tour, Lance said he was going to wait to make his decision and announce it later, but when he got to thinking about it, he realized that there was “only one race that got him up early every morning and got him to bed early every night” - and that was the Tour de France. It is what motivates him to ride, so he decided to go for it and announce it right away, instead of waiting.


Someone asked him how many miles he rides in a year. Lance said he thinks he may average over the year about 75 miles a day, with very few days off - so he did a rough guess of maybe 24-25k a year. Then he started musing about starting as a Pro 13-15 years ago and how many miles that would be. Or if he counted starting as a triathlete, or even starting when he got his first bike.


I had shot Lance an email during the show, telling him to put College in the back seat, and I would drive his motorcoach in Georgia - I don’t know if he or Higgs read the message, but about ten minutes later they started talking about College driving the bus, and his little boo-boos, dents and dings. Lance said he had convinced College to drive again this year. Lance mentioned something about College driving it to Philly.... Hmmmm.... So, guess I won’t need to take the bus driving course from Bluebell Coaches this year... Dudes - you bet your sweet bippy I could do it!


Lance brought Luke, Grace and Isabella on for a couple of minutes of that uninhibited, charming laughter and silliness that only little kids possess. It was funny, and Luke got some poop words on air, which obviously delighted him. Those are great little kids...


Lance said that the purchases of Live Strong bands during the Oprah show crashed the LAF server, and nearly crashed Oprah.com. He said the total for that three-day weekend was 1.2 million bands sold.


Higgs and Lance said the show will originate in Los Angeles next Sunday, where they will compete with the Oscar awards. Almost every Sunday, they have some major competition from some big event... They said they are planning with Sirius how they will have Lance on the air every Sunday during racing season. They may have to tape some shows ahead of time because of the several hour time difference in Europe. Can’t see Lance getting up to tape a live show and then doing a stage of the Tour...


So that’s what I remember - Thanks for reading and thanks for all your great comments!

Sunday, February 20, 2005

Trofeo Luis Puig had some tough climbs, but Max ended up fourth in GC with the final sprint. Altho the win went to Petacchi - he is kicking butt so far this season, with his fourth win. However, I notice that one of our D-Men, Stijn, was fourth in two of the four KOM Primes, and ended up 4th in the final Mountains GC. Stijn must be climbing really well. When I was following the team in training camp, Stijn never got dropped at all. He is looking real good this year. So is Volodymyr Bilenka.


Tried to listen to Frankie Andreu on Spoke Radio yesterday, but my Internet connection gave me grief, so I just heard bits and pieces of the show. Frankie is just the greatest guy - he knows cycling inside and out. The first time that I went to the Tour, I was with VeloSport Vacations for part of the time. Frankie was the celeb guest, and I had the good fortune to sit next to him on the motorcoach for about four hours. He is a funny guy, and writes the best diaries from the Tour. I always caught his USPS team reports. I hope he is going to write for Discovery Channel, and if not Frankie, I wish it were going to be me.


Don’t forget to catch Lance and Company on Live Strong - Sirius Radio program tonight. I record it on my PVR, but it’s weird to not have an image on the screen for playback - When I want to fast forward or reverse, there is no counter or anything to help one find the right stopping place. Just a little bar that misleadingly creeps along. I have the Sirius logo up on my sites, and if anybody clicks thru and buys, I make a few bucks. Unfortunately, GM forgot to click-thru when they put Sirius in their vehicles...

Saturday, February 19, 2005

As I was completing some of my arrangements for the Tour de Georgia trip, I was thinking about how much work went into the logistics of course marshal placement for the first Georgia race. Threshold Sports was hired to do the logistics for that first race, so we had one of our really sharp guys, Dave “Lumpy” Williams, down there for months, planning the route. Then, around January or February, I headed out to Georgia, along with Chris Spaeth from Threshold, and we all spent about a week driving the entire 600 mile route, to plan course marshal placements.


I sat in the back seat of a mini-van with a clipboard and a pad of yellow legal paper, and wrote the location and names of every street and road intersection, freeway or highway entrances and exits, school, shopping center: anywhere that there was traffic entering the race route. And noted our estimate of how many course marshals would be needed at each location to keep the riders and the public safe. Think about it, every spot where a vehicle might enter the course while the race was in progress, I wrote the mileage, street/road names and any hazards (blind curves, potholes, railroad crossings, etc.) Jeeze - writing fast and furiously 600 miles worth...


I’m not kidding - I hardly had a chance to even look up, as Lumpy or Chris would call out street/road names, and I would write as fast as I could as we drove along. I had pages and pages and pages - dozens of pages - of course marshal posts. When I returned to work the race in April, supervising the course marshals (along with Chris and another guy), I hardly recognized many of the routes because all I had seen for seven days and 600 miles of beautiful Georgia country was that damn yellow pad of paper and the back of the driver’s head!


We had local volunteers for each city, and then we had a crew of 50 volunteer traveling course marshals. We had five Dodge Sprints with ten of the traveling course marshals riding in each van. We had to plan how to move these 50 people, picking them up instantly as the race went by, and jumping them around the racing on the course to get them ahead of the race and placed at their posts all the distance of each stage. Van numbers 1 through 5 went in sequential order along the route each stage. The drivers were heroes, who drove like Hell along back roads and freeways to get their course marshals up ahead of the race in time.


It was a tremendous first-time challenge in Georgia, and our traveling course marshals were real troopers, who put up with all kinds of crap from all kinds of sources. They all hung in and did an incredible job on that first Tour de Georgia. There was so much pressure on all of us to not have any screw-ups, especially with Lance riding in the race. I think we set the blueprint for excellence in how do the course marshal logistics in Georgia that first year. I went back to TdG as Media last year, and I think that is when I fully realized what a huge job that started from the back of a minivan.


Friday, February 18, 2005

Did you see the Robbie Ventura interview a couple of days ago on cyclingnews.com? Robbie is a great guy - he and Kenny Labbe (another great guy) rode a lot of American races for the Posties, with little fanfare or recognition. They were always hard-working and hard-riding guys. Kenny rode in support of Robbie and they were a great team.


Robbie is a super guy and a super funny dude. A bunch of Postie guys were at Interbike a couple of years ago, and I got some great pics. A couple of friends of Robbie’s were there and they were having a blast. Robbie and Kenny were such great representatives of the USPS - always had time for the fans, were really interested in talking to fans and would sign autographs for as long as it took to get to each person in line.


I was at Downer’s Grove last year when Robbie was riding his last race before retiring. I was shooting and rooting for him to take the win. At the last corner heading to the finish line of the last lap, Robbie was ahead. His tire flatted and went off the wheel - Robbie flew over his bike and landed on one of the bales of hay. There went his win - and no bike to even finish the race with. Vince, the Postie wrench, went running down there, but everyone had already finished.


Race officials kept the finish area cleared as best they could, and waited for Robbie to ride across. The crowd gave him a standing ovation (well, yes, they were already standing, but...) he got long applause and accolades from everyone. It’s a wonder he didn’t break his neck the way he flew into that bale of hay. Gave me bad memories of Nicole Reinhart’s deadly accident - I was supervising course marshals and was just down the street when it happened. So, so very sad...

Thursday, February 17, 2005

The Cycling Gods have smiled on me and I have found a sponsor for Tour de Georgia! Yes - happiness is heading out for a cycling race. I spent yesterday afternoon making lodging arrangements - Blairsville was a toughie, but a call to a nice gal at their Chamber of Commerce gave me a line on a place. Blairsville, which will be the start of final stage of the TdG, has only three or four motels. I think that the Tour of Georgia folks have all the motel lodging booked for the night of the 23rd. If you’re going, bring your tent...And I bet that Lance will bring some of the big guns along - maybe revise some schedules.


So Max got pipped on the spring at Ruta del Sol in Stage 4 and took a third place today in Stage 5. Cyclingnews.com first reported that Max had won and I was pretty stoked and put it up on the site. Went back a while later and saw the revised results. Not bad, tho - Max pipped Zabel to take third..


Every headline in the world, it seems, has the Lance Armstrong going for Seven story. Everybody is saying they knew it all along and I told you so... Uh huh...Right. Be sure and check out the new MikeCreed.com site - it’s just going up, and looking pretty good. I sent them a couple of photos of Mike from camp and they’re in the photo section. Mike is a cool guy and a hard worker - real determination.

Wednesday, February 16, 2005

Lance Armstrong heads for the Seventh Tour de France win this summer! Yep - the big announcement came out in the wee hours this morning. All the Tour de France tour group operators are breathing a sigh of relief and will sleep better at night now. Guess they were pretty worried about a mess of cancellations if Lance had said no for this year.


Lance says he will start with Paris-Nice, the Tour of Flanders, and then head back home for the Tour of Georgia. Whoa - Georgia is a big surprise, ‘cause he had said he wasn’t going to do it this year. Likely changed his mind so he could spend some time with his kids again...


Yikes, my budget has said No Way to Georgia, so I’m gonna have to do something - I don’t know what, but something!

Tuesday, February 15, 2005

You gotta check out this great article in USA Today by Sal Ruibal about soigneurs - Ten Worst Jobs

Sitting here watching the rain pouring down and thinking that Lance would be right out there pounding out the miles on this bike. And speaking of his bike, I hope you all caught the funny Tour de France blog written by Lance’s Bike in the Austin American Statesman during the 2004 TdF. It was called “It IS About the Bike” and you can find the entries HERE There’s a daily entry through the end of the 2004 Tour. Funny stuff...



Be sure and pass the word along to everybody to vote for Lance as The Greatest American on the poll that seems to be a partnership between AOL and Discovery Channel. The poll is HERE . Matt Lauer will host the awards program on Discovery Channel in June. Remember that vote early, vote often is the great American tradition...



The guys are riding their butts off at the Ruta del Sol (Vuelta a Andalucia) - Got the big guns there: George. Eki, Triki. Today in Stage Three, Eki was 6th and Triki was 17th, but Eki had the same time as the winner and Triki was 0.04 seconds back! That’s kind of a blink away from winning for both of them. The guys are starting to come on strong, with two stages left. Actually, this is planned as a training race, but a stage win would be pretty cool.

Monday, February 14, 2005

Lotta Lance Armstrong last night! Started with Lance on his Live Strong Sirius Radio show. Higgs, of course was there, but Sheryl sat in for a few minutes and the guest of honor was his Mom, Linda Armstrong Kelly.
She talked about how she loved her new home in Tulsa, and about her upcoming book about raising Lance, due to be released on April 5th.


Lance told a funny story about being at the huge Tennis Grand Slam Jam, a fund-raiser at the Irwin Center in Austin. Celebs play tennis with the Pros - the usual shtick. Lance said he was warming up on the court in front of about 5,000 spectators when one of the young Pros decided to run out and de-pants Lance. However, Lance wasn’t wearing anything under his tennis shorts, so he did the Full Monty in front of all 5,000 people! They sure got more than what they paid for.... Nah - I won’t do a Robin Williams thing about keeping your eyes on the ball...


Lance said he will announce his racing schedule next week - first he said mid-week, and then he said maybe he will do it on next week’s Live Strong show... Whether that racing schedule includes a yay or nay about Le Tour, he didn’t say.... Said he’s been doing heavy training in Austin, etc and is just putting on base miles right now. Rode six hours - about 120 miles, before he went out to play the celeb tennis tourney. Whatta guy...



Next came the Grammys, and I waited until practically the end of the show to see Lance and Sheryl. OMG, she looked fabulous in that Roberto Cavalli Tour-de-France-yellow halter gown. It was cut out curved in the middle, and showed her fantastic, flat, not-an-inch-of-fat tummy. Slit way up high on one side to show great legs, too. She looked fabulous and Lance looked great in this tux.


I have to say, though, that the real star of the whole Grammy show was Melissa Etheridge, who proudly wore her chemo, bald head with a sparkling smile and a huge voice. She is just six months out of her diagnosis of breast cancer. She received an extra-long, standing ovation. Well-deserved...



By the way - Eddie Merckx was just interviewed on Belgian TV - he thinks that Lance should go for seven this year. Eddie said that he would go for it if he were Lance Armstrong. Says it would be a “pity” if Lance didn’t go for seven.

Saturday, February 12, 2005

Lance Armstrong


Latest issue of VeloNews has a great article and photos of Team Discovery Channel. VN quotes Billy Campbell, the head honcho of Discovery Channel, as saying that Lance definitely agreed to ride in the “best events” for them - not shedding any light, or even a clue, about Lance and TdF 2005. Nice shots of the team - I was there watching most, if not all, of them.


Here’s a heads-up that you can go to Oprah.com and see an additional seven minutes of the show, on After the Show, with Oprah asking LA about the doping allegations crap. One way or another, everybody has to ask the same questions. Almost makes a person want them to ask the dumb things like what is your favorite color, favorite food and what animal would you be... Remember those yearbook questions?


But the After the Show segment was pretty cool, with a surprise guest, Latrice Haney, who was Lance’s nurse during his really bad chemo treatments. They were pretty happy to meet up again, under much more pleasant and happy circumstances. I don’t usually watch Oprah, ‘cause I’m working, but it was a pretty cool show.


If you are wondering why I am putting Lance Armstrong at the top of each post, it’s cause I’m trying to get this blog picked up on an RSS feed.

Friday, February 11, 2005

Lance Armstrong


Lance on Oprah - what a great show! Lance and Oprah seemed to hit it off really well - they seemed quite fond of each other. Sheryl and Lance are a great couple - just so easy and comfortable together, and that’s the way they have been every time I’ve been around them. No pretense, no BS - just genuine, good people. But Lance always seems to surround himself with really fine people. One of those really fine people, his Mom Linda, sat in the audience - just glowing - she was so happy.


Of course, Oprah asked LA if he was going for seven - after a look at Sheryl, he said yes - absolutely. Oprah said she’d better let him go and start training... He didn’t say anything about having till next year to do it, or that he had lots of time to train for it, or anything like that. Hmmm... Wish she’d asked him where he was planning to be in July.


On his radio show, Lance said that Linda is Oprah’s biggest fan. When he went to visit Oprah to tape part of the show, and took his mom, he kept it a secret as to where they were going. So he was laughing today and said that his Mom made guacamole to take with them - they took guacamole and chips to Oprah’s house. Wonder if she served Shiner Bock?


I hear that Lance will be in Austin till the end of February and then head for Girona. That’s when the tough training will begin...

Thursday, February 10, 2005

Art... Well, facial art - tattoos, that is. Big debate over David Clinger’s Maori tat on his face, but then Nicole Freedman pops up with a humdinger. Her face is a salt-water fish collage. I have to say that I have been given a lot of comments, even ridiculed, about my Go Lance tat on my leg, and my shoulder tat. Well, these two racers make my tats look pretty insignificant. What do I think about it? To me, its their face and their choice - to each his/her own. I think what sounds scary is having the tat removed from one’s face. I would really be worried about having scars and discoloration from remnants of the colors...


So Lance and Sheryl are going to be presenters at the Grammy Awards this Sunday. That is pretty cool - but I hope that they are not handed some dumb script to read, as is usually the case. I also saw that Sheryl was one of the models at a showing sponsored by Celestial Seasonings during New York Fashion Week. One fashion exhibit featured the Think Ink, Not Mink poster of a nude, tattooed-all-over-his-body, Dennis Rodman...


Tuesday, February 08, 2005

Ok - not much going on to write about, sorry! I guess the big news is that Michael Barry and Dede Dement Barry are going to present a new little cyclist to the world in a few months. Congrats to the happy couple. I saw Dede in Solvang and she looked great.


Don’t forget to catch Lance and company on Oprah this Friday the 11th. Just got the latest Velo News and it has a great cover shot of Lance. Haven’t had time to read it yet.. And the newest issue of Road Magazine - I really like this mag - it is so classy. It features Chris Horner on the cover and says there is a poster of him inside, but... I haven’t had time to read it either. Guess I’ll do some midnight reading tonight.


That is after I go thru and delete all the spam out of my suspect mail folder. I always look at my Earthlink Webmail inbox first, before I ever open my OutlookExpress. It always ticks me off when I find spam using one of my own addresses - which is pretty often. It just cycles through all my website addresses and then makes the loop again. Everybody knows it isn't from me and doesn't open it, but there has gotta be a place in Cyber Hell for spammers.

Monday, February 07, 2005

Saw a great little movie tonight, “Sideways” that was filmed in Solvang. It is just so funny and true to life - I really recommend this movie. Sideways was playing at the Buellton Theater while I was at training camp with the team. I kept on saying I was gonna go see it, but I had stuff going on, and then different guys on the team borrowed my car several times, so I never got to see it while I was there. I’m kinda glad I waited till I got back - it was really fun to see the different places and remember being there, and following the team along some of the roads. Some of the guys went to see Sideways, George and Max and a couple of other guys. I bet the folks working in the theater didn’t know they had such famous cycling celebs in the house.


Just heard from Scott Coady, the Tour Baby guy. He tells me that he is taking a couple of groups to the Tour de France this year. Head on over to www.thetourbaby.com if you are interested. Scott was at the Solvang camp for a few days. He rode with the team a couple of times, but ..shhh, don’t tell him I told you, he got dropped on the hills. I think that he helped Dan Osipow plan the route when all the road closures happened due to the mudslides.


We had the Cat’s Hill Crit kick-off meeting tonight. It’s always fun when the whole club, mostly racers, gets together. We had our major sponsor there, Rob Jensen founder of Testarossa Vineyards. He’s a great guy and a great cycling supporter. Testarossa Vineyards sounds like an incredible place - stop by for a wine-tasting and tell them the Los Gatos Bicycle Racing Club sent you...


Sunday, February 06, 2005

Lance! Dude - What happened? Sirius Radio Live Strong didn’t happen tonight. Music for 20-30 minutes, and then LA and Higgs came on for only a few minutes. Lance apologized for being late - said they drove to the office, and there were technical problems. So they had to turn around and go back to his house and try to set up the broadcast. He joked and said the game got in the way, and there was probably nobody listening anyway. Lance asked Higgs what they should talk about and Higgs said the game, and ka-pow - they were off the air again. That was it - no mas. Lance, my man, glad this DNF was for only a radio show.... Guess they should hook me up as a back-up in case have a mechanical - I could talk the talk and be cool with other fans. Hey Sirius - are you listening? The heck with celebrities - how about a nobody doing a show?


As a nobody, I was interviewed live on the air by Active.com from a teeny hotel room in France - I think it was when I was in Lourdes during the 2002 Tour. And some sports radio station in Chicago, or upstate NY (I can’t remember) also interviewed me then, and another called me for an interview, but it sounded like a shock jock show, and I figured they’d do a number on me, so I said no. I did a daily report for Active.com from the Tour that year, as well as doing Podium Girl Gone Bad for cyclingnews.com.


Jeeze, that was so much work to do two totally different reports from the Tour - it was kinda like having multiple personalities, one was Velogal and the other was Podium Girl Gone Bad. I had fun doing it, but the Internet connections drove me nutz - all I had was dial-up and had to do it from my hotels. Over the years, I’ve stayed in lot of cheap little places that didn’t even have phones in the room. In one place, I talked the bartender into letting me use the phone in the bar. I sat at the end of the bar, and plugged into the only phone in the place to access the Internet. I was typing away and he kept bringing me little glasses of some special dessert wine. It took forever - I think the connection speed was something like 12kb a minute! I sent the report and a couple of photos - it took several glasses of wine... er... I mean about an hour and several disconnects to send everything.


Last year, at one of the stages, I was waiting for the teams to arrive, and went into a little shop that advertised magazines, smokes and internet access. I wanted to pick up messages from my webmail. The guy behind the counter was kinda sleazy-looking, and he led me into a little back room with three or four computers. I connected to the internet and was reading my email. The guy comes back and gives me a candy bar - I didn’t want it, but took it to be polite. Next thing I know, the jerk is trying to give me a shoulder massage! I told him no, and he went away, but then came back and tried again. I hollered at him to leave me along and got outta there real fast. I’ve had some pretty interesting experiences following the Tour solo. Most have been really pleasant, but a couple of times things were a little hairy....


Saturday, February 05, 2005

I got a press release that Specialized is sponsoring a pro-am crit the weekend before Sea Otter - The Morgan Hill Grand Prix on April 10th. They are hoping to pick up a lot of ranked riders who are coming for the SO. Pretty sure that Webcor will be there, ‘cause they are re-surfacing the 3rd Street Webcor bridge as a courtesy to the race. Nice! There’s gonna be an Expo and kid’s stuff. Should be a great event for MH and Specialized, and let’s all support this new cycling event. We’re losing a lot of local cycling events around the country, so let’s turn out for both the Sea Otter and the MHGP.


And I know that SO is looking for host housing for teams, so maybe you can open your doors to some team members for both races. The good people of Redlands and of Bend, Oregon are famous for their generous host housing. Last year at Redlands, Trent Klasna was staying with the same hosts that he had stayed with for years - he was just like family to them. Bet they will miss him now that he has retired. I will - he is a great guy and was always smiling, friendly and ready for a hug. I sent him a poster-size copy of the cool shot I took of him at the Oak Glen finish in Redlands last year.


The 2004 Redlands Race Committee had posters made from three of my race photos and hung them in the VIP tent for race weekend. Close-up, tight shots of Trent, Chris Horner and Damon Kluck - the guys really liked them, and I liked them, too... You can find them in my smugmug gallery.


I notice that Fumiyuki Beppu is having the same media problem that Benoit Joachim had when he was new. It’s called Name Reversal Syndrome. The photo captions on cyclingnews.com from the Tour of Langkawai list him as Beppu Fumiyuki. Latest photo shows Geoff Brown working on Fumy’s bike. It’s OK, Fumy, we know who you are... And I know what your favorite American candy is... Langkawai got a lot of press, but we sure didn’t hear much about the D-Men from Qatar. Too bad, I know they were racing hard and giving 100% in the desert heat.


Next up on the D-Schedule is Vuelta Andalucia in Spain Feb 13-17, Volta Algarve in Portugal Feb 16-20, Trofeo Luis Puig in Spain on Feb 20th, Omloop Het Volk in Belgium on the 26th, and Kurne Brussels Kurne in Belgium on the 27th. Maybe the Cycling Gods will send me a win - in the Lottery- and I can pack my laptop, cameras and jeans and head over. I guess my odds are about the same for finding a Cycling Sugar Daddy... Oh well...




Friday, February 04, 2005

Jeez, I’ve been in this deadline frenzy for Tour de France for Dummies. One last chapter was unfinished, so I jumped in with my co-author, James Raia to wrap it up. Our other co-author, Phil Liggett is doing the Tour of Qatar, I think. That guy travels so much, it is unbelievable. He was giving us these little windows of time and places to reach him.


I have to say that Phil is an absolute gentleman - so gracious and considerate - he is a gem. For someone who is a cycling legend, he is a down-to-earth and genuine person, and I admire that so much. Actually, that’s something I admire about Lance, too. Lance doesn’t care if you have ten dollars or ten million - it is what kind of a person you are that matters to him. If you are full of BS and trying to use him - dude, you’re outta there. And I have that same standard for people, too... Right On...


Hmmm - another early morning post. I hit the cyber world about 4:30 this morning. Could this become a habit? I decided to become a Sirius affiliate, so I was adding click-thru icons on my Lance site and my D-Men sites. So, gang, if you’re gonna get Sirius, I hope you click thru one of my sites. I dunno, maybe even Podium Girl Gone Bad will get Sirius, too!


I really liked hearing Lance’s show - No, not because I was on it. But, just as I was saying, he is so real - Lance and Higgs sounded just like you were sitting down and having a beer with the dudes. They were just having fun and it was really cool. You gotta listen in - if you’re a Lance fan, (and you must be if you’re reading this) you’ll love it!


Wednesday, February 02, 2005

I am actually doing this blog in the morning! Unbelievable - blogging in the daylight... Reason? Well... uhhh .. to be honest... I’m procrastinating on some additional, unexpected work that I need to do for the Tour de France for Dummies manuscript. The first step in creativity is procrastination... Who said that? Moi...


The guys are riding well at Langkawai, and hey, cn.com, there are more D-Men there than Tom! We love our new guy, but how about giving us an interview with some of the other hard-working guys.. I was sitting in the lobby at Solvang training camp (wifi on my laptop, of course), right across from Tom and a reporter doing an interview. I was quite impressed with how articulate, thoughtful and poised Tom is. The dude is kewl and funny, so it’s no wonder he’s an interview target.


Did you see this really funny (filling in a long blank space for the HTML here)
photo by John Pierce at Langkawai? There was another funny shot circulating around the Net last year showing a guy working underneath an old truck - it was tipped way up on one side, being held up with two-by-fours, and the guy was all the way under it - only his legs sticking out! No tire jack - nothing keeping it from falling on the guy but a couple of pieces of wood. It was titled “Why women are smarter than men” - ‘nuff said.


Just got an email from my buddy, Dave Towle - he wants everyone in the Boulder area to know that there will be a showing of “Pro: The Movie” on February 8 at Flatirons Theater in Boulder. All the usual suspects will be there - happenings start at 6pm - and Dave will emcee. It benefits the Family Learning Center, and you can contact the Flatiron Theater for more info. If you are anywhere near Boulder, be there or be damned...



Tuesday, February 01, 2005

A thank you to one of my readers, Jay, who tells me that some of the 10/2 Lance wear is already selling at www.niketown.com. I thought it was still in production from the way Lance and Higgs were talking - but maybe there is a lot more still to come.


Did you catch the funny story on Michael Barry’s website report from Langkawai? It seems there was a language problem between Fumy Beppu and Laurenzo Lapage, the DS. Laurenzo told Fumy to try to hold 50kph (31 mph) the whole way in the TT, and Fumy misunderstood and thought he said 60kph - that is like 37 mph. So Fumy did what he was told, and nearly died trying for 60 - He apologized profusely to Laurenzo after the race because he couldn’t hold 60 the whole way! He said his legs were so sore! But he shocked everyone with a tenth place that can be attributed to a communication issue - how funny...


I’m starting to surf the Net for a cheap RT ticket to the Tour. Let me know if you see a great deal floating around the cyber world.