For 54 years, from 1913 to his death in 1967, Edward Hopper’s primary residence was a 3rd floor studio apartment in Greenwich Village. He was undoubtedly enamored with New York City, and his paintings are infused with imagery produced by keen observation of his surroundings: diners, office interiors, bridges, railway cars, restaurants, and street scenes.

Hopper seemed to paint in flourishes and then suffer idly for extensive periods between creative outbursts. His primary distractive measures during the fallow periods were drinking coffee in a nearby Automat and doing word puzzles in the Evening Sun. Thankfully, on occasion Hopper must have ventured beyond reading the paper and drinking coffee to kill the time since one of his bouts of “painter’s block” was spent attending 6-day bicycle races in Madison Square Garden, ultimately resulting in the work French Six-day Bicycle Rider. Says biographer Gail Levin:

“February [1937] was fallow, but on March 5 he began French Six-day Bicycle Rider. The subject had been simmering since December of 1935 when Jo [Hopper’s wife] complained to Marion [Hopper’s sister] that Edward was going repeatedly to the bicycle races at Madison Square Garden, just to see the same scene over and over again. She was annoyed at the forty-cent tickets he indulged in, when, as she saw it, nothing came of it. At that time, he was stuck and unable to paint and she thought they could take a trip, perhaps to New Orleans, so he could work once again. It was one of the occasions when she simply misunderstood the often lengthy gestation periods that Hopper’s creative process required. Very little of Hopper’s time was actually spent painting.”

In later letters, Hopper described the painting’s subject matter:

“I was unable to remember the name of the rider, only that he was young and dark and quite French in appearance. I did not attempt an accurate portrait, but it resembles him in a general way. He was I think a member of one of the last French teams to win a race at Madison Square Garden. He is supposed to be resting during the sprints while his team mate is on the track or at the time when `The Garden’ is full in the afternoon or evening, when both members of a team are on full alert to see that no laps are stolen from them.”

Based on Hopper’s recollections and the painting itself, the rider depicted is very likely Frenchman Alfred Letourner, one of the era’s great six day champions. He won at Madison Square Garden on six occasions, and as Hopper opined, Letourner was indeed the last Frenchman to win at the Garden. The vivid red jersey also points to Letourner, whose customary jersey choice generated his nickname: “Le Diable Rouge”. While Letourner cemented his reputation as one of track cycling’s greats through years of success on European and American velodromes, he is perhaps best remembered for breaking the paced bicycle speed record in 1941. Letourner was the last person to achieve the record on a regular track bike (albeit with a gigantic, custom chain ring and a 6t cog on the rear wheel for one monster gear). He blazed to 108.92mph Breaking Away-style: drafting a race car on a public highway in Bakersfield, CA. That certainly took nerves of steel.

The December 1935 six-day race at Madison Square Garden witnessed by Hopper was a particularly raucous affair, rife with drama both on and off the track. The race exploded from the blast of celebrity starter Pat O’Brien’s pistol shot and set a new record for the most distance covered in the first hour of a six-day race (a shade under 28 miles). Crashes were plentiful as well, and ultimately about half of the participants were forced to retire due to injuries. In addition to on the track excitement, the undertones of Nazi Germany were felt at the Garden. Two German teams were entered, and the promoter John Chapman refused to let the Nazi swastika flag fly over their bunks. The German cyclists were forced to use the recently retired German national flag (the Norddeutscher-Bund flag used since 1867, forbidden by the Nazis in 1935) instead so as not to offend the audience. Ex-heavyweight world champion boxer Max Schmeling also made a public appearance in the infield, as he was friends with one of the Germans teams (Adolf Schoen and Eric Putzfield) and recently sailed to New York to attend a Joe Louis title bout. Louis fought (and knocked out) Basque challenger Paulino Uzcudun at the Garden about 1 week after the six-day race concluded. A German team (six-day legends Heinz Vopel and Gustav Kilian, who in this particular event became the first German team to triumph in a MSG 6-day race) emerged victorious, with Letourner and partner Paul Broccardo finishing third.

French Six-day Bicycle Rider was purchased in 1937 from the Frank K M. Rehn Gallery in New York City, Hopper’s primary middle-man to the buying public, by the husband and wife screenwriting team of Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich. The duo amassed quite an enviable art collection in their Bel Air residence, even by Hollywood standards, and considered their 2 Hopper oils, French Six-day Bicycle Rider and A Woman in the Sun, the prize items. The Hacketts were unquestionably well acquainted with Hopper’s work since Frances Goodrich’s brother was the art historian/Whitney Museum of Art curator and director Lloyd Goodrich, an early champion and lifelong friend of Edward Hopper. The painting remained in the Hackett’s private collection from 1937-1995, until the death of Albert Hackett. During their ownership, they allowed the painting to be displayed in 9 public exhibitions (primarily at the Whitney, but also notably for a 1965 exhibition of sport related paintings at the location of its genesis: Madison Square Garden). Why did Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett buy the painting? I’ve wondered if the purchase was more related to the prestige of owning an Edward Hopper painting with the subject matter being of a more secondary issue (if it was an issue at all). Interestingly, Frances Goodrich grew up in one of early 20th century America’s cycling hotbeds (Nutley, NJ) while the velodrome’s racing schedule was at its peak. Her childhood home was a mere two blocks from the Nutley Velodrome and one can speculate whether her memory of the track’s presence and prominence in Nutley played any role in the painting’s purchase.

As an aside, through my readings of Edward Hopper’s life I stumbled across the name of a man, a rather wealthy man, who was largely responsible for keeping Hopper financially solvent through the purchase of his paintings. The name struck a chord, since it turns out that this fellow, philanthropist and heir to the Singer sewing machine fortune, is the same man responsible for putting Cooperstown, NY on the map for reasons other than being the home of author James Fenimore Cooper. The benefactor’s name is Stephen C. Clark and in addition to his art collecting, among other things, he was instrumental in locating the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, donated the land and buildings which now comprise the Farmer’s Museum and the Fenimore Art Museum, and created the eponymously named Clark Foundation philanthropic trust. In recent years, about 3 million dollars of his family money is doled out annually via the Clark Foundation to Cooperstown-area, college-bound high school seniors for tuition assistance. The scholarships are based on merit; the better your high school record, the more money you receive. I had the good fortune to attend high school in Cooperstown and graciously applied Clark Foundation money to paying the hefty Duke University price tag. Six degrees of separation indeed regarding the largesse of Clark family cash.

Forty years ago, Tom Simpson emerged victorious at the professional world championships conducted in San Sebastian, Spain. Recently, Edmond Hood elegantly situated Simpson’s legacy amongst the pantheon of cycling’s elite. Fittingly, a piece of Tom Simpson returned to Spain for this year’s world professional road race, borne by young British pro Tom Southam. As this photo illustrates, Southam wore a piece of Simpson’s base layer, used by Simpson during his 1965 world title effort, wrapped around his wrist. Unfortunately for Southam, his gesture of tribute to Simpson came up short and he DNFed in Madrid. Roger Hammond was Great Britain’s highest finisher, rolling in for 41st 25 seconds behind Boonen.

Two weeks ago a solitary American professional made the winning split at the Madrid-hosted World Championships, yet that result raised nary an eyebrow, remaining largely a post-script buried in deep in journalists’ accounts(oh yeah, by the way…Guido Trenti finished 23rd). Maybe it’s because he only finished 23rd, maybe it’s because he speaks Italian and the American press were unable to talk to him conveniently, maybe it’s because many question whether he is actually “American” (despite the wholly legitimate dual Italian-American citizenship due to his American mother), or maybe it’s because he was assisting the victor, Tom Boonen, and merely coasted in as a keenly curious spectator. Even USA Cycling itself, the governing body who issues his racing license, seems a bit perplexed about Trenti, listing the results of a 2001 Cat 4 race as his sole American palmares.

Trenti’s role in the American camp at the worlds seemed rather low key to the point of wondering if he was even there. For approximately one week after the event, the only photograpic evidence that Trenti actually was a part of the American team was this photo taken by team mechanic Chris Davidson. Trenti’s bike is second from the left, #51. Slowly a few more images made their way into circulation, but it just struck me as odd that all of the other American participants had at least one picture posted within 24 hours (if not sooner) of the event’s conclusion. Only Saul Raisin shed some light on the story, posting a pre-race photo of Trenti and confirming that Trenti and Fred Rodriguez were protected riders for the final 2 laps.

If you looked at the results with trade teams after the rider’s names, rather than nationalities, then Trenti’s position looks suspiciously like that of the final leadout rider rolling across the line after dropping off his captain about 250 meters out. After all, Trenti is Boonen’s final leadout rider and Trenti was an integral part of numerous Boonen victories in 2005: from the sands of Qatar, to Paris-Nice, to the E3-prijs Harelbeke, to the Tour of Belgium, to the Tour de France, and ultimately, possibly Boonen’s final race (and victory) of 2005- the world championships. Of the three pre-race favorites on a course deemed sprinter-friendly, only Petacchi had the luxury of having his favored leadout man (Marco Velo) being of similar Italian nationality. Boonen’s favored leadout man was not a Belgian, but an American, and Robbie McEwen actually faced a similar dilemma with Fred Rodriguez. Of course, strange things happen in world championship road races and rather odd and potentially unknown allegiances may rear their head. For instance, I don’t think I ever realized the Phil Anderson/Greg LeMond alliance which took place during the 1983 world championship road race. John Wilcockson weaves quite a captivating narrative involving this Aussie/American pact. This quote by Boonen the day after his victory certainly raised my eyebrows:

“So Bettini attacked on that last climb, Nuyens and Leukemans anticipated that perfectly. The last three kilometres Nick and Bjorn took gas back and I asked Peter to give it full blast. Before the last turn I was comfortable, saw that everything was okay. My QuickStep team mate Guido Trenti was able to come underneath still, but I didn’t need his ‘help’ anymore. I nestled myself in Alejandro Valverde’s wheel, he started sprinting with 300 metres to go. Hundred metres before the finish line I picked my moment.”

While perusing Pez Cycling News, I eventually discovered this photo which shows Boonen front and center and Trenti on the far right, a bit blurry. When coupled with the Boonen quote, Trenti appears to be rolling in on the tops, a bit in the periphery, trying to catch a glance of who emerges victorious between Boonen and Valverde. Two of Boonen’s Belgian teammates, Nick Nuyens (white helmet) and Björn Leukemans (red helmet), are also visible (and blurry) in the far background, hoping to see Boonen raise his arms in victory. Just this weekend I caught the cycling.tv video coverage of the race and repeated viewing proved inconclusive. Boonen and Trenti were lost in the scrum about 600 meters out before Boonen emerges on Valverde’s wheel. About the same time of Boonen’s appearance more towards the center/left marks Trenti’s appearance on the right side of the group. Maybe quick words were exchanged between Boonen and Trenti along the lines of Boonen’s quote (”Guido, don’t worry, I’ve got it myself”) leaving Trenti with nothing to do but sit back and spectate.

If Trenti actually appeared to give it full gas on the drops all the way to the line I don’t think I’d ever question his motives, but sitting up certainly got my attention. Perhaps this is nothing more than the stark realities of the consummate professional. I’m sure Trenti knew who was in his group and surely ruled out a chance of defeating Boonen and Valverde. The bronze would still be up for grabs, but maybe Trenti was fried from the effort to make the split and realized a podium spot was out of the question. Who am I to venture how 273 very fast kilometers feels on a hot day. Peter Van Petegem sure looks spent. I was struck by John Lieswyn’s observations of his own efforts and how he sat up and lost more than 5 minutes in the closing 10 kilometers. Lieswyn knew he was cooked so why kill himself to finish maybe 45th. Just shut down the engines and roll on in (…”my days as a pro are over”…). Trenti likely wagered the odds of bronze were slim, that his contract is firm for some time with Quick-Step, and that his duty as the ace lead out man in Boonen’s posse is secure. He already proved to his American peers that he was the best American on the day and he proved to Boonen that under similar circumstances the other 364 days of the year he could be in there for the kill with his boss Mr. Boonen to deliver an armchair ride to victory. Mission accomplished for employment purposes, but regarding national pride I’m still a bit curious about his passion.

Sorry about the lengthy hiatus from providing fresh material. I’ve sort of recovered from a calamitous laptop failure, but now my computer fails to get online anywhere but the UNC campus. Doh!

I have quite a backlog of material, including musings about Edward Hoppers’s and Ernest Hemingway’s obsession with track cycling; The Clash’s head roadie’s book about the 2005 Tour de France; Giovanni Lombardi: suave, classy, and an iron man; up-close with a pissed off swarm of yellowjackets; local road graffiti; and my take on the new-found adulation I’m encountering (while cycling) from construction crews and contractors.

Trey Parker and Matt Stone love them some Bob Roll. So much so that Bobke has been incorporated into next season’s South Park. Here’s a preview of Bobke’s premier in an upcoming episode “Lance Armstrong Will Fuck Your Shit Up”. Everyone knows about Lance and the President’s mountain bike ride in Crawford, but nobody knows what went down in the afternoon road bike session. Until now…

Images source: Screen captures from Breaking Away DVD

I happened across something called “B-to-the-E” in the beer section of our local Kroger’s, and it boggles my mind that anyone would consume this crap. Mmmmm….beer, caffeine, guarana, and ginseng all in one vessel. Who thinks this stuff up? If you want beer, buy beer. If you want a jolt of caffeine, slurp down an espresso.

Speaking of beer, North Carolina finally erased its comical 6% alcohol limit on beer three days ago. Despite the fire and brimstone rantings and furious lobbying of the religious right, I can look forward to purchasing Ommegang in Durham.

Before the current norm of instant race results via the world wide web, one’s expectations of timely race reporting now seems downright glacial in pace. Back in the days of Velonews residing in Brattleboro, Vt., I read about Spring Classics approximately three weeks to one month after they took place and it was still news. With that in mind, relaying info about Bank of America ten days after the fact would be a rush story in the 1980s. Since I’m on a 1980s publication schedule, it’s only appropriate that two riders in their prime during the 1980s caught my attention during the BoA race. Due to their lack of a finishing place they truly lurked under the radar in published accounts of the event. Perhaps looking to duplicate the success of last year’s Euro pro guest rider Zoran Klemencic, the Charlotte based OLP team secured the services of the rejuvenated British speedster/phoenix Malcolm Elliott. The 44 year old Elliott was sitting pretty on the last lap, but was the victim of the first (of two) crashes occurring within the final 700 meters. You may have seen the video (sorry, I don’t know who’s this is or else I’d provide credit). Front and center, #85 in the green and yellow kit, is Malcolm Elliott hitting Charlotte asphalt. I spoke with him briefly at the finish line post-race, just before he headed back to his hotel, and he seemed rather calm considering he seemed to be a shoe-in for at least a top 10 finish and a decent influx of cash. Elliott appeared remarkably unscathed, likely due to his explanation of landing on somebody during the crash. He took it all in stride and proceeded to roll off into the darkness.

1980s flashback number two was delivered by America’s version of Adri Van Der Poel: the ever-fit, lanky ‘cross and road maven Steve Tilford (riding this particular evening for Texas Roadhouse?, not sure). Here’s a man who won his first national title the year I took out a USCF license (1983), a man who kitted up in stars & stripes for the 1986 pro road worlds in Colorado and the 1989 pro road worlds in Chamberry, France alongside Greg LeMond, and most assuredly the only competitor who’s a Hall of Famer. Unfortunately for the 45 year old Tilford, despite having several recent top 20 finishes at this year’s SuperWeek, I saw him get popped between turns 2 and 3 about half way through the race. Of course, Radisa Cubric scored one for the over 40 crowd by finishing BoA in 12th place (which is just what us 35+ guys needed to hear on the start line the following day for the festival of speed in Concord, NC, a race which Cubric won).

I guess I don’t have too much more to say about BoA besides marvelling at 30,000-40,000 people getting together on a balmy summer evening to check out a bike race conducted in the heart of NASCAR nation. Why can’t there be more downtown extravaganzas like this? It seems that plenty of corporations are rolling in cash these days, and I’m sure fronting $175,000 is chump change for the likes of Bank of America. The total purse at the PGA championship was $6,500,000, but for a piddly $175,000 Bank of America got the best riders in the US and the moniker “the richest criterium in the world”. Sounds like a bargain to me.

I found it odd that the only US pro team missing from the start line was Discovery Channel. Well, maybe it isn’t so odd considering they’re a ProTour team with bigger fish to fry than amped up US criteriums, but they’ve seemed to always have at least a token presence at domestic events over the years. Discovery hasn’t been stateside much this year, other than Tour of Georgia, USPRO week, and a few random events when Tony Cruz, Lance Armstrong, or George Hincapie were hanging out in the US during lulls in their programs. I guess with the advent of the ProTour and the demise of UCI points Discovery needed their riders in Europe in order to field teams at multiple events across the Continent. Even guys who I thought would be in the US, such as Mike Creed, Jason McCartney, or Patrick McCarty, are all suited up and racing post-Tour stage races on the Continent.

BoA photos here.

$3900. That’s how much prize money Chris Horner generated during le Tour. He was the biggest bread winner for Saunier Duval, which racked up a grand total of $14,525 after 21 days and 3607 kilometers of the fastest Tour in history. After the team staff gets their cut, the 6 Saunier Duval finishers got about $2200 each. I don’t think there’s a sporting event on the planet with such a disparate effort to compensation ratio. At this year’s US Open golf championship in Pinehurst, NC, an event on par with the prestige of winning the Tour de France, Kiwi Michael Campbell played 4 days of golf and walked away with $1,170,000. Horner finished 33rd overall in the Tour, and that GC position earned him $660. If Horner brushed up his golf game and finished 33rd in the US Open he would have netted about $36,000. Horner likely made more money by finishing 3rd in the Philadelphia US PRO race than the entire Saunier Duval team earned in the Tour de France. The Tour is very top heavy prize-wise (it’s definitely a “to the victors go the spoils” mentality); if your team doesn’t win GC, one of the other jerseys, the team prize, or an individual stage, then there’s a precipitous drop to mere Euro crumbs for minor placings. There’s also a bonus if your team finishes with at least 7 riders, which unfortunately, Saunier Duval didn’t accomplish. Realistically, Horner was gunning for glory via a stage win. He made valiant efforts on Stage 13 and Stage 21, but came up short. Of course, stage wins are hard to come by in the Tour. Only 16 of the 189 starters claimed individual stage wins (which aren’t great odds) and these victories rank up there with Classics victories in prestige. No matter what a pro does with the rest of his life, he’ll go to his grave with “Tour de France stage winner” associated with his name. Horner didn’t jump ship from a domestic US pro gig to Saunier Duval solely for the money. After all, he purportedly took a 50% pay cut, he sold his house, he’s descibed his current European residence status as “homeless”, he lived in Trent Klasna’s yard while recovering from his broken leg earlier this year, and he hadn’t seen his kids for the 3 months prior to his Tour debut, all for a chance (not a guarantee) that he’d fulfill his dream of riding le Tour. But dammit, this guy deserves some cash. I hope he at least made some money during the Tour de Suisse.

Back in June, before we managed to woo Aerospace Engineering’s Hugh Moran and Eric Murphy with our mad converstional skills at the USPRO after-party, Chris Horner actually stopped and chatted with us while making his way through the bar scrum. He had no idea who we were, as one of the day’s podium finishers I’m sure he had a bevy of more closely connected well-wishers to entertain, yet he answered some questions and talked about the caliber of professional racing in the U.S. With that in mind, one of the few genuinely riveting moments of the 2005 Tour was the endgame to Stage 13. How I wished Horner would triumph, but at least he beaned Carlos de Cruz with a water bottle earlier in the day. Horner has a perma-grin plastered on his face, even when he’s really suffering, and his enthusiasm about just competing in the the Tour is infectious.

Iron constitution. On the second rest day in Pau, Horner inhaled a McDonald’s hamburger, Big Mac, large fries, large Coke, and McFlurry for lunch. According to Mcdonald’s, that’s 2280 calories and 80 grams of fat clogging up his system from a single sitting. I’m sure Morgan Spurlock would be impressed with his digestive prowess. Unfortunately for 99.999999% of McDonald’s customers, they don’t have the physiological demands of a Grand Tour to burn off those calories.

That looks familiar. Brad McGee’s stem bolts are just as rusty as mine. And just as rusty as his form.

They’re not all superhumans. What was arguably more outrageous than witnessing George Hincapie triumph in the most difficult stage of the 2005 Tour was watching how composed and non-plussed he appeared immediately afterwards. He just got off his bike, got a few hugs, and sauntered into the team bus like nothing happened. For other lesser mortals, the pain of the Tour is all too real. After spending virtually all of the stage in the winning break, neo-pro Aussie Simon Gerrans finished 3rd on Stage 18, just 8 seconds behind the victorious Savoldelli, and was rendered inert upon coasting to a halt. Gerrans just dropped to the street with his bike cast aside, all wonky against the crowd control barrier. What an effort.

 
Ian MacKaye is probably the last person that Nike wanted to mess with regarding co-opting of underground culture for corporate promotions.

Back in the good ol’ days of my cycling career, when I lived in upstate NY and was kept off the roads 5-6 months of each year by snow, I used to spend a fair amount of time on my bike training indoors on a Turbo-Trainer when I wasn’t cross country skiing. No matter how you try to distract yourself with tv and tunes, it was deathly dull and rather unpleasant wallowing in a pool of sweat, devoid of forward motion (there was the occasional sideways, falling motion when I experimented with rollers and crashed, but that’s a different story…) Interval workouts were exceptionally evil endeavors, although for me it was always the psychological aspect rather than the physical. I could ride myself into throes of unconsciousness while climbing up a mountain, but the prospect of subjecting myself to identical degrees of suffering indoors without scenery and the sensation of speed never failed to fill me with dread. Finally, in order to inject a modicum of “pleasure” to my torture sessions, I made a mixed tape of all my favorite punk rock tunes to play in the background. The beauty of it was that most songs lasted in the 1 to 1.5 minute range so for intervals I’d kill myself for a song, spin for a song, kill myself, spin, kill myself, etc. I believe I had about half of the songs off the aforementioned Minor Threat EP, plus a sampling of the Circle Jerks, Black Flag, The Exploited, Husker Du, Dead Kennedys, and probably a few more bands of that era which I can’t currently recall. I’d warm up for 15 minutes, hit play for 45 intense minutes of high energy, angry tunes, and then spin for 15 minutes to cool down.

Just recently, I joined the 21st century with the arrival of an iPod as a present. Just before the Nike/Minor Threat hullaballoo hit the news, I added a few of the Minor Threat tunes from that EP into the Mini. Those songs still hold up 20+ years later. Looking down my playlist, I’ve noticed that the songs I’ve got are dominated by things from the the 80s through the early 90s. After that, music just ceased to be too interesting to me. I’ve cherry-picked all of my favorite songs from the cds I own, added the MP3 formatted songs which were left over from a previous foray into MP3 players, and only filled up 1 GB of my 5GB iPod. I guess I’ll have to figure out how to extract songs from my huge assortment of cassette tapes from the 1980s and convert them into MP3s to fill up all that empty space.

Speaking of MP3 players, I was rather amused by a recent Frank Hoj article in procycling where he spilled the beans about the exploits of his 21 year old, neo-pro teammate Heinrich Haussler in this year’s Tour of Flanders. In case the team manager in the race convoy wondered why Haussler was curiously silent or oblivious to tactical commands, the speakers in Haussler’s ears happened to be plugged into his iPod for the entire race instead of the team’s radio transmitter. That must have been a rather surreal experience, racing perhaps the most insanely difficult one-day race on the calendar in an auditory cocoon. I don’t know how he managed not to crash in dicey situations where the squeal of brakes or sounds of crunching metal tip off accidents in progress in close proximity, but Haussler apparently survived unscathed.

And on the topic of Gerolsteiner…Levi Leipheimer was interviewed by Velonews regarding his preparation for this year’s Tour De France and this statement regarding his weight loss regimen stood out: “To nudge closer to the podium, Leipheimer wanted to lose weight, so he’s not eaten sugar, fats, desserts or even taken a sip of beer or other forms of alcohol in four months. As a result, he’s shaved three kilos off his race weight, slimming down to a svelte 59.5kg, the lightest he’s ever been for a Tour.” Just once, I’d like to hear someone tell this to the press, “You know, my diet of Guinness and Fig Newtons sure is doing the trick this year”. Maybe that’s Dave Zabriskie’s secret, he’s just goofy enough to a) say it, and b) have it be true. Perhaps that’s why Bjarne Riis had to rain on the Zabriskie parade yesterday with this cryptic comment chronicled by VeloNews, “Dave needs to lose 3 to 4 kilos [about 8 pounds] to climb better in the mountains. If he can do that, I’m sure he can be a threat for the Tour someday”. What? CSC has Zabriskie listed at 6′0″ and a svelte 147 pounds. We’re moving into disturbing throes of skeletor-ness if Riis believes Zabriskie should drop 8 lbs. to 139. That’s nuts. Dave, just keep eating those Fig Newtons, drinking all that Guinness, and inhaling all that press room candy to fuel that V-12 motor tucked away in your legs.

A little late…

Stretch Hummers are probably not something one sees rolling around Italy too often. Friday evening at the race headquarters Wyndham Hotel was prom night for a local high school, and a couple of stretch Hummers were parked outside while their teeny-bopper patrons were whooping it up inside. I spied Lampre pros Alessandro Ballan and Dario Pieri snapping a few photos of the spectacle and wondered if they wanted Lampre management to trade in the team buses for a 40′ long behemoth with a bar.

My name is Petra, and I like to smoke. While I was hanging around the Wyndham lobby a bit on Friday night, I spied a woman who looked somewhat familiar decked out in Euro team casual wear. It’s not too unusual to see riders having a beer (or two) in the lobby bar, but this woman proceeded to smoke up a storm. I figured she must have been a soigneur or support staff and thought nothing more of it. Then, at the post-race party Sunday night, I see the same woman smoking in the company of Judith Arndt and it dawns on me that she’s indeed Petra Rossner. I wonder how many ex-pros start smoking once their stint as a rider is through, and is it more of a European phenomenon? It always seemed to me that (stereotypically) American riders were totally consumed by the cycling lifestyle and would proceed to live cleanly once their racing days were over, but the Euro riders treated the sport as simply a job, a means to garner fame and money instead of driving a truck. Once their days were numbered in the peloton, then it was time to put on some pudge, drink and smoke some, and for many never ride a bike again. Just my impression.

Seeing double. Liquigas-Bianchi had a nightmare of a time with their luggage. Some of their team bikes as well as the mechanic’s chest full of tools and spare parts did not show up until Friday night, and one rider’s (Slovenian Matej Mugerli) luggage never arrived at all during the team’s week in Philadelphia. It was kind of a sad spectacle seeing a ProTour team outfitting their team in local bike shop t-shirts for casual wear since they only had a handful of off the bike clothes to go around. Matej Mugerli was seen training in the Finnish national champion kit of his teammate Kjell Carlstrom since he only had one regular kit available (for the USPRO race) which the soigneurs didn’t want to get dirty. Luciano Pagliarini commented that this was their new strategy to confuse the competition, “From now on we start two Finnish champions”.

Communication Breakdown. Liquigas-Bianchi director (and ex-Mario Cipollini leadout train member) Mario Scirea speaks Italian and a smattering of Spanish. Race radio at Philly week was conducted in English and French. Nobody in their organization who came to Philadelphia could speak English or French well enough to translate so a friend of mine who’s the Philly area Bianchi rep, who speaks decent Spanish, was riding shotgun in the team car for the Lancaster race and letting Scirea know what was going on. Scirea evidently knows a few words of English. Once the winning break got away and it wasn’t coming back, Scirea remarked, “Now we fuck up car” and proceeded to do his best Colin McRae rally car imitation with the race provided rental car.

JFJ. Mario Scirea and some of the other Euro team directors were quite amused by Jittery Joe’s choice for team vehicle: a Mini-Cooper. My friend heard Scirea and company chatting away during the Lancaster race, “blah blah blah blah blah MEEEEE-NI COOOOOO-PER. HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

Sideburns. One of the weekend’s funniest quotes was overheard while my wife and I waited for the shuttle bus to take us off the Manayunk Wall and back to the start/finish area. Several (rather drunk) college age guys were standing behind us, two of whom sported some huge lambchops which would make Geoff Kabush jealous. One of the sideburned gents was telling the story of his first meeting with his girlfriend’s father,
Dad: “What are you, some kind of Civil War reenactor?”
Sideburned Youth: “Not at all, sir. I just think they look cool.”

Did you see that? Most, if not all, of the general public at a pro bike race haven’t any idea about peeing while racing. There aren’t really too many opportunities to whiz away from the crowds at USPRO, and rider #149 probably thought that once you got to boathouses on Kelly Drive that you’d be in the clear. Not quite. A significant portion of the Lemon Hill spectators walk down to Kelly Drive to see the riders head out to Manayunk, and some amazed young ladies next to me just stood aghast as #149 (in desperate need of a teammate’s push, he was running out of speed) coasted by, hosing down the center line of Kelly Drive.

Blind eye to booze. Let’s hear it for (as far as I could tell) non-enforcement of open container laws on the race course.

Sweet. We had the good fortune to have dinner Sunday night in the company of Tony Cruz and family. A gracious guy chock full of tales from the 2005 Giro.

Sweet. I had a brief encounter with CSC manager and ex-Euro pro Scott Sunderland post-race on Sunday. We chatted a bit about his racing days in the US many moons ago in the Tour of Texas and Superweek.

I subscribe to the Jim Jarmusch school of hair care (an all natural, gravity defying thicket of silver thatch), so it was rather amusing seeing the parade of pros Sunday night each sporting a myriad of faux hawks and sloppily sculpted lids drenched in gel. Those crazy kids.

Random celebrity sighting of the weekend: we were lingering in the Wyndham lobby post-race on Sunday about to leave for dinner when my wife spies a portly guy in a beard by the elevator and says, “Hey, that guy looks like C. Everett Koop.” Sure enough, it was him. The hotel was hosting a national health care professional conference and he was in attendence.

Also, check out my photos from Philadelphia.