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.

Captech Classic. Richmond, VA. May 26, 2005. If I happened to be a pro, this is the type of race I’d like to win: a real tough guy course with oodles of climbing packed into 100 savage kilometers. As one can gleen from the results, this was an exceptionally demanding event. The race paid 30 deep and only 30 men finished. Actually, it appears that only 27 made it. The final three look like they were pulled and had their times pro-rated. The largest group finishing together contained only 8 riders. Well, that’s what happens when you cram about 8000′ of climbing into 100km.

The race promoters certainly improved on last year’s lack of spectators by switching the date from a Saturday afternoon (when downtown Richmond is apparently deserted) to a Thursday evening, hoping to entice thousands of downtown office workers to stick around and enjoy the show. If one happens to offer beer, a Jumbo-tron at the start finish showing the entire race, palatable music, spectacular weather, enthusisastic announcers, plus exciting racing courtesy of nearly every domestic professional cycling team, you’ve got a recipe for success. Well, all you really need is beer and a giant tv. And if you want to meet every single spectator in attendence, walk around the venue with a couple of greyhounds like my wife and I did. They are the ultimate gawker magnets. I think a naked super model would garner less attention than our canine companions. It was actually getting hard to watch the race while we fielded questions from the peanut gallery.

I mentioned it last year, but I’ll say it again. Richmond has an impressive population of fixed gear bikes. It seemed that most trees, fences, and parking meters around the course had track bikes stacked up in droves. I don’t know how they negotiate the steep hills without brakes. That’s just me channelling my inner geezer. I’m still stumped about surviving my Evel Knievel-esque youthful BMX shennanigans without breaking a bone, totally devoid of protective gear.

“I don’t win anything, but at least I ride faster than other pros with websites”:
5th Erik Saunders
11th Mike Jones
DNF Todd Herriott (in his defense, stricken with illness)

Downtown Raleigh Criterium. Raleigh, NC. May 27, 2005. This event kicked ass, especially for its first incarnation. This has the ingredients of Athens, GA’s Twilight Criterium. The course was fast, demanding and spectator friendly. It was a Friday night in the part of downtown with an active nightlife. And the weather was perfect. Crowds estimated to be about 10,000 in number lined the course for the men’s event and the Endeavor and Aerospace Engineering pro teams showed up with strong squads eager to take home their share of $10,000. Also in attendance were the odd Health Net, Seasilver, and Jelly Belly pros plus all of the Southeast’s strong amateur squads. The pace was fast, but not too crazy fast. Unfortunately for me, my three solid weeks of training were not enough to undo 6 months of riding once a week. Or perhaps it was the lungful of pot smoke I inhaled inside the porto-john prior to racing. Somebody was flaming up at the race and left a cloud behind for unsuspecting racers to enjoy while seeking relief from pre-race jitters! Anyway, I was unceremoniously shelled after only about 12 of the 50 miles. Next year I’ll be back with a vengeance, hopefully not disappointing my legions of fans turning out to witness the action in person.

While I was stuffing my face with a heaping plate of Chinese food the previous night in Richmond, standing by the course’s KOM line, I was thinking, “Damn, I’ve got to race against some of these dudes tomorrow night in Raleigh.” And when I rolled up to the start line next to Aerospace Engineering’s Eric Murphy, a strong 4th place the previous evening, and looked a few guys over and spied Karl Menzies, 2nd in Captech, I knew there’d be trouble. At least my teammate Charlie Storm had a romping evening, finishing third in a late-race break behind Endeavor’s Garrett Peltonen and the aforementioned Eric Murphy. Here’s my bold prediction for Philly next week: watch out for Aerospace Engineering. Ivan Stevic, Eric Murphy, and Clement Cavliere are ready to light it up.

The one puzzling element of the race was the lack of media coverage in the paper the following day. The race was sponsored by Raleigh’s News & Observer newspaper, yet the only article (a weak, brief account of the women’s race) appeared in the City section with a box score of the women’s results tucked away in the sports section. It certainly seemed that the reporter split after the women’s event. I don’t think that the 10:30pm finish of the men’s race should have been too late to file for Saturday’s paper. It was perplexing that an event that attracted possibly 10,000 people put on by the city’s newspaper didn’t even garner an article on the front page of the sports section with solid accounts of both the men’s and women’s events. I guess it’s not too surprising, considering the weak newspaper coverage afforded to major events such as Philadelphia’s USPRO race. Equally as bizarre was the weekend’s other criterium taking place in Raleigh on Sunday, sponsored by Durham’s ABC News Channel 11. Curiously, no reporters from the tv station seemed to be in attendance. A piddly neighborhood parade attracted oodles of attention on the news, but not a sporting event the channel sponsored. At least USPRO shows live coverage of the men’s and women’s events start-to-finish on a local tv channel, but that’s an anomaly. Otherwise, cycling events seem to take place in a black hole outside the realm of space and time unless Mr. Armstrong happens to be in attendance. And that gravy train ends in July, 2005.

Since I don’t really have a job right now, and I don’t really have grad school to deal with (and I’ve got a spare $5.95 kicking around), I decided to send the cash OLN’s way for their live, commercial-free, announcer-free Giro feed. And I must admit, it’s been quite an experience watching the drama unfold live on my computer screen. Today for instance, at about 42km to go, some crazy, drunk fool (who bore an uncanny resemblance to Father Guido Sarducci) stood out in the middle of the road and threw punches at the Giro competitors. Quick Step had some riders on the front working to bring back the Aussie, Russell Van Hout, away on a solo break and Davide Bramati, riding 3rd in line, beaned doppleganger Sarducci full-on with a water bottle. Great aim! That just enraged faux Sarducci, and he started flailing about with his arms and legs all the while getting nailed with more bottles from pissed off pro cyclists. And after a frightening span of about 20 seconds for the peloton to pass, the guy just walked off the street like nothing happened. I thought for sure some amped up Italian cops would kick his ass, but no such luck.

And then about 30km later it was…

Koldo Gil Perez (Liberty Seguros) vs. Moto 1

Poor Koldo was about to be swept up by a super-charged, Di Luca led group near the summit of the stage’s sole KOM when Moto 1 got up close and personal. Koldo either blew up or missed a shift resulting in a significant de-acceleration and crazy-close Moto 1 rammed his rear wheel and put him out of commission. Doh! What a sickly sound as his back wheel got crunched. Well, this is Italy after all. Eight of the top 10 riders of today’s stage were Italian and Liquigas tried their damndest to take the pink jersey off of McEwen’s shoulders and onto its rightful place on an Italian’s. Di Luca came up short, but Bettini will do for the tifos’s sake. That some hapless Spaniard had his Giro dreams crushed is inconsequential…

I was initially hoping that some Italian would rub off on me from listening to hours of Italian commentary, but to my surprise there’s actually no commentary whatsoever. Just the whirring of chopper blades or the revs of motorcycle engines. I’ve translated the few Italian words that pop up on the screen and can now carry on a conversation revolving around chasing people a few minutes ahead of me, or my position either at the head or tail of the peloton. So much for my grand plan to speak cycling Italian in 3 easy weeks.

and last week, on my way to Southern Pines for Tour de Moore it was…

Peter Hymas vs. North Carolina State Police

I have never, NEVER, seen any cops lurking north of Sanford on 15/501 but The Man was ready and waiting this particular morning. I was doing maybe 63 in a 55, but The Man had a heart and let me off with a warning even though my driving was “conduct constituting a potential hazard to the motoring public”.

I don’t buy the “fog” story for a second. Here’s what went down at OLN headquarters about 10:30am eastern time Sunday morning. Some OLN executive put this formula into the resident Deep Blue super computer:

OLN Amstel Gold Race programming calculus: [(No Lance Armstrong) * (Top Discovery Channel finisher was Ukrainian Volodymyr Bileka, 47th place and more than 2 minutes off the winning time) * (Discovery Channel’s George Hincapie was sole American finisher, not a factor, and 67th place more than 3 minutes back) * (Danilo Di Luca…who’s that?)]/(It’s not the Tour de France)=

Answer: No more than 8 minutes of coverage (including commercials). Follow 1980s CBS cycling journalism formula: 1 random peloton shot, 1 crash, and the final 30 seconds of the race. Create fake, weather related cover story to account for the missing 82 minutes of planned Amstel Gold footage. Provide Phil Liggett, Paul Sherwen, and Bob Roll with gratuitous amounts of alcohol to keep them quiet.

And in honor of the abbreviated OLN coverage, here’s the post-race comments of disgruntled Rabobank teammates Michael Boogerd and Oscar Freire in haiku form:

Boogerd
Botched Cauberg leadout
Glanced back…torched by Di Luca
I hate you Oscar

Freire
Read the script, biatch
Who’s thrice donned rainbow-striped threads?
Go cry to Breukink

“> 

Redlands Prologue: While the likes of Ben Jacques-Maynes, Eric Wohlberg, and Todd Herriott broke out the aero TT gear, The Tallest Man In Cycling blazed to a fine 10th place finish on his ‘cross bike. In case you’ve been ignoring his ‘cross and mountain bike results for the past several years, this man has a motor.

Man of Letters

While I was strolling through UNC’s Bulls Head bookstore a few days ago, a name on the spine of a book in the new arrivals section caught my eye: Kevin Guilfoile. Sure enough, after checking the author photo and brief bio, it’s the same guy that was in my graduating class from high school (not that I imagined there were doppleganger Kevin Guilfoiles strolling the planet who also happened to be writers). Periodically I catch up on his contributions to McSweeney’s, but Kevin’s really pulled out all the stops with a first novel published by Knopf. Of course, with the publication of this book, Kevin has laid waste to the competition in the CCS class of ‘86 Where-Are-They-Now? arms race. My only hope for retaliation is to not only rekindle my designs on signing a pro contract, but now I’d have to make a podium appearance at USPRO in Philly to boot. Damn you, Kevin. Still, I did plunk down some cash for Cast of Shadows and hope to read it one day once my grad school book learnin’ days have come to a conclusion.

I’m stuck in the 1930s: here’s a glimpse at a few ads from some recently acquired 6 day race programs. The Litesome and Ovaltine ads came from a 1934 event in London. The Litesome ad seems like a flashback to 7th grade gym class. Ah yes, the pseudo-science “shock and awe” lectures channelled through a punch-drunk, bellicose, football/wrestling coach delivered with zeal and revelry bordering on evangelical speaking-in-tongues. I’d pay good money to witness this character blaze through the ad’s copy, particularly to see the spraying phlegm and chest-poking rigamarole. The Ovaltine ad reminded me of Jacques Anquetil’s statement about Tour de France champions, something to the effect of “No one can expect pros to race on mineral water alone” as well as Johan Museeuw’s recently revealed coded conversations. It’s amusing that Ovaltine appears within quotes, and the cynic in me translates this as a veiled reference to performance enhancing substances. Of course all riders have trained on ‘Ovaltine’ (wink wink). How do you think they ride so fast for 6 days in the throes of sleep deprivation and supreme physical exertion? The Canada Dry and French’s ads came from a 1937 event in Madison Square Garden. Sadly, not too much has changed prize-wise since the Canada Dry ad was created. How many races have you been in where the bell was rung for $5 primes? The French’s ad is interesting to me due to the carnage in Hot Dan’s wake. Many programs seem to play up the danger element and fuel the spectators’ bloodlust sensibilities.

Cheap Seats hosts Jason and Randy Sklar chime in on Paris-Nice winner Bobby Julich’s Cervelo:

Randy Sklar: Don’t pro teams normally have nice sublimated decals denoting a rider’s name?
Jason Sklar: Randy, most pros do have exquisitely crafted stickers, but CSC is apparently too strapped for cash after ponying up some major lucre to enter the UCI’s latest boondoggle: the ProTour. The custom sticker line-item was hacked from the budget.
RS: That pitifully scrawled “Julich” looks like the work of your typical chain-smoking, boozing, angry old man Euro mechanic with a raging case of the shakes wielding a bottle of Wite-Out.
JS: Are you sure? I thought it was a new font face called “Doodling Toddler”.
RS: Nice try brother, but you would be wrong.
JS: I’m also confused by the period.
RS: Bobby’s making a statement. Although, having just stomped the field at Paris-Nice maybe the period should be turned into an exclamation point.
JS: I hope there’s still enough Wite-Out in the toolbox.
RS: I’m a bit rusty about the inner workings of professional Euro cycling, but don’t they earn prize money for victories?
JS: That’s right. Maybe Bobby made enough cash winning Paris-Nice that he can splurge for some stickers.
RS: Hell, we can probably scrounge enough cash in this couch to outfit every bike in the CSC stable.
JS: Our in-kind donation should probably also be enough to get “Cheap Seats” a spot on their kit…
RS: …and the VIP treatment at US PRO week.
JS and RS: High five, brother! (cue 1970s Hong Kong kung fu film smacking sound)
JS: We’ll be living large in Philly…
RS: …chomping down cheese steaks with Bjarne Riis and Scott Sunderland.

The Library of Congress is a true treasure trove of photographic images from the early 20th century, many of which document the world of 6-day cycling. I recently found the above photo of Floyd MacFarland in the newly digitized George Grantham Bain Collection, and I knew I came across his name in the rash of New York Times articles which I’ve skimmed regarding the early 20th century cycling scene in New York City and Newark, NJ. As luck would have it I’d saved the article in question because the story is just too rich to ignore. This story made the front page of the New York Times, April 18, 1915:

“Some 150 fans, men and boys, were watching practice yesterday afternoon at the Newark Velodrome when they saw Floyd A. MacFarland, the former sprint and six-day bike racer, now General Mangager of the Cycle Racing Association, which operates the velodrome, approach David Lantenberg of 240 Grafton Street, Brooklyn, who has a concession for the sale of confectionary and refreshments at the track. Lanterberg was placing signs advertising his business along the rail guarding the edge of the track, about opposite the bleachers, and some of the crowd could hear MacFarland as he remonstrated with Lantenberg.The manager did not want the signs along the rail and Lantenberg appeared to believe he was within his rights in putting them there. The crowd heard the men argue heatedly, and at last saw Lantenberg turn again to a sign, into which he was driving a screw. As he put his screwdriver against it MacFarland grabbed his arm.

Instantly, both men appeared to lose their tempers. Lantenberg, according to witnesses the police found afterwards, struck at MacFarland with the screwdriver and the manager turned his head to avoid the blow. The point of the screwdriver struck back of his left ear and the point was forced through the skull into the brain. MacFarland dropped senseless just as a crowd of riders, preparing for the races today, and many of the fans rushed around the couple…”

Ouch. Evidently, screws from the advertisements were working their way loose, falling onto the track, and causing flat tires. MacFarland was pissed when he saw Lantenberg defy his no-sign policy. MacFarland was rushed to the hospital in Lantenberg’s car, but he died later that evening having never regained consciousness. Many of the world’s greatest cyclists were at his bedside when he passed. MacFarland had twice won 6-day events held in Madison Square Garden as well as 6-day races in Europe, but he was even better known for his skills as a race-promoter, both in the US and Europe, once his professional cycling days came to an end. The 1915 track season at the Newark velodrome was set to be the grandest of all time since MacFarland had spent the previous winter bringing all of Europe’s best riders to the U.S. since WWI put a stop to racing on the continent. I think it speaks volumes about the prominence of the sport and the importance of MacFarland that the New York Times made his murder a front-page affair.

Most likely the photograph was taken at the Newark Velodrome, but the exact location and date are unknown.

Do you know who Billy Fiske is? I didn’t until about a week ago. I just happened to catch a History Channel documentary about him, most probably a piece of groundwork for the Hollywood extravaganza (“The Few”)to be released this year starring Tom Cruise and directed by Michael Mann. Fiske is perhaps best known for being the first American to die in combat in World War II. He schmoozed his way into the RAF and made the ultimate sacrifice during the Battle of Britain, approximately one month after he earned his wings as a Hurricane fighter pilot and more than a year before Pearl Harbor was bombed. Fiske is a rather fascinating gent, born into a wealthy Chicago banking family but never quite comfortable behind the desk. He spent most of his 29 years in Europe with a particular passion for skiing in Switzerland and raging along twisting Cote D’Azur roads in a Bentley. He also laid the groundwork for Aspen’s ski resort and possibly had a fling with Cary Grant’s fiancee while Fiske was on location in Hawaii for the filming of “White Heat”. For those of you who wish to know all the details of his life check this site out. As an aside, some elderly RAF veterans of the Battle of Britain are getting pretty amped up about the upcoming Tom Cruise flick since it appears that the truth will be twisted to parlay a very pro-American bias. It seems that Fiske (Tom Cruise) will be portrayed as someone who showed up and saved Britain’s ass even though the historic record states that in his month of combat he had no confirmed kills before he brought his wounded plane back to Tangmere airfield and died of burns suffered from a fire onboard.

Anyway, back to my TV watching…Fiske’s life story is certainly worthy of international man of mystery status, but what really caught my attention was his escapades as a Winter Olympian. Billy Fiske, at the age of 16, piloted a bobsled to a gold medal in the 1928 St. Moritz Winter Olympics and then repeated the feat four years later in Lake Placid. What raised my eyebrows as I flipped through the channels and kept me watching the History Channel for the rest of the episode was his behavior in St. Moritz. Young Mr. Fiske christened his bobsled “Satan” and then proceeded to create 5 matching turtleneck sweaters for his team (4 crew members in the sled plus 1 reserve) to wear in the Olympic Village, each adorned with a letter on the back that all together spelled out “S-A-T-A-N”. Needless to say, the US Olympic committee shit their pants. The sled was quickly renamed USA II and the sweaters never saw the light of day again. The Winter Olympics seemed pretty bush league back then, and apparently word never filtered back to the US about his behavior. Could you imagine the furor if someone pulled a similar stunt today? Well, it just so happens that a little birdy at Portugal’s Volta ao Algarve stage race photographed some mysterious behavior from the Team Discovery Channel camp which inexplicably flew under the radar of the otherwise eagle-eyed cycling media. Somebody must have seen the same show as me…

Exhibit A–Team issue Trek frame decal:

Exhibit B–Team Discovery on the front (how did nobody see this?):

I’m sure Discovery Channel management was eager to put the kibosh in those uppity pranksters.