Fleche Wallone - yes, I know I'm late!

Yup, I know I'm a bit late with this, but I've been snowed under with work, and LLB and I only get to catch up with the cycling we've recorded during the week, at the weekend. Pardon the sentence construction.

So we all know what happened, (Phil Gil won it) therefore I won't bother with the blow-by-blow report - if you feel the need to relive it, pop over to Miss Fede's Blog for the full details - and I will just add my few extra comments.

To start with, in England we have a tradition in sports reporting that sports are given time slots for their coverage, but if they over-run, then whatever is supposed to follow it gets delayed. This is very sensible and logical: after all, what's the point in watching the bulk of a race/match.competition then missing the last ten minutes when you find out who won.

Normally, tennis is the culprit - they schedule it a slot, but it can over-run by a significant amount, causing chaos amongst the following programmes.

We don't mind that too much - tennis is popular, I understand it: but snooker? (*voice rises indignantly*) Snooker?!

Anyway, eventually the damned snooker finished (yawn) and our live coverage started, and there we were, all agog to see Andy and Frankie in a race together, along with Contador. Would there be hugs? Would there be fireworks? Would there be elbows in the peloton, and hissy fits?

No, of course there weren't, we barely saw Contador, leading LLB and I to suspect that although he's fully prepared to win everything in Spain, he's keeping a low profile out in the real world, until the Longest Enquiry In The History Of Cycling (sorry, Lance) finishes.

Once again, terrible wobbly camera-bike work: makes me wonder how Tour de France can get it so right, and everyone else get it so wrong. Also, have they not heard of steady-cams? I can't imagine it's technically that difficult to get a steadier image from the back of a bike.  OK, before all the camera-bike fans shoot me down in flames, I admire the camera bikes tremendously, not just the nerve of the cameraman who has to trust his pilot with his life, but also the skill of the pilot who is controlling an inherently unstable top-heavy bike while his passenger commits every crime known to pillion passengers in the sense of leaning left and right, up and down, unpredictably..... but notwithstanding that, as a viewer, I want clear images, please!

So, finally the coverage started, and SaxoBlank and the Leopards (sounds like a 50s pop group with a girl drummer...) were pulling hard at the front.

David Harmon, commentating, said "And we are online live now in Australia." and there was a chorus of "Hi, Leelu!" from LLB and I. Then I distinctly heard Brian Smith, the other commentator, talking about Jakob FOOGLE-SLANG and I thought "oh no, Leelu's going to erupt off the sofa, spitting and cursing!"

Apart from that, not a terribly exciting race, until we got to the part where Andy was leading Frankie and the Peloton (another 50s group, this time biker boys in black leather with greasy quiffs) down the penultimate hill, LLB and I were eating Easter Eggs at the time, and he took advantage of my total concentration on OGL to steal bits of my egg while I wasn't looking. What a swine, eh?

Finally, we had Frankie leading the peloton up the Muy de Huy: not for long, but at least he got 7th. The leader board on Eurosport showed Andy as coming 4th. Uh? We clearly saw him dying like a dog on the last climb - how did he get in 4th? Did he teleport? But no, it was a mistake, he came 44th. At least Frankie beat Contador, who came in 11th. Oh, and my favourite Carrot, Igor Anton from Euskaltel, came in 5th, so I was pretty pleased with the results.

Now, in the last post there was a comment from CeCe about Andy and his new girlfriend - possibly - and here is the photo we were talking about: gorgeous photo, isn't it?  The sort you could imagine made into an arty print, on textured fake-canvas paper, with no frame.

So if anyone knows the story of this photo, do tell.

Incidentally, there have been some ludicrous search terms leading to the blog in the last couple of days: things such as:

"Andy Schleck girlfriend April 2011."   Interestingly specific.

"Andy Schleck girls"  Yes, we've all tried that one, haven't we.

"frefre eisen sex tv"  Don't ask me what that's all about, I haven't a clue.

"Fugl scarves"  Aha! That's more like it! First and Second for Schleckland, closely followed at Third by Miss FeeDee. Yay for the Schlecklanders!

Finally:

"Is Andy Schleck gay" Well, what a question.

a) No, he's not.
b) If he is, it's none of our business.
c) Even if he is, I don't care, he's still adorable.
d) No, he's not.

That's it for now, short blogs this week: lots to do!