McQuaid out: Cookson in!

At last, a great day for cycling - the unlovely Pat McQuaid has finally been prised out of the UCI, and we have someone new in charge.

The new guy is silver-topped Brian Cookson, OBE, who has been the President of British Cycling since 1997, when he (and the rest of the committee) was brought in to rescue it from insolvency - yes, that's how bad a state British cycling was in, fifteen years ago: insolvent. Under his leadership, the UK has won 19 Olympic Gold medals, 28 Paralympic Gold medals, the Tour de France twice, and multiple World Championship titles in disciplines of Road, Track and BMX.

Not bad for an unpaid job eh?

General opinion seems to be that he's too "nice" to take on this role, and that someone more forceful will be required. People who say this clearly have no idea what it's like to get anything done in Britain, what with obstructive local government, budgetary restraints, and the general inertia of the populace. Brian Cookson has taken a sport that was well below Darts in popularity, not to mention the insolvent bit, and has turned it around to the point where we won the Tour twice - TWICE!! - in successive years, with two different riders.

To have done that is a fantastic achievement, and shows a determination to succeed that is not visible on his rather gentle-looking face.

In fact, there was a good indication of this man's character in the actual election - there had been over an hour of arguing about whether McQuaid would be allowed to stand or not,  with some delegates arguing that there should firstly be a vote as to whether his nomination was valid or not.  Brian Cookson stepped in, firmly saying "Right! That's IT! I have had ENOUGH of this arguing. Him or me - vote now."

Which is what they did, and he won, 24 votes to 18.

I would have liked to have seen him have a resounding victory (43 for, 1 against, would have been my ideal result), but there are some rather nasty undercurrent factors in play - McQuaid does undoubtedly have some real supporters, but it is entirely possible that there are some delegates who felt that they had to vote for him - even though it was a secret ballot, if he were to have won again, and found out who had not voted for him, there might well have been repercussions.

However, there were enough honest men (and I use the term "men" to be short for "human") in the room to get  Brian Cookson elected, and now he can get his new broom out, and sweep those corners!

So what do we think his first list of jobs will be?

1) Send a minion round to McQuaid's office and prevent him shredding incriminating documents.
2) Lock said office and guard it against "accidental" arson and destruction of evidence,
3) Get a new office, a new computer, new shelves, new filing cabinets, and start afresh.
4) Rebuild relationships with WADA, USADA etc
5) Rebuild relationships with sponsors, tour organisers etc.
6) Rebuild relationships with riders - listening to their feedback re race radios, safety etc.

It's going to be a while before we see any visible changes, I imagine - something as big as the UCI is a bit like one of those massive tankers that take five miles to slow down or change direction. But give him time, and I am hoping that we will see real improvements in cycling today.

Sort of interesting that there was no third option for the job, eh? No-one else in the entire world of cycling was prepared to take on McQuaid... wonder why? Well, obviously it's a horrible job - everyone is going to hate you as soon as you start changing things, and you have all your predecessor's cronies to deal with. Plus everyone will be watching you for a sign of weakness, or a hint that you are turning to the dark side.

Not an easy job.

But welcome, Brian, and I hope you make as good a job of it as you did with the turnaround of British Cycling!

Canada 2: Montreal

Second of the big one-day UCI races in Canada, another one with lots of circuits, and Andy's riding in it - what's not to like, as they say?

This is another of those races where our poor knackered hard-working riders are tortured by having to keep riding past their hotel, as they get progressively more tired and less motivated to continue, so by the end of the race 68 of the 164 starters had dropped out, including Our Andy, who made it to the second-to-last lap, 23k to go, before calling it a day.

That's not as bad as it sounds - 7 of Sky dropped out (including one who had one of those awful falls where they don't get up), and I don't think one team ended with a full complement. And there doesn't seem to be a lot of point in flogging yourself to death just to be lapped by the winners!

That leaves just the Tour of Lombardie and the unlovely Tour of Beijing *cough splutter* as the last UCI races for RadioShambles - you will remember that dear kind sweet Mr Becca has decreed that he ain't paying for any more races, so they can only attend the ones for which the team is contractually obliged.  I wonder who he will send to Beijing? I bet he is doing eeny-meeny-miny-mo to decide which is more insulting - to send Andy to Beijing in the hopes that he contracts a nasty chest infection, or to leave him at home?

The Montreal race itself was pretty much the same as usual - a break got away, they spent all day chasing it, caught it a bit too early, lots more attacks, a brave lone attack, a last-minute bunch sprint. I spent more time looking at the spectators to see if Figgy was watching... especially when the cameras showed Andy and two others who had been riding together at the back, and who obviously decided among themselves that it was time to climb off. Andy lead them to the barriers and started disconnecting the sections so they could get out - no embarrassing "here, hold my bike while I climb over" for him, unlike the un-named Katusha rider who made a major hash of doing so, several laps earlier - and I was expecting Figgy to be there at any second, offering to hold his bike for him.

*laughs*

Oh, and a quick shout-out for former Schlecklander, Boulderado (Elle) who has moved a short distance away from Boulder, but must still have friends in the area - we've been seeing the terrifying flooding on our news for the last couple of days, and more rain is forecast, so a sincere wish that Elle, and all other Schlecklanders in the area, are safe.

Canada 1: Quebec

LLB and I always enjoy watching this race - I know that most of the peloton don't enjoy circuits, and I can see their point (especially when they are hanging off the back and have to cycle past their hotel entrance repeatedly) but as a spectator, I think circuits are brilliant.

And every year we watch this race - which is to say, every year for the last four years -  we talk about going over to Canada to watch this and Montreal. We are lured by the lovely Park, with the elegant spaciousness, the lovely trees, and the fact that we could clearly stand anywhere we wanted to.

We have even discussed standing on the "other" side of the roadway, holding up banners so the static camera could see them.

"But what would our banners say?" asks LLB.

Hmm, well,  mine would clearly say "go, Andy!" or something similar, which would be a bit odd if he were not riding. And we have no indication yet that the new Trek team will be better than RadioShambles at announcing their team more than five minutes in advance of the race starting...and we'd have to book the trip months beforehand... ah well, maybe next year.

Anyway, what of Quebec?

An interesting field, lots of big names, including Our Andy, much to my surprise, and they had given him number 1 as well - also to my surprise. I rather thought that Mr Spoilsport Becca would not be allowing Andy to race any more, and I was certain that, if he were, he would be relegated from number 1. But I was wrong - there he was, with number 1 on his back.

Alas, we didn't see him until a few laps from the end when he was suddenly spotted off the back, and our commentators (rather meanly, I thought) started saying "Oh dear, there's Andy Schleck falling off the back, well, we don't know where his head is these days," ("on his shoulders, usual place, stoopy" being the Schlecklander response at this point).."looks like he's going to be a DNF again.." but he was hammering up behind a team car and was clearly chasing back on.

At that point we get the action replay, and sure enough, he's pulling over with a mechanical and waving for the car.

So yar boo sucks, Carlton!

Unfortunately, despite chasing back on at high speed, and catching the back of the peloton in no time at all, the next we see is of him with a small group, obviously well off the back and not making any effort to chase back on.

*sigh*

I checked the Radioshambles site this morning, agog for more information, but he wasn't mentioned at all in the incredibly brief report. It would appear that Mad Dog Horner is Shack Rider Of The Month, and no other news is of interest.

The only bright spot is that the one and only Comment below the website report was a plaintive "What happened to Andy?"

So now we have Sunday to look forward to, the GP Montreal, and fingers crossed that Our Andy can make a slightly better showing there!

Andy Schleck Girlfriend 2013 - having a baby!

OK, unconfirmed rumours at present - although you'd think that Wort.lu would know, if anyone does:

Yay!

Hooray!  Brace yourself, TinkerJil, this will be the first of many, as Andy has already said that he wants "heaps of kids", and I think we all know how much he dotes on his neice,  Leea.

D'aaaw, sweet, I've been waiting for aaaages for the announcement of a wedding - we thought we saw a delicate little engagement ring on Tinkerjil's finger a while back, but nothing was said. Mind you, Andy has been being fairly quiet this year, for all sorts of perfectly understandable reasons, so maybe they felt the time was not right to talk about the future..

Perhaps now he might be a bit more forthcoming? *scans Twitter in case there's any more info*

Oh, and it's going to be a boy, of course. Oh, I do hope they go with a Luxembourgish name (cries of "Call him Jempy!" from me) although apparently the top Lux boy's name this year is Toni, which - in all the English-speaking countries - is the girl's version of the name. Short for Antonia, usually. So don't go with that one!

It looks as though 2014 is going to be a fabulous year for all of us: Andy will be racing again, fully healed, and very, very happy: Frankie will be racing again: Trek will have the new team up and running,  no more Becca; Martine will announce her second baby (that's just me speculating); Jil will be having her first baby, ooh! excitement!  and the new Trek team will blow everyone out of the water, except for Sky. *big grin*

I can't wait!

La Vuelta, first half... or two thirds...

The first week of the Vuelta has proved to be a lot more interesting that the normal first week of a big tour, partly due to the shorter stages bringing out a lot more breaks.

For RadioShambles, Horner has done really well with a stage win, and wearing the red jersey for a day, but phew! what a weirdo he is. Did you hear his post-race interview? He was burbling on about Shack's whole plan and strategy being to get him in red and keep him there until he wins the race.

Huh?

Shack didn't even have an acknowledged GC leader, they sent along the best they could scrape up from their team, without including Andy (who was in the Pro challenge instead) or Frankie (for some stupid spiteful reason: wouldn't it have made sense to send him?) and Horner is the oldest bloke in the peloton, and not exactly tipped to do great things here.

I can imagine the rest of the team watching the monitor and saying "Whaaaaat?!" when they heard it. I know that riders are full of adrenaline just after a stage, but I've heard Horner talking at other times, and he really is slightly disconnected from the real world. Hearing him spluttering about Armstrong's innocence was painful to watch, particularly in light of Armstrong's later confession...

Fabian, on a better note, is looking fantastic as always, and he's looking quite strong as well, ha! ha! No, seriously, he's looking in really good form, he even did an uphill sprint to the finish - although I think everyone watching would secretly have liked Tony Martin to win that stage, after his heroic/bonkers one-man break for practically the whole day.

I have to inject a girly note at this point - doesn't the Belkin kit look good? When they first wore it, I thought it was a bit "simple", or "retro", as they call it - none of the intricate shading of the other teams, just simple blocks of colour. But I'm really getting to like it, and it's easy to spot in the peloton, which is a major factor in kit likeability. But am I the only person who thinks that a "belkin" is some sort of medieval codpiece?

Moving on from that, but staying with kit, I still wish that riders would be given individual numbers, or at least would have their names across their shoulders, as they do in football, so that we could more easily spot them. I'm having real difficulty spotting the lovely Jakob in this Vuelta, as the Pyjama Boys all look strangely similar. Usually I can spot all my pets by their riding style, or their stance, or their body shape (JVS) but the Pyjama Boys all look exactly the same, even Nibali. Most odd. Must be something to do  with their onesies. Perhaps they only have one size of kit, and they have to pad out anyone who's too skinny.

Back to the race... Euskaltel are going great guns, in every break: for the first few days it was definitely "contract break" in the hopes of getting an offer from another team, but now that Mr Alonso has come to the rescue, they seem to be determined to show their gratitude by getting lots of sponsor time, which is definitely the right thing to do. I even saw one group of spectators holding up a white sheet on which was written "Gracias, Alonso!" which was very sweet. I wonder which member of the family sacrificed their bedsheets for that gesture?

Luke Rowe of Sky, one of my pets, was doing very well in the early days (although he's now dropped out, not feeling very well, shame, but he lasted as long as Philly Gilly, which can't be bad) , and was cycling along with Johnny Hoogerland (another honorary Schlecklander) who was already sporting a bandaged knee and elbow, poor boy.

The weirdest thing about our coverage of the Vuelta is the theme music which Eurosport have chosen to go with the footage - it's, well, sort of Celtic. More appropriate for the Tour of Ireland, you would have thought?

Despite the music, there's been lots of sunshine and hot, hot days, right up until this weekend when it suddenly changed, temperatures plummeted, and riders started dropping out left, right and centre,  many of them from hypothermia. I have to say, the organisers don't seem to have much consideration for riders, do they? Not only do they plan out routes that involve huge transfers, so they don't get a decent rest after each day,  but they now move them from one coast to another, hurling them from 36degrees heat exhaustion straight into 6 degrees England on a Bad Day. It really does not seem fair. On one of the earlier days we had the treat of seeing Fab go back to the team car and have a quick all-over body squirt from a large aerosol container. Was it a special cooling liquid, asked our commentators? Nah - it was just cologne. Fab likes to smell nice.

On the same very hot day,  my pet Luke was out in the break with no team car - so the AG2R car gave him a bottle. Aaaw! I love this sport.

Going back to kit for a moment, one of the Shack riders, whose name I can't spell (sounds like Keizerlovski) is wearing his national jersey - except that it appears to be a complete national kit, including shorts. So much for the  RadioShambles "we put national flags into a tiny stripe" policy. Or was that Mr Becca's policy? Is this a sign of his waning influence? We can but hope. The rider concerned, however it is spelled, pinged off the front at one point, with the equally un-spellable Txurruca: they got a little bit of a gap, Keizerlovski flicks the elbow - but there is no-one there! He looks round in astonishment to find that Txurruca has faded back to the group, and he's there out front all alone.  And he's so embarrassed that, instead of zooming off, he drops back to the bunch, which made me laugh.

Later on that day, Edvald Boassen-Haagen-Daaz leaps off the front with only 14k to go. "Sanchez goes after him!" yells Carlton Kirby, our commentator. But which one? The helicopter is so high that we can't see which rider it is. Ah, it's someone in green kit, that means Belkin *snorts through nose* so it's LL Sanchez - the pretty one. Sammy is the scary one, you might remember, with the Klingon-style corrugated forehead.  Things are much easier now, as Luis Leon has had to withdraw from the race - yes, hypothermia, join the queue - so we only have Scary Sammy left.

So here we are, two thirds of the way through the Tour, hilly stage today, rest day tomorrow, then a final week of hills. But Wednesday might be dangerous, it's a non-hilly day which might mean one of those awful scorched-earth interior days.. and we all know what lives out in the scorched-earth areas, don't we? Yes, zombies! *laughs*   And what do zombies eat? All together now, "cyclists!". And what do they eat when they can't get any cyclists? "Each other!" That's right. Well done, class.  That's why it's very important to stay with the peloton on scorched-earth days.

And what of Our Andy, while all this is going on? Hopefully he's recovered from the stomach upset that saw him DNF in the Plouay short tour: RadioShambles have not yet announced who they are sending to Canada for the Quebec and Montreal GPs, let alone the Italian races and the Beijing tour next month, so I have no idea if we will get to see him race again this year. Somehow, I suspect that Mr Becca will punish him by refusing to let him ride again.. unless he sends Andy to Beijing in the  hopes that he'll get a nasty respiratory infection from that disgusting smog which blights this Tour.

No, I am not a big fan of the Beijing Tour.

Remember the first one, where the repressive local regime refused entry to spectators, so there was practically no-one at the finish lines? And that smog! I don't know what sort of coverage you all got, but here in the UK we kept getting lengthy travelogue promotional adverts for Beijing, showing glorious blue skies and fantastic distant views, happy locals and impressed tourists: then we'd cut back to the race, where you could barely see across the street for the smog, and there were six men and a dog in face masks watching our riders cough and sneeze their way around the course. It did not endear itself to me.

We have also had partial coverage of the Tour of Alberta, but we haven't had a chance to watch it while the Vuelta is going on, so you'll have to wait a little while before hearing my views on that race. But Andy wasn't in it, anyway... ("pff!")  so it doesn't get priority.

Right, back to la Vuelta: hills today, let's see if Mad Dog Horner can continue his truly unbelievable run of good form.

Another fractured pelvis!

Blimey, what's happening in cycling? Is Our Andy setting a trend?

Today I read that Simon Gerrans of O'rica (the well known Irish Australian team) cracked his pelvis earlier in the Vuelta, and has had to give up, go to hospital, and go home.

What's going on? I don't remember hearing about anyone with a fractured pelvis before, and now we have Andy, G, Barbie Barbie and Simon Gerrans all with the same injury.

Two years ago it was all scaphoid bones......

Perhaps they need to take fewer energy gels and more bone strengthening supplements.

Other odd news today, Puncture Pim has not been snaffled by Trek, instead he has gone to Lotto. I'm a little disappointed by this, I must admit. But at least he has a contract, what with Vacansoleil about to fold. Oh, and Philly Gilly finally, FINALLY! managed a stage win in the rainbow jersey: he won a sprint finish in stage 12 of the Vuelta (which I haven't watched yet, but LLB has it recorded for me), so he must be pretty relieved, eh?

Euskaltel will live on!

Great news in recent days: a new sponsor has stepped up to take over the Carrots, Euskaltel Euskadi, who were about to fold at the end of this season.

The new sponsor is Ferdinand Alonso, former F1 driver, who is apparently very chummy with both Contador and Sammie "Crinkled Forehead" Sanchez: the report says that he's a  big cycling fan, and has wanted to get involved with sponsoring a team for some years now.

Needless to say, I'm really happy to hear this, but I do have some reservations - is he going to be another stupid "rich man" sponsor, who will lose interest if his team fail to win, win, win? (Becca) Does he fully appreciate that he may have bought Euskaltel, but they will still do what they have always done, ie fall off their bikes, knock other riders off their bikes, whizz up hills from time to time, get in breaks, occasionally win a stage, and virtually never win a big race.

If he's ok with that, then we're ok.

If he expects them to suddenly turn around and start winning, he is in for a disappointment (no offence to Euskaltel, or Midge, *waves across the channel*, or any other Carrot fans!), and I really don't want to see yet another rich man dabbling  his fingers in the sport, then dumping it when things don't go quite as he wanted.

We won't know about that until part way through next season, but there are some more immediate questions that need to be asked:

1)  Kit. Will he keep the orange?
2) Name. Will they still be Euskaltel something?
3) Team cars: will they be Ferraris?

Regarding kit, we all hope he keeps the iconic orange, but we have to accept that if he is buying the team - for 6 million euros, it's said - then he does have the right to change it. He comes from a small region of Spain (thanks, Midge, for that info!) whose national flag is a nice shade of blue, with a gold cross on it. I hereby prophesy that if he changes the kit, it will be black shorts, blue jerseys, and gold/yellow stripes, rather like the old Blanco kit.

Regarding name: as above. During la Vuelta, our commentators said that Euskaltel might well stay on as sponsors, now that a big injection of someone else's cash has come along, so there is a real chance that the word Euskaltel will continue to appear in their team name. I do hope so!

And as for team cars, well, don't be silly: Ferrari simply don't make an estate car with a roof rack, and in fact they probably don't even make a car whose speedometer can register 5mph. And frankly, none of their clutches could stand the constant slipping!

GP Plouay

Our coverage begins with a quick look at the start line - Hi, Andy! *waves* Oh! Er, hi Contador! Ooer, is this the first time they have raced together in recent history? They used to be such friends...

Suddenly the race is well under way, and we have a break of four, all small pro-continental teams, in the classic "tv break" (which has recently become the classic "I need a  contract" break) as they get publicity for themselves and their sponsors, including the Damart Boys in their loose grey woolly underwear.

It seems like a small race to be a UCI one: I had actually forgotten it was a "proper" race, and was expressing surprise at all the big teams taking part, until LLB reminded me, with a pitying expression on his face. It seems that everyone who didn't go to la Vuelta is here, making quite an impressive field, for what looks like a small race.

According to Twitter, Andy stepped off barely half-way through the race, but our coverage is only highlights, so we don't see any of that, nor is it being referred to, later in the race. Twitter was full of criticism: "If Becca won't let me race where I want to, I won't race where he wants me to" was one suggestion, and there were a  lot more along those lines. Is Our Andy really that petty? It would be hard to blame him, if that were the case, bearing in mind the latest bomb dropped by Mr Becca ( See Becca pulls the Plug - "No more money for anything other than UCI races that we are forced by contract to attend") but it would be somewhat unprofessional. I'll wait until I have heard his side of it before I judge!

Our coverage makes sudden jumps, as it is only the highlights: we go from 23k to go, straight to 16k with no word of explanation -  the break have suddenly vanished: it makes it hard to see any coherent pattern to the racing. No wonder "new" fans get so confused by it, if all they see are highlights of races.

At 10k to go there is a break of three riders, and the Lotto rider is fishing in his jacket pockets for gels. He pulls one out and immediately throws it away. Huh? Did he not like it? Was it the wrong flavour? Was it to save weight for the final push? I find it hard to believe that a couple of grams could make that much difference - a bidon, yes: water is heavy, but a tiny gel? And what if he needs it in the last few kms?

Well, the race ends: apparently there was a crash in the last but one lap, but we didn't see it due to our "highlights" coverage. The good news for RadioShambles that Nizzolo (currently contract-less for next year) came a very close second and *pants to get breath back after dashing off to their website* it seems that Andy had stomach problems, causing him to retire.

The Shack report ends, rather spitefully, "Hopefully Andy will feel better in the upcoming days."

Will he be sent off to Canada for the last couple of UCI races, I wonder?

USA Pro challenge

Well, what a hoot that was!

I still think that the scenery was very scenic, but not exactly pretty - rather too many loooong looong boring straight roads - but it was good to see Andy racing again, especially in the first week, when we did manage to spot him a few times.

Towards the end of the race, there was less coverage, which I suppose is only to be expected, as they were focusing on likely winners.

Still, Our Andy came in 31st overall, which is where he was sitting for most of the race. So in real terms, he was never going to win it, and he maintained his position right to the end of the race.

Points of note from the race, apart from the scenery? Well, Cannondale appeared in their new kit, a rather less green, more black sort of affair, but still sporting the chipmunk stripes on the back. Peter "more fun than a jammy dodger" Sagan appeared on the podium at one point with whiskers, so the team must have heard me referring to them as chipmunks.

See what I mean?

Some of the USA fans exhibited what - with due respect to all American Schlecklanders - I would call the typical American over-exuberance, but mostly it occurred in wacky costumes, which is fine.  It's the fans who run alongside that make me cross.

I'm now wishing that I'd made notes as the race was progressing, as I have forgotten all the funny little incidents that caught my eye at the time... but I must say a big word of praise for the Tour Tracker, which was generally excellent, and I wish more races would have something similar.

The only improvement would be if all riders had properly enabled GPS transmitters, so that we could choose our top three (or so) riders, and be able to see whereabouts they are on the road at all times. LLB always says that he'd like to be able to check wattage etc of his chosen riders, but I'd be happy just to know exactly where they were.

One thing which was massively memorable about the Pro Challenge was the placenames  - Steamboat Springs, for a start, you just couldn't make up a name like that, could you?

Bachelor's Gulch made me laugh as well, but they seemed to be riding uphill to it: surely a gulch would be lower than everything around, wouldn't it?

And finally there was Beaver Creek, just south of Hanging Jugs....