Posted on 06/26/2013 3:56:07 PM PDT by Baynative
Back in the 80’s I owned a bike shop. Every day I would call the French Embassy in DC and get the results read to me over the phone (top 20 places, green jersey, polka dot etc..) and type them up and post them in the window of the store. Racers would ride by and check them out.
Yep, many pick him to win again.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audrey_McElmury
Won the worlds in 1969.
Saw George Mount in Montreal in 1976. Chatted with him at the finish line after the race.
Nice, but I sort of miss the old days.
Thanks for the ping.
Should be an interesting year.
Looking forward to it!
DVR ready to go!
If you've ridden that area, have you ever taken the fly down State Highway 24 from Tunnel Road to Orinda?
I put 50,000 miles under my butt in those East Bay Hills. My thing was short fast road rides. I had a favorite loop from Jack London Square, up Tunnel Road to Grizzly Peak and Skyline and back down via Broadway Terrace (no, I don't know how fast I was going, but it's not like those old Bell Helmets were going to do any good). The goal was to do it in under an hour. Thirty-four minutes up, 25 down with a 1700 foot altitude gain in between. I was nuts for hill-climbing and speed. The bike was a Fuji Newest, which rode like a freaking spring, especially with nylon tubulars.
Another fave was the loop from Martinez up Franklin Canyon and back along the river through Port Costa. Nice road in a tailwind. Those were the days and I was nuts. Never got hurt though, thank the Lord.
In 1987 I finally broke down and bought a C-Record Somec SPX-Air. I have to this day, Girardi saddle, Vittoria Criterium Setas and all. That bike is pure sex: georgeous lug work with red and white pearlescent paint with blue pinstriping. Just to annoy, I even fitted the Cinelli bars with streamers! ZOOOM!!! During my first job in LA, I used to ride it from Culver City through West LA up to Mulholland and back down via Wilshire Boulevard. Drove the drivers crazy because I was beating them (Wilshire routinely has 45-50mph traffic).
Unfortunately, where I live now in the Santa Cruz Mountains the roads are beautiful but very rough. It's no place for speed freaks.
My, you’re cheery...
Like her, Mount was relatively unappreciated in America and ended up riding professionally for Benotto.
TJ, huh?
Santa Cruz/Central coast was the area I was talking about. I used to live in Monterey. I rode the coastal hills from Pebble Beach and Carmel Valley to Hwy 9 for years and loved them all except the climb from Hwy 1 to Bonnie Doon. It was one of those that I just never developed a rhythm for.
In a history of early American racers called “Hearts of Lions” the author mentioned how when she rode past all the Czechs cheered and when the Soviet riders came past they were silent.
When I was on Parris Island in 1989 my girlfriend recorded the Tour for me. I was a Greg LeMond fan long before anyone was a Lance Armstrong fan. My girlfriend liked Dag-Otto Lauritzen
Le Tour Ping!
It’s a shame Bradley Wiggins can’t be there this year.
I’m expecting the strongest of 2012 to repeat in 2013. Cavendish is now a team leader so that will interesting.
PORTO VECCHIO, France (Reuters) – Alberto Contador has promised a more exciting Tour de France this year after Bradley Wiggins’s Team Sky dominated all the way to the Champs-Elysees in the 2012 edition.
Double champion Contador of Spain, back in the race after a one-year hiatus because of a doping suspension, is unlikely to settle for second against Team Sky leader Chris Froome, the overwhelming favourite.
“We are not the only two actors in this film,” Contador, who won the Tour in 2007 and 2009, told a packed news conference at his team hotel on Thursday. “There will be more action than last year.”
Last year, Wiggins’s rivals seemed to quickly abandon hope of winning the Tour as the Briton dominated the time trials and relied on Team Sky’s conservative tactics in the mountains.
Wiggins is out of the race, which starts on Saturday, for health reasons but Team Sky directors are likely to use the same methods to help Froome to reach Paris with the yellow jersey.
Australian Michael Rogers, who was Team Sky’s road captain last year but has switched to Contador’s Team Saxo-Tinkoff this season, knows a thing or two about the British outfit’s way of operating.
“I think Sky are more advanced in training, in sports science – they know exactly what’s required from domestiques to do the job properly in the last week, they know so much more about the internals of the sport, in my opinion, than any other team,” he told reporters.
“I think Alberto uses his emotions in the races, whereas I think Chris is very calculated and Brad was very calculated last year. (At Team Sky) you know what you’re capable of and you don’t go outside of that.”
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