Broken People Need a Broomwagon

Long ago I grew tired of following and commenting on the Floyd Landis self-destruction. I tried for a long time, like many, to hold out a glimmer of hope that this guy, known for his grit and indefatigable determination, was indeed a true twiner of the Tour de France, and that amazing ride on Stage 17 into Morzine should be what we remember, not the endless appearances before a microphone accusing and being accused.

This morning I found myself skipping over the latest about Contador and ended up reading about, of all people, Landis. I'm glad I read this piece. It made me realize we need a broom wagon for humans, cyclist aside, like Floyd Landis; they aren't bad, just broken. A broom wagon so they can just crawl in, away from the looky-loo insensitivity of media and public, and go work in private at getting ready to start the Tour of Life the next year.

Today CyclingNews reported on the interview Landis did with former cyclist turned writer Paul Kimmage in the Sunday Times. It saddened me once again for Landis, but in a different way, as a human-being broken. Broken in a way we never wish for any human.

Landis: It was either cheat or get cheated

Rouge Report: Mano-a-Mano

And the winner is...
Italy's Adriano Malori, 170th, trailing in Le Tour de France by 4h 27m and 3 secs.

The TT, they call it the race-of-truth. Just you and your bike against the clock, and Saturday, for 52 km from Bordeaux to Pauillac, you shared it with the wind. After surviving three weeks, including one of the Tour's toughest final weeks in the Pyrenees it finally came down to this, the Individual Time Trial.

Mano-a-mano, the race was on the line, one man would walk away victorious, the other only his family and friends would remember the pain and suffering - after 3,642 kilometers the 2010 Lanterne Rouge had come down to this.

Unfortunately for Adriano, a respectable young time trialist with a young palmares full of U23 ITT victories, a bright future and despite trailing the human-rocket Fabian Cancellara by less than seven minutes as well as topping perennial TT strongmen like Andreas Klöden, Christophe Moreau, Michael Rogers, Jens Voigt, and Cadel Evans, he was up against more than a mere mortal Lanterne Rouge contender, it was the three-time former German National and 2008 UCI ITT Champion Bert Grabsch - he was going to need a tailwind and "no chain", and maybe one of those mysterious motors to hold his 2 minute 1 second "lead" out of the Lanterne Rouge.

It was never to be. Bert Grabsch, by virtue of the Lanterne Rouge position, was the first rider out of the gate at 10:15 Saturday morning in Bordeaux for the 19th stage. With light winds and his last shot at stage glory dangling like a bottle of fine Bordeaux Rouge 52 kms west along the Garonne River in Pauillac. Grabsch st0pped the clock in a blistering time that would hold up for several hours until HTC-Columbia teammate Tony Martin blew it away by a minute and a half, only to see that time fall to Cancellara.

In the end 11 riders finished within 30 minutes of the Lanterne Rouge. For much of the three weeks several of these guys were fighting, suffering, dangling near the back, and occasionally off the back, precariously close to time cut-offs and the sweeping sounds of the voiture balai as it low geared its way up hill and down dale. But this year many of the autobusers were pedaling broken, battered and bruised. For anyone who has seen a pro bike race in Europe you know that in the mini-convoy that trails the race an ambulance accompanies the broom wagon; for many riders dreaming of Paris in 2010 it must have been an ominously goolish sight many days.

How it all shook out - and names to watch next year:

159	Brett Lancaster (Aus) Cervelo Test Team	3:57:00
160	Dimitri Champion (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale	3:59:45
161	Marcus Burghardt (Ger) BMC Racing Team	4:00:47
162	Manuel Quinziato (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo	4:01:02
163	Jeremy Hunt (GBr) Cervelo Test Team	4:02:21
164	Daniel Lloyd (GBr) Cervelo Test Team	4:02:59
165	Robbie McEwen (Aus) Team Katusha	4:08:28
166	Mirco Lorenzetto (Ita) Lampre-Farnese Vini	4:09:12
167	Anthony Roux (Fra) Française des Jeux	4:13:37
168	Andreas Klier (Ger) Cervelo Test Team	4:17:16
169	Bert Grabsch (Ger) Team HTC - Columbia	4:23:01
170	Adriano Malori (Ita) Lampre-Farnese Vini	4:27:03

Rouge Report: "The Circle of Death"

Somewhere between a few hundred million and 6.3 billion of us populating our planet most humans lost our primordial priority - contesting for survival. Real survival, the kind where for example, your daily bread comes at the risky price of challenging large beasts which could turn the table and eat you. Survivors were immortalized on cave walls and in totems, they were heroes. Hardwired in us is the need to face deathly demons, survive the ordeal, so we invented sports and then imagined ridiculous challenges - Le Tour de France.

Exactly one hundred years ago now, director Henri Desgrange dispatched his trusted assistant Alphonse Steinès to determine the passabilty, better survivability, of sending single-sprocket riders over the spine of the Pyrenees. Steinès' liberally positive report (after nearly being lost in the snow) concocted an experiment that would be tested two months later on the Herculean Stage 10 of the 1910 Tour de France: four brutal climbs, peaking with the first ascent of the Col du Peyresourde (1569m), the Col d'Aspin (1489m), the Col du Tourmalet(2115m), and the Col d'Aubisque(1710m). A Tour legend was born. To the delight of Director Desgrange, the print press proved contributing accomplices to the legend by naming the new route that grueling day in the Pyrenees “The Circle of Death”, where hopes of a Tour de France victory go to die (Thursday that fate will be decided for Andy Schleck and Alberto Contador.)

A Circle of Death? Why?

In Desgrange's own words, "The ideal Tour would be a Tour in which only one rider survives the ordeal."

That ordeal, first for Alphonse Steinès, included the now famous Col du Tourmalet, generally capped by cold and mist, crowning the Circle of Death. Ordeals of the Tourmalet pepper Tour lore. One story goes - arriving at the summit in 1947 Jean-Apo Lazaridès climbed off to wait for the others for fearing his 'ordeal' would include the challenge of Pyrenean bears. On the day I rode the Circle death had overtaken a local horse and vultures haunted the roadside scene - definitely inspiring this rider to pick up the pedal revs - cyclists are not the only ones challenged by the Circle of Death.

To be fair even generally uncompassionate Desgrange was apprehensive about the mountainous experiment; as a precaution, to protect perception of his race, he created a vehicle to rescue victims of the Circle and, in an extremely rare show of generosity, even allowed them to start the next stage, penalized of course. That vehicle was the voiture balai - Death's chariot was born - the broom wagon.

The Circle of Death wasn't quite as hungry today as in years past, but it did have an appetite, for two riders the journey was pockmarked by 'DNF'. For many in the peloton the Circle was more akin to the Bermuda Triangle; over 23 minutes adrift Sylvain Chavanel, Michael Rogers and Cadel Evans, all but vanished from camera view, leaving commentators to question if they had DNF'd.

One rider soared away from the mountains and apparently out of the Lanterne Rouge race, RadioShack's Dmitriy Muravyev, who once was considered a serious challenger for rouge. Going into the rest day in Pau things aren't sewn up:

159	David Millar (GBr) Garmin - Transitions	3:25:22
160	Nicki Sörensen (Den) Team Saxo Bank	3:26:42
161	Dimitri Champion (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale	3:27:19
162	Brett Lancaster (Aus) Cervelo Test Team	3:27:22
163	Daniel Lloyd (GBr) Cervelo Test Team	3:27:48
164	Manuel Quinziato (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo	3:29:15
165	Jeremy Hunt (GBr) Cervelo Test Team	3:30:01
166	Robbie McEwen (Aus) Team Katusha	3:32:26
167	Mirco Lorenzetto (Ita) Lampre-Farnese Vini	3:33:16
168	Andreas Klier (Ger) Cervelo Test Team	3:38:41
169	Marcus Burghardt (Ger) BMC Racing Team	3:42:51
170	Anthony Roux (Fra) Française des Jeux	3:43:02
171	Adriano Malori (Ita) Lampre-Farnese Vini	3:53:09
172	Bert Grabsch (Ger) Team HTC - Columbia	3:55:10

RACE UPDATE:

Jens Voigt, crashed again today, He was on the descent of the Col de Peyresourde, when he suffered a front tire blowout, out the window went his control and down he crashed at high speed.

Fortunately he eluded the Circle of Death chariot, or worse, by avoiding a repeat of the horrific injuries he suffered during last year's race when he landed on his face and head at top speed.

After waving away the help of race assistants in the broom wagon, Jens battled on to finish the stage with the autobus - and beat the time cut-off. After wards he told reporters, "I'm doing 70 kilometers an hour on the first descent when my front tire explodes," continuing with characteristic good humor, "Before I hit the asphalt I actually manage to think that this is going to hurt. Both knees, elbows, hands, shoulders and the entire left side of my body were severely hurt." Adding, "My ribs are hurting but hey, broken ribs are overrated anyway. Fortunately, I didn't land on my face this time and I'm still alive."

Regarding a broom wagon ride Jens said, "I was offered a ride on the truck that picks up abandoned riders but I'm not going to quit another Tour de France. Now, there's a rest day and Paris is not that far away."

Monday's Rouge Report

Call it what you like, "B" is for Brutal, or Belittling, or the Bast%*d, maybe the Beast, or just Big B, or perhaps plain - the Balès, the climb up today's Port de Balès is one of the truly great ascents in the Pyrenees.

Amazingly it was only included for the first time as recently as 2007. I was fortunate and happy to have climbed it that same summer, two months after the Tour had suffered over it. The road was still graffiti'd in hopes and heroes. Half way up the climb Didi the Devil's pitchforks poked at our tires just as the road kicked up and the real devil - the first of several kilometers at 10-plus percent - bit at your legs like a feral dog.

Today the Port de Balès was only beautiful if you were named Thomas and you were racing away from the field in your National Tricolor (or you were exhuberant club rider and busting your friends in the final couple K's - the memory is still sweet!) for the rest of the peloton the Port de Balès is over an hour of suffering with the boys at the back of the bus and avoiding the hawking voiture balai.

Chapeau to former rouge contender Anthony Roux, you caught an express bus and made up 15 minutes over the Port de Balès, building a buffer for the next two killer stages and left the temporary honor of Lanterne Rouge to the HTC-Columbia rider from Germany Bert Grabsch. Also making a return to the rouge race is Stage 10 laster Adriano Malori (Lampre-Farnese Vini).

Rest up guys, tomorrow's stage is why Henri Desgrange invented to the voiture balai - broom wagon. The voiture's siren will sing, but resist, the rest day is only 5 Cols and 199.5 kms in the distance - just be delighted you aren't a century earlier, the day would be 326km long, 0ver 14 hours in the saddle.

Backing up a full half hour for today's Rouge Report - they will all play a roll in the next two days:

157	David Millar (GBr) Garmin - Transitions	2:57:19
158	Stuart O'Grady (Aus) Team Saxo Bank	2:58:21
159	Nicki Sörensen (Den) Team Saxo Bank	2:58:39
160	Dimitri Champion (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale	2:59:16
161	Brett Lancaster (Aus) Cervelo Test Team	2:59:19
162	Iban Mayoz Echeverria (Spa) Footon-Servetto	2:59:24
163	Daniel Lloyd (GBr) Cervelo Test Team	2:59:45
164	Alan Perez Lezaun (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi	3:00:54
165	Manuel Quinziato (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo	3:01:12
166	Jeremy Hunt (GBr) Cervelo Test Team	3:01:58
167	Robbie McEwen (Aus) Team Katusha	3:04:23
168	Mirco Lorenzetto (Ita) Lampre-Farnese Vini	3:05:13
169	Andreas Klier (Ger) Cervelo Test Team	3:10:38
170	Marcus Burghardt (Ger) BMC Racing Team	3:14:48
171	Anthony Roux (Fra) Française des Jeux	3:14:59
172	Dmitriy Muravyev (Kaz) Team Radioshack	3:16:17
173	Adriano Malori (Ita) Lampre-Farnese Vini	3:25:06
174	Bert Grabsch (Ger) Team HTC - Columbia	3:27:07

Lanterne Rouge Musings

Under a month to go until Le Tour sets off, its Grand Depart in Amsterdam. The buzz is starting to build - the revival of Basso, mechanical doping, Cavandish's lack of wins, Landis vs Lance, the Where's Menchov Mystery, etc. And it's time for cycling to go mainstream media; the cycling journalist are getting some company - regular sports types and the 'other' journalistic world, those that join in like once-a-year Christians on Easter Sunday. Hey, if your bosses will foot the bill for bonnes vacances in France I guess you take it.

With the days dwindling I'm reviewing my contenders, the wannabees and the likely winner. Oh ya, mainstream go ahead and pick the maillot jaune winner - let's see, there is Contador - and there is... um? Contador. Wow, that was simple. If his pistolly avoids backfiring and the pollen count stays low while they pass through the sunflower fields, it should be a multi-minute mutilation of the GC, he is after all the best pair of Sidis pedaling in the Grand Boucle. No, what I'm focusing on is that faint red glow illuminating the tail of the peloton. That eternal flame that draws the broomwagon ever closer. Try picking that rider and you will enshrine yourself in the Prognosticator's Hall of Fame.

Lanterne Rouge Picks 2010
It's a new game this year, I started it a few months ago, it carries extra meaning. Until I had to place myself on 'personal disabled list' I was planning on being at the Tour, covering it from the back of the bus, the broomwagon. (Next year.) So having a hint of who might be hanging on for dear life would help me target interviews and lock in the 2010 Lanterne Rouge.

Unfortunately everybody's favorite, Mr. "I'll eat my handlebars" Kenny Van Hummel and his Skil-Shimano Team were not selected by the committee. Truly a shame. I was looking forward to hanging with Kenny. Kenny would have once again inspired us all. Van Hummel though will go down as one of the most endearingly likable cyclists in this or any year’s race. In his first Tour de France, he often survived stages heroically, "by the skin of his teeth and riding hundreds of kilometres on his own."

But the peloton rolls on and the gruppetto of likely contenders based on the past couple of July's (marking 2007 with a huge asterisk as nearly a third of the peloton finished within that half hour of the little lantern) looks like this:

• Leading candidate is always a returning winner. Last year's Lanterne Rouge Yauheni Hutarovich finished 156 at 4h 16'27" - but history proves with so few Rouge repeats winning also teaches you how not to win.
  
• Bernhard Eisel has to be one of the strongest contenders in years. He was there in 2007, and after finishing first runner up to the greatest Lanterne Rouge winner of all time - Wim Vansevenant in 2008, just under a minute back, Bernhard followed that up with a respectable 6th back, only 29 minutes off the pace in 2009. After leading out the Manx Missile for a week his legs should be spent.
  
• Niki Terpstra of Milram continues to impress with his tenacity and persistance as well as his consistency off the back. In 2009 he was 28 mins off last and 22 mins in 2008. In 2009 Terpstra showed true Lanterne Rouge potential by winning the 3rd stage in the Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré, and taking the yellow leader's jersey; a true anti-grimpeur.
• An outside contender, and perhaps America's first Lanterne Rouge could be Tyler Farrar. At 3h 48'13" the Garmin speedster was five places out of last in 2009; although competing in all three grand tours last year could give him the savvy to stay one wheel ahead of the Lanterne.
  
• Finally, with the triplets of death, Stages 14, 15, 16 hovering over the third week we could have a repeat of 2007 when 34 riders huddled a half hour around the warm glow of the red lamp. There were big names in that group, many still around, like Boonen, Weening, Hushovd, Steegmans, Hunter, Haussler. Many of these guys were within seconds of rouge after nearly 86 hours of pedaling.
  

Throwing a spanner in the sprocket are the grand tour first-timers. Newbies. These guys are unknowns. The kinda riders that drive bookies crazy. They are the Van Hummels or Jay Sweets that surprise you. 1999's Sweet was the kinda wannabee Lanterne Rouge that we club riders connect to on a personal sufferage level. They are us, we could be them, almost.

Jay Sweet, like Van Hummel**, would eventually succumb, turning over the lantern to eventual winner Jacky Durand on Stage 15. This from Jay Sweet's online diary in 1999, Stage 9, for CyclingNews.com:

"What a scarring day! The weather was shabby, raining, cold and a head wind! I got over the first two climbs okay, the bunch took it quite easy which was a relief. The Col du Telegraph (12 kms at 7.1%) was hard. I was the first one dropped, I just climbed it at my own pace. I caught the groupetto over the top on the descent. We then started to climb the Col du Galibier (18 kms at 7%). I lasted about 3 kms with the groupetto before I went hunger flat. My arms didn't want to hold up my body, I had no power whatsoever. I absolut[e]ly crawled to the top of the Galibier which seemed to take forever. When I got to the top I stopped to put on my rain jacket because it was freezing and my director said that I was as white as a ghost and my eyes were half open. He didn't really want me to descend the Galibier but I said I wanted to go on. With 70 kms to go and two more Col's I kept going. When I got to the bottom of the descent it was hailing on me but I kept going! On the Col de Montgenevre (10.5 kms at 5%) it was absolut[e]ly pouring rain but I kept going and at the bottom of the last Col (11.2 kms at 6%). I asked my director how much time I had left for the time cut and he said "You have to go as fast as you can!". I already had been for the last 110 kms but I had to finish. As I climbed as fast as I could it kept raining on me. I got to the last kilometer and sprinted or tried to anyway just to make time cut! I was out by 3 minutes. I didn't make the time cut! After everything I'd been through today and I was eliminated. I guess the officials felt real sorry for me or respected my courage because they are allowing me to start again tomorrow. I don't know if that's good or not yet, I'm too tired to think about tomorrow yet."

Inspiring is 2010's opportunity to see the Lanterne Rouge sail to the western side of the Atlantic or even south to the Land Down Under. It is certain that more Americans, Canadians and Aussies will take the start in Amsterdam than in any other year - and most of those will be rouleurs and fastmen, several Tour newbies, who will be frying their legs in the first week in search of individual stage glory or there after in service of their GC captains. Needless to say, lumpy Stage 8, Station des Rousses to Morzine-Avoriaz, will be the first day we see the brightening of the red lamp. But broomwagon hang on, come stages 14, 15 and 16 you should have a full load, and we should have a radiant Lanterne Rouge by the summit finish on Col du Tourmalet. As Contador recently said, "The Pyrenees will decide and, of course, this Tour will be harder than last year’s." Lanterne Rouge contenders, wannabees and winner - bon chance, bon courage!

** just a footnote - Sweet and Van Hummel share some interesting Tour coincidences, both road for second-tier Pro Continental teams, and each were the final wild card team selected, and each was the final selection for their respective teams, thus each was wearing the #199, the last number in the Tour... an omen? Strange Tour history has a way of resurfacing from time to time - in this case a decade apart, 1999 and 2009. Neither rider returned to the Tour.

A Tour to Die For

The Broom Wagon Brothers?

While the cold has not lifted from the pave of Paris-Roubaix and the peloton parading down the California coast has now been pushed to May, the cycling season does officially start this month. I don't mean that cake-walk sprinters race "downunder", I'm talk'n about a real race,... MANly cycling. A true race of truth. A race that, to paraphrase pro cyclist Kenny van Hummel, I'd eat my handlebars to finish. A race that harkens back to the days when Henri Degrange ruled the roads of France and they were mostly dirt and racers spread cocaine cream on their shaved legs to ward off the cold. Yes, this month riders pull out from the start of the 8th edition of the "Tour d'Afrique".

Easily the biggest cycling race on the planet just pedaled off from the start line in the shadows of the Great Pyramids. This year from the 16th January through 15th May, a total of 49 true 'convicts of the road" will depart from Cairo hoping to compete and complete the entire distance across wilds of the African continent. Another 19 will "weeny out" and only do sections of the race. Of course only those that do the complete tour are considered for the final classification.

So that got me thinking, Is there a Lanterne Rouge? Or do stragglers get pick off by the broom wagon brothers (photo above)? Just the prospect certainly inspires you to pound the pasta, gulp and extra GU and avoid bonking.

The total distance is 11,884 km, spread out over 120 days and 96 stages, dwarfing even the insanity of the original Grand Boucle which was a mere six stages over three weeks and a pedestrian 2,428 km. (Interestingly 60 riders took to that first start in France, about the same as participate each year in ToA.)
The ToA features 96 cycling "stages", averaging 123 km (77 miles) each, broken up by 22 rest days and 2 days of ferry boat travel for a total of 120 days in traversing Africa from north to south. Stages range from 80 km on rough terrain to more than 180 km on the best paved roads. All this before finally pedaling into the finish in Cape Town, South Africa mid-May.

The sections are:

• Pharaoh's Delight : from Cairo to Khartoum : 16 JAN TILL 04 FEB
• The Gorge : Khartoum to Addis Abeba : FEB 6 TILL 20
• Meltdown Madness : Addis Abeba to Nairobi : FEB 22 TILL MARCH 12
• Masai Steppe : Nairobi to Iringa : MAR 14 TILL 25TH
• Malawi Gin : Iringa to Lilongwe : MAR 27 TILL 05 APR
• Zambezi Zone : Lilongwe to Victoria Falls : APR 7 TILL 15TH
• Elephant Highway : Victoria Falls to Windhoek : APR 18 TILL 28
• Diamond Coast : Windhoek to Cape Town : APR 30 TILL MAY 15

You can follow this mad cap adventure on the ToA blog and learn more at Tour d'Afrique