Biased Blow-By-Blow - 2020 Critérium du Dauphiné Stage 3

Introduction

Needless to say, the COVID-19 pandemic has wrought havoc in the sporting world, leaving fans worldwide with nothing to look at but their phones and their pets. Lately the sport of cycling has started to get back on its feet, with all the wobble of a newborn deer. The first stage race of the season was not the Tour of Sweden, as reported in these pages, for the simple reason that the race didn’t actually happen (my coverage having been entirely fictional). But today, I return to the armchair to deliver my essentially nonfiction blow-by-blow report of an actual race.

Critérium du Dauphiné 2020 Stage 3 – Corenc - Saint-Martin-de-Belleville

Today’s race, the third of five stages in this year’s Dauphiné, could be pivotal as it ascends the legendary hors-categorie Col de la Madeleine  before tackling a summit finish on the first-category climb at Saint-Martin-de-Belleville, where the heroes of the movie “Les Triplettes de Belleville” hail from. (Note: I do not have a fact-checker.)

As I join the action, the racers are way ahead of schedule, and I see I’ve missed the entire Col de la Madeleine, which was the whole point of tuning in today. Well, I guess that’s not totally true … I’m off work today and haven’t seen a single bike race this year, so I suppose I’d have turned up anyway. So they’re just descending. “Jumbo-Visma are still leading the peloton as they make their way down this descent,” the ever-insightful commentator says. You know what dude? I can see who’s in front. Tell me something interesting, would you?

Not that he hasn’t tried. He has been droning on this morning about some color-coded helmet proposal but I haven’t had any coffee yet and it’s fricking early and I couldn’t follow a word of it. So I’m pretty bitter. It’s just the one commentator and he’s not exactly a master orator. He has that kind of bored and slightly whiny voice that just sucks the excitement out of everything. Plus, his commentary is totally non-insightful and anodyne. “He’s got a punchy style, his whole body moves when he rides out of the saddle,” he declares of one rider. This means nothing. As does, “Wout van Aert continues to turn the pedals on the front.” Well what else is he gonna do? Coast at the front?

So, leading the race we have Davide Formolo (UAE Team Emirates), who has about a five-minute lead on the peloton. Well, his lead dropped a bit while I made coffee. He’s through with the descent and has 25 km to ride.

The commentator is musing aloud about whether each rider should have the same number throughout the season, and is weaving in a discussion about Michael Jordan’s number that I couldn’t care less about. My irritation is almost absolute here.

Formolo is on the final climb now. He looks pretty bad, but also pretty young.

It’s a mountain-top finish so most of the final 14 km are uphill. Back in the peloton, Jumbo-Visma still leads the chase.

I’ll catch you up on what’s happened in the first couple stages. The first was won by Wout Van Aert of Jumbo-Visma, and was already his third victory of this very short season. The second stage went to Primoz Roglic, also of Jumbo-Visma, who is also having a brilliant season and has to be the favorite not just for the Dauphiné but for the Tour de France, which starts in a couple of weeks. Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ) took second yesterday, followed by Emanuel Buchmann (Bora-Hansgrophe), and that’s pretty much your GC going into today’s stage.

This announcer has nobody to talk to. I guess NBC wouldn’t spring for the extra cost. So he sounds kind of lonely. I feel sorry for him. He’s asking fans questions and I think there’s only one other fan watching because it takes about five minutes to get a response, which the commentator duly relates to us, by which time I’ve almost forgotten the question.

Formolo is bogging down on the climb. It’s like a 10% grade.

The pack is still pretty huge. Team Ineos has all their riders except Chris Froome, who has struggled to regain form after missing like a year of riding due to a horrific crash during last year’s Dauphiné.

I’ve seen exactly one fan watching this race, all by his lonesome by the side of the road. Didn’t have a mask. Should he? Well, these racers are breathing pretty hard…

Bob Jungels is … well, not exactly attacking. He’s just social-distancing from the peloton. He’ll be caught soon enough. I failed to get a photo. I don’t mean I neglected to get a photo—I actually failed. I hit PrtSc and I think I needed Fn-PrtSc. I’m a little rusty here.

Wow, Formolo is really suffering.

Formolo is down to only 4:13 over the peloton and looks as tired as I feel. The difference is, I have no real reason to be tired.

“Formolo has a drink, just to prevent dehydration,” the commentator uselessly and haplessly says. Couldn’t this guy just make something up? “Formolo has a drink, due to his oral fixation. He used to suck Life Savers during races until, ironically, he choked on one and almost died.”

Here’s Jumbo-Visma at the front again. I think that young dude in the back is the American Sepp Kuss.

Geraint Thomas (Team Ineos) is pretty near the front. Meanwhile, his teammate Michal Kwiatkowski is spat out the back. His directeur sportif says to him over the earpiece, “I’m waaaatchin’ you, Kwiatkowski … always watchin.’”

The gap is just under 3 minutes now, with about 8 km to go. Alejandro Valverde (Movistar Team) goes out the back.

The gap is down to 2:30 as Steven Kruijswijk  leads the Jumbo-Visma train. His teammate Tom Dumoulin is also near the front.

Poor Formolo. He’s pretty much underwater. “What the hell was I thinking?” he ponders lugubriously.

Dumoulin takes the lead. Roglic is stoked to have such kickass teammates.

We have an attack! It’s Buchmann, who sits third on GC. He isn't far back so the others will have to take this attack very seriously. 

Daaaamn, Buchmann has a pretty big gap, very quickly! He’s hiding in that shaded box at the lower right of your screen. I’m not sure this actually obscures him from the chasers, but he’s gotta try.

Jumbo-Visma still has a lock on the front of the peloton.

Wow, Thomas is dropped! It doesn’t come through in the still photo, but he really looks like crap.

At some point Buchmann was caught and it’s now his teammate Lennard Kamna a bit off the front of the peloton. You know what? It was Kamna all along. No wonder they gave him some leash.

Now Kruijswijk detonates and goes out the back.

And now Dumoulin is dropped! Pretty remarkable considering his success in grand tours. Of course, due to nagging injury he hasn’t raced since like a year ago June.

Amazingly, Formolo is still off the front, with a gap of almost a minute, with less than one km to go! It looks like he might actually get this! He doesn’t radiate confidence, exactly, but he doesn’t look psychologically shattered, either. He mainly looks like he could use a little more air.

Back in the bunch, only Kuss is still there to help set up Roglic (and shell all his would-be competition). Kuss is a total badass, needless to say. He’s a former mountain bike racer from Durango, Colorado who won a stage of last year’s Vuelta. Oddly, it appears only one Ineos rider is left in this group. I think it’s Pavel Sivakov, who is also a character in a Chekov short story (no he’s not). If you look carefully you can see Roglic tucked snugly in behind Kuss. And the guy two more riders back is picking his nose.

It’s only a couple hundred more meters to the line and Formolo’s lead is still holding up! The chasers are nowhere in sight, but then it’s a twisty run-in so they could be closer than we think.

In the GC group, Roglic finally busts a move! He quickly gets a gap.

Amazing! Formolo pulls off the win! I did not see this coming. He really put the pussy on the chain wax!

A few things worth pointing out here. First, that motorcycle is a damn tricycle. Why on earth is that necessary? Second, look at the crowds! People packed in there like COVID wasn’t a thing! What the hell? What, are they all American tourists or something? And finally, what’s with all the cowboy hats? Is that supposed to stop the virus?

Behind, Roglic utterly crushes the rest of his group and cruises in to pick up the bonus points for second place, padding his GC lead. Only Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ) seems able to respond, but it’s not enough.

Weirdly, the crowd is doing this synchronized clapping thing and it’s giving me the willies. It’s as if they want to show off the fact that they’re all gathered together (!) in a big mob, and the coordinated clapping is their way of saying, “We could be a super-spreader event!”

Formolo is being interviewed. “We were in the break from the start, already before the Madeleine, I said to myself maybe I get some space between the bunch, and then I was alone up and down in the valley, and on the last climb I didn’t know if I could make it, and I see there would not possible to make big time in the break, so I thought maybe I do it. My English is normally a bit better than this. I have no oxygen in my brain. Thank you for covering that mic with plastic wrap. I’m sure that will help with the coronavirus.” (Please note that these riders often talk kind of fast and don’t always articulate too well, so my account of their words is best-effort and not necessarily verbatim. Also, I sometimes just make shit up.)

Here is the stage result. Note that Egan Bernal (Team Ineos) somehow never made a move and wasn’t even in the top ten. Buchmann came in just behind Pinot to defend his podium spot on GC.

Here’s Formolo on the podium.

Oh no! His mask slipped! That could get him DQ’d!

Here is Roglic getting his yellow jersey.

And now Formolo gets the KOM jersey.

You may be wondering why Formolo has no mask in the above photo. Actually, if certain very specific rules are followed, the rider can take off his mask when on the podium. The first rule is that he has to be on the top step of the podium and the dignitaries (I call them dignitaries but one was in acid-wash mom-jeans which is hardly dignified) must be at least six feet away. The second rule is that the rider is not allowed to open his mouth when unmasked. (Mona Lisa smiles only, please.) The third rule is that the rider can be unmasked only long enough for a photo to be snapped, which (with this ambient lighting) equates to a shutter speed of about 1/60th of a second. Formolo nailed it!

They’re interviewing Roglic. “It was hard. It was a hard day. It was a hard day of racing. It was the racing that made the day hard. We wanted to defend the jersey and keep the focus and we had to go quite fast at the end. I think we showed that we have strong guys around and we can be confident and focused. I learned this word ‘focused’ just today, earlier today. Did I use it right?” It’s noteworthy that Roglic’s eyes were closed for the entire interview. This is because his interviewer was fewer than six feet away. This isn’t Roglic’s first rodeo, you know … he is well aware that COVID-19 can be spread through aerosol particles entering via your eyes.

Here’s the Froome group rolling in about fifteen minutes down.

God, again with the synchronized clapping. It’s really creeping me out. Fortunately, the coverage abruptly ends, with the closing music totally drowning out the final, mealy-mouthed and unnecessary words of the incompetent commentator (or “incompentator,” as they’re known in the business).

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From the Archives - Portrait of the Young Cyclist: Part 2

Vlog

This post is available as a vlog. You can open a bag of chips, plug your laptop into your TV, kick back, and pretend you’re watching TV. Or, you could plug in some headphones and pretend this is a podcast, and listen while doing your laundry. Or just read it, below. The world is your oyster.

Introduction

This post continues the tale, from my archives, of how I became a bike racer. What started as an unearned identity became an object lesson in recognizing self-delusion. Things improved a bit from there, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

Here is how I looked at the time. You can see how hapless I am: my belt is crooked, as is my cap, and I’ve got my shirt buttoned up wrong.

Portrait of the Cyclist as a Young Man – Part Two: The Art of Failure (written in February 2003)

As I was saying at the end of my last post, I took up bike racing mainly because my dad had forbidden it. It’s not that I sought to defy him; it’s that my mom did, disgusted by his attitude. “You boys are too stupid to race bicycles,” my dad had warned. “You’d get yourselves killed.” Hearing that, my mom insisted that we all sign up for the Red Zinger Mini Classic. I submitted my application, and a few days later I brought my bike to the High Wheeler bike shop for its mandatory pre-race inspection. It failed. The tires were completely shot.

Now that I think back, it’s a bit odd that Dad prohibited us from racing for safety reasons, since he let us all ride around all day on unsafe bikes. Dad couldn’t be bothered to maintain our fleet, and was too cheap to pay a shop to do it. So we tried our best to fix our own bikes (so long as replacement parts weren’t required). This didn’t always work out so well.

Once, when I decided my brakes weren’t working like they used to, I thought maybe the center bolt was loose. I tightened the bejeezus out of it, thinking tighter must always be better. In fact, now the calipers were too stiff for the springs, which meant as soon as I applied the brakes, halfway down Table Mesa to King Soopers, they stayed on and my bike ground to a halt. I can still remember dismounting and staring at the brakes in confusion, unable to understand or accept what was going on. Finally I pried the calipers apart and resolved not to use the brakes anymore, at least until I had another crack at “fixing” them.

Whenever my bike got a flat tire, I suffered two consequences. First, my dad would be angry at me, like that was a damn fool thing I’d gone and done. Second, I’d be in bike-less purgatory until one of my brothers, in an uncharacteristic magnanimous mood, got around to fixing my flat. During one of these bike-less periods I borrowed my brother Bryan’s bike (probably on the sly). I was shocked by a violent whump-whump-whump sound the rear wheel made, coupled with a terrible lurching. I jumped off and investigated. It was the tire: Bryan had skidded so badly on it at some point, he’d worn completely through the tread and the casing, and had fixed it with Shoe Goo.

Getting back to the pre-race shop inspection, tires were the only flunk-able safety problem with the bike, but it had other issues. The gears, for example, were a mess. Despite being cautioned against using the gears at all (my dad probably thought they’d distract me and I’d run into a parked car), I had eventually transgressed and started making use of all ten speeds. It was Max who taught/corrupted me, one day riding across town. We were descending a steep hill and he kept dropping me, until he spotted the problem—I was always in first gear!—and advised me to push both shift levers all the way forward. God, what a rush! All of a sudden I could pedal again, and I just flew!

(Both levers forward? Yep. This was a Suntour Spirt front derailleur, that was backwards from every other front mech ever made.)

Unfortunately, by the time I had shifting mastered, Dad changed out my rear cogs and derailleur, to give me lower gearing. This had meant replacing the fairly new components with ancient ones from some other bike, and I could never shift cleanly again. Now I was as clumsy as a surgeon operating in mittens.

I wish the gearing had been deemed unsafe by the High Wheeler, because then maybe something could have been done about it. As it was, just getting new tires on our bikes was a big crisis in the Albert household. You’d have thought my parents were being asked to buy EPO for all four boys. Lots of big sighs from Dad, who apparently was resigned to our participation in the race (probably the economist in him couldn’t handle the idea of our registration fees going to waste).

Worse, the whole ordeal made me look at my tires closely for the first time and realize that they were fatter than my brothers’. I had 600C wheels (roughly 24”), with tires 1-¼ inches wide, to my brothers’ dashingly narrow 1-1/8”. Actually, finding any tires was a chore. I had to make a lot of phone calls to a lot of shops, and nobody was happy to hear from me because skinny 600C tires apparently didn’t exist. Invariably I got a big lecture about how the width didn’t matter, that skinny tires were actually less stable and wouldn’t make me go any faster anyway. At first I assumed I was being told the truth, but I didn’t care because looks trumped everything. And of course it was only a matter of time before I realized that all these bike shop adults were lying out their asses to begin with. Of course narrow tires are better, everybody knows that. You think those hypocrites had fat-ass tires on their own bikes?

Eventually I found (albeit fat) tires at some shop in Denver, and my bike passed inspection. This was kind of a gift from the High Wheeler, actually, as my bike lacked reflectors. My brothers had removed them, when they worked over my bike for me, adding toe clips and moving the stem-mounted shifters to the down tube where they belonged. They also removed the so-called “chicken levers,” which enabled braking from the tops of the handlebars. Don’t get the wrong idea: my brothers didn’t do this because they were good guys. They did it in case they were ever seen with me out riding—they didn’t want to be humiliated by association if somebody noticed an amateurish look to my bike.

One of the benefits of the Mini Zinger was the bike clinic they gave far all riders. They found some old veterans of the sport who were willing to volunteer and took us on a ride up NCAR—that is, the road leading from my neighborhood to the National Center for Atmospheric Research, a mile or two from town. We all met at The Spoke, a bike shop in the Table Mesa center. People I knew from school were there, which in itself was an insult, since I thought I was the only guy around with any awareness of the sport. To make matters worse, they were giving this other kid, Mike Blaney, a hard time because he had a Schwinn. He tried to defend himself by saying, “Yeah, but it’s a nice one, with Quick Release!” This made the other kids laugh even harder at him, and they all started mimicking him—“I have Quick Release!”—which terrified me because my bike could just as easily be mocked. Hell, I didn’t even have quick release.

Sure enough, it wasn’t long before some guy went and started making fun of how small my bike was, with its 18-inch seat tube and miniature wheels. The look on my face must have been downright lugubrious, because he actually took pity on me. He lifted up my bike and said, “But it’s so light!” (Of course it wasn’t.) Just like that, the expected fusillade of teasing never materialized. Paradoxically, everyone’s restraint in razzing me became an insult in itself, as thought they knew I couldn’t handle a little verbal abuse.

On our way out of the parking lot, I tipped over because I’d just switched to toe clips and straps instead of mini-clips, and was still getting used to them. So I felt like a complete Fred and the ride hadn’t even really started yet. Things got worse from there. Just getting to the base of the climb almost killed me as I was nowhere near fit enough for the grade. We took a back route, via Stanford Ave and Vassar Drive, which gained about 230 feet but might as well have been Alpe d’Huez. I was totally out of breath and dizzy by time we got to the base of the NCAR climb proper. I thought I might even hurl.

The actual climb wasn’t so steep, so I was able to loaf. It didn’t matter that I’d self-identified as a cyclist for years by this point, or that I’d been one of the first kids in town with a helmet, or that I loved “Breaking Away” … I was dropped immediately and mercilessly. Just like in gym class, I was dead last. The leader of the clinic dropped back and rode next to me, offering up encouragement. He politely suggested I get out of the saddle and go a little faster. This concept was completely foreign to me. The idea that I could choose to pedal harder just didn’t make sense. It seemed to me that if I wasn’t keeping up anyway, there was no point in exerting myself beyond what it took to keep my balance and eventually complete the ride. What this guy was asking me to do was to suffer—more precisely, to inflict suffering upon myself. This just didn’t make any sense.

He left me alone and cruised back up to the group, and as I continued picking my lone way up the road I pondered his words. (I had plenty of time to think.) I eventually began to understand what the old pro was saying. At some point in that ride I finally grasped that what he was suggesting not only wasn’t absurd, but actually made sense. What he was giving me was nothing less than the key to training, to racing, and above all to improvement. Those who went fast, I realized, might not just be more talented. They might actually be working harder, day after day, to service their ambitions.

So did I take the veteran cyclist’s advice? Did I get out of the saddle and push myself a little? Of course not. I understood his tutelage, but lacked the drive to apply myself to it. It would be weeks or months or years before I had the psychological gumption to fully embrace this bold ethos, to locate the will to flog myself vigorously and often in pursuit of betterment. It’s possible today for me to be mistaken for someone with talent, but it has taken decades of suffering to get to this point, all stemming from that day. Not to sound maudlin or anything, but that guy gave me one of the most important lessons I have ever learned. I wish I remember the guy’s name. He deserves to know that, despite all appearances, he did get through to me.

The Mini Zinger itself, a week or two later, was a real eye-opener for our family. Watching my brothers race, it was easy for me to see that gym class was no real indicator of athletic ability, at least for them. At Track & Field in gym class, these guys were slaughtered as badly as I was, but they did pretty well in the Mini Zinger, especially Geoff, who finished somewhere around tenth overall. Here is Bryan toiling away:

And here is Geoff (alas, the best photo I can find):

The difference was the duration of the race: the typical Mini Zinger stage lasted at least 25 minutes, which was an eternity when compared to anything you did in gym class. Geoff, Bryan, and I don’t have a single fast-twitch muscle fiber among us. Our only hope is to wear down our opponents, which isn’t exactly possible in a ten-second running race during a half-hour gym class, of which twenty minutes is spent walking to the park and back.

Our brother Max had mixed results. He had been a champion swimmer for years, and his bike races always started strong. He’d go straight to the front of the pack, fly high for a few laps of a criterium, be the boss of the peloton for several stunning minutes, and then would inexplicably suffer mechanical problems. His derailleur get stuck between gears, or his chain would fall off. He’d announce the problem very loudly. In one race, a criterium, he came around a corner with his saddle broken clean off. He waved it at us frantically as we lowered our heads in shame. 

Which brings us to my performance. God, what a travesty. I was just as bad at bike racing as I was at everything else. Probably worse. If I’d been a Japanese kid, I’d have been honor-bound to commit seppuku on the spot to save my family from disgrace. The first event was a short prologue time trial, and when I saw the results I couldn’t believe how far down I was. I think I was second-to-last. Last place, at least, would have carried some distinction. Worse, while hanging around after the race I pointed out to one of my brothers a kid with really skinny legs—probably to try to cheer myself up by badmouthing him—and my brother was quick to point out that my own legs were even skinnier, and to my horror I realized my brother was right. I’d just never really looked at my legs before, never realized how spindly I was. Two rude awakenings in one day. How could I handle it? 

The next day was the North Boulder Park Criterium, where my Leisure Time Products teammate John Lynch placed top ten and I was lapped, probably more than once, notwithstanding the rather long circuit. I was second-to-last again, beaten out once again for the Lantern Rouge. I actually remember the kid who always got dead last: David M—. I guess I could have tried to let him beat me, so I could have Lanterne Rouge, but the fact was, I never knew what was going on in the bike race. I knew who was ahead of me, but never really could keep track of who was behind me, if anybody. (Of course it was never anybody except David M—, who was probably actually much stronger than I but always crashed or something, for all I knew.)

Once the pack started lapping me I got especially confused. It was a complete nightmare. I’d roll, snail-like, past my brothers, who would be yelling at me. This wasn’t really cheering, but more like a wailing lament such as you might see at a funeral from some bereaved mother throwing herself across the casket, lashing out at her son’s having been cut down in his prime. Unlike the brief moment of cheering we’d do when watching a Coors Classic stage, this interaction with my brothers would go on for a long time because I was moving so slowly. They’d yell for me to shift up, and I’d put the bike in my highest gear, and barely be able to pedal. They’d yell “No, no, that’s too high, shift down!” and I’d put the bike in my lowest gear and be spinning futilely. I was as awkward as the word “futilely.” Now, don’t get me wrong, my screwed up derailleur and freewheel alone cannot be blamed. I know that I possessed the ability to make that bike shift properly, but facing the humiliation of the race, and the extra pressure from my brothers’ yelling, I was just too flustered to function.

After one particular race, I broke down crying. The race organizer, Eddie Sandvold, a kind man, came running over, asking if I’d crashed. I sobbed that I didn’t crash, that I just lost. He didn’t know what to say. His look said, “Well, what did you expect?” This brought about another epiphany: it was just plain stupid of me to expect any other result. I’d never done well at anything athletic before; why should I have assumed that my knowledge of bicycles (which consisted of knowing that Dave rode an Italian Masi with full Campy in “Breaking Away”) and general cycling arcana (e.g., cycling caps) would make me a successful racer? And what about training? Had I ever done that, after all?

Solving this fundamental problem would have to wait, though. In the short term I had to face the crushing knowledge that my dad had seen me lose. He’d watched the whole thing, watched me get dropped and then lapped, and to top it all off, watched me getting removed from the course by the officials. You see, I hadn’t understand that all riders, including the lapped riders, finished on the same lap. I figured I had at least a lap or two more to complete after the winners were all done, and doggedly stayed out on the course, knowing that I could score three points just for finishing, which was slightly better than nothing. By the time somebody was able to make me understand that I really was done, I was more humiliated than ever that once again, just like with baseball and football, I didn’t even understand the rules. This is what had finally brought me to tears.

On the drive home with my dad, he asked me what I’d had for lunch. I said some bread and cheese. He explained to me that cheese, being a dairy product, took a long time to digest, and that likely I didn’t have enough fully digested food in my system to properly fuel me. I brightened at this suggestion, probably as much out of relief as anything, and trotted it out several times that day to explain, to each of my brothers in turn, and then to my friends, why I’d done so badly in the race. I was able to ignore my brothers’ reaction—after all, they were always trying to undermine me—but after the second or third friend gave me the same knowing, kind of disappointed, look, I recognized it for what it was: a look that said, “Yeah, right, whatever.” My dad had (albeit inadvertently) taught me a valuable lesson about making excuses, and at a young age. Of course, this did nothing to improve my morale. I was a loser, after all.

To be continued

Tune in next time for the unlikely tale of how I persevered in the sport, made a fresh start with a new bike, learned how to train, and went on to endure an entirely new form of humiliation.

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From the Archives - Portrait of the Young Cyclist: Part 1

Introduction

I thought I’d just about exhausted my archives—that is, old essays and stories I’ve been writing since the ‘80s—and then I stumbled across a folder called “True Stories.” Jackpot! One of them was called “Portrait of the Cyclist as a Young Man.” I vaguely remember writing this back in 2003, but I don’t remember why. The full story runs like 14,000 words so I’ll be breaking it into installments, which I’ll run about once a month for a while. Here is the first.

Portrait of the Cyclist as a Young Man – Part One: How the Sport Found Me  (written in February 2003)

Don’t let the working title mislead you—what I am about to write will share nothing with James Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (except, I guess, being written in English). Joyce must have had time on his hands, because he wrote and wrote and wrote and never got to the point (that I could see, anyway) and I gave up reading after about 150 pages. As for me, I have only one night to write this, since I’m fighting a cold and can’t ride. My goal is to write the entire history of how I became a cyclist and why that is important. If my output is poor, it’s because I’m in an awful rush. If it’s too verbose, that’s because I’m pretending I’m being paid by the word, just like the pros. (Get it?)

It’s all my dad’s fault, really, because my first bike was a ten-speed. Dad must have worked hard to find a ten-speed, in 1978, in my size. It was a Fuji Junior and had 24-inch wheels. The fact of the ten gears wasn’t the point—my dad figured that any 9-year-old, or at least his 9-year-old, would be too stupid to work the gears without running into a parked car or something, and told me not to touch the shift levers. (I reckon this was supposed to be an interim edict, but he never remembered to rescind it or teach me how to shift. Maybe he figured youthful disobedience would eventually take over, in which case he was right.)

[This is pretty much exactly the bike I had, only mine was red.]

It was the dropped bars, mainly, that differentiated my Fuji from the bikes my friends had. With my three older brothers, who of course also had ten-speeds, I held a playful contempt for regular bikes. We even had a label for them, something like High-Rise-Handlebar-Banana-Seat-Small-Wheel-In-Front-Big-Wheel-in-Back-Streamers-from-the-Grips-Stupid-Schwinn. I’d have to check with my brothers—I’m sure I mangled that—but you get the idea. I remember asking Dad if ten-speeds were faster, just to make sure, or to get something juicy to quote to my friends, and he said in his professorial voice, “The dropped handlebar improves the aerodynamics of the rider, which would make the bike faster.” I didn’t know the word “aerodynamic”—heck, it wouldn’t enter even the specialized cycling vernacular for other couple of years, but it had “arrow” in it and whatever garbled version of that word I spewed for my friends made their eyes grow wide. I felt like a racer long before I ever entered a race.

So did my brothers. I remember Max, at 10 or so, asking our next-door neighbor Greg (no authority on cycling, of course, but a good six or eight years older, and thus an authority on Life) if he (Max) looked like a racer, and demonstrated his style by riding to the top of Howard Place and executing a U-turn through which he put down his inside foot and dragged it lightly as if for support. When Max returned and pulled up to a stop, breathless, Greg laughed and said, “Yeah, you really did look like a racer, except for when you put your foot down in the turn.” I took a lesson well and never did that.

It’s difficult to remember whether my first exposure to bicycle racing was the Red Zinger Bicycle Classic stage race or the movie “Breaking Away.” I don’t think it matters. They were both huge. The Red Zinger gave me a taste, or at least a smear, of the sport. Our mom would drive us out to the Morgul Bismark course, which in the late seventies was basically the middle of nowhere, and we’d screw around for half an hour or so waiting for the racers to come by. Why we didn’t hike up to the top of The Hump, the second hardest climb, is beyond me. Lazy kids, I guess; we watched from the base of the climb. The pack flew by too swiftly for us to catch more than the patchwork of colors, like an animated quilt, and the whirring of chains, mostly drowned out by our own cheering. We knew the racers mainly through the great program that the race had put out. George Mount—Smiling George—was our favorite racer. The way he grinned while suffering, he was a superhero.

Then there was the two-page section showing nothing but racers who had crashed, with lots of blood and such, and it was a natural draw for bloodthirsty young boys.

The program also had a section showing the racers’ legs, all shaved, totally muscular, vein-y, superhuman. I also remember that the racers had these really cool-looking hairnet helmets—we called them Bandinis, for some reason—and between the name and the obvious lack of real protection, we were completely enchanted. I also remember that one or two of the racers had the new Bell Biker helmets, like what our dad had. The fact of those helmets told me that it was possible, just barely possible, that a nerdy kid like me might actually be able to join that race someday, even if at the back of the pack—heck, even off the back of that pack. I would be honored.

While the Red Zinger aroused our interest, “Breaking Away” blew us completely away. It delivered not just a glimpse of the sport, but a real story—actually, lots of real stories, and the main story was of this being a European sport that an American could hope to have a tenuous piece of, but only if he’s willing to immerse himself in another culture. (This was remarkably accurate, if you look at what Jonathan Boyer and Greg LeMond had to do to make it in international cycling at this point.)

It didn’t occur to us to view Dave as an adult would, to find humor in his attempt to become Italian—we were completely with him, somehow identified completely. When the Italian racer put the pump in his spokes, sure, we hated the guy, but we were also in awe, and couldn’t really fault him because this was their sport, not ours, so the Italians were somehow exempt from judgment, like how a hockey player who assaults another player gets a couple minutes in the penalty box instead of going to jail.

Max taught me that Europeans were physically stronger than Americans, and less affected by pain. (When we had some new neighbors and wanted to try to convince them that we were from Europe, we demonstrated our heritage by pretending to fight, and being unfazed by the punches we landed on each other.) “Breaking Away” helped to teach us that as Americans we were not worthy of this beautiful sport. So complete was my awe of the Italians, I was as horrified as poor Cathy was when Dave gave up the Italian impersonation. Even his triumph at the end of the movie was only over a bunch of American college students, on crappy AMF Roadmaster one-speeds. Winning the race, and holding up the trophy, didn’t quite redeem him. What did redeem him for me was that at the very end, he had picked up a new French persona. For months after seeing that movie, I carried around a French/English pocket dictionary and made a horrible attempt to speak in that indecipherable language.

The other thing “Breaking Away” did for us was to steep us in the arcana of the sport. What we didn’t catch from the movie itself, we got from the Bicycling magazine article about it. For example, I knew that the cycling caps that flooded the marketplace as being identical to Dave’s—that is, yellow Campagnolo caps—were completely wrong. They weren’t the right canary yellow (they were too orange), and they had too many stripes down the middle (i.e., five, these being the World Championship stripes). Dave’s cap had just three stripes.

When I found the right cap, for a shocking $5.00 at Pedal Pushers (most caps were $3.50), I had to panhandle for the 30 cents I needed to cover the tax, having only a five on me. When a friend accidentally broke the plastic inside the bill, and refused to apologize appropriately, our friendship was over. I also had a really cool red Cinelli cap, with the old coat-of-arms logo. By wearing these to school instead of a baseball cap, I brought on myself the scorn of my peers, but took it as a natural part of the outcast role I’d need if I wanted to embrace this sport. Boulder, Colorado was something of a cycling mecca even then, but this did not trickle down to the elementary school level. That cap was almost a badge of courage. I was almost, I felt, a Cutter.

[With a cap that cool, it’s a mystery why I wasn’t totally popular at school, especially with the girls. As you can see below, my overall fashion sense was unparalleled. The t-shirt I’m wearing actually says “LAMBCHOP” on it. My mom sewed those letters on there; Lambchop was her nickname for me. At least I had the physique for cycling, though I didn’t appreciate that at the time.]

All my identification might well have stayed in the realm of unearned or false had it not been for the Red Zinger Mini Classic stage race put on by the Sandvold family—Eric and his dad Eddie—and three of Eric’s friends. I guess they’d done a little race in 1980, but I never knew about it. It wasn’t until 1981 that they put on what can honestly be described as a totally legit stage race for kids. They had published a program that was remarkably similar to the Red Zinger ones we’d seen, except of course it didn’t show a lot of crash photos. (Don’t want to scare the devil out of the parents!)

The race’s slogan was “By, for, and about kids.” It looked like an incredibly cool event, and my brothers and I got our registration packets all together, and a kid named Scott M—, who had seen me riding around and saw my caps, even recruited me to be on his team, along with his friend and next-door neighbor John Lynch. There was only one problem: getting permission from Dad. Remember, this is the guy who didn’t want me to know about gears, lest I ride headlong into the back of a parked car.

We were all terrified to approach Dad. He was often grumpy, especially when we wanted something. He also never “got” sports and so far as we knew had never tried one. Mom supported the idea of us racing, but either she wanted to teach us assertiveness or she was as terrified as we were, because she refused to ask on our behalf. We boys all discussed the matter together and decided that Max, being the black sheep of the family, was in enough trouble with Dad already that it wouldn’t matter if he pushed our old man even further. Max wasn’t in a position to refuse his mission, because if he did, either Geoff or Bryan could beat the crap out of him, so with the two of them together he wouldn’t have a chance. Heck, I would have happily piled on myself, to dole out whatever I could add to the beating. Okay, I guess I’m exaggerating about the threat of actual violence, but anyway the matter was decided. Max would ask that night at dinner.

What a solemn occasion that was. The room was deadly silent through the whole meal as Max attempted to summon his resolve. This was very strange, because normally dinner time was an open forum for just about any subject, or at least any scientific or technical subject, and normally our table was abuzz with conversation (or at least my dad lecturing us while we nodded our heads and pretended to understand). The whole meal went by in awkward silence, the rest of us boys glaring at Max while he sweated bullets. Finally, just after dessert was served, Max finally cleared his throat and took the plunge: “Um, Daddy, um, I was wondering, er, actually, my brothers and I were wondering if, um, there was any way that we could, um, enter this bike race, that’s just for kids, um, because it’s really good exercise and would be good for us.” (Something like that.)

Dad didn’t even hesitate. “No. You boys are too stupid to be bike racers. You’d get yourselves killed.” I knew it sounds improbable that he actually said this, but I am quite certain I have it verbatim. My brothers remember it as well, and all our versions jibe. That was it. Nobody said another word for the rest of dessert, and immediately afterward Dad went back to work and nobody ever spoke to him again on the subject.

I guess I was relieved at his refusal, because I’d been pretty ambivalent about the idea myself. Not so much because I’d get myself killed, though I’m sure that worried me too, but the fact is, I was no athlete. I’d swum for years, first lessons and then the swim team, and I basically sucked. The best I ever did was third in some backstroke event (that loss-leader stroke), and that was only third in my heat—I ended up fourth overall, and that was only summer league. I was as undistinguished a swimmer as ever floated on water (or, more to the point, practically sank). I remember when our coach, Paul S—, got some video equipment and filmed us so that we could watch the footage and analyze our stroke. His main criticism of me was that I didn’t stay in my own lane. I’d kill for that footage today: sure enough, halfway through a lap I actually wander out of my lane, under a lane line, into the path of an oncoming swimmer. I tried to explain that I had to swim with my eyes shut because my goggles leaked so badly. Maybe the only guy everyone laughed at more was John W—, who swam freestyle with a butterfly kick.

And yet swimming was my best sport! At school, in Track & Field, I was always dead last in everything. I wished I could throw like a girl—it would have been an improvement. Every aspect of PE class was a source of humiliation. It was assumed that every boy knew the rules of football and baseball. I did not. I had no idea what was going on. Football was the worst. Offense? Defense? I didn’t know the difference. As far as I was concerned my job was to stay out of sight. Baseball? Just sit there and don’t swing, I told myself: if you don’t swing, you can’t strike out, and might get to walk. And yet the teacher kept calling strikes! I thought it was because I wasn’t holding my bat still enough, that the teacher must have thought she saw it move. I had no idea about a strike zone. I just stood there, as motionless as a statue, as the strikes were counted. I was uncoachable; teachers assumed I knew exactly what was going on and was simply demonstrating my complete contempt for the sport. Utter humiliation. Why would cycling be any different?

I guess I have my dad’s prohibition—and moreover my mom’s reaction to it—to thank for the fact that I ended up becoming a bike racer. Mom all but insisted that we all sign up for the Mini Zinger, on principle. I remember this well. The day after Max crashed and burned on our behalf, I was in the kitchen, hanging out around the stove while Mom cooked, and she asked me if I was entering the race. I reminded her what Dad said, and right there on the spot she basically made me commit to signing up. It wasn’t a long conversation, and I don’t remember her argument, but after that I was fully committed. I submitted my application, and …

To be continued

Tune in next time for the wretched tale of my flunked bike inspection, and—worse yet—the bike racing clinic where, for the first time, I felt bad about being a talentless loser unwilling to make himself suffer properly.

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Biased Blow-By-Blow - 2019 Vuelta a España Stage 13

Introduction

I like to watch bike races, ideally in person, but usually online. Watching with friends is best, so we can make snotty comments to one another as do all sports fans everywhere, but I settle for putting my opinions on paper via blow-by-blow reports.

Read on for my willfully biased report of today’s all-important Vuelta a España mountain stage. (For background on the race so far, check out my coverage of Stage 9 last Sunday.)

2019 Vuelta a España Stage 13 – Bilbao to Los Machucos

As I join the action, the riders are climbing the Category 2 Puerto de Alisas. I don’t know why it’s not d’Alisas, and neither do they, I imagine. The sad fact is, spelling doesn’t count in bike racing.

Some dude is off the front solo but I’m going to apply the “office politics” rule of not bothering to learn his name—like we used to do with the temps (and was done to me as a temp). So we’ll just have a look at this fellow, whoever he is, and let him remain anonymous unless he proves we can expect anything lasting to come from his effort.

Now the leaders are over the top of the climb and descending. David de la Cruz (Team Ineos) almost stacks while getting dropped on a curve! I wish I had footage of that. Anyway, Cruz is Ineos’s top-placed rider on GC, but is way down in 48th place, almost an hour back. Maybe Ineos doesn’t give these second-string guys all the good dope that has won them so many Tours de France. Or maybe their supply chain got fouled up. Whatever the case, they’re nowhere in this race this time around. My summary as an armchair pundit? Best. Vuelta. Ever.

I had to step away for a while, and upon returning find the race just as disheveled as I left it. There are riders all over the road, a few here, a few there … it’s a mess. I need more caffeine before I can sort all this out. Suffice to say there’s now some random guy on the Euskadi Basque Country team who’s leading the race solo. It’s Hector Saez, according to the announcers. By his bib number I’d thought it was Sergio Samitier. What, did these guys trade numbers at the start?

Perhaps Saez is feeling bold because his teammate, Mikel Iturria, won a stage the other day after a long solo breakaway, defying the odds and a chase group that just couldn’t get their act together. Anyway, Saez might think he can repeat that, but he has just over a minute on his chasers, which isn’t much with 45 km to go.

So these poor dudes have already done four categorized climbs. There’s a pretty long flat section, then a couple of Cat 3s and then the “ESP” final climb, the Alto de Las Machucos. I suppose “ESP” is short for “especial,” the Spanish equivalent of hors categorie, “so hard it cannot be categorized.”

So, chasing Saez are two loners, Sergio Higuita (EF Education First) and Geoffrey Bouchard (AG2R La Mondiale). Bouchard was solo for a good while during Stage 9 so we know he’s pretty tough. He’s gotta be looking at the KOM jersey because he’s not too far behind in that competition. This duo’s gap is holding at around 40 seconds, with the main chase group another 40 seconds behind them.

They just showed the back of the peloton and rider #176, Juan Molano, has his numbers on upside-down. Probably he pinned them on when he was really, really tired. Probably pinned his jersey to the bedspread while he was at it. I’ve been that tired before. In fact, I’m pretty tired right now. Did I even see that right? Am I hallucinating?

So, if you want to know what’s happened in this Vuelta so far, first go read my Stage 9 report , which includes a synopsis of the first week. Since that stage, Primoz Roglic (Jumbo-Visma) crushed everyone in the only time trial of the Vuelta, taking over the red leader’s jersey with a nice margin of almost two minutes over Alejandro Valverde (Movistar Team), who is riding really, really consistently—you might say oddly, even eerily consistently since he’s 39 years old. Better living through science! Sitting third on GC is Miguel “Superman” Lopez (Astana Pro Team), 19 seconds behind Roglic. Sitting fourth is Nairo “Batman” Quintana (Movistar Team), who had been the leader until his abysmal, totally disappointing time trial. Rounding out the top five is Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates), the 20-year-old sensation who won Stage 9 and also the Tour of California this year. He’s only 5 seconds behind Batman on GC and appears to only be getting stronger as this Vuelta rolls on.

Looks like our chasing duo have been caught by the rest of the chase group. I never even got a photo of them together. I’ll check their Insta feeds later to see if they snapped a couple selfies during their chase. (Did I use “Insta” correctly? I know that’s what the youngsters are calling Instagram, but I’m not sure “feed” is the right word. I’ve never seen the app … I’m not young or cool enough. Speaking of modern teen lingo, I love to get a rise out of my kids by using the word “woke” as an adjective. I just drop that in, real casual-like, and they go ballistic. “Nobody says that anymore! Don’t ever say that again!”)

The cameramen, or more to the point the moto drivers, aren’t doing a very good job today. They can’t seem to get a shot of Saez from ahead, so all the footage is of his butt. I doubt you want to see a lot of that. I want to see his face, and in particular his teeth. Sunday’s and Wednesday’s stage winners had really, really bad teeth and their stage wins filled me with hope that they can now finally afford orthodontia, since stage wins in the Vuelta can greatly increase a previously unheralded rider’s salary.

The announcer says a lot of these riders are rocking compact cranksets with 36-tooth inner rings, and 32-tooth cogs on the back. Seriously, a 36x32? That’s a fricking crazy-low gear. Apparently the final climb is like a wall. It’s about 7 km and gains 630 meters. If my math is correct, that’s like a 90% average grade. Hmm, that can’t be right. Perhaps 9% is more like it. That’s pretty steep but it must be that the steepest bits are where they need that gearing.

Astana is leading the chase for Lopez. Well, I don’t suppose it’s that they’re chasing, exactly (since they don’t care about the nobodies off the front) but that they’re setting a high tempo so as to put Roglic under pressure and set up their leader, Lopez, for a blistering attack. For the remainder of this Vuelta, the climbers’ teams are going to try to crack Roglic. Of course, they’re also giving him a free ride by massing on the front like this.

The peloton is on the Cat 3 Puerto de Fuente las Varas which Saez is now over. His lead is 1:51 which is coming down a bit. The peloton is over 7 minutes down but they could close that up pretty quickly once the GC contenders start assaulting each other. (How come announcers never employ synonyms for “attack”?)

Getting back to this final climb, the Alto de Los Machucos, I am going to assume the profile map is wrong and that it’s actually called the Alto de Los Muchachos, which (if Google is to be believed) translates to “Tall Boys.” Isn’t that a better name? Let’s go with that.

This breakaway just has too many riders to list. Highlights among them are Philippe Gilbert (Deceunink-QuickStep), who pulled off a solo victory in yesterday’s nail-biter stage; Thomas De Gendt (Lotto Soudal); Sergio Henao (UAE Team Emirates); and Robert Power (Team Sunweb).

Pierre Latour (AG2R La Mondiale), also in this chase group, sits up to file his nails. This is a show of confidence. When a rider starts paying this much attention to his personal grooming, you have to figure he’s expecting a victory. It’s kind of like zipping up as you approach the line solo.

Also of note in the above photo is that the chasers were about as fast on the last climb as Saez. The peloton, meanwhile, was clearly flying. At this rate, the breakaway riders won’t be ahead for long.

I’m looking forward to watching Astana and Movistar blitz Roglic and Jumbo-Visma. Roglic won both time trials in the Giro d’Italia this year, but cracked in a later stage and couldn’t thereafter make a realistic bid for the GC. Obviously he’s doing better so far in this Vuelta but there are a number of climbing stages still to come…

There are 15 guys in this chase group with 20 km to go. Back in the peloton, Astana still has at least 7 guys, and they’re still swarming the front. Movistar surely has a number of dudes there too, so it’s going to be hellaciously fast on the Tall Boys climb. Could they pull back 6 minutes? Yeah, probably.

Saez’s gap is holding at just over a minute. I think he’s just over the penultimate climb. As the chasers get over that, his gap will drop. I don’t think he’s going to hang on, even if this chase group manages to stay ahead of the peloton.

Okay, I’ve been staring at the elevation profile, and it looks like this isn’t quite a summit finish … there’s a very short downhill afterward. There’s also a section of the climb that looks vertical in the schematic. Go ahead, scroll back up and look at that. Definitely some super-steep bits.

Wow, the peloton is now only 5 minutes behind the breakaway. I’m glad I didn’t waste more energy learning all the escapees’ names.

The Spanish countryside is as pretty as a postcard.

I don’t know, maybe Saez can stay off. This climb is only 7 km, and he’s keeping his gap pretty consistent. It all comes down to what’s left in his legs, and only he knows that, if he even does. The announcers are talking about how he needs to “empty the tank.” This is where the “full gas” analogy falls apart. I mean, it’s not like you see Formula One cars jettisoning fuel toward the end of a race, though that would be something to see, especially if there were any smokers in the stands.

Another common expression that doesn’t actually make that much sense: “the gloves are coming off.” When’s the last time you were watching a prizefight and a boxer got pissed and removed his gloves so as to deal out a terrible bare-knuckled beating? I don’t follow that barbaric sport, but I’m guessing this gloves-off thing has never happened. In bike races the riders sometimes don’t wear gloves, but I doubt that’s an act of naked aggression … they’re just gambling on not crashing, and maybe their noses aren’t snotty enough to need the backs of their gloves.

The chase group is making its way through a little town toward the base of the Tall Boy. Okay, here’s a schematic showing that final climb. Two sections of 25%, yowsa!

A  rider is trying to bridge from the chase group up to Saez. It’s Bruno Armirail (Groupama-FDJ). Will he make it? And will it matter? The peloton is now only 3:43 behind Saez with Astana continuing to drill it on the front for Lopez.

Saez is getting a water bottle hand-up, which is really strange at the base of a climb. He didn’t pull any of that stupid sticky-bottle nonsense either, like Demare did when he blatantly cheated in the Milan-San Remo a few years back. Maybe Saez is taking on energy drink … maybe he’s about to bonk.

Saez is on the final climb, and it already looks like a beast!

The peloton is now less than 3 minutes behind Saez. They’ll have that chase group in sight before too long.

The chasers are on the climb now and they know it’s all or nothing now.

Armirail has passed Saez and quickly opens a huge gap!

The peloton is now only 2 minutes back … they’re closing it up with a quickness. It’s a surprisingly large group given how fast they’re going. 

Quintana goes to the front! He really needs to drop Roglic. And Valverde, frankly.

Man, Armirail is having to weave all over the road—he’s practically ground to a halt! Suddenly 5 km seems like a mighty long way…

And back in the diminished peloton, Pogachar goes to the front!

Quintana has the chase group in his sights. I’d love it if he took lots of time out of Valverde, who has ridden like a selfish little bitch for this entire Vuelta (and arguably his entire career).

And suddenly we have a new leader, Pierre Latour! He’s caught and dropped Armirail! What did I tell you about Latour, preparing for his victory salute earlier in this race with that manicure…

Rafael Majka (Bora-Hansgrohe) is getting dragged up to Quintana by a teammate. It’s Felix Großschartner, who has dropped back from the break to help. He’s dragging the rest of the GC group with him.

And now the GC group is all back together, just over a minute behind Latour.

LaTour is really suffering in another brutally steep section! But he’s staying strong! Viva Latour! (Okay, that was bad. Sorry … couldn’t resist.)

Quintana is dropped! Pogacar and Roglic are drilling it at the front, as they make contact with more breakaway orphans! Only Valverde can hang! They’re even distancing Lopez!

And they’ve dropped Valverde too! Unbelievable! Only Roglic can hang with the mighty Pogacar!

Quintana is clawing back up to the Valverde group. Back toward the front, the breakaway stragglers have now fallen away and it’s just Pogacar and Roglic. And now Roglic takes a pull!

And with 1.5 km left, Roglic and Pogacar catch Latour!

And they’ve dropped him! The stage is theirs for the taking! It’s gonna be one of these two!

After all the work Astana did for Lopez, he’s been totally dropped. He must be so bummed.

Quintana has caught Valverde, along with Majka.

The two leaders are over the top of the “Muchachos,” and both will want maximum bonus seconds so there’ll be no gifts today.

Pogacar leads out the sprint!

Pogacar has got the win!

It’s kind of hard to care who places where after these first two, because Roglic didn’t follow the script … he was supposed to crack, or just barely hang on, so that we could start to wonder again who might win this Vuelta. But instead he’s attacked everybody, has increased his lead, and seems to be in command now. But here is your top ten on the stage anyway:

As you can see, the big loser today was Lopez. He’ll probably lose his podium position.

Here are Roglic and Quintana warming down. Quintana continues to wear his helmet because hey, you just never know. Roglic wears a backwards ball cap because he’s worried about getting too much sun on the back of his neck. There’s a rumor in the peloton that he’s starting to grow a mullet.

I wonder if people will continue calling Lopez “Superman.” Maybe he’ll get downgraded. Of course he can’t have “Batman” because I already assigned that nickname to Quintana, earlier in this coverage, and it’s spreading like wildfire. I’m going to refer to Lopez as “Robin” from now on, not because he’s Quintana’s sidekick or anything, but because it’s the most demeaning superhero name I can think of at the moment.

They’re interviewing Pogacar. “I was just going to try to keep up today, but then I heard on the radio that Roglic and I had a gap, so I decided to destroy everyone again even though I just got here [to the pro peloton], and then—hey, you know what? I just remembered … my dad said if I won another stage he’d take me up to Wyoming to buy fireworks! Awesome!”

There’s a holdup in the podium ceremonies. Nobody can find the beer guys for the ridiculous winner-has-a-beer-with-friends product placement ritual. Perhaps the models got into those beers early and are passed out drunk in the back of the van or something. It’s really awkward … Pogacar is just standing around up there on the podium by himself. Somebody fits him with a ridiculous hat, which he tolerates (perhaps because it’s warm, perhaps because he’s still too dazzled by the spotlight to get all arrogant). Okay, here are the beer people.

And here’s the new GC after today’s shakeup. Roglic increases his lead; Pogacar climbs up to third overall; Lopez and Quintana drop down. Also of note: Lopez lost his white jersey, for best young rider, to Pogacar, and Quintana lost his green jersey, for points leader, to Roglic. Man … not a good day for these two!

Roglic is being interviewed. “Yes, the stage went well, I have to say that was pretty fun. But I actually kind of miss my ski jumping days. Sure, that’s a boring sport, but a jump is over in just a couple of minutes and then you head to the hot tub. With this damn sport, I’m out there for four, five, six hours at a time, day after day. It’s kind of a grind, to be honest.”

Tomorrow’s stage is a useless spectacle for the sprinters. Sunday is another brutal “ESP” mountaintop finish, with yet another such stage on Tuesday. More mountains on Thursday, with four Cat 1s, and then a final f-you mountain stage on Saturday. So, Roglic’s current domination notwithstanding, the GC is far from settled. With so many superheroes still in contention, the front of the race will be like some kind of fricking Vueltaverse™!

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