Ooopsie! – News

Looks like a made a boo-boo on the category selection. Seems Paolo Betinni is not racing the Tour this year, making my Cookie’s Revenge category utterly pointless. Ah well. I could swap in some other token Eyetai, but it really wouldn’t be the same. Perhaps more relevant to the larger cycling world, another garrulous Italian, two-time Giro champ Gilberto Simoni, will also be sitting out this year’s race. Given his performance in the TdF as of late, I do not blame him.

Jan Ullrich, however, is doing the tour this year, and apparently wants everyone to know about it. The big, freckly, pink-lipped former-fatbody claims to be at his best ever this year, perhaps finally motivated at his last chance to beat Lance. Perhaps Big Jan lost those final kilos just this week, as teammates Andreas Kloeden and Erik Zabel each took sizable chunks out of Ullrich’s hide in the German weekly Bild. Kloeden was miffed at having to race the German Nat’l Champs while Ullrich rested, but Zabel, 6-time winner of the TdF points competition, had far more pointed words at being left of T-Mobile’s Tour roster:

“I wouldn’t have prevented him from winning. When I become second or third it is a loss, yet other people are celebrated for that.”

All respect due to Mr. Zabel, but those are pretty sharp words from a man who just lost the German Nats to an 18-year-old, despite having 13 teammates in the race. Jan is still on everyone’s (especially Lance’s) radar screens this July, but last time I checked, Tom Boonen wasn’t shaking in his boots about you.

Possibly related content: