No results for you today (followed by the sound by the sound of a million browsers clicking their “back” button – wait, did I say a million? I meant, like, fifty), but there is a whole buttload of rider news. So sit back relax and enjoy, and we’ll start with the sprinters: Robbie McEwen got sucker punched (scroll down) at a motorsport event in Australia. McEwen was acosted by a bunch of dudes, decked with a king hit (apparently, the Australian version of a haymaker), before hauling tail out of there. Usurprisingly, he was way faster than the other guys. Recent retiree and divorcé Mario Cipollini was just eliminated from the Italian version of Dancing with the Stars. Bummer for Re Leone, but he can take heart in the fact that he made it far further on the show than he ever did at the Tour de France. Stefan van Dijk’s similarity to Homer Simpson apparently doesn’t stop at the forehead. VanDijk “missed” (scroll down) a dope test by tearing off in his car when he saw the dope tester’s vehicle in the driveway. What’s that got to do with homer? See Reason 204. The doctor saw van Dijk, though, and now the Dutch rider must serve a one-year suspension, though the penalty is lighter than the two years he might have otherwise gotten.

Late post today and my aplogies, but I was racing ‘cross in some classic New England conditions, and I will relate it all later in a race report. Right now, though, meaningful results: Damiano Cunego won the Japan Cup today, adding another event won in the past by his former team captain to his palmares. The young, unmarried father of one escaped late in the day with Francesco Mancebo, only to destroy the likable Franky Manky in a two-up sprint. Gotta spot Mancebo for picking a poor breakaway companion on that one. In one last bit of triva, Cunego’s victory marks the 5th time in 6 years that a Lampre rider has won the event. For those, however, who think cycling world is run by room full of aging, potbellied Europeans high in the mountains of Switzerland, the road season officially ended yesterday with the Firenze Pistoia. The 33k TT, the last road event on the offical UCI calendar, was dominated by Eastern Europeans, as these one-day chronos tend to be, with Ukrainians taking all but one of the Top 6 spots. Panaria’s Sergey Matveyev was the top rider on the day, which really made his year, as he’d been waiting on this event since last October.

Sorry for not posting yesterday. I try for every day, but dang it, I’m not a machine. Too bad that I didn’t post, too. Big news on the transfer front: Gibo Simoni’s chosen to hit up Saunier Duval for his paychecks next season. The two-time Giro winner said he went to the yellow machine “not for the money, but to help the group of young riders.” Right. Like you helped Cunego in the 2004 Giro. Between the arrival of Simoni and the return of David Millar, the 2006 Saunier Duval sqaud could also be one of the whiniest in recent memory.

Seriously, the closest thing I can find to news is word of a Rabobank team car getting stolen. Everyone’s all just rehashing their Simoni teasers, horribly misspelling the names of nearly-were sponsors, or editorializing wildly on the current state of affairs in cycling. That’s not to say there’s nothing good to read. Velochimp makes an elegant arguement for a smaller ProTour and T-Mobile talks about how great a team it is (making excellent use of selective omission), while the NFL appears to have found a team more f-ed up than the boys in pink (strangely enough, the Vikings also sport a somewhat less-manly uniform color). Pez has some, uh, let’s go with “interesting” reports on Lombardy and a small Spanish race that has “escalada” in the title, so I ignored it completely for philosophical reasons. Cyclingnews gives its default 4.5 yellow jersey ranking to yet another $5,000 Italian triumph of style over substance, as VeloNews once again shows its utter disregard for meaningful research by publishing an article on ‘cross brakes so rife with shortcomings I don’t know where to begin:

1. Preamble concerning mechanical advantage is confusing and largley irrelevant to article;
2. Claim is made that V-brakes reduce mud clearance, which the tight clearance of most ‘cross forks makes irrelevant anyway (especially when you consider which way the front wheel, where most of the braking happens, rotates);
3. Non-linear cantis of all varieties squeal horribly; mechanics who say this is merely the result of poor set-up have clearly never heard a World Cup Cyclocross race (listen to one over at Cycling.TV if you don’t believe me);
4. No mention is made of BMX mini V-brakes that are compatable with the shorter pull of a traditional road lever;
5. Also omitted is any discussion of tandem levers, which are mechanically identical to road levers, but pull enough cable to function with standard mountain brakes;
6. Disc brakes, which have overrun the MTB world with their stopping power, modulation, and steady performance in pretty much any weather, are mentioned only in passing, and with no attention paid to the fact that disc models exist that are designed to integrate flawlessly with road levers.

The cycling world learned of the retirement of two former Grand Tour winners this week: Pavel Tonkov and Angel Casero (scroll down). The problem was, though, only one of them (scroll down) is actually quitting the sport. Pavel Tonkov really is retiring, after a dream career that saw him escape Soviet Russa, marry a podium girl, win the 1996 Giro and give the whole world the ole’ va fangul, which is Jersey Italian for va faire en culo which is, uh, best left in Italian. Another former Giro winner, Gilberto Simoni is currently in contract talks with the Italian branch of Miramax for a remake of an American comedy classic, under the working title “There’s Something about Gibo,” as now Saunier Duval becomes today the third team in as many days to be linked the diminuative Italian.

This isn’t really a news flash, per se, as there’s nothing definite to it, but Eurosport is now reporting that Unibet, if it can successfully lure Gibo Simoni, currently in post-Sony-Ericsson limbo, and CV’s Carlos Garcia Quesada to their squad next season, that they will immediatly apply for a ProTour License. The squad has until Thursday to get the paperwork in, but manager Koen Terryn seems confident: “I can’t believe that [the UCI license commission] would offer five licenses to France and only two to Belgium.” Some sources report that Terryn then muttered “when the four existing French teams suck so bad,” under his breath, though there is no confirmation of that at this time. French setup Ag2r is the only team currently vying for the spot left by the dissoultion of Fassa Bortolo at the end of this season.

First off, I’d just like to apologize for yesterday’s technichal difficulties. We’re working on moving the page over to cyclocosm.com (screw this bush-league blospot business), but there’ve been a few technical hurdles. No doubt it’s also a little digital karma after I ripped on Daily Peloton for being offline for a few days. They’re back, by the way, and have report from the half-a-month-old Interbike Outdoor Demo (not only that, but the report ends in “to be continued…”). They’ve also got word that Gibo Simoni might find himself out of the ProTour, on Murilo Fisher’s Naturino-whatevertheheckitis continental squad. I don’t think I’d notice, honestly, as, other than his suberb win on Mont-Faron at this year’s Paris-Nice, Simoni hasn’t done much outside of Italy this season.

In case you’re hadn’t noticed, I don’t care much for the ProTour. But the previous system (and, no, not the World Cup or Super Pernod or all that other crap that came before it) of counting wins was really even worse. Take a look at this year’s standings. Rocket Robbie and Ale-Jet looks awfully close, right? Only 4 wins apart? No. Petacchi has 3 non-UCI wins, and McEwen has 8. So more like 9 wins apart. “What’s a non-UCI race, then?” you ask? Generally, though not always, these.

Traditionally, ever since Independence Day broke $300,000,000 in domestic box office sales, the media has been used to try and hype things up before an event to increase popular interest. Not so at VeloNews, it seems. Look at these two “get fired-up” Lombardy stories that came out after the race. In fact, there seems to be a general flood of late-to-press (you may have noticed that yesterday’s post linked to VeloNews for a race report; it was a borrowed AFP story, but still, not something I generally do) or follow-up stories. (BTW, scroll down in that last link; looks like after the Sony Affair, Ag2r is a lock for the ’06 ProTour). Then, of course, there’s ProCycling. Still waiting for these guys to catch up with any race report. It’s like they take the weekends off, or something. Then there’s Daily Peloton, which I haven’t been able to get to load since Friday. I have no quarell with Eurosport’s report, however. Keep up the good work, kids. And while we’re being critical, we’d like to apologize for yesterday’s editorial. Such unbearably long sentences. We’d fire that guy, but he’s the only one who knows how to use the coffee machine.

Yes, its been a long nine months since Jens Voigt beat the frosty Parisian wins and 167 other competitors to take the first ProTour race back in March. The season closed down earlier this morning (local time) as Paolo Bettini won the Tour of Lombardy after providing much animation. Quick.Step star Bettini, who puts forth perhaps the most Bella Figura in the cycling world, what with his upbeat, friendly diary, charming nickname and adorable smile, (despite an evil dark side that pops up from time to time), beat a not-quick enough Gibo Simoni from Lampre and CSC’s suprising Franck Schleck, who, despite the ponderous excess of consonants in his last name, could be a man to watch in the hilly classics next spring. All three riders in the trio made attempts to hop away over the final series of climbs, but they were all too evenly matched, and after his attack at 1km failed, Giampaolo Caruso of Liberty Seguros lead out the sprint. Though Gibo’s got a good burst after a tough day in the saddle, Bettini has the legs of a much fatter man, and took off at 300m, knowing the others couldn’t muster the kick to come around him.