It’s been a while since I gave the ol’ VeloNews cage a good grab-and-rattle. Part of it’s been that I’ve been busy, part of it’s been that I rarely read their articles anymore (I mean, with so many other options, why bother?), but at any rate, I’ve fallen off a bit in my vituperatives. Then yesterday, that mangy bird squawked louder and more gratingly than it has in some time with this alleged tech article, and I, as always, am eager to correct it.

Ex-Postie Robbie Ventura and realRides deliver a crit-oriented intensity training DVD. 2004, Color, Approx 90min.

Originality: 5. I hate training videos. But calling this “just” a training video is a kind of like calling the Poggio “just” a hill. Its main training feature is an uncut, rider’s eye view recording of a race, complete with live commentary, heartrate, cadence and power statistics, plus some basic tips on racing and pack riding. Useful, unique and compelling stuff.

Yeah, folks, I would have liked to write more in the past few days, but every since that dashing young Spaniard Valverde won Liege-Bastogne-Liege, there really hasn’t been any news in the cycling world to speak of.

Despite claiming the Tour de France is what “really matters”, Jan Ullrich waited practically until May to make his first start. Another Tour hopeful, Floyd Landis, has won three stage races already. Jan Ullrich being woefully behind in his Tour prep is not news. Ullrich claimed to be ready to “go through the pain barrier” prior to his first start on Tuesday, but then barely cracked the top 100 in the opening time trial (a discipline he is allegedly good at) in the Tour of Romandie. Jan talking tough and then underperforming – not news.

So I was watching “Honey, We’re Killing the Kids” a few nights back (no, seriously…) and after a few minutes of pre-adolescant New Jersey-ites Twinkie, Coke and video-gaming away their afternoon, suddenly this commerical comes on with Lance Armstrong. Apparenlty, his other former teammates are so crappy when it comes to bike racing that Lance has found it necessary to hold an official race to find his successor as leader of the Discovery Channel Pro Cycling Team.

(Yes, I am aware Reagan was not sworn in until 20 Jan 1981. I don’t care. Riders born after 1/1/80 are herein described as “Reagan Babies”.)

Perhaps there will be no image more representative of the 2006 classics season than that provided by Alejandro Valverde and Paolo Bettini in the closing meters of today’s Liege-Bastogne -Liege: the young Spaniard, sprinting to victory in this long, hilly classic with a Cipo’-sized gap, peering over his right shoulder just long enough to see the Italian drop his gold-covered head in disgust at being beaten soundly in a race he considered as good as won. Il Grillo, previously unbeatable in these small sprints, was perfectly positioned on Inbatible‘s wheel, but was never a threat to come by him in the closing meters. For those keeping track at home, that’s all four of cycling’s five Monuments this season taken by riders born after 1980, and perhaps more significantly, the winner at each event has been different. Without question, the Reagan Babies have arrived.

Not sure how many of you will find this useful, but here goes: alcohol has long been used to augment classics of cinema, and I have here attempted to carry that spirit over into the classics of cycling. I know that most of Cycling.TV‘s races air between 7 and 9am EDT, but that’s what they invented Bloody Marys and Mimosas for, right? I think the real issue may be that college students, who seem to find the most use for such boozy diversions, are either asleep or racing on early Sunday when the races are run. I suppose you could do it to their on-demand race highlights, but where’s the fun in that? Anyway, this should make tomorrow’s Liege a blast, no matter how conservatively it’s raced.

I found a decently sized rock on the side of the road on a group ride earlier this week and went flying, but it had photographers been present, it would have been nowhere near as exciting as this. Piecing together exactly what went wrong here is great fun. My guess is that’s Marco Velo (who broke his collarbone) is the Milram chap somewhat obscured by Hondo.

I suppose the fact that Danilo Hondo didn’t get caught up in such a catastrophic crash upon his return to the peloton could be taken as a sign that the anti-doping gods approve of his somewhat unorthodox exoneration process. Then again, the fact that there was a crash at all could be those same anti-doping gods registering their disgust.

Every time Alejandro Valverde wins a race, I think about how Velonews‘ spring preview last year complained that he’d never won a race outside of Spain. Never mind that he’d been 3rd in the ’03 Vuelta, while winning the combine classification, along with two stages, and then finished second (to his teammate) at that year’s World Championships (held in Canada, by the way), or that the next year he won three week-long stage races, before finishing in the Top 10 at worlds (again, assisting a teammate who won). “Never won a race outside of Spain” – the Journal of Competitive Cycling, folks; get your subscription today. I wonder if Valverde sent them a postcard from Courchevel last July…

I. Thy race documentation shalt be as concise, clear, and accurate as possible.
II. There shalt be separate pre-registered and day-of registration areas.
III. Thou shalt not organize thy race check-in by field.
IV. Thou shalt not distribute thy race numbers without regard to field.
V. Thy registration areas shalt be clearly delineated.
VI. There shalt be toilets in proportion to field size.
VII. There shalt be signage to all Critical Areas, and for all Critical Events.
VIII. Thou shalt not distribute swag on the honor system.
IX. Thou shalt have separate start times listed for each field.
X. Thou shalt start thy races on time.

I know this hardly seems relevant to Americans, what with Tour de Georgia starting tomorrow and all, but I thought that was a pretty good Amstel they had on Sunday. The bunch stayed together a little longer than I like to see in a classic, probably because some people think they can just wait, sit on, and win the uphill sprint. That’s the problem with these Ardennes classics, same as it’s the problem with pretty much any amateur road race with an uphill finish; put a big hill at the end, and (usually) no one wants to attack ’til then. Boogard, having blown the sprint for the the uphill finish (that was supposed to keep the race from ending in a sprint in the first place, after Zabel’s Y2K victory panicked the Amstel race organizers) two years running, probably studied the heck out of the Cauberg this off-season.