Freire Wins ’08 Wevelgem, Cyclingews’ Decay Continues

Not sure how many of you were up on yesterday’s comment thread, but to jackhammer the point through the floor, today’s Cyclingnews post not once, but twice misnames Juan Antonio Flecha as the 2008 Flanders runner-up. This wouldn’t be such a big deal if the race hadn’t been four days ago. Jeff Jones, where are you?!

Anyway, Flecha: not a winner Sunday. Not even a runner up. But today he still got some props from his teammate, homeboy, and today’s winner, Oscar Freire, who reminded the world who should have been the first Spaniard to win Gent-Wevelgem, back in ’05. Still, not like anyone in Spain cares about this cobblestone crap. The Tour, the Vuelta, and that’s about it. And my pick, Boonen? Just seemed to be out for a ride. Hopfeully, he’ll be that much more ready come Sunday.

Velonews’ candidate, Mark Cavendish, did manage to finish the race fairly winded, but only because of the tirade he went on, berating the people who were “not even sprinters” contesting the group kick finale. Young Cavendish should take a lesson from Slipstream’s Christian VandeVelde, who won the argyle squad’s first Euro race on a bike apparently borrowed from a 12 year old. And he didn’t even complain once. Then again, he didn’t have to go over any “roads” that, under the Americans With Disabilities Act, couldn’t even be called “sidewalks”.

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