It’s baaack! And you thought I had gotten sick of it. Today’s match-up: Utah’s own Dave Zabriskie vs. the 1970 counter-culture classic Zabriskie Point. Click here for a listing of the previous battles.
| Category | Bike Culture: Dave Zabriskie |
Pop Culture: Zabriskie Point (1970) |
Winner |
|---|---|---|---|
| Claim to Fame: | Bicycle racer, ’04 US TT Champ, Fastest TT in TdF History, won stages in three straight Grand Tours | “Daring” Hollywood cinema attempt to cash in on popularity of 20-something angst and European directors | Dave; Point is hardly as memorable as its packaging declares | Directed By: | Bjarne Riis, 1996 Tour Winner | Michelangelo Antonioni, groundbreaking Italian neorealist, Oscar for lifetime acheievement, 1995 | Point; you can tell who directed it just by wathcing. When I see DaveZ, sometimes I wonder… |
| Plagued By: | Horrific crashes | God-awful acting | Dave; crashes will always happen, bad acting never should |
| Memorable Quote: | “Rock and Roll, dude” (his only comment on winning a stage of the ’05 Giro) | “Well, I’m willing to die, too…just not of boredom” (Mark, losing patience with student radicals meeting) | Point; c’mon, that’s a sweet line, despite its shabby delivery |
| Endorses: | First Endurance Innovative Racing Nutrients | Somewhat simple-minded escapism from the conformity of “establishment” America | Draw; I’m pretty disappointed (scroll to bottom) about both |
| Moment of Disbelief: | When Dave somehow hung on to win Stage 11 of the ’04 Vuelta | When Mark somehow manages to steal, and then successfully fly off in, a plane | Dave; see, one of these things actually happened |
| Soundtrack By: | Westside Connection (scroll to bottom), Guns ‘n Roses (search “Guns”) | Pink Floyd, The Rolling Stones, The Grateful Dead | Draw; and, Dave, the song is “Out Ta Get Me” and the line is “You won’t catch me/ I’m fµ¢&in’ innocent” |
| Dialogue Best Described As: | Sparse | Sparse | Draw |
| Window of Cultural Relevance: | Opening, though he’ll have a hard time keeping America interested without recovering from cancer | Very small. If it had opened in 1965, it would have been huge, but being released in 1970, it closed almost before it began | Dave; here’s to hoping for something awesome, man |
| Ends With: | Only time will tell | About 10 minutes of houses, TV sets and refrigerators exploding over and over again while Pink Floyd wails in the background | Point; I have no idea what DZ’s demise will be like, but I imagine there’ll be fewer explosions |
So it’s a 4-3 victory in favor of the CSC rider. Can’t say I’m surprised as I’ve never heard of anyone even mentioning Point outside a collegiate film class. Well, I guess CN did reference it (see link “Stage 11” above) once. But those guys seem to know everything. Dave Zabriskie, on the other hand, is mentioned all over the place, like, um, in bike magazines, and, uh, y’know, bike magazines. Ok, so they’re both pretty esoteric. But clearly, Dave Z is the better of the two.
That’s hilarious!
sweet post
Nice one cosmo, but i would like to dispute the “Endorses” category. It clearly should have gone to dave to give him the commanding 5-3 victory. Don’t knock the stuff if you havent tried it. I mean i have no idea if it works or not, but the first endurance recovery drink tastes like happiness. Seriously, i might just sell my bike just to buy more of the stuff.
Oh god, i want some right now.