Wooo! it’s Friday, 11:33pm, I just woke up from a nap and I’m starving…for some pro cycling madness! Begin with the racing, where Petacchi has returned to form in Germany. Well, returned to form kinda. Meanwhile, Damiano Cunego showed he’s fighting fit for next (¡OMG!) week’s Giro d’Italia with a GC win at Giro di Trentino. Next stop for Lampre’s little prince: dark horse instigator at Liege Bastogne Liege. Have you been reading the previews?
If you’re anything like me, you’ve been musing to yourself “Hmm, it’s been a while since Gilberto Simoni said something utterly outrageous”. Well, muse no longer. Cunego’s erstwhile “teammate” may be a whiny homunculus, but I’ve got a definite respect for the fact that he’s not afraid to speak his piece. Ever. And let’s keep in mind, the Saunier Duval captain and two-time Giro champ was well ahead of the curve on the Basso accusations. It’ll be interesting to see if the oddly-described relationship between him and the young Richardo Ricco is a firm as he he says in three weeks’ time.
But returning to the Basso case, track superstar and roadie tourist Brad Wiggins has opened his mouth surprisingly wide on the Puerto situation, calling Disco “hypocites” for signing the ’06 Giro champ. Seems to me it’s equally hypocritical to promote clean cycling while at the same time side-stepping the very rules established to enforce it. Anyway, the gearless wonder is sick of all these doper stories – he wants to hear about “clean riders” now; I suppose were to infer that means him. Maybe if Wiggins’ road palmares weren’t shorter than Jose Rujano, he might get his own headlines once in a while.
You didn’t love Gibo complaining about Basso trying to cut a deal with him (“I discovered that it was not his first error in trust”) and then complaining about Cunego not abiding by a deal with him a couple paragraphs later (“From the team car they said ‘Simoni wins’ but, instead, Cunego shot off”)?