What the – ? Rest day already? A three day chunk of Grand Tour racing is like making out with this totally hot girl you’ve been trying to kiss for weeks – for about five seconds. Honestly, it wouldn’t be so bad if the biggest story thus far weren’t the pink jersey pinballing between Enrico Gasparatto and his teammate/captain Danilo DiLuca. The word from Liquigas climber and functional anorexic Charly Wegelius is that the alleged tiff between the two is no big deal, and given the lack of other compelling story lines, I’d agree.
If I were a real journo, I might focus on the surprising number of casualties thus far – T-Mobile is already two men down, and plenty of other squads are beat up. Cunego, who was caught up in yesterday’s tumble, is apparently ok, as is his erstwhile (and perpetually disaffected) teammate Gilberto Simoni. Yeah, I’d probably write about the heavy attrition thus far. Either that, or I’d do something about how Italians are incapable of doing the Macarena correctly .
Hmm…so, no racing. Then what will everyone talk about? The last bit of Dunkirk? No. Any other guesses? I promise, it’s not hard. Yes, exactly – we’re gonna talk about doping,, with the Landis trial taking first billing. In the sport’s second-most high-profile case, “attempted doper” Ivan Basso has regressed to a state of uncooperativity as he awaits his come-uppance. Experts conclude that doping goes on, but it seems practically nothing can penetrate the reality distortion field hovering around Alexandro Valverde (though if I had the ’06 TdF Victor-Elect on my roster, I might not care who’s riding in my jersey, either.
