It's being pretty widely reported that Bert is staying at Astana - at least according to the Kazahks.  I have 3 comments on that: 

1. This year's fun with Lance at the Tour is not even going to qualify as a warm-up for the all-out open battle he'll face with future teammate Vino (assuming Astana even gets an invite next year).
2. The Kazahks are not really interested in either the major payout on Bert's contract on the one hand or the prestige of having the defending champ riding for them on the other, but instead know they need to keep Bert to have a shot at getting Vino into the game (still less-than-50/50 chance of an invite, I would think).
3. Heh heh heh (is that 75 yet?) heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh

I just got a survey from Cycle Sport USA and didn't delete it. (WIN STUFF!  Get discounts!  Do something other than work for a couple of minutes!) 

One question first made me laugh and then made me a little mad (no PdC, but SI and ESPN - huh??)  It is replicated here for your amusement and/or annoyance:

Continue reading this post »

I know we're all a little tired of coverage of Ben Stiller at the Tour but I came across what has to be the UK version of The Onion today.  Amoung other silliness, this stands out:

Insiders claim the theme of Dodgeball 2 will be cycling and George Hincapie is being tipped to take on Vince Vaughn's role as the good guy, while Chuck Norris, who played himself in the original, may be replaced by Lance's friend Jens Voigt.

Who here wouldn't pay to see that?

Has anyone opted for the (pay) subscription to Versus' live streaming yet? 

I guess it will be a bigger issue tomorrow morning when many of us are at work...   Silly me, when I heard Versus would be live streaming, I didn't even thing about it being pay-per-view.  Viewing is available as either a full package or on a single stage basis. 

Thoughts?

So much to read, watch and do for the next 3 weeks!

I am sooooooo enjoying Universal Sports' tv coverage of the Giro and wanted to give them a little shout out.

Granted, I do miss Paul and Phil but there haven't been a bunch of crazy features and replays of profiles of the same riders over and over again.  (As much as I love to see George racing, I was pretty sure he wasn't winning last year's Tour.  Just sayin'.  And if I'm following along for 3 weeks, I saw the feature on him, and Christian and Dave and all the Garmin guys, and Levi, the first time it was played). 

I recognize tha this may be a function of the fact that U.S. didn't get the rights until the very last minute (and therefore didn't have time to develop all that extra content), but I'm willing to accept that the coverage is what they intended... 

Today's stage was an excellent example -- instead of some wacky blonde doing wacky things in wacky locations (away from the race), we got a phone interview with CVV.  Wow - timely and something I really cared about!  AND the cameras were on the race THE WHOLE TIME.  (Granted, they spent an inordinate amount of time asking him about Lance but that's just going to happen as long as LA's back in the game... I'm a big enough fangirl that it didn't bother me, but I realized watching it that some people might have been throwing things at their tv.)  That said, I come back to my original point - I don't even think we've seen our commentators, have we? 

Vs - take note:  We like to watch the race.   Keep the cameras on the riders.

And thanks again, Universal Sports - I'm with you for as many years as you continue to cover the Giro.  (Hey, you know there's a big race in Spain later in the year, too, right?)

So CNN is reporting that Lance is having a baby with someone we've never seen him with. 

Thumbs up to to Lance for having a lower profile relationship.

Thumbs down for timing.  (Baby's anticipated arrival is in June.)  Coming out of retirement to ride the Tour is definitely a creative way to stay out of the delivery room!

Best wishes to all, of course.  :)

Not 75.  Drat.  K I S S I N G...

Hey - where is everyone?  Cyclingnews says it's 200m to the sprint but the sadly silent coverage at ToM's website has even deserted us.  (And Universal isn't up until 4:30pm.) 

 drat - 75 word min.  Do dashes count as words?  - - - - - hmm.  Oh look, the pic is back.  Wait, it's gone again.  No it's back...  Really it is this time.  Where's the sound?  Only 2 minutes to go and how many words?  Is this enough?  Or this?

SOUND - we have commentary!

Some admittedly random things from the US Pro races in Greenville the last few days:

• At the TT on Sat, the announcer was trying to work up the crowd about the will-they-won't-they question as to whether Greenville would have the race next year.  On the podium, he had a few words with David Z and threw him what with anyone else would have been a softball - i.e., Dave, where would you like to see this race next year since Greenville's been so good to you?  David's answer: Salt Lake City.
• At the RR on Sunday, during sign in Danny Pate was on stage (CVV was just signing in, too).  Announcer asks what's the plan for today?  Danny:  I think the other guys are working for someone else, but I'm out there for myself today.  (He than playfully wacks CVV and exits.)  Good chuckle but then when Pate's in the later breaks, the announcers are seriously bringing this back up.  Seriously?  Wow.
• I know there were some complaints here at PdC about the quality of the video coverage... FYI, closed circuit tv at the road race itself wasn't any better.  We didn't really have pictures until the last circuits.
• Interesting thing - Floyd was at the TT.  (He may have been at the road race, but I didn't see him.)  He didn't seem to be attached to anyone and he wasn't selling books or hip replacement parts but was hanging near the teams during the race.  (Call me crazy, but I still want to believe!)  He was, as ever, gracious to the few fans that noticed and approached him.

As mentioned in the comments for Sunday, Greenville gets the race for at least one more year.  As suspected, the set up was not nearly as friendly for the road race this year, but it was still a blast.  (I heard there was construction near the usual start/finish and I think someone here mentioned the same.)  If anyone from USA Cycling is reading this - please put it back to the old location next year!  But  in all Greenville throws a nice party and I'd add my encouragement to itswell from a few days ago - if you're in driving distance, it's worth the trip next year.

I know we care most about the first and fourth items, but here's the complete list of (US) coverage of cycling for the Olympics.  I really hope NBC narrows these down somewhat.  I'm not even sure my tivo will let me schedule 12 hours straight!

The Tour de Georgia team presentation was held tonight in Savannah.  It was fun to preview the teams; however, it was an odd affair.

While I understand the motivation for a charity event (charging accordingly), it seems like it would have better served the sport to host an open event which welcomed everyone with an interest in cycling.  (And ultimately, wouldn't bringing more people to the sport generate more value for the charity and sponsors?)  This had lots of politicos, sponsors and what I assume were Savannah's most charitable but not a lot of fans.

And another odd thing - the biggest cheers were for the Rock Racing guys.