Incredulous revelations

Today the cycling world woke up to incredulous revelations. First, UCI will take Alberto Contador to TAS, the Sports Tribunal so they can get him suspended. "The credibility of the sport is at stake", says UCI president, Pat McQuaid. Tell that to Barry Bonds, whose perjury trial is currently underway in San Francisco. It must UCI the wrong way that Contador is not only back on the bike, but he is winning too.

The Belgians meanwhile, had to hear the organizers of Gent-Wevelgem complain that Tom Boonen is riding for points, not for the win in Sunday's race. Points Quick-Step needs to put their car in the pole position or at least a bit nearer to that position for the Ronde.

Boonen had originally said he would not ride Gent-Wevelgem because he did not like the race and in any case, he liked the E3 Prijs better. You may remember that the E3 Prijs put Boonen and Cancellara on their new poster after the bankers at KBC forced them to ditch Gaelle.

Later Tommeke said would ride both races, but then last night, Quick-Step pulled him out of the E3 Prijs so he could concentrate on getting the much needed points.

And Competitor magazine revealed that Lance Armstrong has retained none other than running legend Alberto Salazar as his coach to prepare for a comeback in the sport of triathlon. That despite very recent public denials.

There is however, some good news. Nick Nuyens won Dwars door Vlaanderen, giving the Belgian public a much needed victory in the Spring races. Something to sustain us in these troubled times.

Qatar

Tom Boonen scored his first victory of the year at the Tour of Qatar. Not a big surprise really and Tom has been winning there for several years now. Besides, the season isn't open yet, at least not in Belgium. Still Qatar has a special significance in Belgium because of what happened to Frederiek Nolf last year.

Speaking of Qatar, Sporza intercepted Eddy Merckx there, who was furious some journalist had written that "he (Merckx) no longer drinks champagne since his bout with colon cancer." Although cancer seems to be the cyclists' scourge -if you are in good cardio health then cancer is your only option so to speak- Eddy vehemently denied he had ever had cancer.

And speaking of cancer, our friend Lance was pretty ticked off at Jonathan Vaughters, manager of Bradley Wiggins, who said in a Times interview, that in the 2009 Tour "Astana was soft-pedaling it so as not to embarrass Lance."

Meanwhile here in Northern California, racing season started with a rather busy Cherry Pie criterium in Napa. The weather cooperated and it was nice and sunny and pretty warm to boot. I did not race, but I managed to get in a great ride while Alistair rode the Cat. 3's. Team Specialized scored big in several of the races, and brought in lots of pies so we ended up eating cherry pie for lunch. In the afternoon, we did some time trial bike trials (how is that for an expression) on Skyline Blvd. Although it was warm in Oakland too, the only dark cloud this side of the Mississippi hung right over the road at all times.

On Saturday I rested. On Sunday I rode 25 miles in Napa and then another 20 on Skyline with Alistair. On Monday I ran 8.25 miles in the hills and today I rode 20 mi on my mountain bike, getting very muddy in the process. Although most days have been great with only occasional rain during the daytime hours, the hills are now well saturated with water, and mud-slides are once again legion.

Now we are getting ready to go to Phoenix for the Valley of the Sun stage race.

Bike problems

Nothing much happening in the Tour. One wonders why they went to the Pyrennees if only to have 30 plus miles tacked at the end so everyone can regroup? Lance also disclosed some of the internal tension in Team Astana. And for some odd reason Bruyneel does not want to talk to Sporza, the Flemish television channel.

There was a revealing moment during the flight to Limoges. Lance was sitting next to Bruyneel -showing the power structure of the team- when a Sporza camera showed up. Lance tried to get Bruyneel's attention -he was looking out the window- saying, "Hey Johan, Sporza.." Bruyneel said something like "Not now," and then Lance said, motioning to Johan: "It's him, not me."

On Saturday I did a third "fit test" and was only partially successful. Although everything was going well, I once again hit the panic button at around 21 minutes. This time I was able to restart quickly and I ran another 1.5 miles at 9.1 mph to make up for the break. I felt pretty good. I get the impression these "tests" aren't just tests, but they add to my conditioning. How else can you explain that I seem to do better each consecutive time?

Today I rode my bike one last time -it has to go to shipping tomorrow- but it wasn't a great success. First my disk hub came apart, and once I fixed that, my derailleur started skipping. I suspect the freewheel is in poor shape but I can't find my freewheel removal tool. Go figure! I also think my Ergomo bottom bracket is a bit stickier now and the power numbers are no longer very good. They always seem too high. Not sure what to do about that. There isn't really much I can do without spending a fortune, so I will just go with what I have.

Let's hope I don't suffer too much on the bike.