Late musings and predictions on the 100th Giro d'Italia

I have been so busy lately that I almost forgot about the Giro starting last weekend. I assumed it began on the Saturday when in fact it was a Friday start. Aside from short clips I seen nothing of the racing. And it was only today, on Monday, when I would finally have the chance to follow it. So of course there would be no race to watch. That Friday start was so they could transfer from Sardinia to Sicily today.

Scenery aside, it doesn't sound like I have missed too much. The first few stages were flat and belonging to the sprinters. It's tomorrow when things will kick off with a mighty summit finish at Mount Etna. It could be explosive!

From then on there will be few times when missing stages will go unpunished. This 100th edition of the Giro has got a brilliant route traversing most of the country. There are some savage mountain stages packed in toward the back in. The lineup of contenders is long and distinguished. Indeed, on paper, this has the makings of the best Grand Tour of the lot. I'm not sure if its the unflappable Chris Froome that has turned so many off targeting the Tour in July? Either way, a lot of them have shown up here. Nairo Quintana included.

Michele Scarponi 1979 ~ 2017

If you are you having fun then you don't tend to spend too much time worrying about life. It is as it should be, and you should be lucky for it. But life is fragile and sometimes something horrible happens that reminds us of that, and we count our blessings.

Last Friday afternoon, April 21, I looked up the results of the final stage of the Tour of the Alps. I seen that Thibaut Pinot had won it and that Geraint Thomas had taken the general classification. A huge result for the Sky rider ahead of his Giro d'Italia ambitions. In fourth place was Michele Scarponi. I didn't take too much notice of it but considered him a man on form. He would lead his Astana team at the Grio now that team leader Fabio Aru had withdrawn through injury. Often a faithful lieutenant of Nibali and Aru, this was a chance of freedom for the 37 year old Italian.

On Saturday morning, April 22, I woke up, put on the kettle, settled into my armchair, looked at my phone and seen the horrible news. Scarponi, with so much going for him, was dead. An accident with a van while out training near his home in Italy that morning had ended it all. It was shocking and so saddening. His final tweet had been a picture of him a few hours after returning from Switzerland, with the race leaders jersey he had had won on the first stage, on the shoulders of his sons while they sat on his back, all smiling at the camera. How could your heart not break in knowing the fate that awaited them all in the hours ahead?

Van Avermaet completes one of the great cobbled campaigns

I didn't see any of Paris-Roubaix live this year. I was out on the bike instead. I promised myself come Sunday morning that I wouldn't fall victim to temptation and make an excuse to stay on the sofa watching the Hell of the North. It promised to be a great race as Peter Sagan looked to salvage his spring cake and Greg Van Avermaet looked to ice his. As it turned out it was the later who came through.

By all accounts it was a decent race though I have heard it was far from historic. No Paris-Roubaix is bad but I got the sense when Sagan punctured for a second time, ruling him out of contention, some of the drama went out of the race. Tom Boonen was of course competing in the final race of his career but the four-time winner could only manage 13th. The fairy tale finish was not meant to be.

No shock though at the winner. Van Avermaet has been a level above this spring. Sagan has been unlucky on several occasions, but the Belgian was always able to capitalize. Philippe Gilbert stole his thunder at the Tour of Flanders but didn't race this one. Still, across the seven cobbled classics this spring Van Avermaet won four of them. He took Omloop Het Niewsblad to kick off the campaign, followed it up a month later with wins at E3 Harelbeke and Gent-Wevelgem, he was second at Flanders and returned to winning ways in Roubaix. Throw in a second place at Strade Bianche too and seventh at Kurrne-Brussles-Kuurne and you see an Olympic Champion on form.

A ride for the ages

It has to be the image of the cycling season so far. Philippe Gilbert standing solo on the finishing line of the Tour of Flanders in the Belgian champions jersey with his bike held high above his head, victorious. It was everything the locals could want from such a race. And what a race it was. It always is. But we don't usually get an individual performance quite like that. We don't usually get such drama from so far out.

The Muur-Kapelmuur is one of the most famous climbs in the Tour of Flanders. In recent years though it hasn't featured due to its location on a new route, but that changed for 2017. The climb was back in, but early in the race. Too far out from the finish to factor, or so we thought. They hit it with 95km to go, and but for the forlorn hopes up the road, the pack was still together. As they hit it, Gilbert brought his Quickstep team to the front. Rivals, such as Sagan and Van Avermaet hung back. Too early, right? Wrong.

Quickstep hit the climb hard. Teammates Tom Boonen and Gilbert looked at one another and gave a nod. The power went down and the race blew wide open. Over the top a gap had opened, but again it seemed to soon to matter. It would likely come back together or those behind would bridge across. Gilbert, Boonen et al would sit up and save their matches for later. But nobody knew how many matches Gilbert carried. With so long still to go, Gilbert pushed on, urging the group to work. And the group was dangerous. Sep Vanmarcke was there, so was Alexander Kristoff. Luke Rowe, Jasper Stuyven and a cluster of others were also present. Sagan and Van Avermaet were not.

The 2017 season so far: Big names come to the fore

It has been a long time since I last wrote anything on here. It has been a busy winter. And anytime I have gotten some free time I've spent it on my bike rather than writing about bikes. On that end I've cycled over 1,500km since the turn of the year, way more than in any other winter before, and I am feeling good for it. A lot of it on the turbo trainer, but a mild winter here in Southern Ontario has meant I have gotten out on the road too. I have a couple of races in April and I decided to actually get ready for them. So far so good, though I could use to cut back on some junk food!

That isn't to say I haven't watched my share of cycling though. Indeed I have watched as much this winter and early spring as ever before. Some of the racing has been spectacular and there has been a lot of talking points. There is little point in me going into them all in detail right now, you've likely seen them yourself, but I do want to address some. So where to start?

Team Sky have slipped, but not fallen. A review of the 'scandal' as I see it

I told myself I wouldn't bother writing about this whole Team Sky mess. Not this close to Christmas. Not with two children under four both hyper and my wife's present still to buy. Yet here I am, rattling away on the keyboard in an attempt to squeeze in some thoughts before Christmas. After that, I'm not sure I'll care enough. But there has been so much outrage that I wanted to give my own perspective to some degree or other.

If you're still reading now then chances are you know the background and the details, so I'll spare you a run down. Suffice to say, it has been an ugly year for Team Sky away from the racing. In fact, on the bike it's been quite memorable. Another Tour victory, and their first Monument win at Liège-Bastogne-Liège. But the year draws to a close with their reputation on the line and a scandal at hand. One in which they have prolonged by failing to present an adequate response.

I must say though, I find it hard to call the whole mess a scandal in the traditional sense of the word. Knowing where the sport has been before, and all that.  An ugly situation for sure, but classified by your own personal perspective of it only. And that's the difference with this one. In the old days it was a full-blown back and white objective doping scandal. This is more a subjective shade of grey; one of ethics and morals and where each individual sees the invisible ethical line in their own mind. With no violation of the rules taking place, where does Sky's failure in ethics sit in proportion to your own standards? Or do you care about some fictional line if they haven't broken the hard line that is the letter of the law? As such the outrage here is subjective to what you think is and isn't wrong from a moral point of view.

2016 season in review: The year of Monument firsts

2016 was the year of Trump, Brexit, Zika, the Rio Olympics, Russians in Syria, terror in Brussles, terror in Nice, Climate change and nuclear deals, Pokemon Go, and Celebrities dying. It was also the year that Peter Sagan won his first monument and retained his world title, and Chris Froome ran up Mont Ventoux on his way to winning a third Tour de France.

I was in tough to pick a name for this years year in review. At first I was going to go with 'the year of the Brits'. I mean, Froome won the Tour again, he was second at the Vuelta and he won an Olympic medal. The British track team dominated those games with some record breaking and historic moments. Geraint Thomas won the Paris-Nice and Team Sky got their first Monument win by way of a non-British rider. But it was the later that got me thinking of another kind of year this was: The year of first time Monument winners. And given that the majority of my focus is around road cycling, I figured that might be more apt.