Jan Ullrich, the great rival to Lance Armstrong, and the only German winner of the Tour de France ever, has retired. It’s a little depressing to me, since it reminds me of just how much I used to love watching cycling. I have many fond memories of watching Lance and Jan compete with each other, but those memories have been tainted by the doping scandals.
The cycling season has kicked off with the Tour of California. I didn’t really watch and certainly didn’t report on it here. I am finding it hard to care. Every cyclist that I try to get behind turns out to be involved in some scandal (Lance, Tyler, Landis, Millar, Ullrich…). I worry that if I get involved again, I’m just going to be disappointed.
Nevertheless, the Tour de Georgia is coming up. I’m pretty sure that Jittery Joe’s is competing, and we’ve got Cesar back, so I might be tempted to get involved in that. We’ll see.
#1 by Charles on 2/27/2007 - 12:30 pm
Fight the urge to give up. I need someone to talk with about it. I liked Bob Roll’s comment during stage 7 of the Tour of Cali. I will paraphrase: “Cycling gets a bad image due to the doping scandals but, it is only because cycling is one of the first sports to take testing as seriously as it does.”
Imagine if Barry Bonds or Mark McGuire had to pee in a cup every time they hit a home run. Not to say that either of those two guys were using anything more than mom’s apple pie.
If you want to put your energy into a team that will restore your faith in the sport look at “Slipstream- Chipolte“. There was an NPR article on them. Two of their riders were in the Stage 7 breakaway. Plus their argyle uniforms are pretty cool.
#2 by Charles on 2/27/2007 - 12:32 pm
The Slipstream- Chipolte link that got mangled is:
http://www.slipstreamsports.com/
#3 by Chris on 2/27/2007 - 2:05 pm
You’re right. I’m just bitching, but I refuse to let my enjoyment get spoiled for too long.
Have you been getting any good riding in lately?