cyclocosm

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Testing

seeing if this still works for no particular reason, definitely not related to anything about to happen to Twitter.

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Here’s the second half of that @milanosanremo_official retrospective—guess I’ll need to put something together for @rondevanvlaanderenofficial and @parisroubaixcourse now, too 💀💔🥀. As always, the #howtheracewaswon videos for all these races at https://howtheracewaswon.com, with a link (for Sanremo) in the bio if that’s easier. Not sure when I’ll have time for that, but… 🎥 @eurosport 🎸 @air_supply_band #milansanremo #msr #cyclingclassics #springclassics #laprimavera #coronavirus #covid19 #ucicycling #uciworldtour #cyclingmonuments @vincenzonibali @alafpolak @kwiato @petosagan @olivernaesen @alejandvalverde #htrww (at Poggio, Liguria, Italy) https://www.instagram.com/p/B94LTZ_l5Yf/?igshid=5sfqwsjw5tf2

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View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Cosmo Catalano (@howtheracewaswon)

DID HE OR DIDN’T HE? It’s been awesome to watch @yveslampaert emerge as a serious threat for @deceuninck_quickstepteam over the last few seasons, but he might have tipped his hand a bit in the closing K at @omloophetnieuwsbladofficial this weekend. An attack just outside 2k had a look back just before, immediately after, and a again a few beats later—not exactly telegraphing a serious belief in race-winning power. While I’d still tab @jasperstuyven as the faster finisher all other things being equal (which they *never* are after 5 hours of racing) the glimpses might have given the @treksegafredo rider that little extra confidence to take on the sprint from the front. Regardless, I’m still stoked to see both riders (and teams!) battle for the the rest of #classicsseason 🎥@eurosport #ohn #omloop #hetvolk #ompoop #omloophetvolk #spingclassics #springclassics2020 #cobbledclassics #procycling #uciworldtour #omloophetnieuwsblad #omloophetnieuwsblad2020 #howtheracewaswon #htrww #hetnieuwsblad #worldtourcycling #soundon #soundon🔊 (at Gent, Belgium) https://www.instagram.com/p/B9PCYgOF_1v/?igshid=1ae5mgxjcfpqg

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I was thrilled to meet Ryan Kelly, a local amateur racer who was the unintended star of a video that I will forever remember as A Dump Truck of Awesome.

Peter Flax, thrilled—as everyone should be—to meet Ryan Kelly From The Internet.

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A passionate cyclist and athlete, DeMartini has ridden in the Pan-Mass Challenge bike-a-thon for the past 11 years…

USA Cycling That sound you just heard was every Boston-area bike mechanic wincing in unison.

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We had some good battles buddy! See you at the bar.

Tom Boonen

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FEED THE FUCKING ALGORITHM MOTHERFUCKER

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I didn’t realize #LogContent was something I had strong opinions about, but dang. This is some good #LogContent.

(via DirtWire)

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Hey—I'm going to delete your comment. Not because I disagree with it (which I do) but because it sucks.

If you want to come back and write a better comment that demonstrates you've at least Googled the abstracts of studies on testosterone levels in elite athletes and trans/intersex elite athletes in particular; and also that you’ve carefully read the IOC rules on testosterone levels in elite trans athletes; and furthermore that you’ve considered some of the expert opinions (on both sides, even!) in any of the recent dozens of in-depth articles on the topic in various sports publications; and additionally that you’re aware of the potential legal implications of denying an athlete the ability to compete based on sexual identity; and finally, that you can present a thoughtful, rigorous opinion (even one that I disagree with) based on that self-education, then I’m all for it.

This is relatively new ground for everyone, and there is room (and even need) for respectful, fact-driven discussion about competition guidelines as our knowledge of the issues surrounding them grows in the years come. But until you can clear even the lowest informational bar, my FB page isn’t a place you get to have an opinion. And I’m not sorry for that.

See, I have the same problem with a comment like “testosterone is a thing” as I do with “biological advantage”—it’s a sloppy, oversimplified response that purports to leverage “common sense” in heading-off the sort of rational question-asking responsible for pretty much everything humans have ever accomplished.

And, as it happens, my disdain for that particular phrase stems not from issues surrounding trans athletes, but from my fellow cis-males, a certain subset of whom insist that some amorphous “biological advantage” prevents a Cat 3 amateur cyclist who can put out 250 watts at threshold at age 20 from competing fairly with a Cat 3 amateur cyclist who can put out 250 watts at threshold at age 45.

Regardless of the specific areas they’re applied to, these are just bad arguments, and you should not make them. If, for some reason, you remain hellbent on public proclamations about where trans-females should and shouldn’t compete—a topic that will literally never affect you, by the way—as someone who looks like you and who may be pre-judged based on the things you say, I’m going to have to demand you make a good faith effort to at least present some actual reasoning.

It’s true, I suppose I could have not deleted your comment and instead posted this as a reply. But that’d just be rewarding your ignorance on the topic with attention it has not earned and most certainly does not deserve. The resulting discussion, no matter how nuanced and detailed the responses, or how carefully cited the specific facts, would not change your mind, and—as a point of basic psychology—would likely make you cling ever more relentlessly to your own ignorance on the topic.

So please—take the respite I’ve granted removing you from this conversation to reconsider not just the opinion you hold, but your motivation in expressing it. What positive outcome are you seeking? While I do disagree with your take on the topic, I don’t disagree to the point that I want to see you piled-on and publicly shamed for it. That won’t help you reach the sort of thoughtful, carefully-considered conclusion (even one I may disagree with) that I believe, in my heart of hearts, you’re capable of. And finally—just since it seems to be news to many of us white dudes—attaching your name to half-baked trumpet blasts across a social network of 2 billion can have far-reaching, real-world consequences. It’s worth reiterating that “freedom of speech” has never come with a “freedom from accountability” rider.

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An outlier, of course, is Chris Horner’s win at the Vuelta a España in 2013, at age 41.

Neal Rogers, employing some incredibly charitable verbiage describing one kind-of-inexplicable bright point in the decade-long decline US men’s racing.

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On September 27th, 2001, Filippo Simeoni soloed clear of a breakaway on Stage 18 of the Vuelta a España. As he approached the line (around 2:30 or so in the above video), he took the unusual step of dismounting his bike, holding it aloft, and kissing the top-tube before walking across.

He was fined for this—and this is where we enter the apocrypha so endemic to pretty much everything in professional cycling. Wikipedia, uncited, claims the UCI was involved, and fined him despite the fact that the gesture was somehow a “tribute to the victims” of the 9-11 attacks.

However, the admittedly tiny sliver of primary sources available to me makes no mention of this. VeloNews’ report focuses on breaking the drought of Italian wins at the event. Cyclingnews had a blurb reporting on the fine following day, but attributes it to the race organization, not the UCI, and quotes Simeoni explaining the unorthodox salute: “It's my best-ever win and I thought I'd give the crowd something to remember me by”. No mention of September 11.

Fast-forward to July a few years later. Simeoni has a dust-up with a certain Lance Armstrong over testifying against Michele Ferrari two years earlier. It’s an objectively terrible look for Lance, but if you haven’t learned by now that support for public figures is more tribal than rational, I don’t know what to tell you. But I do know that having counter-narrative, some dimension to Simeoni to make him more than just another of Lance’s Euro-antagonists, would be an extremely useful thing to the growing legion of fans who were sick and tired of the Texan.

And the very next month, as the sort of unfounded opinion you’d expect from such a predominantly old, white, and male fanbase was flying, a letter appeared in Cyclingnews, quoting Simeoni, in an alleged post-race interview from that 2001 Vuelta stage, as saying "The gesture of raising my bike above my head was also meant as a protest against the terrorist's attacks in New York.” In October of that year, Simeoni’s first Wikipedia entry appears, also pushing the 9-11 Tribute.

It spreads as these things do—forum posts, blogs, etc—pretty much anywhere outside the professional cycling press, which would have been extremely reluctant to raise Armstrong’s ire at that time. No matter that the BBC article cited in those forum posts contains nothing even suggesting a Twin Towers remembrance—it’s the line I’d always heard, passed along by Lance haters and long-time Euro cycling fans alike, a badge of knowledge that a deeper sport existed beyond the even-then-cliched prattle of Phil and Paul.

But was it real? Does it make any sense that an Italian rider in a Spanish race would feel compelled to dedicate a win to the victims of a terrorist attack in the US two weeks earlier? Wouldn’t the rider have mentioned this to American journalist Andrew Hood, covering the Vuelta for American publication VeloNews, in his post-race commentary? Wouldn’t he have at least brought it up as justification when fined for the unusual display?

Like so many of cycling’s war stories, it’s almost impossible to know. Truth and fiction have always blended easily in a sport built to craft narratives to sell papers. And as a digitally-based Anglophone, it’s a particular challenge—the only thing I can find even close to a citation for the September 11 tribute comes from Simeoni’s Italian Wikipedia page: page 20 of the 28 September 2001 edition of the defunct Italian paper, L’Unità.

Please let me know if you think your local library might have a copy.

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I am Jack’s complete lack of surprise.

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Hello there, Zombie Universal Sports!

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Alaphilippe and Jungels know what’s up. Also, go watch some TDF How The Race Was Wons: http://cyclocosm.com/2018/07/how-the-race-was-won-tour-de-france-2018-stage-17/ http://cyclocosm.com/2018/07/how-the-race-was-won-tour-de-france-2018-stage-12/ http://cyclocosm.com/2018/07/how-the-race-was-won-tour-de-france-2018-stage-9/

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I love the sport, but it’s kind of silly, and there’s also kind of a silly way to state how things went in the day, and people seemed to like it.

Chad Haga, taking an approach which (if Tati were still around) I would consider #correct.

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OH MAN—you know an Amazon product is a good buy when it’s pitched by BikeSnob’s favorite stock cyclist.

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giffity gif gif gif

go watch the HTRWW