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If cycling team coaches were like their brethren in American football they would be studying tapes of all the races that have been held on the 17.35km Varese road race circuit this year. What they would find is a pattern that has flowed through the world under-23 men’s and elite women’s championships the past two days, along with last month’s Three Varesine Valleys race and the finale of stage 18 of this year’ s Giro d’Italia.

Nicole Cooke’s perfect season just got better. Just six weeks after winning the Olympic gold medal in Beijing, the 24-year-old Welshwoman executed seamless tactics Saturday in a thrilling final lap to win her first world title. Cooke followed her instinct to make a final-stage attack by arch-rival Marianne Vos and then pipped her at the line to relegate the Dutch rider to silver with Judith Arndt collected her second bronze medal in the Varese world championships.

The much-maligned ProTour series will continue despite a peace treaty hammered out this week between the UCI and the grand tour race organizers. UCI president Pat McQuaid said a reduced ProTour series will exist alongside Europe’s biggest races as part of a new world calendar that will mark a cease-fire between cycling warring parties.

UCI president Pat McQuaid says cycling’s governing body is powerless to stop Frank Schleck from starting Sunday’s elite men’s road race. The Luxembourg rider, who wore the yellow jersey in this year’s Tour de France, has been linked to the Operación Puerto blood doping ring via supposed bank documents that reveal he paid nearly 7,000 euros in the spring of 2006 to the ring-leader Dr. Eufemiano Fuentes. “At this moment in time, he’ll race,” McQuaid told journalists on Saturday. “We have no evidence to stop him.”

Luxembourg's plans for success in the men's road race at the world championships have been hampered by a police raid on the team’s hotel, and a damning newspaper report on one of the country's top riders. According to journalists staying with the team at the same hotel police carried out a raid late on Friday evening. Around 15 of Italy's NAS (anti-doping) brigade searched bedrooms occupied by the Luxembourg team, taking particular interest in a hypobaric chamber which is designed to artificially simulate conditions at altitude.

After writing two columns about Lance Armstrong’s decision to return to elite-level racing — first looking at questions about his age and long lay-off, and last week examining his possible schedule to find top shape by next July’s Tour de France — I’ll devote this “Inside Cycling” column to the reactions his audacious plan has generated both within and outside the cycling community.

Rudy Project’s ImpactX lenses are photochromic. Notice the dark spot from shining the flashlight on it for a few seconds. The ImpactRX version can be made to your prescription while retaining the flexibility, impact resistance and photochromic (and polarized if you wish) characteristics of the ImpactX.

Rudy Project’s ImpactX lenses are impact-resistant. No amount of hammering will shatter them. Rudy even makes bulletproof ones for police use. “Some riders pay big dollars for carbon wheels but don’t protect their eyes by buying cheap sunglasses. That’s crazy,” says Rudy Project marketing director Claudio Fantin.

The drive-side chainstay of the Wilier Cento 1 is lower to better resist drive forces and relieved for the textured chainstay protector.

The Wilier Triestina Cento 1’s oversized bottom bracket uses the “BB90” system with bearings that press directly into the shell. BB90 is constantly attributed to Shimano, but it was Scott that first brought this to Shimano to support, followed by Trek.

Wilier Triestina’s Cento 1 (101) will be the bike of Alessandro Ballan in 2009. The curved top tube carrying through to a continuous curve around the seatstays and the beefy chainstays is not only elegant, but it also carries the stresses better and makes it a stiff, high-performer. The integrated seat mast has a Ritchey one-bolt saddle clamp atop it, but if you want to re-sell the bike and it is cut too short for its new owner, you can also completely remove the mast and slot it (better get the Effetto Mariposa CarboCut saw for this) and slap on a binder clamp and a 31.6mm seatpost.

Touring anyone? The KHS TR101 has all the amenities of a full-on touring bike and then some for only $1099. A super heavy-duty rack, Shimano triple crank and SPD pedals, fenders, full braze-ons, and reflective tire sidewalls you might expect. But would you have expected a brake light (there is an accelerometer built into the rear taillight that turns it on when the bike decelerates rapidly) and Dura-Ace bar-end shifters?

The $599 KHS Urban Uno offers single-speed coolness with the practicality of a freewheel and some very cool flat aluminum fenders. But if you want to run with the bike messengers, you can flip the rear wheel around and installed a fixed gear. Reynolds 520 butted Cro-Mo steel tubing makes it tough and adds to the cool factor.

The Specialized S-Works Era FSR is as full-carbon, as full-on, and as women’s-specific as a cross-country racing bike gets. The tuning of the Brain front and rear shocks are optimized for a woman’s lower center of gravity, lower weight, and smaller stature. The frame and its low standover curvature and shock mounting point are specifically designed for women; this is no FSR with a few tweaks to make it fit a woman better. Even the seatstays and chainstays are carbon, and the whole thing weighs only 21 pounds.

The Yakima Quick Back strap-on rack adjusts to any car with the turn of the red adjuster knob on top, which allows the entire curved structure to telescope. The bike-support arms fold down with a turn of the red adjuster knob on the right.

The Yakima Landing Pad II bolts to hard mounting points on high-end cars. The really slick quick-release feature allows the user to pop the entire rack off in seconds.

Yakima’s Rail Grab tower eliminates three towers by being able to attach the company’s round crossbars to all factory-installed roof racks.

Another look at the detailed lugwork on the new retro Schwinn Paramount.

Return of an icon. Schwinn has a retro Paramount with chrome lugs to commemorate the bike’s 70th anniversary (the company itself was founded in 1895).

With three Italians in the eight-up sprint at the end of Friday’s heated 173km Under-23 world championship race, odds were stacked against Fabio Duarte. So the pint-sized Colombian uncorked a daring attack with 400m to go to leave the remnants of the winning breakaway choking on his fumes and deliver a huge upset against the heavily favored Italians racing on home roads.

Levi Leipheimer has pulled out of the world championship road race in Italy, it was announced Friday. Leipheimer, who last week finished runner-up at the Vuelta a España behind Astana teammate Alberto Contador, failed to claim a medal in his main event of the time trial here on Thursday. Andy Lee, USA Cycling spokesman, said Leipheimer, who also competed in the Olympics where he took time trial bronze, "didn't feel up for the leadership of our relatively young team at the road race.”

Tour de France chief Christian Prudhomme has welcomed an end to a four-year long conflict with cycling's world ruling body the UCI. The Frenchman, however, said Friday the world's biggest race would reserve the right to enforce strict anti-doping rules. "This agreement allows us to look forward to working together in a positive fashion in the future, but there is still a lot of work to do," Prudhomme told AFP Friday. "For the Tour, there's no question of letting our guard down."

German sprint great Erik Zabel, a six-time winner of the Tour de France green jersey, will retire in early October, his professional road team Milram announced on Friday. "I've had a lot of fun this season and managed to keep my main rivals on their toes. But I don't know if I can do it for another season, so I think it's the right time to stop," Zabel was quoted as saying in the team statement. Zabel will compete for the last time in Munster, Germany on October 3.

Spain's Alberto Contador says he has been given assurances from Astana that he will remain team leader even if Lance Armstrong rides with the squad. Armstrong, a seven-time Tour de France winner, announced his plans to return to competition earlier this month and the Kazakh team has confirmed that he will join it for several races. Contador, who won the Tour de France in 2007, is the current team leader at Astana and he has given conflicting reactions to Armstrong's decision.

These Dominators have 96,537 miles in them, they’re from 1998 and were part of a contest the Italian shoe manufacturer organized to find just how long its shoes last.

Sidi’s new Vernice finish adds a new element of over the top style to the brands Dragon 2 mountain and Ergo 2 road shoes. The new models cost $540 and $560 respectively.

Vittoria has a new cyclocross tire called the XM. It’s made for the mud and comes with a 220- or 290-tpi casing, but won’t be available until early December.

Despite its modest price the Rainer Cross has details like stainless inserts in its horizontal dropouts.

The alloy frame and Easton EC90X costs just $725.

Raleigh’s limited edition Rainer Cross drew plenty of people into the booth.

The Speedvagen’s paint job is inspired by Evel Knievel

Sacha White’s Speedvagen project continues to draw eyes. This single-speed ’crosser sports his extraordinary attention to detail.

Parlee’s Z2 CX uses the same molding and construction process as the brand’s Z2 and Z3 road bikes but with a tubeset that offers a slightly softer ride. The frame along with Edge Composites fork goes for a whopping $5950. U.S. national cyclocross champ Katie Compton is currently doing R&D testing to refine Parlee's cyclocross design.

The target weight for the carbon Hakkalugi frame is sub-1000 grams, but Ibis is still working out the final details. It doesn’t have a price yet, but it does have the Lion of Flanders on the seat tube; the color is Phlegmish yellow.

Ibis’ new ’cross bike comes complete with the once retired hand-job cable hanger.

Ibis brings back its Hakkalugi cyclocross bike for 2009.

Ciamillo Tech the machinists behind Zero Gravity brakes have a new low-profile ’cross brake. The new brake has a target weight of 198 grams for a bike’s worth including pads, mounting hardware and straddle cable.

Avid’s new Shorty Ultimate cantilever ’cross brake offers a wide and narrow profile brake in one design. The brake can go from a wide setup to a low-profile setup in about 10 minutes without having to change the pad positioning.

Check out Matt Pacocha's author page.

Inside Ride’s eMotion rollers feature 8 inches of fore/aft movement. The roller mechanism slides back and forth with the rider for a natural road feel. The 30-pound system features four magnetic resistance setting and retails for $850.

Edge will have road bars ($350) next year that feature a continuous curve in the drops, double cable grooves and rounded tips. Sizes range from 36-44cm center to center.

An Edge customer modified these Edge mountain bars to swallow the cable housing and run it through the integrated stem and down the steerer tube of the Lefty fork.

Edge has a wide range of carbon hoops, from 26- and 29-inch mountain wheels in two widths (24mm, 32mm) to road rims in tubublar and clincher options. They’re all made in Ogden, Utah.

Nick Crumpton built this ultra light frame with tube-to-tube construction with unidirectional carbon. The things that look like lugs are just the carbon wraps around the mitered joints. Without the outer cosmetic layer of his standard super light frame, this frame weighs in at 880 grams with hardware.

Chrome’s Champ features reflective strips on the cuffs and around the lower back hem that are quickly hidden for around town use.

For those riding straight from the trails to the bar, Chrome’s Champ jacket ($165) has technical features with urban style.

This jersey is green. Really. Capo constructs the $120 jersey from 100 percent recycled materials.