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Neal Henderson is the Sport Science Manager at Boulder Center for Sports Medicine. He is a USA Cycling certified coach and works with a diverse clientele at BCSM. He has been Taylor Phinney’s personal coach since 2006 and traveled with Phinney and his family in the lead-up to the Beijing Olympics. This is his wrap-up column following the Olympics. The 2008 Olympic Games have officially ended and Taylor Phinney had the best finish for an American men’s individual pursuit rider since Steve Hegg won gold in 1984.

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This time there were no late climbs or rising finishes. Tuesday’s flat and treacherous arrival into Puertollano in the fourth stage of the Vuelta a España was a flat, fast and furious finish ideal for the pure sprinters. So it was no surprise that Daniele Bennati (Liquigas) made up for the disappointment of losing Monday with a definitive victory ahead of arch rival Tom Boonen (Quick Step).

The Belgian bicycle manufacturer Ridley has announced plans to sponsor the new Katusha cycling team, a Russian squad team organized by Tinkoff owner Oleg Tinkov. Ridley, which has served as the bicycle sponsor of the Silence-Lotto team and its predecessors for the past four years, will begin its sponsorship of Katusha in 2009. The team announced on Monday that it had also signed Silence-Lotto sprint ace Robbie McEwen, meaning the Australian will continue to ride on the carbon frames produced in Belgium.

The second sample provided by Spanish rider Manuel Beltran, who tested positive for erythropoietin (EPO) during the Tour de France, has also tested positive for the blood booster, a source close to the dossier said Tuesday. The test on the second sample, known as the "B" sample, was carried out by French anti-doping agency AFLD which also tested the first sample back in July, the source, who does not want to be identified, told AFP. The anti-doping agency is expected officially to announce the results of the testing on the "B" sample shortly.

I’ve received a lot of mail about our story in the print VeloNews, issue 14, about climbing wheels. It was a great test that revealed a lot about climbing wheels we saw right afterward in the Tour de France. Matt Pacocha rode 50,000 vertical feet on the wheels and performed wind tunnel tests on them, and then we did our own measurements of rotational inertia. For those not understanding what rotational inertia is and how we measured it, please go here. Lennard

Jelly Belly's Bernard Van Ulden and Team Tibco's Lauren Franges took the wins in Atlanta on Labor Day, taking their share of a $30,000 combined prize list at the city's U.S. 10k Classic. Held the same morning as a 10k running race, men race 100k on a fast five-mile loop, finishing on a wide downhill highway. The mens field contained many who had raced in the weekend's USPRO championships in Greenville, South Carolina, including Van Ulden, who was eighth in the USPRO time trial and did not finish the road race. Women raced 10k, with the same wide-open finish as the men.

Ralph Naef (Multivan Merida) and Irina Kalentieva (Topeak Ergon Racing Team) won their respective races at the penultimate round of the UCI mountain bike World Cup over the weekend. The competition, held August 29-31 at a new venue in Canberra, Australia, provided a preview of the 2009 UCI world championships, to be held Down Under next August.

The multimillion-dollar Russian spending spree that’s energizing the contract market shows no sign of abating soon. Robbie McEwen, three-time green points winner at the Tour de France, and mullet-man Vladimir Karpets are the latest big names lured to the new Katyusha lineup for the 2009 season. Backed by a reported budget worth 30 million euros (about $45 million, said to be split between the professional team and the promotion of cycling within Russia), Katyusha is making a big splash right in the heart of cycling’s silly season.

Tom Boonen (Quick Step) and Daniele Bennati (Liquigas) – two riders who missed this summer’s Tour de France for dissimilar reasons – were both back on the podium spotlight in Monday’s 168.6km third stage at the Vuelta a España. Barred from the Tour after he tested positive for cocaine in late May an out-of-competition test, Boonen jumped off Bennati’s wheel with 100 meters to go into a stiff headwind to claim his first Vuelta stage-win in his career.