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The gods have been with the organizers of the Giro d’Italia for the past six years, which have produced six winners from the home nation. That trend could well continue in 2003 because it’s unlikely that Italy’s favorite three riders, Gilberto Simoni (the 2001 winner), Stefano Garzelli (winner in 2000) and Francesco Casagrande (second in 2000) will vaporize as they did in 2002. You will remember that Garzelli won two stages and led the race commandingly this year before being expelled for an inopportune, and still unexplained, positive drug test involving Probenecid –- the easily detected

Robbie at the Giro

The VeloNews Awards appear in the December 16 issue

VeloNews’s North American Awards are for performances on North American soil. RIDE OF THE YEARAs the lead group approached the jam-packed Taylor Street climb at the San Francisco Grand Prix, every spectator was waiting for the inevitable last-lap attack from one of Postal’s big guns, Lance Armstrong or Viatcheslav Ekimov. But when the Russian veteran Ekimov made the move, he was shadowed immediately by young French-Canadian CHARLES DIONNE. After his undermanned 7UP-Nutra Fig team had kept things in check in the first half of the race, Dionne took over late, marking every important move in

Much to the dismay of our readers, advertisers and attorneys, the O’Grady Awards have become an annual tradition at VeloNews, largely because the budget’s exhausted by November and O’Grady will work for beer, which our intern can shoplift from Argonaut. We thought we’d be spared embarrassment this year, with the perpetually disgruntled Mick on the run from the homeland-security coppers over an especially venomous Web column that called George W. Bush the Antichrist, among other things. Alas, his observations on the year just past were slipped under the North 55th door in the dead of night,

Dionne turned in the ride of the year.

The VeloNews Awards appear in the December 16 issue

The 2002 O'Grady Awards

Yes, even the O'Grady Awards appear in the December 16 issue of VeloNews

Dear VeloNews;The best thing about Mrs. Dunlap is her great personality - she is talented, beautiful and has a great personality.I had a chance of speaking with her during the Redlands bicycle classic and she spoke to me in a manner that you speak to somebody you know for years. Alison definitely deserves and she is a great champion. We love you in southern CaliforniaFred JacobsRowland Heights, CA Nice women finish FIRSTEditors;I am very glad that Alison got this reward. She very much deserved this and she is a very kind person too.Bike BoyMario the ambassadorEditors;Thankfully, in our

There were some tremendous performances by American pros on the global levelin 2002. Tyler Hamilton, Fred Rodriguez, George Hincapie, Levi Leipheimerand Floyd Landis all had banner seasons, and in years past any one of themcould have taken this award. But their accomplishments were all eclipsedby those of Lance Armstrong, who again raced at a superior level. Armstrong’s season didn’t get underway until the first World Cup classic,Milan-San Remo on March 23, but he was immediately effective. For the firsttime in his career, Armstrong finished in the front group at San Remo. Thefollowing week

As is usually the case this time of the year, things in the world of professional mountain bike racing are still very much up in the air. There’s still no word on what Cannondale will be up to in 2003, and a slew of big-name riders including reigning world cross-country champion Gunn-Rita Dahle are still looking to sure up deals for next year. But some pieces of the 2003 puzzle have fallen into place, most notably the continuation of the RLX-Polo Sport team. In a press release issued this week it was announced that RLX and Tomac Bicycles have joined forces for the 2003 racing season. The

Four and counting

The VeloNews Awards appear in the December 16 issue

Monique Ryan is the nutrition columnist for VeloNews and Inside Triathlonmagazines and is founder of Personal Nutrition Designs, a consulting companybased in the Chicago area. Ryan will try to answer selected questions eachWednesday in her regular on-line question-and-answer column. Readers are welcome to send questions directly to Ryan.Holiday challengesDear Monique;I plan to stay on track with my training for the upcoming race season. However, I would like to enjoy the upcoming holiday season without overindulging or, on the other hand, coming across like a food Nazi at parties. Do you have

The argument for Alison Dunlap as North American Female Cyclist of the Year really started in 2001 when she signed her then-new deal with Luna. Originally, the contract was for two years, but when Dunlap reminded her new bosses that cyclo-cross season was just heating up, they added three extra months so she could race their colors during the fall ’cross campaign. The move paid off, as Dunlap blitzed her way to her fifth straight U.S. national ’cross title, then headed to Europe where she won the Grand Prix of Holland and was the top North American finisher (fourth overall) at the world

“We don’t have to like each other, Joanne. We’re family.”Holly Hunter as Claudia Larson in “Home for the Holidays.” “Home for the Holidays,” one of the top-two Thanksgiving movies, according to a local Blockbusters clerk, depicts the annual fall reunion of a Boston family that’s nearly as dysfunctional as our own - the scattering of rival clans overpopulating the inbred tribe of American bicycle racing - except there are only two turkeys at director Jodie Foster’s cinematic table. Cycling’s family tree is a perch for many a squabbling gobbler, a species prone to “gather in vulnerable groups

“The Tour de France sucks.”— headline of a Jonathan Vaughters Tour diary on VeloNews.com“They should say thank you.”Marga Fullana responding to criticism from her competitors becauseshe didn't race all the World Cups. Fullana won all three that she didrace.“I’m definitely not stopping at the end of the year. I’ve already toldmy team I want to continue.”— Laurent Jalabert (in January)“It’s a good moment to quit. If I cannot be at the top of the profession,I do not want to race.”— Jalabert (in July)“Do I think they’re gonna outsprint Cipollini? No.”— Chris Horner, on the chances of U.S.

Mario Cipollini was voted cycling's top dog by France’s Velo magazine on Wednesday, winning the publication’s Velo d'Or (The Golden Bicycle), beating the man who has won the prize for the last three years, Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong. Cipollini, known affectionately as the 'Lion King', won the world road race title at the recent championships in Zolder, Belgium after a successful season during which he falsely announced his 'retirement.' The 35-year-old flamboyant Italian from Tuscany started off the year winning Milan-San Remo - the first one-day classic

Team T-Mobile, the all-American women's team structured under USA Cycling and sponsored by the wireless subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom, introduced their 2003 international squad at a training camp in Arizona over the November 23-24 weekend. The most notable addition to the team is Kimberly Bruckner, formerly of Saturn. Brucker enjoyed a remarkable 2002 season that brought a second consecutive national time trial championship, as well as numerous stage race podiums, including the Cascade Classic (1st), Sea Otter (2nd), Solano (3rd) and the HP Women's Challenge (3rd). Also new to the

The VeloNews Awards appear in the December 16 issue

No, that's not Beth Wrenn-Estes -- nor is it the USA Cycling board in the background.

The VeloNews Awards appear in the December 16 issue

The American All Star Squad

The Sonoran Desert provided a surreal backdrop for team photos

Dotsie Cowden, testing her sponsor's T-Mobile phone

Sunrise in Tucson, as thousands prepare to ride in the Tour de Tucson

What has 10 arms and is azure blue, brimstone red and safety yellow? Yeah, I don't know either, but I do know we're up to our collars in winter riding jackets around here. Thanks to a nasty little winter squall that raced into town this weekend, Lennard and I have been riding our brains out in the frosty coldness that is late November. Here in Boulder, Sunday cracked a high of just about freezing, which is ideal conditions for the jackets we've rounded-up for this particular test. From relatively affordable, to downright ludicrous in price, it's interesting to see what an extra $100 (or

Ever since the first shock was bolted to a bicycle, engineers have sought to develop the seemingly impossible — suspension that reacts to the terrain, but remains inactive to pedaling forces. Heavy compression damping, manual lock-out and sophisticated linkage designs have all worked to quell unwanted energy-robbing suspension activity, but most cross-country racers stood by the climbing efficiency of the hardtail. Until now. The debut of inertia valve technology this year stands to revolutionize the suspension world. Although originally patented almost 100 years ago, the inertia valve first

VeloNews technical writer Lennard Zinn is a frame builder, aformer U.S. national team rider and author of several books on bikes andbike maintenance. Zinn's VeloNews.com column is devoted to addressing readers'technical questions about bikes, their care and feeding and how we as riderscan use them as comfortably and efficiently as possible. Readers can send brief technical questions directly to Zinn. Zinn’s column appears each Tuesday on VeloNews.com.Question:I've been thinking about putting a 650mm wheel on the front of my bike.Will it help with acceleration as well as by dropping the front

Technically Speaking: Winter options

Inertia Valve Technology

The science represents a big step in the development of the bicycle

The VeloNews Awards appear in the December 16 issue.

The Mongoose streak continued this weekend as Todd Wells and Marc Gullickson took top spots in U.S.’s two top UCI-sanctioned cyclo-cross series at opposite ends of the country over the weekend. Wells scored a win at the second round of the Redline Cup o’ Cross at Utah’s Soldier Hollow, site of the 2002 Winter Olympic Nordic skiing events, Saturday. Wells topped an elite field that included his teammate Gullickson, who promptly hopped a flight, flew to the east Coast and took on Sunday’s fourth round of New England's Verge series in Connecticut. Soldier Hollow victorySaturday’s race in Utah

It was a tumultuous season for Italian super-sprinter Mario Cipollini, and a breakthrough one as well. In his 14th year as a professional, the 35-year-old achieved a number of firsts. The Lion King wowed us all year long, from taking the World Cup opener in March, to his mid-summer pursuit of Alfredo Binda’s stage-wins record at the Giro d’Italia, and to his rainbow-jersey-winning sprint at October’s world championships. And it wasn’t just his sprint that kept him in the spotlight. There was a bizarre unveiling ceremony for his Acqua & Sapone team, the “Cats”-inspired skinsuit at the Giro and

It is said that, when the cat is away, the mice will play, and that was, in a sense, almost literally the case Sunday at the Microsoft Seattle Metro Cyclo-cross Series in North Seatac, Wash. With Jonny “The Cat” Sundt, along with a handful of other top cyclo-cross racers, out of town for the Redline Cup in Salt Lake City, Steve Crosier (Redline) and Christi Berg (Bicycle Centre) took convincing wins over what was left of the local talent pool. It was the sixth round of the Metro Series, this round sponsored by Gregg’s Greenlake, with a course that was equal parts technical and power.

Experience Counts. In 1985 Breaking Away Bicycle Tours unveiled the first high performance cycling vacation for the avid cycling enthusiast. The challenging trips catered to riders who enjoyed the rush of sweeping descents or the thrill of reaching the summit of a famous Tour de France switchback climb just as much as the beautiful scenery and culture along the way. Since then over 6000 guests have spread the word about Breaking Away, and over 75 percent of its clientele are either past guests or their referrals. Guests can choose between Breaking Away’s popular Tour-Pak trips that offer

Gullickson retains command of the Verge series...

... while Wells holds the Redline lead

The triple barriers sorted out some of the field on the early laps

Cipo' was the man to beat in Zolder and no one did.

Sometimes you'd think he was doing this for show!

VeloNews Awards: Cipollini named International Cyclist of the Year

Crosier

Berg

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

Breaking Away ToursExperience Counts

Breaking Away ToursExperience Counts

Spaarselect’s Bart Wellens won the opening round of the UCI World Cup for cyclo-cross in Frankfurt on Sunday. Wellens, who won last week’s third round of the Superprestige series, finished 13 seconds ahead of world champion Mario de Clerq and defending World Cup champion Sven Nijs. Dutchman Richard Groenendaal finished fourth, again missing the podium on the heels of a Belgian sweep. The four men remained close throughout the opening portion of the race, with Wellens and Nijs trading the lead. With two laps remaining, Wellens made a decisive attack, building a 10-second gap within 500

Wellens wins

American Jonathan Page

Wellens wins GP Frankfurt

The UCI's five-race World Cup of cyclo-cross kicks off this Sundaywith the Grand Prix of Frankfurt. Earlier this year, we had a chance tospeak with the series’s technical director Adri Van der Poel about whathe has in mind for this season, for the future and for the sport in general.When he took over his current job two years ago, Van der Poel said he wasready to make changes: changes in course design, changes in the scheduleand, “hopefully, some changes in attitude.” With more than 20 years of mud-slogging and barrier-hopping behind him,the Dutch superstar brought a rider’s perspective to

Defending World Cup champion Sven Nijs

Editor;I have a response about the whole "exploiting women in advertising"thing: Get over it.Yes, sometimes women are portrayed as beautiful and desirable in advertisingand sometimes even as soccer moms and successful career women, but it'snot just the bike industry. A lot of companies use women and sometimesmen (gasp!) in their marketing campaigns. Get over it.If you don't like a marketing campaign a company is using, what canyou do about it? Don't buy their product. Maybe even contact that companyand tell them the reason you are not buying their product is because oftheir

Following a disappointing 2002 campaign, management completed its off-season overhaul of the Saturn men's team on Wednesday when it announced its finalized roster, numbering 13 riders after the additions of Charles Dionne and Nathan O'Neill. Since the end of the season, the team has added six riders -- Dionne, O'Neill, Chris Horner, Tom Danielson, Phil Zajicek and Victor Repinski -- who will join returning riders Trent Klasna, Mark McCormack, Eric Wohlberg, Tim Johnson, Will Frischkorn, Rahsaan Bahati and Ivan Dominguez. The squad now bears little resemblance to the team roster

Fred Rodriguez is one of seven riders on the now defunct Domo-Farm Fritesteam who have yet to sign a contract for 2003. That doesn’t mean that thetwo-time U.S. pro champion, who had an outstanding classics campaign thisyear, is on the dole.Speaking from his Emeryville, California, home this week, Rodrigueztold VeloNews, “I’m still in negotiations with a lot of teamsthat are interested, but they’re all trying to figure out their budgets… or a lot of teams don’t have their financing all together. So at thispoint, I’m still in a holding pattern, waiting, like a lot of other riders[but] I’m still

After 21 years of racing - 12 of them as a professional - Scott Moninger had been thinking of how he might eventually leave the sport of cycling. It's not that he had to - Moninger is the winningest cyclist in the country with a total of 209 career victories, and is still winning races - it's just that it's time. By the age of 36, any pro athlete starts seriously considering retirement. In fact, Moninger and his wife had recently agreed that he would probably race for another two years before moving on to the next phase of his life. But Moninger may no longer have that option. On

Scott Moninger's e-mailed statementNov 19, 2002Dear friends, family and fellow cyclists,On or around the 22nd of November, certain information regarding myselfwill become public. It will not be good news but I thought that hearingmy side of the story first, might lessen the shock a little when you doread this, or hear about it in a few days. Some of what you will read inthe media and hear on the streets will be accurate, and some of it willnot. I can assure you however, that everything written here in this e-mailis 100 percent fact.In early July I began preparing for one of the biggest

VeloNews technical writer Lennard Zinn is a frame builder, a formerU.S. national team rider and author of several books on bikes and bikemaintenance. Zinn's VeloNews.com column is devoted to addressing readers'technical questions about bikes, their care and feeding and how we as riderscan use them as comfortably and efficiently as possible. Readers can sendbrief technical questions directly toZinn. Zinn’s column appears regularly on VeloNews.com.Question:It would seem like the ultimate night riding light would be an L.E.D.light for light weight and efficiency. Has there been anyone working

It was exactly 100 years ago today that the three words “Tour de France”were first mentioned in connection with bicycle racing. On November 20,1902, in the Paris newspaper offices of the sports daily, L’Auto,three journalists were sitting around chatting about their circulationwar with their bigger cross-town rival, Le Vélo.L’Auto’s editor-in-chief Henri Desgrange asked his two colleaguesif they had any ideas to increase their number of readers. The answer camefrom the paper’s cycling editor, Géo Lefèvre.“Why not a cycling tour of France?” he said.Intrigued, Desgrange invited his young editor

American professional cycling pioneer Jonathan Boyer was sentenced Tuesday to one year in jail and probation in a Salinas, California, courtroom after pleading guilty in September to 10 felony counts of child molestation. Boyer, a resident of Seaside, California, was allowed to meet with family members before being taken into custody in handcuffs by a court bailiff. Boyer will serve his sentence in Monterey County Jail. "I don’t think there is a chance in the world that Mr. Boyer will violate probation," Boyer’s attorney, Tom Worthington, said in court. "What he did is a serious crime and

Moninger faces two-year suspension

Le Tour was invented 100 years ago today

Ever wonder how manufacturers choose the colors and graphics for their upcoming products? While some take a decidedly low-key approach ("My girlfriend's eyes are azure blue, so let's go with that"), others are meticulous in their selection process. When GT was still GT, the company was rumored to have spent almost a quarter million dollars researching the "perfect" looks for its 2001 product line. Part of that process including using involved focus groups and scientific analysis in which participants were hooked-up to diagnostic equipment to monitor specific emotions as subjects were

Monique Ryan is the nutrition columnist for VeloNews andInsideTriathlon magazines and is founder of Personal Nutrition Designs, aconsulting company based in the Chicago area. Ryan will try to answer selectedquestions each week in her regular on-line question-and-answer column.Readers are welcome to send questions to Ryan.Why not real food?Dear Monique;Please help shed some light on a topic that is hotly debated amongmy triathlete friends. It's about post workout nutrition. There seem tobe two schools of thought that, I'm sure, both have validity.First, there are those who swear that a

A source of inspiration.

A year ago this color was going 240mph.

Belgian Bart Wellens (Spaar-Select) easily won the third round of the Superprestige cyclo-cross series in northern Belgian city of Gavere on Sunday. Wellens managed to escape early in the race and maintained a healthy one-minute lead throughout the hour-long ‘cross race. Wellens finished 1:22 ahead of world champion Mario de Clerq and well ahead of fellow Belgians Peter van Santvliet and Sven Nijs. Indeed, Belgians swept the top five spots on Sunday, leaving Dutchman Richard Groenendaal, who finished in sixth place along side Belgian Erwin Vervecken, as the day’s top “non-Belgian”

Two of cycling's most celebrated one-day classics could be pulled from next year’s 10-race World Cup series because of an ongoing dispute over television rights, UCI president Hein Verbruggen said Monday. During a presentation of the Union Cyclist Internationale’s World Cup schedule, Verbruggen said that Milan-San Remo, the World Cup opener in March, and the season-ending Tour of Lombardy could be pulled off the calendar because Italian broadcasters RAI are still at odds with the European broadcasting authority over financing. The consequence is that the races have little coverage

Vuelta a España winner Aitor Gonzalez will ride next season for the Italian Fassa Bartolo team after signing a two-year deal here Monday despite an ongoing dispute with the Acqua e Sapone team. The 27-year-old Spaniard now looks assured of a safe passage to the Italian set-up after an acrimonious few weeks. Top International Cycling Union (UCI) official Alain Rumpf told the French wire service AFP that Gonzalez is clear to ride as a member of the Fassa Bortolo squad. "Given the documents we now have it looks as if Aitor Gonzalez will be able to ride for Fassa Bortolo next season," Rumpf

Bas and Gerome were coolEditor;Two of the coolest guys I have met in my 15 years of bike racing, Jerome Chiotti, and Bas Van Dooren-both admitted cheaters, drug users. There is something good about their character. Is this saying I am lover of drug users? Of course not. I am just pointing out that only two guys have ever admitted it, and I like that Bas and Jerome are really great guys. Heck everyone and their mother smokes pot in this world, and I think that should be illegal, how come everyone praises a pot smoker and not situations like this?These guys made a huge mistake and realized it,

Jan Ullrich declared Sunday he will be ready and determined to win the world's greatest cycling race for a second time. The 28-year-old, who won the Tour de France in 1997 and has been runner-up in four Tours, is currently without a team having resigned from Telekom after admitting taking ecstasy on a night out with friends while recovering in hospital after a second operation on a troublesome knee. However Ullrich said that he would be ready to compete when his suspension ends on March 23, 2003 and expects he will be riding for the CSC team, managed by former teammate Bjarne Riis, who

Swiss cyclist Jean Nuttli failed in his second bid Saturday to beat the world hour record held by Britain's Chris Boardman. Nuttli rode 47 kilometers and 93 meters on the indoor track in Bordeaux, France, well short of the 49.441km set by Boardman in October 2000 in Manchester, England. The 28-year-old Nuttli also tried to break the record on Friday on the same track but gave up a third of the way into his bid after 21min 2sec and 17km of riding. Nuttli, who was seriously obese as a teenager, famously lost 57 kilos when he was 22 years old thanks to a draconian diet and hours of