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Boonen was hoping to add Het Volk to his palmarès

O'Grady and Flecha almost made it

Boonen and Nuyens driving the chase

A big turn-out for the opening round of Belgian classics

The Mailbag is a regular feature on VeloNews.com. If you havea comment, an opinion or observation regarding anything you have seen incycling, in VeloNews magazine or on VeloNews.com, write toWebLetters@InsideInc.com. Please include your full name andhome town. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. Writersare encouraged to limit their submissions to one letter per month.The letters published here contain the opinions of the submittingauthors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, policies or positionsof VeloNews.com, VeloNews magazine or our parent company, InsideCommunications,

"Races are like films. You need actors to make them happen. The teams have all the actors, and without us there are no races." — pro-teams president Patrick Lefevere The drudgery of a daily newspaper job is starting to look pretty good these days, and not just because the PETA contingent in the VeloNews.com audience objects to my habit of running a cute little puppy or kitty through a blender with some yogurt and fresh fruit so I can have a delicious protein shake for breakfast. Next weekend’s Paris-Nice is in turmoil, with the grand tours and the UCI locked in an infantile squabble that

It looks like UniBet isn't the only team wondering what the heck is going on in cycling.

Clerc and McQuaid shoot for break

Contador

UCI president Pat McQuaid, in happier times.

Floyd Landis and Tom Danielson battle on Brasstown Bald in the 2006 Tour de Georgia

Boulder, CO, March 1, 2007 - VeloNews magazine is designing thenext generation of our famous cycling training diaries and we want inputfrom you.  If you've ever used the VeloNews Training Diary, chancesare you have ideas to make it better. We're looking specifically for cyclists who have used the VeloNews Training Diary in the past. If this is you, this is your chance to voice youropinion about how you want to track your training.Fill out our online survey to help us design the training diary. The survey should take you 15 minutes or less, and the first 50 respondents will

Quick Step-Innergetic team manager Patrick Lefevere is poised to file suit against Belgian newspaper Het Laatste Nieuws for a series of articles it published about doping in the team, Belga news agency reported Thursday. In January Het Laatste Nieuws published a series of articles accusing Lefevere of complicity in doping at his team, citing blood-boosting drug EPO and cocaine as the drugs in circulation. The paper published its accusations through several anonymous sources. "No one will ever again see me in the same light they did before January,” said Lefevere. “The damages are

Jufre Pou gathered some critical data in California, even if it cost him a little time in the TT

A brave new world: Piles of data and the tools with which to analyze them.

Press Release - Help Design a New Cycling Training Diary

Tour de France Director Christian Prudhomme (L) and general director of ASO, Patrick Clerc

The Mailbag is a regular feature on VeloNews.com. If you havea comment, an opinion or observation regarding anything you have seen incycling, in VeloNews magazine or on VeloNews.com, write toWebLetters@InsideInc.com. Please include your full name andhome town. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. Writersare encouraged to limit their submissions to one letter per month.The letters published here contain the opinions of the submittingauthors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, policies or positionsof VeloNews.com, VeloNews magazine or our parent company, InsideCommunications,

DBC Events Announces “The Boulder Cup” Television ProgramAirs March 3 on Altitude Sports & EntertainmentFebruary 24 (BOULDER, Colo) DBC Events announced today the broadcastdate of “The Boulder Cup”television program, a recap show of the cyclocross race of the samename held last fall in Boulder, Colo.The 30 minute broadcast will air March 3 at 5:00 pm MT on AltitudeSports & Entertainment.Cyclocross has its roots in racers trying to maintain fitness in thecolder months by riding off-road andrunning over barriers. This niche sport has grown into the fastestgrowing segment of bicycling in

Petacchi is closing in on his old form

Sevilla is back

Bettini narrowly edges Gerald Ciolek in San Luis Obispo

George led an epic chase... with a broken arm

Merckx says Ullrich's retirement 'a sad way to go out'

Bennati - here winning stage 2 at the Tour of the Mediterranean - is starting his season with a bang.

Fighting Uphill

Complete Coverage - Amgen Tour of California

The near-universal reaction to Patrick O’Grady’s latest Foaming Rant about Jan Ullrich was a big thumbs-down, the general sentiment being that if anyone should be dope-tested, vilified and hounded out of the sport forever, it should be our acerbic editor at large. A representative sample follows. Tune in Friday as O’Grady takes on a basket of puppies and kitties with a ball-peen hammer. —Editor Karmically bankruptEditor:Way cold. I hope you're tutoring blind orphans in your spare time because otherwise your karma bank is gonna be way upside down after that number. I'm not an Jan

Our latest reader-submitted PhotoGallery is now ready for your viewing pleasure. Of course, a new gallery also means the naming of the winner of our most recent contest. This week, we kept checking out Jesper HV Lauritsen’s “Fighting uphill,” a picture that captures that intensity of racing one-on-one with the guy who might be beating you for a podium spot or 55th place. Jesper’s shot seemed to tell that story for us. Nice shot, Jesper. Please drop us a note at Rosters@InsideInc.comto work out the details and we’ll send you a copy of our new Coors Classic DVD. Meanwhile, go ahead and

Embattled German cycling star Jan Ullrich, a former winner and five-time runner-up of the Tour de France, announced his retirement from cycling on Monday. Ullrich was one of dozens of cyclists implicated in an alleged doping network in Spain last year, which forced him out of competing in last year's Tour de France along with many other top riders. The 33-year-old, the only German to win the world's most prestigious bike race, claimed Monday he never once cheated in his career. "Today I'm ending my career as a professional cyclist. I never once cheated as a cyclist," said

"Unlike [Lance] Armstrong, [Jan] Ullrich doesn't have the killer instinct. He's not obsessed. It's too bad. Because if you mixed the professionalism of an Erik Zabel with the talent of a Jan Ullrich, you'd have an Eddy Merckx." — T-Mobile team manager Walter Godefroot after the 2004 Tour de France Jan Ullrich has finally hung up his bibs, saying he never cheated despite pernicious rumors to the contrary, most of them coming from the Operación Puerto inquiry, apparently headed by a Spanish graduate of the Inspector Clouseau Close Cover Before Striking School of Earning Big Pay

Valenciana gives the Astana team a chance to try its legs.

Ullrich insists he did nothing wrong

Innocent or guilty, Ullrich closes a spectacular career on a sad note.

Ullrich struggled to stay at fighting weight, providing comedic fodder for a certain cartoonist

Danielson and Basso lead Leipheimer up Ocean Boulevard

Bettini at the back, enjoying the view

The break nearly went all the way

But it was Dominguez who took the stage and the podium, in front of family and friends

Leipheimer finished a little later

His biggest problem to date: a balky champagne bottle

The big Cuban pulls it off

The top three overall

Unzué is optimistic regarding Valverde's Tour chances

And who's this? Homeland Security? Hey, wait a minute . . . .

The big Cuban scores the only victory by a non-ProTour rider in this year's race

The break built a lead of three minutes and change

But once the chase was on, the escapees were pulled back

Leipheimer finished in the bunch to take the final overall title

The pace wasn't exactly killer

Leipheimer takes the overall

And away we go

Basso leads Discovery on the circuits

And O'Grady drives the break

Disco' chases

Leipheimer pitched in, too

Wiggins ripping it up

Johnson gets in on the action for Health Net

Haedo takes another win

But it was CSC's Haedo doing all the celebrating at the line

The audacious break

As for Hincapie, his reward was a visit to the race doc, who diagnosed a broken arm

Another day, another jersey

Leipheimer and Voigt, mano a mano

Hincapie and Cruz hit the deck

Back in the battle

And leading the chase

Discovery gets some backup from Health Net

Glad this day's over with

Rolling out of Santa Barbara

But not before official Carla Geyer does a little donut business off the back of her moto

Lagutin meets the fans

Leipheimer putting the hammer down

The happy podium

Another golden fleece for his collection

No word on where this guy finished . . . but the UCI is looking for him

Voigt hammered it, but conceded Leipheimer was the faster man today

The stage podium

McCartney was the top dog — until Voigt and Leipheimer threw down