By Bryan Jew, Assistant Managing Editor
I’m stoked.
After a weekend of watching the Winter X Games, I’m stoked to learn that, “Dude, great run. Are you stoked?” is apparently a journalistically acceptable interview question. All I can say is, “I’m stoked.”
I’m just glad the X Games weren’t around when we were kids. Who among us would have survived a childhood of trying to copy those moves? I don’t know how the kids do it. It was bad enough trying to ride no-hands and running into the trunk of a parked car.
How can you not watch the Winter X Games, though? Fourteen-year-old kids hucking themselves through the air, all the while twisting and turning themselves like contortionists. Loved that Carrot Top kid who won two snowboarding golds. I shudder to think, though, how much further can they take this stuff. You know, they’re doing backflips, on motocross bikes, on studded tires. What next?
Me, I’m sticking to the snowboard this weekend, but if my friends and relatives were smart, they’d put a two-week moratorium on me hitting the slopes after watching the X Games, just so any crazy ideas don’t stay in my head.
The good news here in Colorado is, we are finally getting some snow. Not that it’s doing much to help the drought conditions, but at least when the lawn’s covered with snow, it doesn’t look like a mini-version of the Dust Bowl.
Did I mention, I’m stoked?
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One man who is more than happy to leave the Boulder snow behind is Chris Wherry. Wherry, whose deal with Navigators was announced last week, was getting ready to leave on Saturday for the team’s training camp in Italy and its European spring campaign. In between paying his bills for the next three months, he had some time to sit down and talk with VeloNews.
A full feature will appear in next month’s VeloNews U.S. road season preview, but here’s a few excerpts:
On his new deal with Navigators: “We came to a conclusion on something and it looks like it’s going to work out. The money’s not great, but in this sport, we’re not in it for the money. There aren’t very many cyclists except for a few real big Euro guys that are getting rich doing this. We do it for the love of the sport, and that’s why I do it and why I continued to race when we weren’t getting paid two years ago with [Mercury]. … I’m at the peak of my career, and it’s just unfortunate that it’s in one of the worst economies that we’ve had in recent history in America, or the world.”
On going over to race in Europe, and his new team: “I had an opportunity to [sign] with 7UP, but the Navigators’ race program is what I want. It’s my dream and my desire to race big-time bike races, go over and do a major tour if possible. I don’t know, that could be a possibility with those guys. I just think it would be sweet, plus I’m psyched to be back with Henk [Vogels], and I think that the squad’s awesome. It’s pretty much the same as what it was [last] year, they’ve just added a couple of young guys, [Justin] Spinelli and Jeff Louder, and to add Henk and myself to that mix … between [team director] Ed [Beamon] and myself working something out, we’ve taken that team to a super power. They were gonna be awesome, regardless, with Henk and the guys from last year, but to add myself to that team, we have some serious depth on that team.”
On his upcoming travels to training camp: “The nicest thing about being on a new team, and their training camp’s in Europe, I’m traveling really light over there. I’m going basically with an empty suitcase, because I know it’s going to come home full. Seriously, I’m taking two or three casual outfits that I can go hang out with, one steppin’ out set for hitting a club or something like that if we have time, but other than that, I’m taking an empty suitcase, because I know it’s gonna come back full of new team clothing and … nice new bike, nice new Col-nago, I’m pretty psyched about that. … I don’t have to pack a whole lot, there’s no doubt about that.”
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In warmer climes in the U.S., the season is rolling to a start. The Schroeder Iron team is wrapping up its training camp in Southern California this weekend, and team boss Frank Schroeder reports that all is going well.
“The team’s coming together great,” he said. “The guys are riding fantastic. I’m really enthusiastic about how well it’s coming together.”
The team got its first taste of racing last weekend at the Boulevard Road Race and El Cajon Criterium in San Diego, but despite the team “blowing the race apart,” according to Schroeder, Prime Alliance’s Mike Creed took the win in the road race. On Sunday, the team lined things up for sprinter Miguel Meza, but traffic from a crash in the final corner tied Meza up, while local Greg Medinilla took the win.
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The T-Mobile women’s team is currently training in San Diego at the Olympic Training Center. The team held a late-November camp in Tucson, largely for the benefit of sponsors and media, but the current camp is strictly business, including lots of physiological testing.
The team opens the season on two fronts in March: in Europe at the Primavera Rosa World Cup in Italy, March 22, and the Vuelta Castilla y Leon stage race in Spain, March 26-28; and in California at the McLane Classic, March 22-23, and the Solano Cycling Classic, 27-30.
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In the Southeast, the Atlanta-based Genesis Scuba-FFCC women’s team has made some off-season noise. Last week, the team announced the addition of Canadian Sue Palmer Komar, who last year rode for the TalgoAmerica squad. Palmer, who will split time between Genesis Scuba and the Canadian national team, joins a couple of other newcomers, including former collegiate mountain-bike star Candice Blickem, who had a solid season on the Southeast road circuit last year. Also joining the team on a part-time basis will be 18-year-old Larsynn Staley, the former Saturn Development rider who took sixth in the junior women’s time trial at world’s last year in Zolder.
One of Palmer Komar’s Talgo teammates from last year, New Zealander Susy Pryde, will likely be seen more on the dirt than on the road. The former Saeco-Timex, Saturn and Autotrader.com rider has signed on with Specialized to contest the NORBA national series, the North American mountain-bike World Cups and “select 24-hour races.”
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January 31 was the deadline for Division 3 teams to submit their paperwork to the UCI. Fourteen U.S. teams have registered, including six that are new for 2003: Colavita-Bolla, Webcor, West Virginia, HealthNet, LeMond Fitness-Blender and Sportsbook.com. We’ll have more on all the teams in the coming weeks, and in the U.S. road season preview issue of VeloNews, coming in March.
U.S. Division 3 teams
7UP; Schroeder Iron; OFOTO-Lombardi Sports; Jelly Belly; Jittery Joe’s; Saturn; Prime Alliance; Sierra Nevada-Clif Bar; Colavita-Bolla; Webcor; West Virginia; HealthNet; LeMond Fitness-Blender; Sportsbook.com
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The Tour de Georgia (April 22-27) has released a preliminary line-up of teams for the inaugural event. In addition to Division 1 U.S. Postal Service, Division 2 Navigators and the other top U.S. domestic teams, the list includes the Dutch Rabobank team and the Dutch national team, with additional international teams expected to be named in the near future.
Tour de Georgia teams
U.S. Postal Service; Navigators; Saturn; Prime Alliance; Sierra Nevada; 7UP; Schroeder Iron; OFOTO-Lombardi Sports; Jelly Belly-Carlsbad Clothing; Jittery Joe’s; Colavita-Bolla; Webcor; West Virginia; Rabobank; Netherlands national team
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What to watch for: Jesse Ventura’s new talk show debuts on MSNBC some time this month. Early reports said that MSNBC wanted to incorporate Bloomington, Minnesota’s Mall of America into the show, with the show possibly originating from there. How could it not originate from there? From where else but a 4.2 million-square-foot, 520-plus-store shopping mall/tourist destination does it make any sense to host a talk show featuring a man who Newsday described as “a one-time Navy SEAL/biker/wrestler/movie star/XFL commentator/best-selling author/ radio-show host/former Minnesota governor?” Only in (the Mall of) America.