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Abbott rides into the lead

O'Neill is enjoying his return to the podium after a tough early season

Munoz takes the stage

After a low-profile spring, Oscar Pereiro is getting serious about racing during this week’s Tour de Romandie as he ramps up his preparation ahead of the Tour de France. Pereiro – who could be named Tour winner if Floyd Landis loses his legal battle to clear his name of doping allegations – has been relatively quiet so far this year. After the Tour, the Spanish rider will race the Vuelta a España, so all along he’s planned his season to have a strong second half. The Caisse d’Epargne captain is hoping for a strong performance in the six-day Romandie. “I will take the start at Romandie in

Italian cyclist Michele Scarponi has agreed to give a DNA sample to the Italian Olympic Commitee (CONI), which is investigating whether he may be connected to last year’s Operación Puerto doping scandal. A CONI statement said Scarponi had been called to the hearing "following the reopening of the investigation into Operación Puerto.” “He is suspected of having violated article 2.2 of the World Anti-Doping Code on the use and attempted use of illegal substances or methods,” the statement continued. After spending 90 minutes at CONI headquarters in Rome, the former Astana rider, now with the

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Fresh from his fourth-place finish at the 2007 Tour of Virginia, Rite Aid's Alejandro Borrajo made his presence felt at Tuesday’s Beaufort Memorial Cycling Classic, pipping Cuban sprinter Frank Travieso (AEG-Toshiba-JetNetwork) at the line. "I'm very happy. Now I'm getting the outcome that I was hoping for,” said Borrajo. “I think the racing in Virginia served me very well. I'm recovering well and I have momentum now, so I'm very content."

Markus Fothen (Gerolsteiner) won the first stage of the Tour de Romandie on Wednesday. The German outsprinted Spaniards Francisco Perez and Joaquin Rodriguez (Caisse d'Epargne) to win the 157.8km stage from Granges-Paccot to La Chaux-de-Fonds. Italian Paolo Savoldelli (Astana) retained the leader's yellow jersey. Fothen's win in the northern Swiss town took him to third place in the general standings behind the 32-year-old Savoldelli and Czech Roman Kreuziger. Five riders broke away just 18km into the stage and their valiant effort only came to an end 125km later. Veteran

In the last couple of weeks, we have done quite some racing: Pays Basque, the Ardennes and now the Tour de Romandie. They form a beautiful stretch of races, in the heart of the spring, with some of the painfully hard courses that attract masses of spectators and all the best cyclists in the world. Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the last and most prestigious of the Ardennes trio, is the longest, most historic and toughest of the classics. The race is an endurance test at 260 km with several tough climbs in the last 90km. The climbs are not incredibly hard but after six hours on the bike they

Last year, SRAM’s RockShox brand debuted a line of new long-travel single-crown suspension forks capable of competing with the market’s best. But at the same time SRAM admitted that it did not have the industry’s best-in-class rear-suspension components, especially after Fox Racing Shox introduced its RP23 air shock in 2006. This is what you call motivation. SRAM got busy, digging down deep into its BlackBox program. And at Sea Otter, program manager Jeremiah Boobar showed what had been unearthed: a 1998 BlackBox four-way coil-over rear shock that was ridden to two World Cup overall titles.

Nathan O’Neill (Health Net-Maxxis) and Rachel Heal (Webcor) won the opening stage of the 2007 Tour of the Gila on Wednesday. O'Neill covered the hilly, 16.15-mile Tyrone Time Trial in 34 minutes, 13 seconds. Ben Jacques-Maynes (Priority Health) took second at 15 seconds back with Chris Baldwin (Toyota-United) third at 1:29. Heal finished in 39:47, 15 seconds ahead of runner-up Dotsie Bausch (Colavita-Sutter Home). Mara Abbott (Webcor) took third at 30 seconds back. In its 21st edition, the May 2-6 Tour of the Gila will again send riders racing around the small southwestern New Mexican

Pereiro has his eye on July

Fothen takes the sprint

Savoldelli holds onto the jersey

Defending champ Cadel Evans says the early going suits teammate Chris Horner to a T

The Vivid long-travel, coil-over rear shock

The Monarch 4.2, RockShox’s high-end rear air shock

The new X.0 rear derailleur

The Noir, in single-speed with chain guard

The Stylo 3.3 Team crank is Truvativ’s workhorse crank

Juicy's carbon lever

The Code 5 lever

The Code 5 caliper

The Giro d'Italia and Tour de France may be a long way off for some - but the conclusion of the spring classics season on Sunday has brought the pink and yellow jerseys that much closer. The Tour of Romandie begins Tuesday with six of days of mostly climbing in the Swiss mountains signaling the steady run in to the first two Grand Tours of the season. The three-week Giro begins on May 12, and the tour of Romandie gives the race's pink jersey aspirants a chance to test their legs over some tough climbing terrain. Cadel Evans of the Predictor-Lotto team is the reigning champion, but

The World Anti-Doping Agency is considering relaxing its regulations to give the US Anti-Doping Agency a stronger voice in the fight against drug abuse in sports. Dick Pound, chairman of WADA, said Monday a proposed amendment to the World Anti-Doping Code's gag rule would make it easier for USADA to respond publicly when it believes athletes are making false or misleading statements about an ongoing probe. "If something is completely nonsense where someone is challenging evidence by saying there is no reliable test for X and there is, then it would be nice to be able to say the test is

Ivan Basso said Tuesday that he is "at peace" with himself ahead of his Italian Olympic Committee (CONI) hearing on doping allegations that may well decide his future as a cyclist. Basso, last year's Giro d’Italia winner and a pre-race favorite for the 2007 Tour de France, quit Discovery Channel on Monday noting that ongoing suspicions on him were damaging the team and its hunt for a new title sponsor. The decision has ruled him out of defending his Giro title in less than two weeks time, and has likely ruled him out of the Tour de France for the second year running. The 29-year-old

Old-school rims at Paris-RoubaixDear Lennard,I noticed that all the teams for Paris-Roubaix used old-school tubular rims for the race. How come they don't use the fancy composite tall rims as they do during the rest of the season? Did it have to do with their stopping power in the dry, dusty conditions or the punishment of the cobbles?Peter Dear Peter,Both. Carbon rims, especially deep-section ones, are so much stiffer that they are likely to crack rather than flex and bend like an aluminum rim would. In a crash, jagged carbon edges are worse than bent aluminum. And of course,

A quarter of a century is a milestone. It’s real history. When someone or something has been around that long it has had a chance to grow into its true being. In 1981, Yoshi Shimano, president of Shimano’s U.S. sales office, noticed a weird new segment of bikes popping up in the U.S. bicycle market and immediately informed corporate headquarters in Japan that Shimano needed to be a part of this new “mountain” bike movement. The following year, Shimano introduced the Deore XT component group to the world. Since other full component group options were virtually non-existent, both bicycle

The Freiburg justice department will investigate charges that two lead doctors from the T-Mobile cycling team gave cyclists performance-enhancing drugs, according to Thursday's edition of Suddeutsche Zeitung. Wolfgang Meier, the Bavarian prosecutor general, said his department was taking very seriously accusations made by a former masseur of the team, Jef d'Hont. D'Hont claimed the two doctors, Andreas Schmid and Lothar Heinrich, supplied the team with EPO during the 1996 Tour de France, which was won by then-team member Bjarne Riis. "The information available to us has

Italian Paolo Savoldelli (Astana) won the prologue of the Tour de Romandie on Tuesday, leaving his main rivals trailing in the hilly 3.5km time trial through the streets of Fribourg. The 34-year-old, two-time Giro winner claimed his fourth prologue win in the Swiss race, finishing with a five-second lead over Czech Roman Kreuziger (Liquigas) and seven seconds ahead of third-placed American Chris Horner (Predictor-Lotto). Complete results "I didn't come here to win but to test myself and to do the best possible," Savoldelli said after tackling the long steep climb and a flat sprint to

An astounded and elated Mark Hekman stood in the floodlit streets of Athens, Georgia, on April 28 as the winner of the Heyward Allen Toyota Athens Twilight Criterium. The 29-year-old Abercrombie & Fitch rider was one of the few in the elite men's field to walk away unscathed by an evening of spectacular crashes.Two significant pileups, one of which led to the neutralization and subsequent restart of the race, changed the fortunes of many hopefuls who came geared up for the kickoff race to this year's USA Crits and USA Crits Southeast series. At one point, dozens of riders went down

The heady days of Ireland’s Nissan Classic came to mind Tuesday when Sean Kelly was the subject of a photo shoot before the first International Tour of Ireland was announced in Dublin Castle. The new five-day stage race will take place in late August, starting this year, with major sponsorship from Fáilte Ireland, the country’s national tourism development authority. The race is being organized by The Event Group of race director Alan Rushton, in association with Shade Tree Sports’ Darach McQuaid, the project director. BMW will supply a fleet of 75 vehicles for the race, and Tipperary

Our latest reader-submitted Photo Gallery 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’s winning photograph had us wondering why we’re sitting behind a desk pining for time on the trails instead of heading to the desert. Take a look at “Joe’s Ridge” by Perry Brown. You can imagine a day’s worth of riding if you follow that line with your eye. Dang… enough with imagining. We’re going riding! Nice work, Perry. Please drop us a note at Rosters@InsideInc.comto work out the details and we’ll send

Romandie - here led by Liberty's Alberto Contador (now with Discovery) - is a good opportunity for Giro-bound climbers to test their legs.

Cadel Evans took the overall title in 2006

The new XT — plenty of choice for 2008

The new BL-775 brake lever incorporates Servo-Wave technology

The ST-M775 Dual Control lever does as well, both feature radial master brake cylinders.

Shimano’s new RD-772 is called the Shadow rear derailleur for its narrow profile.

Shimano’s new HB-M776 20mm XT hub hub can be purchased alone or in complete wheelset.

The new FC-M770 Hollow Tech II crank has a carbon reinforced steel middle chainring.

The new XT cassette has pins that extend rearward to catch a chain before it damages spokes in the event of an over shift.

The XT PD-M770 pedals look like XTR except for their logo and powder coat.

Savoldelli gets off to a fast start in Romandie

Horner says the legs are coming around

Kreuziger races to second on the day

The podium

Joe's Ridge

Do you have a North American race report? Wanna get the word out? Do you have something interesting from the local scene? Teams, technology, or race information/results? Send it on to Rosters@insideinc.com. Please include the appropriate credits for writers and/or photographers, and attach your contact information in case we have questions. Nature Valley GP adds crit in downtown St. PaulMinneapolis (April 30) — Organizers of the Nature Valley Grand Prix, now in its ninth consecutive year, have announced the addition of the Downtown St. Paul Criterium to the five-day stage race, which

As defending Giro d’Italia champion Ivan Basso awaits a hearing on his alleged involvement in Spain’s Operación Puerto doping affair, news reports on Monday suggest that another 49 cyclists may be implicated in new documents seized in the year-old investigation. According to Gazzetta dello Sport, a new 6000-page dossier from the Spanish doctor Eufemiano Fuentes implicates a new crop of clients in a scandal that has already ensnared several top riders, including Basso and 1997 Tour de France winner Jan Ullrich. The Puerto scandal erupted in May of last year when police uncovered an alleged

Beleaguered Italian rider Ivan Basso has removed himself from his two-year contract with the Discovery Channel team at his own request just days ahead of a hearing before the Italian Olympic committee for alleged links to the Operación Puerto doping investigation. Basso requested to meet with sport director Johan Bruyneel and general manager Bill Stapleton on Sunday. In a press release issued Monday, Basso said the decision to leave the American team was his.

Tyler Hamilton will start next month’s Giro d’Italia—at least, that’s what his Tinkoff Credit System management insists in the face of growing pressure to suspend riders linked to the Operación Puerto doping scandal. The names of both Hamilton and new addition Jörg Jaksche showed up in police documents released by Spanish authorities last May, but Tinkoff officials denied reports in the Italian media that the team has sidelined the two riders ahead of the May 12 start of the Giro. “For me, Tyler and Jörg can start the Giro. Stories that they are suspended are not true,” Tinkoff general

The final and deciding stage of the 29th La Vuelta de Bisbee unfolded Sunday on the high desert terrain of Southern Arizona. In past years, a familiar script had played out — a group would leap off the front, build a sizable gap in the rolling terrain west of Bisbee and be reeled back in as the mountains approached and the climbers took over. But this year, the gap was bigger, and there were able climbers in the breakaway. At the first intermediate sprint, a group of nine driven by three RideClean riders worked to build a 4:30 lead. In the break were Daniel Ramsey (Successful Living) and

When Tom Danielson joined VeloNews for a cup of coffee in an Athens java shop on the Monday following the Tour de Georgia’s final stage, it was evident that he felt a touch of remorse over failing to repeat his 2005 victory. “I love Tour de Georgia and I love Georgia. Every time I come here I tell my wife, Kristen, ‘Man, we should get a house up here in the Brasstown area.’ It’s just so beautiful and the climbs are amazing and the pavement is nice,” said the 29-year-old Discovery Channel rider, who was in town for a fun ride out of The Hub bicycle shop. “I love to fish and I see these lakes

Basso has asked for and been granted his release from Discovery

Ramsey takes the overall

Munoz wins the final stage

Danielson: 'Hey, look, man, there goes your race'

Jeff Frost and Tom Spiegel took over race organization responsibilities for NORBA in 2003; the year after the governing body’s national series saw its major cash sponsors jump ship. Since then the continent’s largest off-road racing series — now called the National Mountain Bike Series or NMBS — has operated solely under their direction. That was supposed to have changed at this weekend’s Santa Ynez Valley Classic mountain-bike festival, which hosted the second round of the NMBS’s cross-country competition. Spiegel and Frost outsourced organization of the event out to local promoter Mike

The final round of the Ardennes Classics went off Sunday morning in Liège. VeloNews senior writer was at the start and sent in these images.

Coming into the 93rd Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the number of riders named as potential race favorites was almost overwhelming. Nearly a dozen men were believed to have a serious shot at winning the hilly classic on its demanding course that suits a variety of riders. In the end, the cadre of serious contenders proved to be a hindrance for all the favorites, except one — Danilo Di Luca (Liquigas). The Italian, who won the Amstel Gold Race and Flèche Wallone in 2005, completed a career triple of the Ardennes Classics by bridging across to a late attack by CSC’s Frank Schleck and then jumping away

Tony Cruz is back in the European peloton after racing last season on the domestic circuit with Toyota-United. The 35-year-old Californian says he still has unsettled business in Europe and rejoins Discovery Channel more motivated than ever. Cruz talked to VeloNews at length about his career, why he refuses to compromise his integrity and how he still hopes to race the Tour de France this year. Here are excerpts from the recent interview: VeloNews.com: How are you recovering following your classics campaign? Tony Cruz: I have a little problem with the tendon that covers my left knee. It

Riding an early breakaway Sunday, Colombian Javier Zapata held onto the GC leader’s jersey to win the 2007 Tour of Virginia. Zapata (Caico) came into the 100-mile stage 7 with just an eight-second lead over second-place Alejandro Borrajo (Rite Aid), but 40km into the race, Zapata latched on to a 10-man breakaway. Borrajo did not, a problem his team attributed to a technological breakdown. “We had problems with our radio and never got word that Zapata was in the break,” Rite Aid director Jonathan Wirsing said. Showing no signs of slowing down, the breakaway stretched its lead to 2:45

A patient Geoff Kabush used his experience to win the Santa Ynez Valley Classic, the second round of the 2007 National Mountain Bike Series. The Canadian, suffering from admittedly bad legs, spent the day riding in the draft of Jeremy Horgan-Kobelski (Subaru-Gary Fisher) and Barry Wicks (Kona), before out sprinting the two Americans for the win. “I took one pull today and it was in the last 50 meters of the race,” Kabush conceded after the win. “Something wasn’t right with me from the get go, and I just tried to hang on today as long as I could. Luckily I just let Wicks and JHK chase each

Floyd Landis claimed Sunday that electronically stored data from disputed dope tests conducted on his 2006 Tour de France stage 17 samples had been destroyed at a French laboratory. Simon Davis, a technical consultant for Landis, told the cyclist that "critical evidence stored as electronic data files had been erased from the hard drive and the original data destroyed at the Laboratoire National de Depistage du Dopage (LNDD)," according to a release issued by Landis spokesman Michael Henson on Sunday. "The existing data bears indication of alteration," the release said. Davis was at the

The Future of the NMBS: A Conversation with Jeff Frost

Gilberto Simoni is well suited to the roads of Liège-Bastogne-Liège .

Amstel Gold winner, Stefan Schumacher

Horner loves this race

Rabobank's three-time world champion Oscar Freire was relaxed at the start.

Liège-Bastogne-Liège - A view from the start

Liège-Bastogne-Liège - A view from the start

DiLuca has to be among the favorites

World champion Paolo Bettini (Quick Step-Innergetic) said he's recovered from the food poisoning that saw him vomiting from the bike at Fleche.

Riding in his last LBL, Rabobank's Michael Boogerd is hoping for a good result.

CSC rider Frank Schleck learned Saturday that he broke a vertebra in his fall at last Sunday's Amstel Gold Race, but he's riding anyway.

Cruz readying up for Paris-Roubaix

A healthy gap. Di Luca has time to relish his win