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Cycling’s homecoming gameImagine for a minute that you’re headed to the famed Notre Dame Stadium.It’s game day, time for a little flag football and tailgating before youhead inside to watch the Fighting Irish do battle. Now imagine if insteadof football being your passion, you are a cyclist. Where is your NotreDame Stadium? What’s the game of choice at your tailgate party?Well, for anyone who has been involved in cycling for the last 15 years,the answer is simple: Monterey, California, is home to the big game, andthe activity choices are endless — as long as they involve two wheels.The event

Boonen repeats

The Mailbag is a regular feature on VeloNews.com. If you have a comment, an opinion or observation regarding anything you have seen in cycling, in VeloNews magazine or on VeloNews.com, write to WebLetters@InsideInc.com. Please include your full name and home town. Letters may be edited for length and clarity.OLN can blame itself for small cycling audienceEditor:Quote from letters:"OLN is under no obligation to cover cycling at all. None of the other networks cover cycling because it is a money-losing proposition. If more people watched, things would be different." That argument is a load of

The Austin-Bergstron airport is a lonely spot to spend a Sunday night. The place is completely vacant – save for a lone security guard and a guy washing the floors – and any form of caffeinated sustenance is either locked up behind a closed café door or held within the glowing beastly machine that won’t take my #@$%ing dollar bill. Reassuringly, a soothing voice continually reminds me that “any bags left unattended will be subject to search and could be destroyed,” despite the fact that there is nary a soul to either abandon – or destroy – pieces of potentially hazardous luggage. The

Boonen keeps the rubber side down and takes the win

Armstrong

Dekker moved into yellow on Monday

I promise. I won't. Really.

The feedzone.

Maybe a better alternative...

Come back and see us some time.

Voigt starts the week out in yellow.

Teutenberg is her old self again

Voigt took a few risks to get the prologue win on Sunday

Fabian Cancellara takes second

Dekker finishes third

Vladimir Gusev in fourth

Sylvain Chavanel is the top French rider, finishing fifth

Zabriskie finishes as the day's top American

Julich finished 17th

Landis debuted in his new kit... and the largest TT helmet on the planet

...and finished ahead of his old boss

What goes up, must come down

Cunego on the chase

Gil and Arreitunandia out front

A final day in the yellow jersey for Hondo

Burghardt leads

The women's podium

The men's podium

Arreitunandia outkicks Gil at the finish . . .

. . . but Gil gets the leader's jersey

Gerolsteiner rolls along with snow-capped peaks behind

On the road

The 2006 X.0 rear derailleurs will feature full carbon fiber inner and outer jockey cages.

The carbon cages are backed and rimmed with a carbon alternative to protect the otherwise brittle carbon from chain rubbing and impact. It will be available in three variations: mini cage (gravity); mid-cage (XC/general riding) and long cage

The new X.O shifters share the same general shifting principles as the 2005 X.9 versions, but have been engineered from the ground-up for maximum efficiency and performance.

2005 Junior PCT Grand Prix AnnouncedEvent Features Riders 18 years and Under, Sunday June 5, 2005, AtWachovia USPRO ChampionshipThe Junior Pro Cycling Tour is inviting boys, ages 18 and under, totest their cycling skills at qualifying events for a chance to race inthe Junior PCT Grand Prix.  The event is an invitational points racefor 20 junior male cyclists scheduled to take place at the Wachovia USPROChampionship on June 5, 2005 in Philadelphia.The top 20 qualifiers will race for prizes valuing $1000 on June 5thin the Junior PCT Grand Prix on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway after

The shifter pod can be moved in or out from a rider's hand for perfect ergonomics. The the larger downshifting trigger can be rotated 360 degrees for trigger/finger alignment.

CATCH THE SPIRIT WITH THE FIVE BORO BIKE TOURLARGEST BIKE TOUR IN THE UNITED STATES RETURNS TO NYC ON MAY 1ST30,000 CYCLISTS GEAR UP FOR THE TOUR'S 28TH YEARBike New York, in association with the City of New York and the NewYork City Department of Transportation announced today that the Five BoroBike Tour will return to the city streets on Sunday, May 1, 2005.The Five Boro Bike Tour-presented by Con Edison-will be commemorating its28th year.The largest recreational cycling event in the United States, the FiveBoro Bike Tour began twenty-eight years ago with just 250 participantsand has now

The X.0 triggers feature Zero Loss technology. Thanks to the trigger's high tolerances, four internal bearings and improved ratcheting system, when you press either trigger, a shift is instantaneously engaged.

My first live glimpse of the Tour de France came on June 26, 1963. I was sitting with my bike and a group of French picnickers on a grassy hillside in Picardy. They were big fans of the defending champion Jacques Anquetil, whose hometown of Rouen was the destination for that day’s fourth stage. As the peloton crested the hill and headed our way, the fans warmly applauded the riders, shouting out “Bravo, Jacques!” when they spotted Anquetil in the distinctive red-white-and-blue jersey of his St. Raphaël-Gitane team. Their hero was tucked in behind a teammate, who was wearing the yellow

The new levers feature real carbon fiber covers to provide improved clamshell structural integrity as well as help lighten the overall pods to an impressive 110-115 grams (over the current X.9's 130 grams)

Ah, March has finally arrived. That’s good news for so many reasons. March means spring is around the corner, and that means longer days, greener hills and girls in tank tops. It means that my birthday is coming up, followed by St. Patrick’s Day, one of the greatest non-reasons for getting drunk of all time. It means my income-tax refund is on the way, which should just about pay for the new mountain bike I ordered myself … for my birthday. But best of all, March means I don’t have to hear anyone else say, “It’s only February,” every time the pace heats up, the ride is longer than 35 miles

The Mailbag is a regular feature on VeloNews.com. If you have a comment, an opinion or observation regarding anything you have seen in cycling, in VeloNews magazine or on VeloNews.com, write to WebLetters@InsideInc.com. Please include your full name and home town. Letters may be edited for length and clarity.Where in the world is Chris Horner?Editor:Like many other American cycling fans I am eagerly awaiting the second coming of Chris Horner into the European cycling scene, but sadly I have yet to see a schedule or a race result during what is still very early in the cycling season. So what

Never shy to attack, Elliott's main quality was working hard as a domestique

Davis wins

Scheuneman leads the break

Liberty keeps things under control

Gerolsteiner hoped to set up Hondo

Lopez tries a solo

Leipheimer enjoys a soggy day in the saddle

Gutiérrez takes third

Leipheimer can take solace in that it's still early in the year...

... as can Damiano Cunego. Cunego is hoping for a win on Saturday.

Hondo is enjoying his time in the jersey.

Cunego at Murcia

Hondo's win surprised even Hondo.

Plaza could only manage second.

Hondo - and Gerolsteiner - get their first big win of the season

Murcia in springtime

Gerolsteiner was active all day.

Leipheimer starts his season with Gerolsteiner

Cunego and Tafi on the attack

Tafi tries his luck with Wuyts

Two-time cross-country world champion Roland Green announced Tuesdaythat he has been retroactively suspended for six months after testing positivefor a banned substance at the Houffalize, Belgium round of the World Cuplast May (see "Paulissen,Dahle rule Houffalize World Cup"). Green's suspension commenced July 4, 2004 and will conclude April 4th of this year. That is obviously longer than six months, but the suspension includes the UCI's pre-defined "inactivity period" for mountain bike racers, which runs from November through January. A hearing was recently conducted through the

Cunego has big goals this season

Former three-time world cyclo-cross champion Mario De Clercq has been banned from the sport for four years and cyclo-cross rider Ben Berden for 15 months, the Belgian cycling association (LRVB) announced Wednesday. De Clercq, who retired in November 2004, was involved in the so-called"Jose Landuyt affair," a scandal involving a veterinarian who admittedselling performance-enhancing drugs. Berden is banned until April 2006 after testing positive for the bloodbooster EPO (erythropoietin) in a cyclo-cross competition in Essen, Germanyin December. De Clercq's lawyer Peter Callebaut said

Beloki is still on the road to recovery

Sayers

Hondo gets the jersey today and may pass to teammates tomorrow

The sponsorship of domestic cycling teams is a volatile venture. In the past few years, it seems that almost every brand-name team lost its marquee sponsor. Saturn and Mercury, for example, were dismantled and their riders, some of the most competent and successful racers in America, were scattered to the four winds. But turmoil, as tough as it can be, almost always leaves a vacuum. And a vacuum can be an opportunity in the right hands. One group of racers and their sponsors taking advantage of this vacuum is Health Net-Maxxis. Formed only three years ago on a shoestring budget and around