(Bloggers note: I created some nice paragraphs for easy reading but all the formatting was removed when published. Sorry!)
The Giro d'Italia is in full swing. There does not seem to be the same coverage for this race as there is for the Tour de France. I did find a good site that gives the results:(www.steephill.tv/2007/giro-d-italia). Check it out.
Kind of interesting the Floyd Landis Arbitration Trial started at the same time as the Giro d'Italia. However, there is a lot of side stories going on as well. Tyler Hamilton (US) was originally scheduled to start the tour but it did not happen since he was caught up with the Puerto doping scandal along with his Tinkoff teammate Joerg Jaksche. Ivan Basso is caught up in this as well and most likely will not be riding this year.
The way things are going I may have a chance to ride in the Tour de France. I have been taking extra spin classes just in case.
The Versus network is not running as much coverage of the Giro as they do for the Tour de France so I have been getting all my updates online. It is hard to really follow who the leaders are. I usually check for the Americans but I do have a couple of non American Favorites.
Robbie Mc Ewen (www.mcewenrobbie.com) is one of the better sprinters. When I first started following professional cycling I was more interested in the overall leader and then I started looking forward to the big climbs. However, I started to notice that the leaders usually hung out in the peleton and covered each other and the climbs were usually a group of riders in a breakaway that just kind of struggled to a finish.
(Real-time Landis update: I started writing this blog on evening of May 16, 2007 but it is now the evening of May 17, 2007 and I just notice some interesting events on the www.msn.com. It seems that Greg Lemond has testified that the Landis Camp tried to blackmail him. Here is the link to the article if you are interested http://msn.foxsports.com/other/story/6822648?MSNHPHCP>1=10035)
However, the sprints always end with the mass race to the finish. Each team works at getting it's sprint specialists up to the front. It is a mass of color which is very impressive and it always seems like Robbie Mc Ewen is usually the winner or at least in the top 3.
At this year's Giro D'Italia Robbie Mc Ewen won the second stage. Of course I did not see it. I really do not know the leaders that well. It seems like there are a lot of Tour riders missing.
This year pay attention to the sprint stages and see if you feel the same way.
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