ELECTION YEAR

A jet of mere phantom
Is a brook, as the land around
Turns rocky and hollow.
Those airplane sounds
Are the drowning of bicyclists.
Leaping, a bridesmaid leaps.
You asked for my autobiography.
Imagine the greeny clicking sound
Of hummingbirds in a dry wood,
And there you’d have it. Other birds
Pour over the walls now.
I’d never suspected: every day,
Although the nation is done for,
I find new flowers.

  — Donald Revell (b. 1954), Director of Creative Writing at the University of Utah

Once he dominated - now Lance could own the Tour - Sport - smh.com.au

Rupert Guinness

LANCE ARMSTRONG says the reason for his return to road cycling is to engage in a global war against cancer. He also says more details of his battle plans will be revealed on Wednesday, when he holds a press conference in New York while attending the Clinton Global Initiative.

Rumours are circulating that behind Armstrong’s decision, which will allow him to race in next year’s Tour de France, is an audacious plan that will change the face of cycling.

It may not be unveiled next week, but the word is that Armstrong is involved in a possible buyout of Tour organisers Amaury Sport Organisation from its parent company the Amaury Group.

Furthermore, Armstrong may saddle up in the deal with Hein Verbruggen - the former president and now vice-president of cycling’s world body, the Union Cycliste Internationale. Some say it may be an Armstrong-UCI deal.

Do the Aussie’s celebrate September the 20th Fools Day? Because this MUST be a joke.

Shimano Shuns Cables for Full Electronic Shifting

Japanese parts manufacturer Shimano is launching an electronic shifting system for high-end road bikes that it claims will vastly improve performance and reduce maintenance. By replacing the conventional levers that pull wound-steel cables through protective housings with solid-state switches and rubber-coated wires, there’s no chance for road gunk to clog things up and interfere with shifting, or, for that matter, your post-ride beer.

The principle of an electronically controlled drive train is to execute perfect shifts every time, thus “reducing mental overhead,” in the words of Shimano marketing manager Devin Walton. This is a resource cyclists find in short supply during epic rides.

Thursday’s announcement that the system, called Di2, will hit shops in January 2009 settles a question first raised in 2005 when prototypes began cropping up on the bikes of select Shimano-sponsored racers in the pro peloton. The system’s development has been photographed, chronicled and Angsted over ever since.

When it makes the pages of Wired, you know it’s going to be huge amongst all the techies on bikes in Silicon Valley … pretty much guaranteeing that at least from a sales perspective, the new group is going to be a success.

Is this the “more cowbell” of the cycling world?

Days of Me  

When people say they miss me,
I think how much I miss me too,
Me, the old me, the great me,
Lover of three women in one day,
Modest me, the best me, friend
To waiters and bartenders, hearty
Laugher and name rememberer,
Proud me, handsome and hirsute
In soccer shoes and shorts
On the ball fields behind MIT,
Strong me in a weightbelt at the gym,
Mutual sweat dripper in and out
Of the sauna, furtive observer
Of the coeducated and scantily clad,
Speedy me, cyclist of rivers,
Goose and peregrine falcon
Counter, all season venturer,
Chatterer-up of corner cops,
Groundskeepers, mothers with strollers,
Outwitter of panhandlers and bill
Collectors, avoider of levies, excises,
Me in a taxi in the rain,
Pressing my luck all the way home.

That’s me at the dice table, baby,
Betting come, little Joe, and yo,
Blowing the coals, laying thunder,
My foot on top a fifty dollar chip
Some drunk spilled on the floor,
Dishonest me, evener of scores,
Eager accepter of the extra change,
Hotel towel pilferer, coffee spoon
Lifter, fervent retailer of others’
Fumor, blackhearted gossiper,
Poisoner at the well, dweller
In unsavory detail, delighted sayer
Of the vulgar, off course belier
Of the true me, empiric builder
Newly haircutted, stickerer-up
For pals, jam unpriser, medic
To the self-inflicted, attorney
To the self-indicted, petty accountant
And keeper of the double books,
Great divider of the universe
And all its forms of existence
Into its relationship to me,
Fellow trembler to the future,
Thin air gawker, apprehender
Of the frameless door.

From Dig Safe by Stuart Dischell. Copyright © 2003 by Stuart Dischell. Reprinted without permission.

From www.cyclingnews.com - the world centre of cycling:

Neben, others sue Hammer Nutrition over contamination
Mark Zalewski, North American Editor

American cyclist Amber Neben, along with professional triathletes Rebekah Keat and Mike Vine, filed a lawsuit in a California district court last December against Hammer Nutrition, maker of Endurolytes. The lawsuit alleges that the product contained unlisted substances that caused all three plaintiffs to produce positive doping tests, and that further resulted in subsequent doping violations and sanctions.

Court documents obtained by Cyclingnews state that each plaintiff took multiple capsules of the product Endurolytes before competing in events in which each subsequently tested positive for 19-norandrosterone, a metabolite of the banned steroid norandrostenedione found in urine. Arguing for the plaintiffs is Howard Jacobs, well known for his work with Floyd Landis’ case as well as other professional athletes involved with doping violations.

The lawsuit, which was initiated by Keat and her twin-sister Simone, states that Simone had the capsules in question independently tested by the WADA-accredited Doping Control Centre lab in Malaysia in June of 2006, all before retaining Jacobs. That lab reported to Keats that the capsules contained dehydroepiandrosterone and 4-androstenedione. Upon further examination, after repeated requests by Keat, the lab also found the samples were contaminated with norandrostenedione.

Hammer Nutrition’s response:

Response to Athlete Lawsuit

(WHITEFISH, MT) On January 23, 2008, Hammer Nutrition LTD. was served with a lawsuit filed by three athletes. The complaint alleged that a Hammer Nutrition product used by the athletes, specifically Endurolytes, was contaminated with banned substances which led to the athletes’ positive drug tests in 2002-2004.

On February 11, 2008, the plaintiffs issued a press release. It is unfortunate that the plaintiffs have decided to take their case to the court of public opinion. We trust that the media and the public will allow due process and the courts to deal with this matter before rushing to judgment. While we empathize with the challenges that these three athletes face by virtue of their positive drug tests, they are directing the blame for their situation in the wrong direction. We are certain that when all of the facts are presented in a court of law, Hammer Nutrition LTD. will be vindicated of any wrong doing.

It will be interesting to see where this one goes … it would also be nice to see Hammer put out a statement of some sort indicating that controls are in place to ensure that current manufacturing procedures do not allow any cross-contamination … my guess, however, is that their attorneys are telling them that would be tantamount to an admission that at the time the alleged contamination occurred they did NOT have any controls in place; because, of course, that’s the way that lawyers think.

Is it cheesy to crib a post for your own blog from comments that you’ve left on someone else’s?

Fastgrrrl wrote today about having a sense of place, and how places leave their mark on people.

My place … I’m still trying to determine exactly where my place is …

It’s the Tennessee River, drifting along in a fishing boat. It’s Chickamauga Lake, learning how to slalom. It’s the dogwood tree in front of my great-grandmother’s house in Chattanooga.

It’s the treehouse my friends and I built with stolen building materials from the houses in our new development above Lotus Lake in Chanhassen, Minnesota.

It’s the cobbled roads and small little cafes and bars of Belgium, albeit not by bicycle, as I wasn’t a cyclist then.

It’s the North Beach bars and jazz clubs of San Francisco. It’s the streets of San Francisco dodging buses and taxis, and the roads of Marin County where I truly came into my own as a cyclist.

And it’s rapidly becoming the Utah mountains and canyons, where my knees scream on each attempt to climb higher, but my heart soars as I descend, whether with boards strapped to my feet, or astride my trusty steel steed.

I have a long way to go before I am defined by any one particular place, but as long as the journey continues, I will take it all in and make it a part of who I am, and who I want to be.

A couple years ago, I was tagged by the best chick at my wedding, the devine mamazilla, the wonderful Lindy Bunny, to list my idiosyncrasies.

I did then … but it’s time to repost, and expand.

G-bunny even sent me a handy-dandy definition to go along with everything to help set parameters:

id·i·o·syn·cra·sy n. pl. id·i·o·syn·cra·sies

1. A structural or behavioral characteristic peculiar to an individual or group.
2. A physiological or temperamental peculiarity.
3. An unusual individual reaction to food or a drug.

So here we go:

1. I’m a mean, cruel rotten bastard. Except I’m also a really wonderful kind and generous man. Except when I don’t want to be, which is most of the time. Except that I’m working really hard to have a more positive outlook on life and stuff.
2. I like cheese. Cheese doesn’t like me.
3. I was 39 years old before I ever owned my own motorized vehicle. Since I got it, I’ve hardly ridden my bike at all, except that I’m racing cyclocross now, and despite the fact that I really suck at it, I’m loving it.
4. I really like the cheese from Liberty Heights Fresh. It still doesn’t like me.
5. I can dance. I don’t like to dance, but I can. Too bad it takes me 4-6 cocktails to get over myself enough to actually let myself dance, because God forbid that all of those dumbfucks out there whom I don’t know and whose opinion I really don’t give a rat’s ass about might judge me.
6. I like pizza. Pizza doesn’t like me, either.
7. I fall for women who aren’t available. Want me to get hooked on you? Start dating someone else.
8. I wear socks and flip-flops (well, slides, actually) in public, on purpose. Short white socks. And Bermuda shorts that come below my knees. And I shave my legs. I’m a cyclist. It’s what we do.
9. I once had a phone number that spelled GAY-MONK, while living in a house that was painted lavender, on a street that was named “Younglove” … talk about playing games with the psyche!
10. I like beer and vodka, but not at the same time. Hmmm … maybe that’s not so idiosyncratic after all.
11. Cabernet? Yes, please!
12. I have a tendency to piss off people I care about, when I least want to do so. That’s an idiosyncracy I’d love to ditch.
13. I’m a firm believer in retail therapy. Unfortunately, I don’t have the bank account to get really therapeutic.
14. And yet, I still have 4 computers, 2 televisions, 2 pairs of snowshoes, 4 pairs of skis, and 5 bicycles.
15. I’m a Democrat, and I love Utah. Okay, not all of it, but I like thinking that my vote might actually effect some change, rather than just being another “yes” man like I was in NorCal.
16. Most of the time, when I buy shoes, I buy two pairs of the same shoe, but in different colorways.
17. I hadn’t bought a new pair of pants in at least 2 years … until last month.
18. I last bought underwear in an airport. Okay, granted it was Brook Brothers, which happens to have a shop in Port Columbus International, but still … who buys underwear in an airport?
19. I eat when I’m not hungry, and don’t eat when I am hungry.
20. I’m finally learning how to ski powder, but still fall over in the lift line.
21. Like I said, I’m a cyclist. That’s idiosyncratic enough for most people.

So now, faithful readers … all 3 of you … TAG! You’re it. I expect to see your posts within the week … or not.