Shoes, Ships, and Sealing Wax

A time to mourn

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.

That may be my favorite reading, or at least my favorite of the usual funeral readings, but we didn't have that at the funeral today. Instead it was the one from Wisdom, the one that has

They seemed, in the view of the foolish, to be dead; and their passing away was thought an affliction, and their going forth from us, utter destruction. But they are in peace.

My aunt was in pain, and now she is not. I'll leave the thoughts of whether she's at peace or merely gone for another time. Death usually has me pondering that, but this time I'm not worried about when I die, I'm thinking about living without my aunt in my life.

Not over

Just as my aunt zoomed through the pre-active stages of dying, I zoomed through the Kübler-Ross grief stages and made it to 5 (acceptance) right away, no problem.

Uh-huh. I thought so, but after I got home this afternoon, I slipped back into Stage 4, Depression.

And it's not on the Kübler-Ross scale, but I think there's a Stage 3.5: utter uselessness.

I keep losing my train of thought. I have a list of things that need to be done as long as my arm (or I would, if I had the wherewithal to sit down and make a list). So what did I do tonight? I wandered around the mall looking for a Snoopy tie for Victor to wear to the funeral. (One of her final instructions was that people were not to wear black, somber clothes to the service.)

I lost the train of thought again.

Oh yeah. So at the mall, I walked by a bench and saw from behind a woman with gray curly hair, about my aunt's height and build before the cancer caught up to her. I almost walked around to the front to see if she looked like my aunt from the front too, but I didn't. I don't need to be seeing dead people.

Damned if she didn't end up following me all over the mall, although each time I saw her it was from the back.

There's no cosmic significance, just the realization that I still have some grief to work through.

Over

My aunt was a secretary by profession. She worked for a bank, in fact, for the president. I met him a number of times and he always gave me the impression by his praise of her that my aunt could have been the one running the bank, and that was probably true.

She was very organized and efficient.

I was not overly surprised when I got the call around 4:30 this afternoon that she had died. The signs she was showing last night may have been the One to Two Weeks Before Death list, but she ran through the two week process in under two days.

When I took the Bible from her nightstand, I saw that she had been faithfully recording the deaths. On the page that listed her parents, her brothers and sister, and her sisters-in-law, there was one line left. She had said more than once "I'm the last one left," so we filled it in.

I keep thinking

Will the circle be unbroken
By and by, Lord, by and by
There's a better home awaiting
In the sky, Lord, in the sky

I know my aunt believed this, no, she knew it as an immutable fact. I expect that made it easier for her to go.

Continued

This will probably be my main preoccupation for awhile.

After I shut down the computer last night it was nearly midnight, which is hours past my usual bed time. I still couldn't sleep.

My aunt has chosen a "good" death. Back when she elected not to treat the cancer she said she was ready, and I guess she's sat in enough hospitals watching every other member of the family die that she didn't want that. Early in July, she had a bad night where she couldn't catch a breath if she was lying down, so she slept, as well as she could, in her chair. That was the sign to call in the hospice services, and she reminded my father then: no hospital, no ambulance.

Back to my rat model, sort of. I took one of the rats in to be put to sleep during the last year. I was nearly hysterical when I did, because I felt guilty...she had been dropping weight at an alarming rate, even though she ate like a horse, and I'd come home from work that evening to find her having seizures. I got it in my mind that the weight loss was a sign I'd ignored, and I should have taken her in to be treated.

No, said the vet, who is the guy who profits from my taking the rats in all the time. She was eating and happy and you knew she was old. We'll make the end quick and painless for her, but you had no reason to try to stop the course of nature.

Around this time my vet had been making frequent trips home to see his mother, who was very ill. He compared the situations, and told me how agitated his mother was, and how each time he was out there she was getting worse, until the last time he took her home. Then he asked her: which is worse, how you feel, or going to the hospital once a week? She was able to tell him that it scared her to be in the ambulance and that she wasn't comfortable in the hospital full of strangers. Although they could stabilize her condition, she was ready to stop being stabilized...she just wanted to stay home in peace.

My grandmother's last months...years, really...were marked by that: frantic ambulance rides, hospital stays. Unfortunately she'd had several strokes and could no longer speak much, so if it scared her, if she'd have preferred a different route, we didn't know.

I read an article a few weeks ago about the bird flu, and it mentioned that in our modern American society, we really have removed death from the course of everyday life. In some ways, the article pointed out, the developing countries can deal better that we can, because they are used to people dying at home and the families are used to handling the bodies. Except for the few professions who make a living dealing with death for the rest of us, it's a sanitized, distanced experience.

Between now and the time she dies, my aunt will not be alone. When one of the family can't be there, the hospice will send a volunteer. When my mom told me this, she said "Is that not the ultimate selfless volunteer job?" My answer was "I could never do it." I was scared last night.

I'm still scared, and I'm still sad. But I'm realizing that my aunt is giving me a great gift with this experience, as difficult as it is.

Deathwatch

Not a rat this time, although we have two who are not doing well. Not the dog.

I've mentioned my aunt a few times. She was diagnosed with lung cancer a bit more than two years ago, back during the cicada summer. I remember this because of the haiku

In the cicada's cry
No sign can foretell
How soon it must die.

I wrote about it then.

I spent the evening with my aunt. She's dying, and every sign fortells it. In fact, the hospice people left a booklet about the stages of dying, and her...symptoms, I suppose...are a bang-on match of what's listed under "One to Two Weeks Before Death" in the book.

What the booklet doesn't tell you is what you are supposed to do when you're sitting next to the bed of someone in the One to Two Weeks Before Death stage.

I wanted to tell her much I enjoyed it, when I was a little kid, when I spent the night at her apartment. How much fun it was to eat at the People's lunch counter and how I appreciate all the puzzles she taught me to do from the Dell puzzle magazines. How I will always revere Charles Schultz because of how much she loved Snoopy. How cool it was to ride around in her Chevelle.

A single woman driving a muscle car...I never realized 'til just now that she may have been my role model.

I didn't tell her any of this, because in the One to Two Weeks Before Death, the dying person is (according to the booklet) is letting go of her surroundings, moving inward to prepare to leave.

That, and my aunt didn't seem up for conversation. She mostly said "Oh, gosh," and a few sighed "Lord have mercy"s. That, and she tugged at the oxygen line, and pulled at the blanket, and writhed like she was in pain, although she'd had a few morphine shots.

The restlessness was in the booklet, too. It's metabolic, apparently. I can only hope she doesn't feel as uncomfortable as she seems.

Some people might find this massively disrespectful, to compare the death of a family member to the death of a rat...but I saw some real parallels between how I've seen the rats die, physically what they do, and how my aunt was tonight.

The little hospice book kept stressing that the dying process was natural, a shutting down, a gradual transition, and I suppose that makes sense. I couldn't help but think, though, that nature seems to have some kinder ways to speed up the process, like heart attacks or being struck by lightening.

Which isn't to say that I want my aunt to die quickly. I don't want my aunt to die at all. But she is dying. I wish I could know what she thinks of the process.

One of her few statements tonight, an unsolicited comment, was "I bet you never expected this."

She is right that I didn't, but I wonder if she was talking to me or herself.

Stage 17

Ho. Ly. Sh-t.

Floyd Landis may have crumbled in stage 16 but today he proved that he is a true fighter. He attacked at the base of the first of five climbs and raced onward to Morzine to claim a fine victory in one of the most exciting stages in year. He began the day in 11th place overall, and ended it in third just 30 seconds behind Oscar Pereiro.

Ok, usually this is where I'd say "This is why I'm not a prognosticator," but today I don't feel so bad about it, because I'm wasn't alone in thinking Floyd Landis was out of contention.

Let me explain why. It isn't because I don't think that Landis is a superstrong rider capable of amazing things...it's because cycling is a team sport. The strongest rider in the world isn't as strong as a hundred strong riders.

Basically, every stage of the Tour you have a group of guys who are trying to win the stage. The peleton lets them go, because those guys aren't considered a threat to the overall goal, having the yellow jersey in Paris. If a guy who is a contender tries a breakaway, the teams of the other contenders will organize and run him down.

Last night, Victor and I were talking about this, and I said something about how CSC, T-Mobile, and Rabbobank would make sure Landis didn't gain more than a minute. (Victor pointed out that I needed to add Illes Balears, Oscar Pereiro's team, to that list.) I was thinking that was sad, because it took away Landis' chance to win the stage, which would have been a consolation prize. I was thinking he might get a stage win on the time trial Saturday, at least.

Now, the reality of today sure proved me wrong. All I can figure is that, since Landis was pretty much alone, the leaders decided there was no way he was sufficiently recovered to make those climbs and keep that big ol' time gap through the entire afternoon. (No way to prove this, but I'm thinking if Axel Merckx and maybe another green and gold rider had been there with Landis, the peleton would have closed up that gap.)

I keep saying...why did this happen? I can't wait to get home to watch my OLN tape, to see what better minds than I have concluded. I do have one other theory, or more of a contributing factor idea, and that is that the teams were so scrambled by the last-minute withdrawls of the expected leaders, so even by Stage 17 there's more chaos than order. Convention wisdom is right out the window.

But the bottom line...this is so freaking exciting. Those Lance-only twits who aren't watching this year don't know what they are missing.

TdF quote(s) of the day

From Floyd, of course. It's too long to quote the whole statement, so just go over to Procycling and check it out.

Ok, ok, maybe this will get you to click over:

How will I deal with it mentally? I’ll drink some beer.

I'm printing this out and I'm reading it after every ride.

Anybody see the stage?

What the hell happened? I wanted drama, but not this much drama.

It was frustrating to "watch" this via the text updates, because I couldn't see why Floyd Landis folded...was it simply coordinated attacks and he was stranded without his team? Did he bonk? His hip?

I keep loading VeloNews, but obviously it'll take a few hours for the reporters to get the interviews done and the stories filed.

Man. The day of the time trial, when Levi Leipheimer had such a horrible ride, I said "What a bad day to have a bad day." Square that...no, cube that...for Landis today. He dropped like a stone in the GC, down to 11th.

I of course don't make predictions or do analysis...but it seems to me that Floyd would need the rides of his life tomorrow and Friday, the time trial of the century on Saturday, and perhaps some lucky flats and a case of food poisoning in the CSC and Rabobank buses to come back now.*

(Speaking of Levi Leipheimer, though, he had a good day today. He's back up to 9th overall, 3:24 back, after being down 10 minutes-and-some before they hit the mountains. But that's the difference...the race changes completely when you hit the mountains, but it doesn't totally flip again between the mountains and Paris.)

*I'm the kiss of death, right? So maybe if I say Floyd's down for the count...go Klodi...

News flash

It's hot. In July.

Hold the presses.

Y'know, I like it hot in the summer. I rode home today with my windows down, happy as a clam. I was wearing seersucker. I was quite comfortable.

Ok, it would suck to be repaving a road today.

But for the most part, I think I'd be fine in the days before air conditioning. I'd sit in the shade. I'd wear seersucker and linen. I'd drink lemonade.

...Good God. Maybe I am a Southerner.

Fall down go boom

We rode on the canal today. It was great...the July heat and humidity was tempered greatly by the shade, I kept my pace easy and my heart rate out of the red zone, and you don't get views like this from the road:

Beats the spandex shorts off road riding. We did just shy of 25 miles and it was nearly perfect. I only wish I could have a do-over for two little moments.

The first, I was riding around a gate, and I'll share the internal monologue:

Don't hit the gatepost, dumbass.
Aw, crap.
Raise your arms! You don't want to fall on your hands!
Oooooh, soft ground.
Soft and cool. Soft and cool and green. Green...oh man, I hope this isn't poison ivy.

It wasn't poison ivy (I think it was actually wild strawberry), and I squirted the dirt out of the scrapes on my right knee and we rode on.

Then later, as we finished up the ride, we had to go around another gate. I said "I think I'll walk the bike, ha ha ha." After I was safely past the post, I got back on for the last few yards through the gravel parking lot. The internal monologue for that one went something like

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Why is there gravel in my mouth?

That one hurt. I didn't have the presence of mind to raise my arms, so I took most of the fall on my right hand. (Luckily I was moving pretty slow, so all I have to show for it is a big swollen bruise, not a broken wrist or collarbone.) I also scraped up the left knee (which hurt like a bitch to scrub clean), and now it is turning funny colors and has an extra lump, too.

On the drive home I was thinking I was pretty lucky not to be hurting worse, but then a few hours later, I'm hurting worse.

Want to know what's funny?

This is still the best ride I've had in years.

I love July

Of course my favorite thing about July is the Tour de France, especially when it's an exciting race. (Yay, Jens! Jens Voigt, born in 1971, isn't quite old enough for my Grey Jersey classifications, but I like him a lot anyway. And for those of you following the Tour only in the popular American press...there is a difference between losing the lead and not bothering to defend the lead. There is still a week to go...although didn't Oscar Pereiro do some good riding in the Alps last year? This could be a great competition!)

Here are the other reasons I love July:

That ratatouille...the squash, green pepper, and basil came from my garden, and the tomato and eggplant came from a local farm.

But even better:

Blackberries from the farm.

And since I just finished reading The Omnivore's Dilemma, instead of Cool Whip, I picked up a carton of heavy cream and whipped that instead.

As we finished dessert, I said "I could eat this every day." But of course, I can't, since blackberries have a pretty short season, and though it's not too far away, the farm isn't next door, either. We only get this a couple of times a year, only in July.

And that is why I love this time of year.

Stage 11

The Col du Tourmalet is my favorite of the Tour de France mountains. (I don't know why, and as I typed that, I realized, what an odd thing of which to have a favorite.)

To me, of course, any grade increase is hors catégorie, so when I hear the Phil Liggett voice in my head (c'mon, everybody does that...right?) it's always Tourmalet I'm climbing. (The Pyrenees are not kind, and Nic is really suffering...)

Anyway, today was the stage I've been waiting for, and what fun it was. I guess I must be pulling for Landis now, because I found myself on my feet trying to hold Dessel back as he finished.

I was bummed that Iban Mayo abandoned...that must have hurt, especially on his home turf. I would love to know what he was saying to the camerman who was hanging over him, though.

TdF quote of the day

The race don't think like commentators do.

-Phil Liggett

Actually, he said that during one of last week's stages, but I think it works well enough today, too.

I can do another one that is from today:

I had a secret hope this season and that was to do something on the Tour. Not to win it. I'm not getting carried away. But maybe to win a stage. And here I am with the yellow jersey.

-Cyril Dessel

I love it. Spread those yellow jerseys out!

Lordy, Lordy, she saw the light

As the gf wrote, cycling didn't exactly suck on Saturday. It may not have been perfect, but she sounded almost enthusiastic as we discussed future rides on the way home.

She and I, simply put, ride at different speeds. Part of that is our bikes. My road bike* has a racing geometry, which means I'm spread out and am in a more aerodynamic position. My position is such that on a certain hill at Seneca Creek State Park I can get into a real tuck, coast down that hill at close to 30 mph, and continue coasting almost completely up the next (admittedly smaller) hill.

It's got a short wheelbase, pretty narrow tires, a pretty tight gearing range--it's a sports car, built for speed.

Nic's bike is a fitness/touring bike. She rides a first model-year Bianchi Strada** which uses a frame identical to the Bianchi Volpe, a touring bike.

Touring bikes, on first glance, look like road bikes with a double-triangle frame and drop handlebars, but a closer inspection will reveal subtle differences--they have a longer wheelbase, wider tires, and a wider gearing range. She also has a rather upright riding position (less aero) due to the straight handlebars and tight cockpit (which is due to the bike being slightly too small for her). In Nic's case, her Strada also has smaller chainrings than a racing bike (and for most touring bikes, to be honest). Think of the chainrings as a transmission, and think of the whole touring bike as a station wagon.

Another important difference is the engine--that is, me and Nic. I ride faster, but part of that is my transmission--I've got a higher gearing range. But, yeah, I've got more endurance, my heart rate stays lower, and I recover faster. I'm no racer by any stretch of the imagination, but neither of us can deny that, in the end and for several varied reasons, we end up riding at different speeds.

Thinking about the century, I want to ride with her. It doesn't bother me to go slow; OTOH, it seems to bother her to feel she's holding me up. Funny thing is, is we both recognize there's a solution, but we just don't have the room to store the thing--or a way to move one to and from the trailhead.

* Specs linked are for the 2006 steel-and-carbon frame model; mine is an '01 or '02 all-steel frame but the geometry is, for practical purposes, identical. Mine is also built-up with lower-end Shimano components, not the mid-level Campagnolo components listed.

** Specs linked are for the 2006 model; Nic's is a 1999 or 2000 model. Components are all of comparable quality, although the specs for the 2006 cassette are different from Nic's.

Why do sharks live in salt water?

Because pepper water makes them sneeze!

My niece told me that one over the weekend, and I'm still chuckling.

In other stuff...I'm not going to recap every stage of the Tour, because anybody who cares is already glued to the sites with the good Tour news. (I have some listed there on left, if you need to catch up.) The first week has had me saying "holy sh*t" an awful lot, from the doping through the crashes to today's news that Floyd Landis pretty much has no hip left. (I've known people with avascular necrosis, and it is seriously debilitating before the hip replacement...I can understand that being on the bike is probably about the most comfortable Landis is. I wonder how he can sleep though the pain, though.)

Since Sori isn't in the home run derby, I'm not payng much attention to the All-Star stuff until the actual game tomorrow, but I was anxiously awaiting the news from Stan Kasten about what the RFK makeover would include. I'm happy to see half smokes on the list.

In theory they are also going to improve the fan experience by giving the staff more customer service training. I must say, we've been to a lot of games already this year, and I haven't seen customer service as an issue. Really. The ushers, the concessionairres, the security guards, they've all been really friendly and helpful. (One game last week...probably the 4th, when it was so brutally hot...my ponytail band broke, so I went to the souvenir stand hoping to find a Nationals scrunchy. [I hate that word, but that's what people call 'em.] They don't sell them, but the vendor realized why I needed one [my hair must have looked awful] and offered me a regular rubber band. Little things like that have been the rule, not the exception.)

I did hear a rumor that spiffing up the stadium would involve painting Hondo's white seats, but that's gotta be crazy talk...Ted Lerner was a Senators fan, after all.

And to wrap up this random post, another joke:

One muffin turns to the other and says "Do you smell something?"

The other muffin says "Holy sh*t! A talking muffin!"

(Blame that one on Victor.)

I see the light

Every time I've switched on the TV and sat down in the comfy chair to watch the Tour a voice in the back of my head had scolded me: you can't train for that century with your ass on the La-Z-Boy instead of the saddle!

The voice is right, and last week, I was starting to weasle, setting up the justification for doing the metric (62 miles) instead of the full 100 miles. Then the other night I ran across my ride log from 1997, the year I botched my century. I realized a couple of things: I worked really hard, and I was really hard on myself.

I decided that I really do need to try this again, but this year, I need to work smart, and I need to give myself more credit, regardless of what happens on October 7.

First thing I did was set up a list of goals for each weekend, miles and where I'd like to ride. Second thing I did was remind myself that riding a bike is fun...if I am dreading every hours of this training, why put myself though hell? This is an indulgence...I'm allowing myself to spend the summer playing on my bike.

This morning Victor and I went out to ride on the W&OD, a converted rail trail in Virginia. Committed Marylander that I am, I hate to admit that the commonwealth has us beat in nice places to ride. I like Rock Creek, but the trail is in awful shape, and it's so narrow that on a Saturday morning, it's a downright dangerous place to ride a bike. The W&OD, in contrast, is wide, well paved, and most of the people on it are polite about announcing when they pass or keeping their kids from darting out in front of you and stopping.

Anyway, we did 20 miles. I felt good for about 16 miles, and I finished up the last four by sheer force of will. This is typical of my rides.

Also typically, my average heart rate was 90% of my max, and more than once when I checked my monitor, I was at my max. So today I actually hauled out those old training books I bought ten years ago and ignored. Seems I'm doing my training in a zone where I'm pumping out lactic acid, which explains why I finish feeling like shit, and why I'm ready to sell the bike for scrap metal the morning after each ride.

One of my problems is, in order to approach Victor's speed...and in order to avoid being run over by skateboarders and dog walkers...I ride in a fairly big gear. I knew my knees didn't like it, but I don't have the endurance to spin and still move the bike forward. My new strategy...starting next week, since I now realize that tomorrow really needs to be an "active recovery" day...is to work on endurance. I have always focused on two numbers, miles and miles per hour, and all I've cared about is making those numbers bigger. For the next ride, I'm leaving the odometer at home, and I'm strapping the heart rate monitor to the handlebars. I'm focusing on time, and keeping my heart rate at 144.

And I'm patting myself on the back for getting as far as I did today.

This weekend didn't suck

One reason: it was six days long. When I get back to work tomorrow I need to start the annual Hell Project, so I took a couple of extra days off in anticipation. I got to watch biking, I got to go biking, I got to watch lots of baseball, and I got to see family.

I wish I could say that I caught this ball. Actually, I suppose I could say that I did, but it's a sin to tell a lie. The funny thing is that on Friday, Victor and I sat in right field, in the front row, in seats so close that we could offer popcorn to Screech

and see what snacks Bill Bray was taking to the bullpen

but that's not when I got the ball.

And on Tuesday we sat in left field (where we could see Alfonso Soriano and Ryan Zimmerman, not that I'm getting attached to either of them)

and we didn't get any balls in our fourth row seats, either.

No, my dad caught this one for me during batting practice on Monday night, when we were sitting in our regular (20-game plan, that is) seats in the upper deck.

I'm oddly excited about this baseball. I think I'll give it a prominant place on my desk with my Credit Lyonnaise lion to remind me of what I'd rather be doing in July.

It's business, not personal

Remember how I said that I'm not getting emotional about sports? Not getting attached to individual players?

For example, I'm not getting attached to Ryan Zimmerman, even if he has had two walk-off home runs this season, even if he does get the Rookie of the Year, even if he is nearly a local boy. Not gonna get attached.

Here's why:

Stars sign Jeff Halpern

Dammit.

Grey jersey

Victor and I came up with this a couple of years ago...the "best old rider" award. They award the white jersey to the best rider 25 or younger, but the guys who hang in there for years should be recognized too.

I used the totally arbitrary "older than I am" to determine "old," but that narrows the field a lot. This year I was checked birthdates and decided to go for "born before 1970," which gives us four riders:

Giovanni Lombardi, born July 20, 1969, CSC

Christophe Mengin, born September 3, 1968, Francaise des Jeux

Laurent Brochard, born March 26, 1968, Bouygues Telecom

Viatcheslav Ekimov, born February 4, 1966, Discovery

Stage 1, and we go for a mud bog

American George Hincapie is wearing the yellow jersey today, so perhaps the Tour will get a few minutes on SportsCenter tonight. (Cranky, cranky. I guess fans of soccer, or sailing, or any other niche sport feel this way, too.)

Instead of watching everything live this morning, we actually went out and rode a bit. (In theory, we are traing for that century, and I am starting to panic.) Normally we'd ride in Rock Creek Park, but sections are still closed from the flooding last week. I'm sick to death of the 5-mile cloverleaf of hills at the park closest to the house. So we decided to dust off the mountain bikes (well, Victor's is a hybrid) and ride on the canal.

I'm always complaining that I'm slow and it feels like I'm riding through mud, but today I had an excuse: we were riding through mud. (Before you say "Duh! Wasn't Maryland under water last week?" we did actually go up to Monocacy and check the towpath yesterday to see if it was in good shape. It was...at the Aqueduct, where the towpath is mostly pea gravel. We decided today to go south from White's Ferry, and that's a lot softer. Not that I realized that til today...)

I didn't have any trouble staying in my target heart rate zone, though, even if I was going only 7 miles an hour.

We got home in time for the last few miles of the race, so we saw the final sprint, and the drama of yesterday's winner Thor Hushovd lying in a puddle of blood after he crossed the finish line. Victor and I were both staring at the replays trying to figure out what happened. It looked like he ran into something along the barrier...you see him look back in the replay, although by the third or fourth time I saw the clip I was thinking he wasn't looking back, he was looking at his bleeding arm. Victor's thought was that he'd cut himself on the ties the plastic barrier, I've seen some speculation that he was cut on one of the hand-shaped signs the spectators have. It sure looked like more blood than would come from a simple scrape, but then in a sprint his heart was pumping, so I guess that would make any wound bleed more.

Whatever it was, I hope it wasn't as bad as it looked, and that they can stitch him up and that he'll start tomorrow.

See, I really did ride:

Update three minutes later: Heh, I guess Victor and I should communicate before we both start blogging the same thing. Well, he types faster, so my post will show up on top.

And Velonews has a picture of Hushovd.

Yellow and Red

Jersey and blood, that is. If you saw the end of today's stage of the Tour you were witness to a horrific sight: The yellow jersey Thor Hushovd lying on the ground, bleeding profusely from an injury to his right arm. The gf couldn't look.

Speculation is he was hit by a green foam finger (at 5:36) and was cut. What could be seen was, as he sprinted in, he suddenly looked to his right, possibly at his arm, and (you had to be watching really carefully for this) that as the camera followed the stage winner (Jimmy Caspar) the right arm of the yellow jersey was in frame briefly and he was already bleeding. Also, from the overhead view, you could see Hushoved was right up against the barriers and also that spectators were leaning over the barriers. Finally, it is also certain Hushovd was struck by a foam finger as he was sprinting for the line.

As I said, most speculation is the foam finger caused the injury. Me...I'm not so certain.

First of all, let's get the silly conspiracy theories out of the way: Yes, someone could have had a knife or razor blade and intentionally attacked a rider (either the yellow jersey or someone else and he just missed). Fortunately, that should be pretty easy to disprove: A weapon should leave a very clean cut and the medical examination should shed some light on the nature of the injury. I doubt very seriously that's what happened but it is certainly within the realm of possibility.

Speculation currently centers on the green foam finger, probably because replays showed Hushoved almost certainly struck one in the sprint. I, personally, find that hard to believe as I don't see how thick, soft foam could cut human flesh, even at 40+ km/hour (~25 miles/hour). Yeah, that too is within the realm of possibility but it seems, to me, even less likely than an intentional attack with a sharp object.

Overhead replays showed Hushovd was right up against the barriers as he began his sprint. If I'm not mistaken, the barriers are metal and are also covered with advertising banners. Something has to be holding those banners in place, and I'm more inclined to think it was one of those.

Working the AIDS Rides many, many years ago, metal barriers had vinyl banners on them. The banners were held in place with heavy plastic zip ties, and, quite frankly, the ties were not trimmed flush. Up to an inch of heavy, rather sharp, plastic was sticking out where they held the banners to the barriers.

I'm more inclined to think it was something like that that cut Hushovd's arm. The plastic on some zip ties is certainly tough enough and if it's cut short but sticking out, I think it could easily cut someone moving by at greater than 20 mph. The only way to determine this is to carefully examine all of the banners on that side of the finishing straight carefully...but, sadly, it's been about an hour since the stage finished and I strongly suspect the barriers and banners are already being taken down for a future stage.

Here's hoping Hushovd makes the start tomorrow.

UPDATE: According to Velo News, the green hand was not made of foam, it was plastic, and stiff plastic is certainly more likely to cause a gash than foam. As a result, Tour officials have banned those signs in the final two kilometers of a stage.

On another note, American George Hincapie of Discovery, has taken the yellow jersey, becoming only the fourth American to ever wear yellow in the Tour de France.

The drama!

Now we're racin.'

What got my heart pounding this morning was when OLN came back from the commercial break and Phil Liggett said "We are looking at an empty start house" instead of Floyd Landis. Just enough seconds went by for me to imagine all kinds of horrible or bizarre situations, but then Landis was on the road and doing fine. (The delay was caused by a tire change, apparently.)

I haven't picked a new favorite rider yet. It's been a not terribly well kept secret the last couple of years that I had a particular sympathy for Ullrich. I have like Landis for years too, mostly because he's nuts. Pick up a copy of the August Bicycling magazine and read the interview he did with Dave Zabriskie. If you are not rolling on the floor...well, you might as well not come back here until July 23, because you will just be bored to tears by the bike stuff.

Ok, a little more (or, Doping quotes of the day)

Racing starts late today (the Prologue is a short time trial), so I do have time for more doping talk after all...

Actually, this is an interesting interview that puts some perspective on what I talked about last night: the presumption of innocence or guilt that seems to be in play with the suspensions.

Cyclingnews.com interview with UCI president Pat McQuaid

Some salient quotes from McQuaid:

It is worth remembering that no other sport does what we do. In every other sport in a disciplinary matter they wait until the sportsperson is found guilty before sanctioning. But we - in compliance with the UCI Pro Tour Code of Ethics - can suspend a cyclist once they are implicated in an affair, as in this case. He will stay suspended until the due process is finished

I cannot deny that it will have an effect on the sport, but I have to look at the positive side. It has to be a message to all the other riders in there that no matter how clever you think you are, you will eventually get caught out.

Can you imagine a player's union of a major sport here agreeing to a code like that?

But again I have to state that everything we are dealing with at the moment is allegations. Everybody is innocent at the moment, until we go through a process which proves them guilty. That has got to be stated, clearly. These riders that are being sent from the Tour de France today are being sent home on the presumption of innocence. Because their name is implicated in this report, they have been suspended. But they have not been fired, they will continue to get paid. It is a suspension for now.

One downside to the less-than-zero tolerence that occurs to me is (cue conspiracy theory music) it makes it too easy to frame somebody long enough to knock them out of a particular race, and let's be real...the Pro Tour is really one major major race, two other big races, and a bunch of races that don't have anywhere near the return for sponsors and host cities. Suspended riders may be cleared in time for the Tour de Pologne, but that's not going to make up for missing France.

But at the end of the day, I'm a good ISTJ: if you sign something, you can't turn around later and complain that you're being held to what you signed. Here is the Code of Conduct for UCI Pro Teams to which everyone has been referring:

The UCI ProTeams undertake to:
...
IX. Without prejudice to the right to terminate the contract for serious misconduct, not to enter any licence-holder for events who is subject to judicial proceedings or investigation for facts relating to sporting activity, or any act constituting a breach of the UCI antidoping regulations, or any other intentional criminal act.

1. as from the opening of the investigation or proceedings:

· if the facts are admitted by the party in question, or
· if information from an official source available to the UCI ProTeam shows that the facts in question cannot be seriously contested;

2. in other cases, as from the date of referral by the investigating body or, where no such procedure applies, the date of the summons to the accused to appear before the trial judge for sentencing.