Why is everyone on this forum obsessed with Lance and the Tour de France ? I'm not sure if any of you saw the Giro but the second to last stage to Sestriere had to be one of the most amazing stages I have ever seen. To see Gilberto Simoni and Danilo Di Luca put down the hammer to that anonymous bloke from Discovery was great. I have never watched 3 hours of cycling and been enthralled by every minute of it. Watching all of the hand signals the conversations between the riders gave a great insight into the sport. Three things to stick in my mind was 1. Salvodelli frantically waving at the team car down the mountain to bring some water 2. Simoni chatting to Di Luca and giving him the elbow wave every time he needed him to come through and take a turn 3. The Lampre team car pulling along side Di Luca and giving him some water for all of his hard efforts in pulling Simoni up the mountain.
You just don’t see good racing like this in the Tour because the peleton has too much control from the bigger teams (namely Discovery/USPS) and a lot of riders could learn from Simoni and Di Luca for putting their GC places on the line in a chance to ride for overall victory. Simoni and Di Luca rode for over 40km on their own at a outside chance of winning the Giro in contrast to Armstrong who rode only 15km on the front for the entire Tour in 2004. Now can you see the difference between good racing and bad racing ? I just hope that this year that the others try and ride to win rather than protecting GC. (Jen's Voight you have been warned ride for Discovery again and your nation will disown you !) (also remember us Europeans have a romance with the sport and we like a leaders and winners to lead from the front and show themselves and true fighters and winners. Not to hide in the pack to ride the last 5km on your own.)
So stop the threads about 'Will Lance win the tour' and take a look around you as there is some great racing going on and you are all missing it with your obsessions about one man. Remember in Belgium and Holland no one in bike racing really cares about Lance or the Tour as the one day races mean more to them.
Here's to some good racing in 2005 and positive discussions not the boring repetitive mundane cra* we have been seeing and hearing on these pages. Come on !
WBT out.
