Giro Finish

Miles from Home - 5612.4 miles
Firsts / Highlights - Lunch on terrace overlooking the Colleseum, Giro Stage 21, Colloseum, Forum, Capitol Hill, close-encounter w/ Lance and Team Estana
Miles Ridden - 0 miles
Vertical Feet - 0 ft
Route - No Route Today.
People - Brad Frazier



This post is from May 31, 2009.

Brad humored me today and followed along for all of the Giro viewing around Rome. Time trials are not usually the most exciting stages to watch, but this one had some extra drama heaped on. It was the final stage of the 100th anniversary of the race, and it was being held in Rome for the first time. Not just Rome, but a circuit course setup through many of the iconic images of Rome. The starting ramp was in the Venezia Plaza, then it wound through the ruins of ancient Rome, past Villa Borghese, into Vatican City, St. Peter’s Square, Castle St. Angelo and finished with a lap around the Colloseum. Closing down Rome for a bike race must not be an easy thing to get done.

Prior to the race, Brad and I walked through the team staging areas and watched the mechanics working on bikes and riders warming up. Just as we got to the Astana bus, there was a big commotion. I recognized from my time at the race three weeks ago that something was likely to happen and be over within seconds. Moments later, the team emerged and got on their bikes to go to the starting area 500 meters away. Levi Leipheimer brushed past me while I fumbled to get my camera. Then by coincidence, I found myself standing directly in line with Lance Armstrong who was about 10 feet away moving directly toward me. He was looking down trying to clip into his pedals without being taken out by the crowd. I knew that I would only be able to get one shot with my slow point-and-shoot camera, so I waited. I didn’t want a shot of the top of Lance’s helmet, so I continued waiting as he slowly moved toward me – still looking down. When he was 5 feet away, I needed to decide whether to step aside or wait just a little longer. At the last possible moment, he got clipped in and looked up. I was only about 2 feet away by the time I got the picture. It was simply fortunate that I was there when I was and recognized the commotion and was able to get to my camera quickly.

One of the unique things about bike racing is that the stars are so exposed. You can see from the picture how tight the crowd was. Someone as recognizable as Lance Armstrong needed to make his way through that crowd unprotected just to get to the start of the race. That is a lot of risk in an already dangerous sport just to get to the starting line. I mentioned to Brad that it would be like Tom Brady having to walk through the parking lot on his way to the Super Bowl. It just wouldn’t happen.



In the end, Denis Menchov rode well enough to slightly extend his 20-second lead and win the Giro. It wasn’t without some tension. After 2,200 miles, he had managed to get a lead over the second place rider of only 20 seconds. That was considered an insurmountable lead for Sunday’s short time trial, as long as nothing catastrophic happened. As the race leader, Menchov had the advantage of being the last racer to start on the course, which meant that he knew at every time check whether he was going fast enough to preserve his lead. Brad and I were positioned on the course at a place where we could see the riders pass once at 1 km from the start, and again at 3 km from the finish. Menchov took off quickly and extended his 20-second lead on the first half of the course. By the time he passed us for the second time, a light rain had started to fall on the Giro for the first time in 21 days of racing. It wasn’t much, but enough to make the cobblestone streets a little slippery. I said to Brad, “There goes the winner of the race, unless he crashes. With this rain, that isn’t out of the question”. Since we did not have access to a television, that was the end of it for us and we started climbing Michelangelo’s steps up to Capitol Hill.

It wasn’t until the next day that I learned Menchov’s advantage of being the last to start turned into a disadvantage. He had the advantage of knowing all other rider’s times, but he was the only person who had to negotiate the final turns around the Colloseum on wet cobbles. It turns out that he crashed in the final kilometer just as he was about to cross the finish line and claim the pink jersey for 2009. A team mechanic in the chase car was alert enough to stop the car and get a replacement bike off the roof before Menchov even stopped sliding following his crash. The mechanic ran the new bike up to him and Menchov was underway in time to preserve his lead and win the race. If the crash had happened 300 meters later, the chase car would not have been available because they were required to exit the course on the final curve. Who knows whether he would have been able to finish the race on the crashed bike? You can’t take anything for granted in bike racing.

Following a hike around Capitol Hill and The Forum, Brad and I returned to the team staging area to see what was going on. I expected that everything would be torn down and moved on like it is on a normal stage. Since this was the final stage, the riders just milled around talking to fans, signing autographs and posing for pictures. This was the first time I had seen them when they were not in motion. The most notable observation was that they all had significant scrapes and scars. Some wounds obviously happened during this Giro, and some had happened earlier in their careers. It made me realize that like football, no one gets out of professional bike racing without permanent damage.

In addition to all of the race-related activity, Brad and I covered the archeological section of Rome fairly well in one day. We toured the Colloseum walked through much of the Colloseum neighborhood. We know that it will be impossible to fully cover Rome in the 2 days we have here, but we will see what we can.

Corragio

Miles from Home - 5354.1 miles
Firsts / Highlights - Mountaintop finish, Bolzona, bike paths, epic climb, strudel in the Alps, castles, Tyrolean food and culture.
Miles Ridden - 50.39 miles
Vertical Feet - 6,178 ft
Route - View Today's Route Here.
People - I am going to start including the people I meet along the way in the heading section of each post. Although I have been with Experience Plus for a number of days, I have not mentioned everyone’s names:

Michele and Stefania - Our Italian group leaders, guides, logisticians, translators, sommeliers and good people.

Don and Jane Volta - Kirkland, WA (near Seattle). Retired couple on their 8th Experience Plus tour. Turn 70 this year. Just completed a tour through Turkey.

Marvin and Margie Amernick - Basalt, CO and Delray Beach, FL. Retired couple on their ~12th Experience Plus tour. After a week of traveling alone, they are joining the third-week Giro tour with Experience Plus for the finish.

Bill Plutnick - Owingsville, KY (near Lexington). 46 year old, easy-going defense contractor. His wife was at a conference in Sicily, so he decided to follow the Giro for a week. They are meeting in Rome Thursday.

This post is for May 13, 2009.

My cold set back in last night. I woke up with little energy, but today was the final and biggest climb of my Giro week. The pros don't get to take a day off when they don't feel well, and either do I if I want to watch the race. The Giro stops for just about nothing.

Italians shout a lot of phrases at the racers. One that is reserved for the suffering riders who are obviously having difficulty just getting over a climb is, “Corragio”. It means, “dig deep, summon your courage, keep going”. Alpe di Siusi was the climb at the finish of Stage 5 today. It is a monster that starts in the river valley and climbs nearly to the top of the Dolomites at the mid-station of a ski resort. The length of 25 kms, grade of 8-10% and elevation gain of 5,000 feet make it a challenge on any day. For those from Steamboat, it is the equivalent of a steeper Rabbit Ears, followed by a 5km recovery at an easier grade, followed by another steeper Rabbit Ears. Climbing it today required me to tap into all of the corragio I could find.

It isn’t much consolation, but Lance had a pretty difficult day on the climb today as well. He ran into a spot of bother and finished 3 minutes behind the lead group that included teammate Levi Leipheimer. Today all but eliminated Lance from contention in the race. He looked exhausted at the finish.

Our day started with a van transfer from our hotel in Trento to a little town called Ora. Stefania got the other riders started on their way and then took me to a Pharmacia in search of cold medicine. Explaining symptoms to a pharmacist without a command of the language is a real challenge, so having a translator was a huge benefit. I got my medicine and began to chase down the rest of the group.

I caught them fairly quickly and rode along some amazingly well-developed bike paths into Bolzano. These bike paths went through vineyards, tunnels and around castles. Since they were formerly train tracks, there was infrastructure that could never be funded for a project that started as a bike path. By the time we arrived in Bolzano, the world had turned decidedly Austrian. Signs were in German first, then Italian. Architecture was Tyrolean. Food became very hearty with good dark bread, pretzels and streusel. We stopped for lunch in the city, which was well-maintained and picturesque. There were lots of pedestrians and bicycles throughout the center of town.

The weather forecast indicated that we might get some rain, but it wasn’t to be. The entire week of following the Giro ended without a drop. That was fortunate, because the climb that was about to begin didn’t need any help to make it a challenge.

The stats for the climb provided a pretty good indication that this would be a tough one. What the stats didn’t show was that when I was stopped at the bottom, my head was on my handlebars and I easily could have fallen asleep. Not the energy level you want to approach a big physical challenge. I decided to use a mental game to get up the climb. Rather than a 5,000 foot climb, I decided that I would do five 1,000 climbs. That way, when I got to 500 feet, I was half way to my first climb rather than only 10% of the way to the top. That tactic worked pretty well for the first 1,500 – 2,000 feet. After that, I had figured out that no matter what I said to myself, this climb was not going to end.

By the time I was 4 km from the top, the racers were only about 30-45 minutes behind me, but I didn’t know that. The police hadn’t cleared the road yet, so I assumed I still had a couple of hours. When I reached the summit, they had blocked the final 500 meters and the racers were only about 20 minutes behind. I would like to think that knowing they were chasing me would have motivated me to increase my cadence over those final 4 kms, but I don’t think Denis Menchov touching my back wheel would have made me go any faster. My heart rate was only idling at about 145-150 bpm, which is high, but not indicative of an all-out effort. I think the cold combined with my body calibrating its hemoglobin for sea-level riding just converged to make this a difficult day. It would have been fun to see how I could have done on such an epic climb feeling well, but getting to the top with adverse conditions creates it own rewards.



I could have turned around and headed down the hill looking for a good vantage point for the finish when I was blocked with 500 meters to go, but by that point, there was a goal to be achieved. I wasn’t going to turn around after getting so close. I got off my bike and pushed it through the grass and crowds parallel to the course until I figured I had reached the elevation of the finish line. I could then be satisfied that I had made it. Right about the line where I declared victory, I found a woman in lederhosen selling streusel and water. With one of each in hand, I found a spot to watch the big screen TV of the racers approaching with the race course in the foreground. Success.

As a frame of reference for how big a 5,000 foot climb is, the descent after the race back to the river valley took 50 minutes. That is 50 minutes with barely the need to turn my pedals.

Here is an article that compares the climbs of this year's Giro to climbs in North America. http://www.dailypeloton.com/displayarticle.asp?pk=14733

BTW – the camera decided to come back to life. Not sure how long it will last.

Big Ass Alps

Miles from Home - 5354.1 miles
Firsts / Highlights - WWI Tunnels, Category-2 climb, bike museum
Miles Ridden - 50.5 miles
Vertical Feet - 5,829 ft
Route - View Today's Route Here.


View Trento in a larger map

Today had a couple of significant climbs. I was riding with Bill from Kentucky who told me when we reached the top of the first that it was the hardest thing he had ever climbed. I told him that his record wasn't likely to stand very long, because our last climb of the day was going to be even tougher. He agreed with me at the end of the day, but he made it up both with a smile.

First off, I am sorry to say that my camera has officially given up. What I thought could be managed by keeping a fresh charge on my battery is apparently something more severe. I charged it twice last night, and when I fired it up this morning, I couldn't take even my first picture. That was really unfortunate because there were plenty of interesting things to see today. I will look for a replacement battery, but I don't expect much luck unless I can get to a bigger city. I may try to get one shipped from Amazon to the bike hotel I will be checking in on Thursday. Following the Giro, my address changes every 48 hours, so there is no way to have anything shipped. If the battery doesn't solve the problem, then I guess I will need a new camera, but by the time that arrives, a lot of photos will be forever lost.

The ride started this morning with a good route selection. In order to get from our hotel to the Giro route, there was either a fairly busy modern road or one that was built by the Austrians around WWI that gets very little traffic today. Obviously, we took the road less traveled. Turning onto the road, you could see far ahead into a mountain canyon. It looked as if it was a box canyon with sheer rock walls at the top going up 500-1000 feet. I couldn't figure out how a road could get past such an obstacle. As we got closer, the walls looked bigger, but still no obvious way to get through. After what had already been a difficult climb, the crux move came into view. There were tunnels stacked up on top of each other climbing the last 500 vertical feet. Each tunnel had a 10-12% switchback inside it, so what looked like 2 tunnels stacked on top of each other was actually 1 tunnel with the entrance below and the exit above. There were 5 such tunnels to get to the summit. To make it a little more interesting, the road narrowed to 1 lane so that you had to wait for a traffic light to let you know that traffic was going your way for the next 5 minutes. I didn't want to meet a truck coming down the hill in the middle of one of the tunnels, so I rode hard to clear them before I suspected the downhill light would turn green.

At the crest of the hill, Bill and I stopped at a cafe for a bottle of water. We saw a very fit couple come running up over the hill. They had ski poles for hiking, but this was obviously a morning run, not a casual hike. After a quick stop at the cafe, they turned around and headed back to the tunnels at a running pace. Bill and I dropped down the big descent and spotted some mountain peaks poking through the haze. I had come to think of the climbs we had been doing as mountains until I saw these peaks. We had been riding hills. These were mountains. We had reached the Big Ass Alps.

The second climb was scenic but not epic. One of our tour guides, Michele (Mi-Kell-a) pointed out that the forest smelled like garlic. The wild garlic is in bloom, so even a hike or a bike ride in the forest of Italy can get you thinking about food. After stopping for a lunch consisting of prosciutto-wrapped asparagus with cheese, bread, pasta and salad, we got back on our bikes for the final climb. This is the point where we intersected with the Giro course and rode their first category-2 climb of the race. We were about 2 1/2 hours ahead of the race and only had 11k to cover, but there were quite a few vertical feet to be grabbed before the mutants arrived. The bottom of the climb was the most difficult, but you never know that when you are doing it. It started off at a grade that never dropped below 8% and was quite consistently 10%. There were a few sections of 12%, just to make the 8% hurt a bit more. It was not a consistent grade, however, and there were some sections of 7% past the halfway point to provide some recovery. It occurred to me that I felt as if I was recovering whenever I hit a grade that was the same as Rabbit Ears Pass. If this climb had been longer or did not have those recovery sections, I suspect it might have been a category-1. For the last 500 meters of the climb, the crowds were getting fairly large, so I pulled Ray's video camera out of my pack and started recording as I rode. I hope the video captures what it is like to climb up through the switchbacks with the big crowd assembled. I won't be able to post it until I get a memory stick reader. Not sure when that will be.

It was rewarding to see that the mutants were impacted by the climb we had just done. The race was fractured by the hill. There was a 10-minute gap from the first to the last riders, which was very unexpected for such a short climb. I'm not sure what it did to the GC standings, but I expect there were some changes today. Where I saw them pass, Lance was safely in the peloton, right were he would strategically choose to be. After they dropped over this climb, they had another comparable climb to the finish. That's a pretty good dose of pain for one day at the office.

Speaking of category-1 climbs, I think that is what we have in store tomorrow. I haven't seen the official race profile to confirm it, but we are climbing Alpe du Siusi, which is a single 5,000 foot climb. Again, not a consistent grade for the entire thing, but I would guess that its length might earn it a category 1.

After descending from the big climb of the day, we loaded into the van and shuttled to Trento to be within striking distance for Stage 5 tomorrow. Sadly, tomorrow will be my last day with Experience Plus chasing the Giro. I hope to see another stage in Milan and the final time trial in Rome. But tomorrow will be the last day of dedicated race spectating.

Sorry for the lack of pictures. If you want to see other people's pictures of the areas I am riding, go to the "View Today's Route" link at the top of any of my posts. When you get the map of the ride, click on the "More..." button on the upper right corner and select "Photos".

Stage 3

Miles from Home - 5396.1 miles
Firsts / Highlights - First third-category climb of the Giro. I made the front page.
Miles Riden - 50.8 miles
Vertical Feet - 3,966 ft
Route - View Today's Route Here.



Quick update today. Rode much of the third stage course, including the only somewhat significant (category-3) climb and the finish area. After viewing the mayhem in the finish area, I rode back up the third-category descent and watched the racers come through. This was the first opportunity for the riders to win GPM (King of the Mountains) points. This part of Italy has never hosted a Giro stage in its 100 year history, so the towns and Prosecco vineyards were all dressed up in pink.

I was on the front page of the Italian newspaper (Gazzetta) during the team time trial. I told you I found a good spot. I'll post a picture of the pictue later.

These are long days chasing the Giro. Start riding at 8:30, ride and spectate until 7:00 or 7:30, eat a 4-5 course dinner, go to bed, repeat. I'm not saying they're not good days, but they're long.

Another Venice Whirlwind in the History Books

Miles from Home - 5396.1 miles
Firsts / Highlights - First stage start, first open air market
Miles Ridden - 53.7 miles
Vertical Feet - 1,417 ft
Route - View Today's Route Here.


View Solighetto in a larger map

It seems counter-intuitive, but I would probably have more current Giro results from Kent at the switchboard in Steamboat than I have following it live in Italy. It is such an odd thing to watch an event that covers over 100 miles of open road in a day. There isn't a scoreboard you can watch to see what is happening.

The answer to yesterday's question is that Mark Cavendish wore the pink jersey for Team Columbia today. I never heard whether it was because the team selected him, or if he was the first team member to cross the line. I suppose it is the same thing. If he crossed the line first, it is because the team selected him.

We left Venice this morning and rode to Solighetto in the pre-Alps. This was my second trip to Venice in the past 3 years, and both times I have left feeling like I had not spent enough time. I think I will have one more chance when Brad comes to visit in early June.

There is no Internet access at my hotel here, so this post may be delayed for a couple of days.

This morning, our spectating was limited to watching the start of Stage 2 from Lido di Jesolo. The race didn't start until 1:30, so we had some time to gawk at the team cars, equipment and mechanics. Everyone had a very clear role to play to get the teams ready to role by race start and the trucks ready to move onto the next town. Some were prepping bikes, some were packing and securing the load and one guy was doing laundry in the washing machine and dryer they carry in the truck. It was like watching a colony of ants at work.

I saw Lance's new road bike at Astana's hotel and Ivan Basso's rig at LiquiGas. The interesting thing is that I did not see a lot of prototype parts on any of the bikes. Everything was the very best you could buy, but surprisingly, nothing jumped out as something you could not build for yourself if you felt you needed to in order to keep up with your neighbor down the street. On some of the teams, each rider's name is painted on their frame like a fighter pilot's call sign on the side of a jet. That is a pretty cool customization, but I thought there might be more.

The procession of the race departure was interesting. I watched from the 0 km marker where the race officially begins, even though it was several kms after the ceremonial spot where the riders start riding.

About 45 minutes before departure, the road had been closed for some time and a high speed parade went through with sponsor vehicles, load music and eye-candy girls in convertibles. It was moving along at about 30 miles an hour, and I assume they run the entire course in front of the race. A little while later, the caravan of 22 team busses headed out of town toward the finish line. I assume the trucks went out at a similar time, but I didn't seen them. Over the next 30 minutes, a steady flow of Giro official vehicles and police cars and motor cycles headed out on the course at high speed. The official vehicles are all brand new Skoda cars, and there must have been at least 50 of them. It appeared that VIP's who bought their way in with a "donation" were in the official vehicles ahead of the race. Who knows what kind of influence you have to yield to get in one of the team cars. The only person I know who has done that is Robin Williams.

As the start time grew closer the TV motorcycles gathered just ahead of the 0 km marker next to me. After 2 hours of waiting, things happened quickly. The first signal that things were about to happen is the TV helicopter started approaching. The grand poobah of the race in one of the Skoda cars passed under the 0k banner and waiving the starting flag. 198 riders were directly on his tail. I could hear a lot of gears shifting as everyone accelerated up to a racing pace and Lance Armstrong lead the peloton under the starting banner.

Just as the racers passed under the banner, the TV motorcycles launched out ahead of the race. Those are some skilled people on both the front and back of those motorcycles, but that will wait for another time.

The peloton accelerated and was past us in less than 30 seconds. Then came the internal combustion component of the race. About 66 team cars sped under the banner and were jockeying for position just like the racers. These are all perfectly clean, brand new vehicles covered in sponsorship logos. It looked like a car race by itself. The cars actually took longer to clear the start area than the riders, but they were gone within about 60-90 seconds. Finally, 10 ambulances followed and a few dozen more police and it was done. Before we could mount our bikes to begin our ride, crews were starting to tear down the barricades and advertising banners.
By the time the race was out of town, it was almost 2:00, and we still had 80 km (50 miles) to ride to our hotel for the night. While the mutants headed east, we headed northwest to a spot close to their finish line tomorrow.

It was a nice ride on the Venetian flats for the first 40 miles. After that, we hit the pre-Alps and very suddenly hit some abrupt climbs. After 2 1/2 days with no more than a bridge overpass to call a hill, it was a shock to the system. All day, we rode through vineyards and fields of poppies and lavender. Many miles were on roads that were not as wide as a bike path back home. On a couple of occasions, a car would pass in the other direction. Even though I was on the white line on the right side and the car was on the opposite white line, I still needed to tuck in my elbow to avoid leaving a big sweaty mark on his window. I have no idea how 2 cars would pass.

Image for the day - Having such a tight squeeze passing a car had me curious. I stopped and lay on my stomach perpendicular to the road with my belly button more-or-less in the middle. I touched my toes on one white line and reached the other white line with the palms of my hands. Based on that, I think the roads were about 8' wide.

Stage 1 - Team Time Trial

Miles from Home - 5509.5 miles

Firsts / Highlights - First pro bike race

Miles Riden - 41.7 miles

Vertical Feet - 329 ft

Route - View Today's Route Here.



My observation about professional bike racers - they ride really really fast.

Bike racing isn't as much about cheering for your home country as some other sports. All of the teams are such a mixture of nationalities that it almost doesn't matter where the team is based. Almost. That said, today was a very good day for the American teams. The 2 American teams finished 1st and 2nd. Third place went to a team from Kazakhstan that has 3 American riders - Chris Horner, Levi Liepheimer and a newcomer named Lance (see picture #1).

Today's stage was the team time trail. No one I have spoken to remembers a team time trial ever being the first stages in a professional race. The obvious question is, "who wears the pink jersey?". Everyone on the winning team has the same GC time, so who is the leader? Since I was not at the awards ceremony after the race today, I still don't know the answer to that question. If you want a refresher what a team time trail or GC is or why anyone would care about wearing a pink shirt, refer to the post I wrote before leaving called Giro d'Italia Primer.

Today's stage was held on the Lido of Venice. An island with no bridges. I'm sure the team and event organizers spent a good deal of time figuring out the logistics for this one. A great image (which I was not able to capture) was a ferry loaded up with at least 25 team cars with 8 bikes on top of each car. It is already a big effort to move all of the stuff from stage to stage, but when you introduce water crossing, it just gets a little more interesting. Our tour group had a private boat take us over. It was big enough for 100 people, but we had 8 (including the guides). My bike had plenty of legroom.

Although I am on a pre-organized trip to address a lot of the complex planning required to follow the race, a certain amount of improvisation is still needed. When we arrived on the island about 4 1/2 hours before the start of the race, the time trial course was already barricaded and there were a number of police at every intersection for the entire length of the course. Since there is only really one road on the Lido, it was important for us to be able to ride the course in order to get to any location other than the starting line. We had found a small town about half way through the course where mid-stage time splits would be measured and the racers passed by on the same road in both directions. On paper, a pretty good viewing spot. Without access to the road, however, the plan was in jeopardy. Our Italian guides spoke to a number of different policemen and kept getting different stories. Eventually, they found one that would let us on the course. All was well. We were riding along the course all dressed out for the event, passing under banners indicating the number of kilometers left to go. It all seemed to be falling into place, for about 3 kilometers. That is when another policeman stepped into the road and held out his arms saying, "it is forbidden". We left the course and rode on a sidewalk for a couple of blocks -- until we found another policeman who allowed us back on the course. This happened at least 4 times. One would say we could not be on the course, one would say we must be on the right, another on the left, and finally that we had to be on the right until 1:00, then switch to the left until another said that we could not be on the course at all again. The "official" looking blue-coated police were very authoritarian and certain of their (contradictory) information. The green-coated officials didn't seem to care much one way of the other. We eventually made it to the location we initially set out to find. We had to cancel our plans to ferry to a second island for free-riding, but at least our viewing location was secure. Apparently you can play mom off against dad until you get the answer you want with the Venice police as long as you're persistent. Police roulette - successful this time.



The entire race was only 20km today. That is very short for a pro ride. I assumed that meant an easy day for the riders, but they actually put in a lot more distance than the race numbers would indicate. Every team rode past our viewing location about 4 times in each direction before the race. They were riding faster than any fast club rides, but probably about 75-85% of race speed. I don't know if they were riding and re-riding the entire course, but they were definitely doing more that a light warm-up. Now that I think about it, perhaps because the team time trial is such a rare event, maybe they were working through their communication and team riding tactics just in time for the race.

Although there are no hills in this area, there was a small rise over a bridge that made for a short viewing distance from our crosswalk. Near the beginning of the warm-up period, I had not seen many teams go by, so I was not calibrated to their speeds. I looked both ways and almost stepping in the road. At the last moment, I thought I saw some motion coming over the rise, so I stepped back. Within about 5 seconds, Team Columbia flew by with Mark Cavendish in the lead position. For those who don't know, Cavendish is the 23 or 24 year old phenom who is considered the fastest human on a bike right now. When it comes to a sprint, he seems to be unbeatable. I think he won 4 stages in the Tour de France last year, which is particularly impressive when you consider his age. If I had stepped into the road and taken out Cavendish, I would have been like the guy Dick Cheney shot in the face and apologized to him for causing so much trouble. Fortunately for both of us, it was a non-event.

I scouted for a while to find a good location to take pictures. I wanted a spot on a curve so you could see the teams fan out and catch more than one face. Then I needed a place that was not terribly backlit. I wanted to be on the out-and-back section of the course so that I could see each team twice. Finally, I wanted to be in one of the barricaded sections to give some perspective for the curve. I found what looked like a good location, which I later confirmed was a good choice. First, I noticed that there was a photographer from the national newspaper next to me. Then, a video crew from New York showed up and dropped a video camera next to me. They were shooting a documentary on Lance that they hope will have theatrical distribution after the Tour de France. The former editor of Winning Magazine was the director of the documentary, who pointed out a guy 5 feet further down who he introduced as the "best cycling photographer in the world". I don't know cycling photographers, but I'll take his word. At any rate, I think I found a pretty decent location. If only I could have had my "real" camera and lenses here...

Although the race was only 20km, viewing it took 11 hours. Left the hotel, road 10 miles to the boat, ferried to the island, rode the time trial course before it was closed, staked out a viewing spot, watched the race, rode back to the boat, ferried back across and rode back to the hotel. Now it is 8:15pm and time for dinner.

I have found that national TV goes to live coverage of the Giro every day from 3:30 - 5:00. They schedule the start time of each stage so that the high drama of each day will fall during that time. I look forward to pulling off to the side of the road at a cafe wherever I happen to be for the next 3 weeks to watch the live coverage. Even when I am not viewing each stage, this will keep things interesting.

The Circus has Arrived

Miles from Home - 5432.3 miles

Firsts / Highlights - First signs of the Giro

Miles Riden - 21.8 miles

Vertical Feet - 97 ft

Route - View Today's Route Here.



The Giro and all of its spectacle has arrived in Venice. I am staying in Lido di Jesolo which is on the mainland near the island of Venice. All of the teams are staying in hotels in this area too. Lance and Team Astana are about 4 blocks away. It is difficult to maintain a low profile when you pull into town with 2 busses, 6 or 8 team cars and a couple of semi rigs full of equipment all with your team's logo several dozen times displayed on each.

I am meeting up with the Experience Plus group in a few minutes to begin my 6-day tour of the first 5 stages of the Giro. I ran into one of the couples from the trip in the lobby this morning. They went out Lance-stalking this morning and found him. The team was out for a 5-hour training ride on the day before the start of the race. Just to keep the rust out, I guess. That makes it official - Lance is going to ride the Giro in spite of his broken colar bone. The paper says that he has more or less conceded the race and only plans to ride to promote his cancer cause.

When I got down to San Marco Plaza last night, I found the first sign of the pomp surrounding the Giro. Workers were setting up a big stage in the Plaza for the welcoming ceremonies. There isn't even any racing on the island of Venice, but apparently they wanted the recognizable setting for the opening ceremony and the 10 seconds of TV coverage that it will receive. I expect that the Giro is going to be like a series of one-night-stands for the Rolling Stones. The staging, rigging, sound & light systems and TV equipment is going to need to be torn down and reassembled every day for three weeks. All that in addition to the 30 teams of racers, TV crews from all over the world and millions of spectators. That isn't hyperbole, there will be millions of spectators over the course of the race. The odd thing is, in the area where all the teams and I are today, it is dead as a doornail. Until the other people from Experience Plus showed up, I felt as if I was the only person in the hotel.

Went out for a short ride today to try to shake off the effects of travel and my cold. My altimeter said that we are at an elevation of -7 feet. I don't think that is quite accurate, but the biggest climb got me up to about 0. This is as flat as flat gets. Flat will be a distant memory in about 48 hours.

I think Venice may be the place where the "point and shoot" camera got its name. You could aim the camera just about anywhere and capture something interesting. Although today was mostly about the first signs of the Giro, I have to also include a picture of the full moon rising from San Marco, and no one would believe I was in Venice without a picture of a gondola or two.

Possible, but not Pleasant

Miles from Home - 5432.3 miles

Firsts / Highlights - Traveling by train with coupler bike

Miles Riden - 0.0 miles

Vertical Feet - 0 ft

Route - No ride.

Visualizza Lido di Jesolo in una mappa di dimensioni maggiori

There is no denying it. Travel BY bicycle is wonderful. Travel WITH a bicycle is not. The routine for getting from Riccione to Lido di Jesolo (outside Venice) started last night.

Here is the simple 27-step process to move between cities.

1) Disassemble bike
2) Pack bike (went pretty well)
3) Pack luggage
4) Load bike and lugguge into van
5) Take van from hotel to train station in Rimini
6) Unload bike and luggage
7) Carry and pull 80 pounds of bike, tools and luggage into train station
8) Lift all gear to go down stairs, under the tracks and back up stairs to the designated platform
9) Board train
10) Look for open seat while navigating a 2' wide hallway. Push the day pack, pull the bike and wear the day pack. It is not possible to turn sideways with the backpack on. It is necessary to take heal-to-toe size steps while pulling the bike because you cannot not walk beside to it - and allow other passengers to pass going the other direction.
11) In the seating compartment, hoist the backpack and day pack into the storage bin and store the bike in the hallway. Make friends as people trip over it.
12) Ride like a normal passenger for a few hours
13) Get off the train (see getting on the train)
14) Go down stairs, pass under tracks and up stairs with full floatilla in tow
15) Navigate 200 meters of sidewalk under construction to the bus station.
16) Wait 30 minutes for bus
17) Load bike and luggage into bus hold
18) Ride 85 degree bus for 1 hour
19) Exit bus
20) Unload bike and luggage
21) Wait 20 minutes to transfer to another bus
22) Load bike and luggage
23) Ride bus 15 minutes
24) Exit bus
25) Walk last 1/4 mile with all gear to hotel
26) Take bike and lugguge (via elevator, finally a break) to room.
27) Write about it

This move from city to city would not have been possible without the coupler Moots bike. I don't have any second thoughts about it being the right thing to do, but it would be a stretch to call it convenient.

Lessons learned today:
a) Get seat reservations even if they are not necessary. That limits the amount of moving around needed inside the train looking for a seat.
b) Schedule longer stays in fewer locations
c) Schedule some non-riding destinations where I can leave the bike behind, travel and return for the bike before moving on.
d) Don't get a nasty cold the day before traveling with a bike.

Now for the pay off. I'm off to catch a bus and a boat to have dinner in Venice, and hopefully catch some sunset pictures.