Frolix-8

The Sunn o))). We Love It.

Here's another pic from the weekend's big fight - Anderson vs. O'Malley at Butlin's, Minehead. Anderson's winning on points here, although O'Malley was having problems with his valves. But let's face it, performing at that illustrious venue is bound to send anyone 'a bit funny'.

Well done to the Illusionator for the find. And weller done to the photographer for taking the pic in the first place.

Genital Shrinkage

Here's a thought - do female bodybuilders suffer the same sort of shrinkage 'below stairs' that can afflict their male counterparts? I know that they cultivate iron-hard pecs as opposed to the more natural fun pillows, but what about the slide n' glide lovelips? Do they devolve as being surplus to requirements in the face of constant steroid abuse, in the same way that male bodybuilders end up with what amounts to a sweaty twiglet between their legs? And if so, is all that silverware on the mantelpiece worth a permanently arid shag canal? Or a terminally frightening appearance viz the photograph on the left? I would say not, but what do I know?

As I write this, my Irish neighbours' seventieth birthday karaoke party continues unabated and has just been joined by an open-air gig at a town cafe, where a band of a certain age are steadily murdering the works of Buddy Holly, Rod Stewart and Free. This may be affecting my brain.

Excuse of the Year

Materazzi on his apparent goading of Zidane during the world cup final -

"It is absolutely not true, I did not call him a terrorist. I'm ignorant. I don't even know what the word means."

Well, I'm sure one bit of that statement is correct. Just play the game in future, you overpaid pillock.

Weekend Wind-Up

Just a quick note about a couple of letters published in today's Grauniad. One, in the main paper, was from a chap saying the general antipathy towards people displaying England flags is anti-working class. Yes, it is. So what? The kind of people with little flags stuck out of their car windows at the moment probably are working class, which means they're likely to be the kind of ignorant and aggressive bastards who made the lives of kids trying to make the best of the education game at school a misery. So they deserve all the shit they get.

The second letter made me laugh so much that I'm going to type it out in full here;

I was repulsed, utterly nauseated and reduced to tears by the pictures of lambs' tongues in your food section (May 27). I immediately binned the magazine, as I couldn't bear to touch it...

Only in the Grauniad, eh? Poor woman. What she does when she sees a car, or someone smoking, I wouldn't like to think. She probably puts blinkers on before walking outside.

You Cannot Be Assimilated...

The comedy value of Bjorn Borg's name has just struck me, vis a vis the hilarious Star Trek race of cosmic traffic wardens. Click the image for full joy. Look, I'm sorry, OK? I know it's not exactly bleeding-edge humour but I'm currently sat in a windowless cupboard of a room, in the company of humming machinery, listening to a re-run of Marc Riley's 6 Music show where he is currently interviewing semi-Scoused children. So chill. Nome sane? My own sweat is choosing to evaporate rather than keep me company. Human contact has been reduced to telephonic burblings and sociopathic conversations with people who need a wash even more than I do at the moment. Thanks BBC. You're lovely. In a vast, forbidding, institutional kind of way. But as the ads say - it's my BBC.

Reborn

Belated many thanks to Paul and his fellow organisers of this year's Leicester Tigers Junior Tigers' Club Christmas party, held last Saturday. Also thanks to the players - the sight of Leon Lloyd playing pass-the-parcel is an image I'll treasure! One other thing - soon after walking in, I heard this announcement on the P.A. - "Jeff Buckley, come and have your face painted, please." Strange way of contacting the dead, I thought. Also an odd time to choose. But still, each to his own and I suppose there wasn't space to get out the ouijia board.

Not Fair !!!

Heard on the radio this morning that Messrs. McGrath and Ponting have been bemoaning England's use of substitute fielders as "not in the spirit of the game". And they have the nerve to call us whingeing poms...

Giro 24-05-05

Tirano - Lissone

It's late May so it must be time for shitty weather and cold.  What is up with the climate eh?

Anyway, due to the poor weather yesterday's stage start was moved from Livigno to Tirano, cutting out the climb.  Leaving this stage as flat as a flat thing.  As such not a lot happened up to the 3 laps of Lissone.  These criterium type finishes are a bit dull I must say.

Anyway, 5 k's to go and Fassa Bortolo get on the front (deja vu?) and lead Petacchi to the last kilometre.  Zabel's T-Mobile team mates disrupted the lead out somewhat and after a disrupted 500m Petacchi was left alone for the last 500.  No worries for him though as he powered away taking Zable and Bettini with him.  they offered no resistance and he won the stage handily, very impressive.  McEwan's removal after Friday's police raid has left Petacchi as easily the strongest sprinter.  McEwan was caught with hyperbaric oxgen equipment and IV equipment which could be used to boost red blood cell counts as far as I can tell.  I didn't know the tents were illegal, and I am surprised as McEwan always seems a clean type of guy. A shame.

Only other point of note was Sean Kelly explaining, as the riders rode through the drizzle, that "road rash isn't as bad when you come off on a wet road, the water cools down the flesh as it's torn by the road".  So that's alright then!

No post tomorrow as it's a rest day, see you Thursday!

Giro this weekend

OK so (as Sean Kelly might say) I couldn't get this fecking thing to work from home this weekend so covering all bases in one post (deep breath).  Apologies for no pictures I'll try to link to some later in this post.

Friday Allaghe - Rovereto

An early mountain (cat 1 I think) made little difference today, the field stayed together and a bunch sprint ensued.  Fassa Bortolo got to the front at 5 km to go (see the pattern emerging here?) but left Petacchi alone with 200 m to go.  He was awesome today though and powered to victory.  Smith and Kelly both failed to recognize Grillo as coming second (he's the only true Panaria sprinter, and Duffers recognised him for christ's sake).  I did though (spotter's badge to me).  They did provide the amazing fact (to me anyway) that Erik Zabel is only 34.  He seems to have been around for ages.  No changes on GC, a nice "easy" day for the leaders.

Saturday Mezzocorona - Ortise

The day started with the slightly shocking news that Garzelli had withdrawn from the race.  I say slightly as he was a fair bit of time down and decided to concentrate on the Tour de France.  Cioni and di Luca could do with his support though, but there you go.

Anyhow on the penultimate climb Simoni and Cunego moved away, but couldn't significantly drop anyone, however, Basso seemed to have a bit of trouble regaining their wheels.  From here the report of this stage is going to be a bit vague.

I'd watched the first 3 parts of the stage resume on Eurosport's late round up.  When the decisive part started (part 4 fact fans!) they obviously put the wrong tape in as we went back to the previous climb.  Bloody amateurs.  At least they showed the last 2 minutes of the stage, so I saw Parra winning.  Savoldelli came in having distanced Simoni by 30-odd seconds and di Luca by a little bit more.  The shock was Basso losing just over a minute.  Savoldelli now leads Basso and di Luca overall by 50 seconds and change.  How all this happened I didn't know because of you Eurosport!!!!

Sunday Egna/Neumarkt - Livigno

The climb of il Passo de Stelvio.  This was one of the most truly memorable sights I have ever seen on TV in any context.  Some of you will know I'll be attempting the Tour de France's (arguably) most famous climb Alpe d'Huez which has 21 hairpins on the 12 km climb this summer.  The Stelvio has 48 (see here for altimetry).  The sight of these guys riding up this mountain cannot be described in words.  Go here and click on stage 14 for pictures, although most of these don't compare to the action pictures from the helicopter yesterday.  It's probably not as famous as the French climbs (probably because it's only been used 9 times since the 50's and it isn't the stage finish) but is the most intimidating and awesome sight in cycling.

Anyway back to the racing, after 10 hairpins Basso slipped off the back of il gruppa maglia rosa the whole CSC team came back to pace him, and cameras stayed with him, but you could see he was suffering.  It transpired that he went straight to the team trailer to throw up after yesterday's stage, and obviously still had the stomach bug today.  The team riders looked like they were on a Sunday social ride, but Basso was grimacing, sweating and standing on the pedals to keep going.  He finished the stage 42 minutes and 15 seconds down, an iron man performance just to finish, but I think he should now pull out and concentrate on the tour (better reasons than Garzelli, no other interest for CSC in this race).

Cunego drove the field up and over the Stelvio.  A group of 9 had gone away at the base of the climb and were down to 4 by the time they reached the summit.  The Stelvio is followed by a cat 1 climb, which again saw Cunego on the front shadowed by Savoldelli.  I was worried that di Luca and Simoni were a few back in the line, not really there to cover Savoldelli if he broke away, but Cunego's pace kept him honest.  Parra had broken away (by about 2 minutes) from the lead group, to lead the stage.

This cat 1 climb was followed by a short unclassified climb (not HC but just not long enough to be classed).  Here Simoni and di Luca attacked and were not followed by Savoldelli.  I think this was because it was a short climb with a 5 km descent to the finish, and he thought he could catch them on the descent (he is, as mentioned in previous posts, the best descender there is).  This descent was non-technical (i.e. very straight though steep), so he didn't really make an impression and lost 28 seconds to Simoni and, more significantly, di Luca.  Again my live viewing was interrupted by a thunderstorm, I thought digital wa sthe way forward, but our picture always goes in heavy rain, a bit shit really. Caught the resume to finish the picture.

So an enthralling day ending with Savoldelli still in pink by 25 seconds over di Luca and 1'48" over Simoni.  Parra gets the laurels for winning the stage, an amazing 2 long (one 6 hours one 5 hrs 40) stage wins in 2 days.  Di Luca gets big plaudits for climbing really well and surprising everyone.  It's a tough one to call from here in 3 hilly stages (one a time trial) to go, and no leader seems to be able to hold on.  I'm just with Savoldelli at this point but the first 3 places are all in question going into the last week.

Giro 19-05-05

Marostica-Zoldo Alto

Into the Dolomites (cue Richard Jobson impression) ad the race really takes off.  I love the mountain stages, drama tension and unbelievable physical endeavor.

The action really started when 5 men (Rujano, Basso, Simoni, di Luca and Savoldelli) went away on the penultimate climb.  Mike Smith called this "the highest point of the race", but he uses that phrase to mean 'stage' as well as the race overall.  Anyhow after Basso and Simoni going away for parts of the climb, it all came back together by the summit.  It was here that Savoldelli (pictured) lived up to his reputation as the best descender in the world, taking 25 seconds out of the others.  Rujano was dropped completely on the descent (Kelly was giggling while describing him as "our non-descender"), and then went on to recount how he and a team-mate clocked 70 mph on a descent in the "Tour of France" (I love it when he calls it that).

Savoldelli slowed up as the final climb started to allow the other 3 guys to join him for the final ascent.  So then there were 4 for the final 7-ish km climb to the finish.  Basso was very much in control all the way.  Di Luca dropped back after about 2 km, and then after 5 km a vicious rise in tempo dropped Simoni.  Basso could not shake rider of the day Savoldelli though, and they breasted the summit together, Basso didn't really look to any enthusiasm for the sprint, so Savoldelli took it quite easily, but Basso still took the overall lead (pictured).

An enthralling stage (that sounds a bit wank I know).  Simoni proved me wrong by kicking ass and moving into 4th on GC behind Basso, Savoldelli and di Luca.  Garzelli and Cunego were the big losers on the day dropping 6 minutes on the leaders, surely ending their chances of overall victory.  The Lampre team seemed to support Cunego more in numbers but that may be 'cos of the cracking pace Simoni, Basso, di Luca and Savoldelli set.  Cunego looked very flat, a bad day to have a bad day.  Di Luca defended his maglia rosa heroically, still maintaining a podium position and only dropping just over 1 minute. Honchar moved up to 5th and could be a threat for a podium.  Bruscegin, Scarponi and Cioni are the only riders within 6 minutes of Basso now.

Only 1 big climb today and that's near the start, from there it's pretty much downhill, so could be a bit of a rest for the big hitters, especially given yesterday's endeavors and the fact there are big time gaps now.  Maybe one for an escapee.