Road Bike Racing - Not Surprising, but JAN ULRICH retires

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2007/feb07/feb26news2

If he really IS innocent, it's a shame that he was finally driven away by the doping allegations, but it does seem strange to me that Basso is back on the bike and he's retired.

But who knows--it would seem that he lost his focus long before Puerto.

Very sad news..he's a great cyclist , dope or not.

That sucks. He was a very interesting guy to follow. So many "what ifs," but that's what made him so fascinating.

I'm reminded of the last entry in the famous myspace blog when the Puerto news broke... This guy summed up The Jan pretty well:


This may be the last blog for a while.

It's hard to sum up the disappointment that comes with an announcement like this.

I love Jan Ullrich. I love him for his class. I love him for all the sh*t he eats from the press. I love him because he couldn't beat the arrogant Texan with a baseball bat, but Jesus did he try. I also love him for his near-genius ability to f*ck things up no matter how much natural talent God gave him, and always seemingly at the last moment.

But I hate this, and regardless of what comes out of this, Jan definitely had contact with that sleazy doctor, and Jan definitely lied about it. Innocent until proven guilty, but if you're T-Mobile, and staring at a very likely Tour de France victory, everything you've dumped hundreds of millions of dollars into for the last five years, you don't pull Jan out of the Tour unless you've seen some pretty hard evidence. And then for CSC to pull Basso AFTER Jan is already gone? Ivan Basso was nearly guaranteed a free ride to the Yellow Jersey with Jan gone, so don't tell me CSC didn't see something scary.

This is a disappointment on many levels for me, but it's a slap in the face to everyone who loves the sport, to every CAT racer out there grinding it out in Nowhereland for a place on a rickety plywood podium, and everyone who just gets out and rides.

If I'm going to cheer for anyone, I'm going to cheer for David Millar, who has been brutally honest about what he did, and is now trying to ride the Grand Boucle without anything in his bloodstream, unlike God-knows-how-many other riders in the peloton.

Thanks for reading, let's hope Jan and Ivan get themselves straightened out, and lets hope for the best Tour de France in 20 years.

Get out and ride.

I'm reminded of the last entry in the famous myspace blog when the Puerto news broke... This guy summed up The Jan pretty well:
http://re3.mm-a5.yimg.com/image/3220548684

Cypress and Jakey may be on suicide watch. I think it's now time for Cypress to admit that he is "Der Jan".

What a sad end to such a great career.

" I have never cheated" Read, I never did anything that gave me an unfair competitive advantage over all of the other riders.

My favorite racer ever. The only guy in the world who could start the spring season off looking like he rides for Hickory Farms, then snag 2nd in the Tour.

So. Much. Talent. Ugh!

Sad news, but expected.

" I have never cheated" Read, I never did anything that gave me an unfair competitive advantage over all of the other riders.

Merlin I never thought you cheated ;)

Merlin I never thought you cheated ;)


MY secret is being really slow, throws off all suspicion.

I'm actually kinda sad.

I will miss the Jan. What great theater, and what a racer. Goodbye Jan. :beer:

Definite sadness here. I was hoping to see him face off against Basso and Valverde and show them the Der Kaiser smackdown

What a horrible end to Der Kaiser's career as a professional cyclist. I'll certainly miss him.

I just hope he doesn't get all depressed and do something silly like jump off a roof.

Come on now. If he ever climbed up on a roof he'd fall right through it before he got the chance to jump off.

Come on now. If he ever climbed up on a roof he'd fall right through it before he got the chance to jump off. Hahahaha. I guess that would be a relatively fair point. :roflmao:

What a horrible end to Der Kaiser's career as a professional cyclist. I'll certainly miss him.

I just hope he doesn't get all depressed and do something silly like jump off a roof.


Actually, he'd probably crash his porche into the roof.

i had a dream a couple of months ago about jan...he said he'd be retiring. I kind of had that feeling...

i think the whole scandal is basically like Guantanamo bay--- all these guys get screwed without any real evidence, just suspicion or conjecture.

I'm so going to miss the myspace blog...

Another favorite, for the sake of reminiscing. :D


Ja, the Mob is reforming like the Voltron.

Klodi is finally being back from his injury. The Jan is wanting to take this time now to do some apologizing to his bro, Klodi. The Jan did not mean to be hurting you so badly, bro, but when the Jan is putting on his patented double-thigh scissor-lock, he is not being doing it half-ass. Sometimes the Jan can be kind of a dick, he knows, but the Klodi is like the little brother that the Jan never had. I mean, when you are doing the knee-capping of little Klodi with a rusty tire-iron, he is doing the funniest crying-screeching sound. He is sounding just like some crazy, sobbing monkey. It is being soooo hilarious. And the Jan is always remembering the time he kicked in the door on the T-Mobile bus bathroom when Klodi was in there doing number zwie, and the Jan beat him half to death with a sack of water bottles. Oh, we laughed and laughed. Well, ok, maybe just the Jan laughed, because Klodi was being half into a coma at that point, but the Jan knows that if Klodi had been conscious, he would have screech/cried at the obvious funniness of the situation.

As for the earring, though, the Jan is not sorry for ripping that thing out of Klodi's ear. That thing just looked ********.

It is being kind of strange, everyone getting back together, cowering in fear, huddling in the back of the bus in terror of one of the Jan's legendary rages, but something's missing. The Vino isn't here.

The Jan had high hopes for little Vino. It is being true. He was being like a little mini-Jan. Everyone knows the unholy might that is the Jan, they know that the Jan strides this trembling earth like some dark colussus, dealing death and pain with every turn of his massive gear. But the Vino is being pretty evil too. He not only is looking like a punk kid who would toilet-paper your grandmother's house and then push her down and steal her purse when she came outside, but he is actually being kind of an a$$hole, too. When the Jan dropped a bar of soap inside a sock and then used it to beat the holy living hell out of Klodi, it was always Vino who would be holding him down. Vino is not on the level of the Jan, of course, but still, he is about 10 pounds of evil in a 5 pound bag, and the Jan will be missing him.

The Mighty Uniballed One, the Lance, is now telling people that he thinks Jan is going to be winning the Tour this year. To which the Jan is being saying, Ja, no *****, dumbass.

Ivan Basso, Valverde, Floyd Landis, it doesn't matter. No one can drop the hammers on the climbs AND the time trials like the Jan. It is being like the Highlander. Or like Lance's nuts.

Actually, he'd probably crash his porche into the roof.

What the hell is a porche?

I'm so going to miss the myspace blog...

Another favorite, for the sake of reminiscing. :D

I'm going out on a very short limb here and saying the 'Der Jan' was/is Cypress. It's time to come clean Cypress and fess up.

I'm going out on a very short limb here and saying the 'Der Jan' was/is Cypress. It's time to come clean Cypress and fess up.


I fess to nothing.

I fess to nothing.

coward

coward

Dr Zaius.

Dr Zaius.


zing...

Dr Zaius.


Well its better to be the smart primate...but this isn't about me or your ape fetish. This is about your alter ego, confess damn you confess!!!!

Come on now. If he ever climbed up on a roof he'd fall right through it before he got the chance to jump off.
spoken like a true, anorexic teenage girl.

I think all the comments about his weight are pretty ridiculous, to be honest. Jan was skinny when it counted.

-Bullseye

...Jan was skinny when it counted...

Like on Alpe d'Huez?

http://images.usatoday.com/sports/cycling/_photos/2005-06-30-lance-look.jpg

Jan Ulrichs career

http://www.earthstation1.com/MerchantPics/TheHistoricalView-ALegacyInPictures/HindenburgCrash.TN.jpg

Some excellent results and some wasted potential. Jan has palmares that most riders would kill for, so he doesn't even come close to tickling Frank Vandenbrouke What-a-Waste meter. But I remember seeing him come in 2nd in 1996 (his rookie year) behind Riis and and seeing him absolutely blow everyone away in 1997, and thinking along with a lot of other people the this guy was going to winning Tours for a long time.

Now here it is, ten years after the TdF win, and he retires without any more. Whether it was gacking in the cold against Pantani in 1998, injury or illness keeping him out in 1999 and one or two other years, using party-drugs and getting himself booted, or just his annual inability to avoind binge eating in the winter, he just never seemed to be able to focus that last little bit to get it done once he had a maillot jaune in his pocket.

Of course, there is another factor. Leaving 1998 out of it as a one-off mistake in the cold, and 1999 due to injuries, there is a huge difference between beating Richard Virenque in 1997 and beating a post-cancer Lance Armstrong from 2000 on. Lance may be the most focused, most mentally tough athlete we've ever seen. It is pretty clear from the results that Ulrich was clearly better than everyone else, and but for Armstrong, we'd be celebrating Jan as a 5-time winner of the TdF (and maybe, just maybe, more). What it comes down to is that Jan did not want it as much as Lance did. That's too bad, because if he had, I think Jan could have beaten Lance at least once, and maybe two or three times, head-to-head. As it is, he goes down as the greatest foil for a dominate rider since Gino Bartali had to concede preeminence to Fausto Coppi.

I think Jan could have beaten Lance at least once, and maybe two or three times, head-to-head.

+1

You put Lance's training dedication under Jan, and Jan would have destroyed everyone. Even Lance has said Jan was a bigger talent, just not as committed.

I'm reminded of the last entry in the famous myspace blog when the Puerto news broke... This guy summed up The Jan pretty well:

Doc...the only problem I have with that piece is the part about Millar. He "confessed" after the police raided his house and found used syringes hidden in a hollowed out book. Had they never done that, my guess is he'd be the same old Millar.

Doc...the only problem I have with that piece is the part about Millar. He "confessed" after the police raided his house and found used syringes hidden in a hollowed out book. Had they never done that, my guess is he'd be the same old Millar.

Good point. Ignore the part about Millar. ;)

What the hell is a porche?

It's where you sit in the evening with a glass of iced tea and watch the sun go down.

;)

I can't imagine the disappointment retiring from pro cycling. The loss of endorphins. Could one get in sufficient hours riding to keep up your drug addiction to endorphins. Following a career retirment, many suffer career let down. I'd think the lack of excitment would be a real downer. Do cycling instructeurs get in enough ride time. ? All those hundred of thousands of miles on the bike in training. How would one cope.

I can't imagine the disappointment retiring from pro cycling. The loss of endorphins. Could one get in sufficient hours riding to keep up your drug addiction to endorphins. Following a career retirment, many suffer career let down. I'd think the lack of excitment would be a real downer. Do cycling instructeurs get in enough ride time. ? All those hundred of thousands of miles on the bike in training. How would one cope.

Jan pretty much retired after every season :D

I can't imagine the disappointment retiring from pro cycling. The loss of endorphins. Could one get in sufficient hours riding to keep up your drug addiction to endorphins. Following a career retirment, many suffer career let down. I'd think the lack of excitment would be a real downer. Do cycling instructeurs get in enough ride time. ? All those hundred of thousands of miles on the bike in training. How would one cope.


I don't think Jan ever suffered from the loss of endorphins! ;) The reason his career never reached his full potential was because he like to party too much.

A good quote to sum up Jan:

"Unlike [Lance] Armstrong, [Jan] Ullrich doesn't have the killer instinct. He's not obsessed. It's too bad. Because if you mixed the professionalism of an Erik Zabel with the talent of a Jan Ullrich, you'd have an Eddy Merckx." - T-Mobile team manager Walter Godefroot after the 2004 Tour de France

That good German fatty food? He gained weight faster than any other pro I recall reading, during the off season . Still, he parties during Christmas, imagine how he will act if he has no season to go to following the Winter doldrums. he might become another Eddy Merckyx. Or maybe it's the German beer.

Well, Jan was one of my favs. And definately one of the prettier cyclists. I'll miss him.

coward
+100

Ok. So does anyone here actually have a job? Or are we all like microns close to the "panic" button on our computers so boss doesn't see what is going on?? lol.

Now that I'm teaching college chem. I can pretty much do whatever unless I am actually in class or lab. Although I think I did jump on BF during the last exam I gave since we have wireless internet in the classrooms.

+100

Ok. So does anyone here actually have a job? Or are we all like microns close to the "panic" button on our computers so boss doesn't see what is going on?? lol.

Now that I'm teaching college chem. I can pretty much do whatever unless I am actually in class or lab. Although I think I did jump on BF during the last exam I gave since we have wireless internet in the classrooms.

:eek:
:eek: :eek:
:eek: :eek: :eek:

:eek:
:eek: :eek:
:eek: :eek: :eek:

Don't be surprised...she's your dream girl and you know it. She's smart and rides...what more could you ask for?

If he really IS innocent, it's a shame that he was finally driven away by the doping allegations, but it does seem strange to me that Basso is back on the bike and he's retired.





I'll miss him, snif.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b268/halimec05/Par805628_200.jpg

In a way that final performance in the tour de suisse was befitting and classic, a screaming TT finish through a hellfire-n-brimstone thunderstorm to take the podium.

Things would definitely be different if Ulrich had been licensed in Italy. More and more Puerto is looking to me like an object lesson on how untidy the European Union can be. Riders licensed in one country implicated in something in another while under contract with a team licensed in a third country that wants to participate in a race in a fourth country, sounds like a recipe for lining the pockets of legal teams for decades.