Professional Cycling For the Fans - Tour Of California

Does that mean it's unofficially OK to start a Tour de Calif thread here? I've been off the forum for a few months so my apologies if this is the wrong place, and for a mod to feel free to delete or move this if appropriate.

Other than that, are you psyched about the race? I think I'll wait until Saturday before I stick my neck out as far as any predictions. :)

Leaving tomorrow to head for California to follow the Tour. I'm lucky get to follow the whole race and see each stage! Hoping the weather dries up!
My prediction for GC: 1st- Levi will narrowly win his 3rd ToC 2nd- Floyd will be on form and hungry for the win, but just miss., 3rd- Someone from Columbia/High Road... Big George, Lokvist, Rogers?
I'm hoping that the Garmin/Slipstream boys (i.e., Christian VV) win a stage or two and that the Rock Racing guys get shut out completely.

I'll be at the prologue. The NorCal group is doing a ride in the morning preceding it. Should be a fun time!

OK, you guys have raised the jealousy factor by several notches. I wish I could be at the race, dammit! Well I was going to hold back on some of my picks but I will hereby stick my neck out and post some of my favorites who I hope will at least win a stage and perhaps finish in the top 10...

1. I have a soft spot for Cyril Dessel (AG2R) and hoping that support from Tadej Valjevec and Vladimir Efemkin will get him at least 1 stage win.

2. I simply cannot vote against Thor Hushovd (Cervelo) to get a sprint victory, though he will be hard pressed by Mark Cavendish (High Road) to get it! I figure Daniele Bennati (Liquigas) will surprise them both and grab one stage. Tom Boonen (Quickstep) will have Marco Velo to lead him out but I predict Boonen to be frustrated with 2nd places at best.

3. Oscar Friere gets a stage win, though not in a bunch sprint.

4. Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank) finishes in the top 3.

OK that's enough of a gamble, I have to hold off on my winner prediction for a few more days. This should be enough to get me in trouble. :D

nope, you could have always posted it here. We are going to take care of that soon.

+1 for Thor, especially with the weather being what it is.

Does that mean it's unofficially OK to start a Tour de Calif thread here? I've been off the forum for a few months so my apologies if this is the wrong place, and for a mod to feel free to delete or move this if appropriate.

Other than that, are you psyched about the race? I think I'll wait until Saturday before I stick my neck out as far as any predictions. :)

Its killing me that the whole race covers all my old stomping grounds, but I won't get to see a thing!

Anyway, I expect Astana to win, with the racer of their choice. What I would really like to see, though, is Landis to destroy the field with his months of frustrated suspension, and prove to all finally, in the only way that it could be proven, that his TdF Stage 17 was not a cheat. But I'm not holding my breath, and in spite of having read all the books I haven't made up my mind either way.

Edit to add a good race link, in case anyone is lacking:

http://www.cyclingnews.com/road/2009/feb09/california09/?id=09default

Thanks for the Cycling News link! Additional information can be had at the official race website as well...

Amgen Tour Of California (http://www.amgentourofcalifornia.com/)

I almost forgot it starts this weekend!
Levi for #3?
How will Landis look (though I'm not sure I care)?

I think Floyd has a lot to prove and he seems like the type that would like nothing more than to throw down an "in your face" performance. Whether he can physically back that up, who knows? But I'm looking forward to the prologue and first stage. I just wish my dad were alive to argue with...he'd be eating this up right now! :)

I will go with Dave Zabriskie to win the prologue. I was hoping to use Kloden as my favorite but it appears he is not riding.

This prologue is so short and flat that it will be very fast unless there is some kind of high wind or very cold conditions. I would like to see Zabriskie win and I think that he will place high but I think Fabian will blow everyone away on this one. But then again the race is so short it is almost like a long sprint. Kind of like running the 400 meters on foot. It could go to a rider who has track sprinting experience. Or a rider who is good at both TT and sprinting.

As for Landis. I think he is going to be testing the waters to see how well his hip holds up to full on racing. I don't expect either Floyd or Lance to do any better than top twenty on the prologue. But it will be interesting to see.

EDIT: I just learned that Floyd crashed on a training ride and is OK but bruised up. He still intents to start the race though. This could effect his performance.

Here I am enjoying the cold, rainy weather , since would could really use the water, in Southern California, and it dawned on me that the ToC was starting in the middle of it ! Man. Another year with poor weather for cycling, when the race will be viewed all OVER the place.

It's supposed to storm with strong winds on Sunday and likely last into Monday. It's a slow moving system that will dump a lot of rain (potential flash flooding) into the Santa Cruz mountains. I hope it doesn't affect stages 1-2 too much! :(

Watch for Team Type 1. I am hoping they will make a name for themself in this. My son is a type 1 diabetic so we have been watching them for a while. Moisés Aldape has been pretty decent.

too many to choose from

Is the live tour tracker showing any coverage for anyone?

http://tracker.amgentourofcalifornia.com/

I watched all of last years on the net and it was great.

That feed seems screwed up, but the cycling.tv one is working fine.

I would expect Levi to win unless he misses a key breakaway. It'll be interesting to see how LA rides including as a team mate.

Levi rode like a devil but finished in 2nd place. Fabian destroys all. Zabriskie in third. Armstrong turns in a very respectable 10th place or so. The old man still has it, that's for sure. Landis about 88th place.

Landis & Tyler very rusty. LA looked good and will be a formidible team mate to Levi.

Great to see all those big names racing today. Has me pretty pumped about riding tommorow!! Watching those guys always inspires me....

Great to see all those big names racing today. Has me pretty pumped about riding tommorow!! Watching those guys always inspires me....

Yes, me too! I've been stuck on the trainer all winter and itching to get out and ride. It was a great prologue. Lots of action though I would like to see Craig Hummer leave most of the play-by-play to Phil and Paul. He's an OK guy and he tries hard, and fits in alright as an extra, but he doesn't have the "Phil skills" to broadcast the race action. Other than that minor "nit" I was happily glued to the TV set for 2 hours. :)

I watched on cycling.tv and on Versus. Magnus Backstedt's commentary on cycling.tv was just great, and along with Anthony McCrossan's play by play, was far better than what we got on Versus. Plus they showed the whole race, not just the hour that Versus pruned it to. I signed up with cycling.tv with some reluctance due to cost, but I'm glad I did.

Does anyone know where the feed zones are for Mondays and Tuesdays stages? I want to pick up some water bottles and musette bags as souvenirs.

How was the streaming on the Tour of California site and on Cycling.tv? I watched it on Versus but will not be near a TV tonight. Are these good options?

Cycling.tv seems to be leading me to believe that they are streaming it live for free?

The Tour of California web site is the best web site that I have seen for a bike race. If you have a fast DSL connection you can have two live cameras plus the running commentary and map which shows the riders position. The only down side is that it is not very high definition. All this is free.

Technical problems today with the web site. I hope some of you guys were able to see things better on other channels.

This years TOC is already showing it's teeth by spitting out the guys who are not at a high level of condition this early. Landis got dropped or bonked about 10-15 miles from the end, but he did stay with the first chase group over the mountains. Now they are saying that Landis is pulling out. He looked totally bonked when he fell off from the chase group.

I don't know that the technical problems were the web site or the weather. I suspect the weather.

Looked like a tough day, or what I saw of it. It was very windy, and the cold rain would have made for really difficult conditions.

Ya, I think the rain was interfering with the digital signals and also during most of the race the helicopter and plane would not fly due to weather concerns. Funny that they came on at the end of the race just in time to see the ending.

The story on Landis droping out now seems to have changed so hopefully he has not dropped out. If he is not fully on his game what better place to get it back together than by racing.

I was pretty impressed with Mancebo and his ability to have something left at the end. When Nibali caught him I was sure the Italian had the win in the bag. And then Van De Walle chased them both down, and I figured no way would Mancebo hold off the attacks from the two of them after doing 100 miles of solo riding. The smart money was on VDW to win in the Belgian-like conditions. Shows how much I know! :D

Well I have the DVR programmed for the rest of the week, I just hope the weather improves so that we get more race coverage and less filler.

Ya, Mancebo's ride was incredible. If this was not a fluke ride he is going to be a serious threat for the GC. However, the TOC often becomes a ride of survival due to the weather. Last year something like 60 percent of the field left the race as I remember. The biggest challenge is just going to be able to finish each day with a respectable time and not get sick or too run down from the cold.

I hope that the motorcycle camera's had local recording abilities so they can piece together footage from the race. It would be stupid if they didn't have a backup plan. My guess is that the helicopter and plane service tripled thier fee to go up in the bad weather or refused altogether. At the end of the race it was still raining when they went up but perhaps it had slowed down to some degree.

Velonews is now saying that Landis flatted. Perhaps this is why he slowed down so much and looked bonked. He may have been riding on a flat tire and slowing down for the new wheel car which may have been quite a ways back.

Great ride for Mancebo to pull out the sprint at the end. Coverage was a little off. Time checks were all over the place & they didn't even know the where abouts of Van De Walle until he showed up on camera near the end.

whose local and going out to watch stage 2 tomorrow? where are the hotspots to watch the riders?

Yesterday’s coverage was terrible. I hope today is a lot better, I'm sure the riders would be happy about that too. Glad I had it recorded on the dvr so I could fast forward. I wish there was more footage of Mancebo going off the front at only 5 miles in. He did one hell of a ride. Over 100 miles alone. I was happy to see Lance holding his own. I can’t believe that stole his TT bike though.

Yesterday’s coverage was terrible. I hope today is a lot better, I'm sure the riders would be happy about that too.

I agree. It sure was a disappointment from watching the TdF and the Giro. Not knowing who is off the front is very frustrating. And having a few circuits of the city at the end is a cool thing, but when the main field is many minutes behind, it can cause confusion when break riders are actually more than a lap ahead. I'll give them the benefit of the fact that the weather was atrocious and the video feeds from following motorcycles were probably non-existant. I am hoping for better stuff today though! :thumb:

Awesome ride by Mancebo, heroic comes to mind. Im glad he had enough zap left for that final kick.

Coverage on the web site was bad today also, but we did see a little of the end. Was quite an exciting race. Levi is either in yellow or close to it as he gained back most of what he was behind on Mancebo. Lance crashed again but got back on and finished in the first big chase group at the end about a minute behind Levi and Peterson. I lost track of Landis and Zabriskie.

Somebody apparently stole Lance's TT bike along with 3 other team Astana riders.

bummer.

:d

Great stage for Levi really lighting up the stage, really showed his metal. Rock racing had no answer, they're lucky they had sevilla up there.

So watching the evening highlights, there was not a single time check, no listing of where riders are. It was basically a guessing beyond Levi. Surely it's not that difficult :notamused:

Still, with the atrocious weather, there's been a lot of great racing.

I just wish the camera operator would wipe off the lense once in a while.

Other than that I'm excited about the way the race is developing.

Did they really have to cut the last 34 minutes of Tuesday's stage to start the NHL game on time? Yeah, yeah, I know . . . . . . contracts.

Yeah that was extremely aggravating. Although I set my DVR up to the time that it said for today's stage and I didn't get to see the last 30 minutes or so. The peleton was about 2.5 minutes back, running up to the finish. I set it to run an hour longer than it said for tomorrow though.
They won't catch me off guard tomorrow. :notamused:

http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/6996/239stolenlancebikeembedfg7.jpg


Lance Armstrong's Bike Turned Into Police Station. On Wednesday, February 18, 2009, at 10:35 a.m., a local resident brought Lance Armstrong's stolen Trek bicycle to Sacramento Police headquarters at 5770 Freeport Boulevard.

http://www.sacbee.com/latest/story/1635044.html?mi_rss=Latest%20News

Yeah that was extremely aggravating. Although I set my DVR up to the time that it said for today's stage and I didn't get to see the last 30 minutes or so. The peleton was about 2.5 minutes back, running up to the finish. I set it to run an hour longer than it said for tomorrow though.
They won't catch me off guard tomorrow. :notamused:

Yeah I tried that same tactic on Tuesday's stage, setting my DVR for an extra 30 minutes, just in case. I normally do that for the TdF stages too since they often run over. The trouble is, the extra 30 minutes was the hockey game since VS was contractually obligated to televise that.

Besides recording the 2 hour show,I've been recording the late night recap 1 hour show which shows the actual end of the race.

Did anyone else see HINCAPIE pull to front on the stage 3 sprint to the finish and then backed off when he looked over his shoulder? The fun of team tatics!!

Did anyone else see HINCAPIE pull to front on the stage 3 sprint to the finish and then backed off when he looked over his shoulder? The fun of team tatics!!

Well Hincapie was trying to lead out Cavendish but Cav was stuck further down the field hence his poor placing. George was a little pissed about that.

They got it sorted today with help from Renshaw.

I still can't figure out why Cavendish slipped back so quickly, did he miss shift or something?

I loved the crazy spectators on yesterday's hill climb. Batman and Robin, the grim reaper, the guy with the Texas longhorns. And did you see the guy with the jersey that said "Live Clean"...he was brandishing a pitchfork made from oversize medical syringes. OMG I about peed my pants! :roflmao2:

I wanna do that stupid stuff! :D