Ya, but I didn't want to mess it up for anyone.

Hahahahahaha that made me laugh though it is very true...

And you are correct, I've ridden with pros who still can't corner worth a damn...

pre race I am always worried about my cornering (descending mostly in RRs)

During the race I am always surprised at how bad most other people are at descending.

The devil you say

Correct and direct is not necessarily a rant. It was all good stuff.

OK, I'll say his name...Horner. When it comes down to it, I guess I kind of like the guy. Not that I have any great heroes in cycling. I'll reserve hero status for people who genuinely change the world for the better. I think Chris is a smart guy that that has a lot of racing savvy and who would, in the boxing world, be a master of 'ring generalship'. He really does race well. That was kind of my point about the other day. I think he read the race correctly and his time gain was as much about his tactics as it was about his legs. That's cool to see even if you don't care for the guy on a personal level. In a similar vein, I like to watch Floyd Mayweather box. It doesn't mean he's any less of a tool as a human being.

The defense of 'Big Tex' was really weird. He could have at least said something like, "It doesn't look good, does it?" or something reasonable. Instead he was in full Kool-Aid mode until Oprah-time. Who did he think he was kidding? I bet even Lance was like, "wut?"

One quote from Chris that spoke volumes to me was simple. He was asked, "Why have you not been implicated in doping like all the other Americans riding at the time?" His response was, "I guess because I wasn't those guys teammate." It wasn't, "Because I rode clean." or anything of that nature. He basically said, "Because I didn't get caught."

I find that if I get gapped due to a descent it's because I'm worried about the stupidity of others rather than my own stupidity. Sometimes I've just made the conscious decision to back off because the the chance of the moron ahead of me killing us both is just too high. It's worth spending some energy in a chase at the bottom to make sure you get their safely.

Apparently 'spoilers" aren't allowed in my office...
Especially on high protein days...

So, I have only been watching tours for a few years but he always seemed genuine. It was nice riding with him at harpeth last year? Would love to hear what you don't like about him as I probably missed most of his career

you're doped or not.

it's like being a little pregnant.

There's nothing to indicate Horner was ever clean. In fact, he was probably kind of a prick spending quite a long time being doped beating up on the domestic scene when he couldn't make it in Europe originally.

I was in a road race in July with some fairly sizable descents, and the crap descending of some Cat 3 bike racers is horrifying to behold. Like FB, I'm much more afraid of the other guys on the road than the descent itself. I love descending. I do it pretty well. Trying to dodge the pinballs on the way down a mountain at 50 mph is no fun, though.

The way I see the Lance defense was, after years of being the black sheep, Horner decided he wanted to ride in the Olympics and he wanted to ride in the big show, and the way to do that was to kiss ass. So he kissed ass, and it was a little like he'd found religion or something. Very weird. Regarding whether or not he was doped - Horner is probably a perfect example of a guy who didn't gain the benefits of blood doping (assuming he did, which I certainly don't presume to know, but is likely) that a Lance Armstrong did, despite perhaps having more natural talent. Or perhaps not, I don't know. I don't know whether he's clean, obviously I hope so, but nothing surprises me anymore. On the other hand, he's not doing anything that seems to out of this world. He is going better than I expected.

Um. Mostly the talking himself as God's gift to American cycling. He clearly has a very high opinion of himself, and the way he expresses that really rubs me the wrong way. I think what really got my goat was his complaints about being excluded from the initial Tour team last year, that it couldn't be based on form because he was doing just fine. But checking on the team's story (regarding who could do the Tour based on who did what races, especially Suisse) and checking his results leading up to it, it seemed like taking a bet on his form being good was indeed unwise. And what do you know, after he whined a bunch and got his way, he went to the Tour and did f**k all. And to top it all off, the American cycling news media just eats it up. I get that he's a good interview, but everything the guy says is taken at face value, like he can do no wrong. I guess that's not a problem with Horner, but it is annoying.

Horner is widely believed to be Anonymous Rider 15 in the reasoned decision.

granted, he may very well be clean atm, but his past is a lot more clouded than what most think of him. While we are at it, same thing goes for his teammate Jens, who also gets way more plaudit than he deserves.

oh no you didn't

He might be doped and just not realize it. Sort of a Barry Bonds thing. He might have actually believed Lance was clean. Concussions do bad stuff to the brain.

concussion? rub this cream on your skull.

Hahaha. I like Jens well enough (and he is unbelievably charming in person), but I find rampant Jens-worship a bit distasteful.

I don't agree 100% but the general vibe is ROTM.

Mayweather has skill, speed, and ring smarts but I really hope Alvarez hits him in the face, hard.

My brother's wedding pics are in. It's rare that I see pictures of myself that I like, but I guess I should go to more Hawaii weddings.

http://i.imgur.com/Pv5Dejd.jpg

Agreed. Having said that...

Tour of Alberta prologue was a fun evening out. Doubt I will have much of a voice in the morning...

Bring your mtb, pump the tires to 40 psi. At least you'll get a bit more of a workout.

I ended up going with the cross bike - well, my wife's cross bike since I traded mine for a set of Reynolds DV46s last year. I had to adjust the saddle height a couple of times during the ride, which really wasn't a problem because we stopped to regroup every 10 minutes or so.

At one stop, I asked, how much longer is this ride - we'd already been gone for almost 90 minutes - and was told we were at the halfway point. I texted my wife to tell her to get her own dinner, I wasn't going to be home any time soon.

For most of the ride, I kind of just sat in the middle with folks on a variety of bikes - including some that sounded like they needed to be tightened up in a lot of places, but by the end, I was at the front with the guys on road bikes just trying to get back as fast as possible.

As for Horner, I just assume they all are doping.

And with regards to descending, several years ago, I did a race to the top of a mountain in Texas - Ex knows this race well having won it I believe.

At the top, a friend of mine who had been riding for many years more than me, told me to be careful on the descent - going down a 17 percent wall with a sharp left turn at the bottom can be tricky. I then proceed to follow him down and watched him miss the left hand turn and crash straight into the side of the mountain.

Even though I wasn't flying down the hill, I couldn't stop to check on him. I was going too fast and there were too many people behind me to try to stop quickly.