GrainBrain

Got a few americans, a Swiss national rider, the mighty Rohan, a Canadian, an Italian, a Belgian ...

slcbob

Is McNulty really taking the start? I thought he got roughed up at LBL.

Not that I'm plugged in to the going on, with the death of steephill and the dearth of good analysis without a $ub$cription. But that's another thread! And even if you do pay, to read, the journos can only print what they're hearing and no one is speaking anything but un-truths about injuries and such.

Onward!!!

GrainBrain

Wow sharp insight and I even watched the debacle. I had to go back and see, yikes he was limping a little and missing some skin

GrainBrain

Shout out to ooga-booga for Uran and semroc for Pinot. I wasn't going to get that spicy though I'd love to see either win GC. canam73 and I have high hopes for Dennis. I'm excited for Sepku and Powless. slcbob I picked Cattaneo after being influenced by youtube pundits.

Shout out to our interloper picking McNulty - I sure hope my last second snub of him comes flying back in my face!!

diphthong

dennis is dead to me.

slcbob

I don't know what slowed down the TGV today. Perhaps Remco was buying after La Doyenne.

Niagara Falls! Slowly, I turned. Inch by inch, step by step...

I flirted with Lazarus Rohan for a nanosecond. Naw. I almost convinced myself G could stay upright for a week. Naw. The one that came closest to getting out of the woodshed was Louie Meintjes.

I'm sure we're in for some surprises this week. Like Hayter! I see a lot of Sheffield fans in our league. Vlasov, too, but that's more mainstream.

slcbob

I did this one pundit free. I expect the results may reflect!

Who was touting Cattaneo? Just curious. I've given up on the YouTubers. I can't consume it without too much hassle.

I see now that the Mole didn't even mention Cattaneo. Reflecting on what I see there now, if I were to make one change, it would be to add O'Connor.

diphthong

wanted hayter but couldn’t make it happen w/o losing uran or woods. flirted with the idea of bungle in the jungels/bojangles and hirschi but neither has been the same rider they were after leaving their previous team. hmmm…

GrainBrain

The "Ow Do Cycling" guy they pimp on the VG Twitter feed. Pretty sure he purposely threw this one because I'm pretty sure he snubbed all three Bora riders in the 12 point range. Then I watched großchatner Schachmann storm it and was like "oh yeah Paris Nice '21" (right?) Schachmann!

Looked at hayter and Bevin. I had Sean Quinn till the last minute. Shout out to McNulty literally showing up to his start time 7 seconds (!!??) before he was to go down the ramp. I bet he'll do well, he seems to do well under pressure.

I'll double check but I'm pretty sure I picked the Swiss rider that rode up the side of the barriers

slcbob

After phoning in the spring classics, now the man from Pitcairn Island is not to be trifled with in Romandie. Nice start, canam73 . Hitting your stride as things are about to get serious in Budapest soon?

diphthong

seppuku(ss) has been kinda quiet this year so far but it would seem like he's about to be unleashed. would love to see him (and brandon) ride the giro as the big dog(s).

slcbob

I was hoping to find out that his middle name was Ulysses or Umberto or some such thing, but no joy. I checked Wikipedia and USA Cycling. No middle initial. Darn.

May our bevy of scrappy Americans excel in Romandie.

diphthong

did romandie start yet? oh. it's all been downhill since msr...not boding well for the gt's...

diphthong

not to jump the gun but loving this year's giro stage profiles/routes. okay, jumping the gun-twice. dq'd. looks a little less predictable for certain types of riders and favors another type.

slcbob

Don't be dreaming of your beloved Vuelta when you pick your Giro team. See what happened with the Giro and Romandie?

You'll be crushing it soon enough, I fear.

GrainBrain

canam73 almost had stage three with taaramäe, would've been awesome! now holds the overall.

Neat finish by Bora in today's stage 4. Ethan Hayter I completely forgot about!

I'll be interested to see how Sean Quinn does tomorrow. Thinking Powless could get 4th or 5th at least in GC?

Just realized Rigo out with fractured collar bone from stage 1? That's awful luck along with l-b-l!

diphthong

possibly our closest competition this year in the tour of romandie! Semroc/team Pulling Faces (do i want to know?!) nips both
Grain Brain and slcbob at the line in a tight, hard-fought affair.

there's a little thrashfest on the near, pink horizon...

diphthong

nice giro win by slcbob.
5.06-5.29.22 giro d'italia (marco pantani/"il pirato" memorial trophy: slcbob

monarchofthetours is still Grain Brain.

we've got the dauphiné rapidly approaching on june 5th. look to have rosters available to mangle by june 2nd or 3rd.

diphthong

dauphiné is up! deadline of 10:00 cest (central european summer time) on sunday, june 5th, 2022. that is 09:00 in the uk and 04:00 on us east coast.

GrainBrain

Lot of great looking 8 pointers, like Froome.

diphthong

tour de suisse is up and rolling! deadline of 12:45 cest (central european summer time) on sunday, june 12th. that is 11:45 in the uk and 06:45 on us east coast.

https://www.velogames.com/suisse/2022/

diphthong

congrats to Keka 76 and Team Poetovio/SLO in taking the dauphiné! yours truly finished 2nd while Phil Shepherd and team Das Boot took 3rd! thanks to everyone that participated. tour de suisse looks to be a barnburner...

for those more recent joiners...welcome. have a pre-existing rule in the contests/stage races/gt's where if someone hasn't joined before stage 3 (or the 3rd race of the contest), they just hafta wait until the next velogames version of that race. so the superclassico and stage race championship are locked in at a huge five participants this year. recognizing the actual winners of each stage race, but not counting totals for the later joiners for superclassico or stage race championship. otherwise, it just gets too hard to go back and revise history, totals, etc. making an exception for the three grand tours...as long as you're in by the start of stage three...since there are always some people that only play the gt's (probably the smartest people in the room). the tour de france is rapidly approaching and the newcomers have had some fantastic results. the old-timers have their work cut out for them.

slcbob

Who is this Keka guy/gal? Brutally consistent at the top. I liked it better when we were pretending s/he didn't exist. I would have had a soft landing on the bottom step of the podium instead of being flung off the stage.

Our little league did not represent well in the overall. Pacing ourselves. May everyone have a great TdS and greater TdF.

slcbob

Glancing at the TdS team I picked hastily last week, my only thought was "why the heck did I pick van Baarle?"

Glancing at the teams across our little league, I saw ooga-booga made the same call.

My knee jerk assessment of that sort of situation is "great minds think alike" but, in this case, I think we're much more squarely in the zone my grand old drinking buddy Aine offered: "fools seldom differ."

Beautiful scenery in the parts of the stage I saw today. Here's to more racing to come. Slainte.

GrainBrain

I think van baarle would've been a good pick, so I was surprised to see him riding the front today. No wonder he's slated to move on from ineos (right?). I'm glad my cheeky pick of lutsenko might work out. Guess I'll be picking betiol for the tour!

Geeze so much for my soler GC pick - Cosnefoy hopefully loosing time on purpose...