diphthong

you know that scene in caddyshack where the priest drags bill murray out to caddy in a
ridiculous rainstorm/windstorm, has the best lucky round of his life and gets struck dead by lightning on the
18th hole after missing a putt and blaspheming the lord? yah. i feel like the priest right about now.

diphthong

half of the giro participants in the bike forums league are in the top ten % right now which is pretty cool.
kudos to everyone participating and pissy that their 2nd domestique missed out on those extra 3 fantasy
points by freewheeling to the finish.

diphthong

bummer. if it's just for the gt fantasy nonsense, i'll be seein' ya only in may, july and august. fair weather rider.

slcbob

I don't think the heavy stuff is going to come down for quite a while.
- Carl Spackler

diphthong

carl spackler...along with yogi berra...one of the
top sages of the 20th century. i'd throw the
dude lebowski in there too.

diphthong

stage 8 looks to have a spring classics finish with a narrow street and a helluva kick at the finish.
ain't gonna be a sprinter's finish. if kwatkowski, valverde, gilbert, gva or sagan were racing, i'd pick
one of them. since they aren't, who knows?

diphthong

and in other news...doesn't look like velogames is doing a tour of california fantasy games. oh well.

just caught Canam73's correlative funny between the team name and team country of origin. touché my friend.

diphthong

aaand despite having the 2nd & 4th place finishers along with the ciclamina, white and pink jersey wearers
and some decently placed gc guys at the end of stage 7, i plummeted from 34th overall to 35th overall.
paranoia is returning and i'm (again) sensing yet another vast internet conspiracy. everyone ready for week two?

slcbob

Kirby / Lloyd nickname of Mr. Bojangles for Bob Jungels was cracking me up today.

Bojangles is going to have have an off day if I'm going to close on ooga-booga and avoid being pipped by the Bounty coming up from behind. Or some other Mutiny would be OK. Or maybe some of minions will find their legs.

Gallo

Okay now the climbs are coming and my turn to totally dominate and take ooga down. Victory will be mine! I only have about 7 thousand placement overall to over come and about 500 points No problem

except that ooga has Nibali and Yates as do I and I do not have Zakarian

Blockhaus is a beast. It will be a huge test for Jungles as I think he will be isolated. The GC guys were pretty calm on Etna I wonder if there will be a real attack tomorrow. There will be a rest day to follow and a relatively flat stage on Tuesday so we might see some fireworks.

edit oops a time trail on tuesday, no days off its the Giro my bad. Wednesday as a medium hard day looks wicked as well

canam73

I apologize to anyone else who had Thomas or Yates. I have a Fantasy Giro curse that goes back several years to when I only had 3 riders finish. I took out Dennis in the first week.

diphthong

fireworks there were. changes will there be.

slcbob

Well, hell.

I'm feeling pretty good about Tuesday with Dumoulin.

Feeling less stellar about my Kruisjwijk over Pinot selection (close to a coin flip, but decided Pinot & Zakarin together was too much choke potential.

Feeling lousy about the whole stupid chaos and the impact it has on the results and the riders' lives. What a fickle sport.

diphthong

good thing there's not money involved.

diphthong

seems like the sport is getting more "fickle." between the extreme weather protocol, neutralizing/truncating of finishes and the
increased motor bike presence (how many motorcycles in the last 5 years are responsible for affecting a stage/race in a
negative fashion?), there are more rules thrown into the works. and then there's the whole "did movistar do the right thing by not
slowing down today after a crash slowed down many gc contenders?

Gallo

I am not sure that Moviestar should have pulled up. It seems the old unspoken rule and chivalry is either dead or close to it. There is a problem not just with motos but with fans and cars as well. There seems to be lack of etiquette where fans are into the look at me im on tv to selfie sticks being dodged by racers and crowding the roads to the point where riders have only one lane to get through. This provides danger to cars and motos having to dodge fans and make way for riders. The stopping on the course whereby the moto had more than a meter of firm grass next to the road is crazy. There were little or no fans on this stretch and really no need for policing. They need to reduce the amount of cars motos on the course while have rigorous training and vetting of vehicle operators. Provide better crowd control to reduce interference from idiots. Otherwise these incidents will continue to happen with even more frequency and even worse results.

My picks this year are not looking good. Not sure what happened to Rolland but a nearly 100 not a good day for a climber. TJ blew a gasket early and might earn me a few points but will not be a revelation. Yates got caught up in the melee which was unfortunate but Landa looks to have suffered the worse of the 10 second bunch along with GT. Nibali was beaten soundly on this stage. Pinot who was not on my radar as I stated but well should have been had a great climb. Dumoulin was unexpected to be this good on that climb His time trial will be the one to watch. Nario was beyond spectacular and simply smashed the peloton and I am not sure that he was even on his limit because his poker face reveals nothing

slcbob

I thought the customary bet was in play. WTF?

slcbob

Race was already in full flight. It would have been a closer call if Jungels had gone down in pink, but even then I think stopping would be over-chivaling.

But what do I know, I'm just an armchair QB not an ex-pro.

Other than Matt White, who is going off on Movistar?

There will always be something go wrong and it's a slippery slope. Too much accommodation for every contender would result in half of the stages being neutralized at one point or another. I like the custom and class, but the textbook instances of it I think of generally have a bit more focus to them.

diphthong

the bike forums maglia nera still gets a lance tattoo on their left calf-right?

slcbob

Livestrong and prosper.

diphthong

v

i like it

diphthong

dumou crushed that tt. nice to see bojangles and nibbles and even zakarin put in solid rides. tomorrow's mtn stage looks like a good one for some of the downtrodden gc guys like tj and yates to take a flyer in hopes of pulling a few minutes back.

slcbob

Will today be your day, Mr. Christian? I can feel the Bounty right up behind me, but perhaps the Gorilla will help me open up a little space these next few days before you cause trouble for me again in the hills to come.

I've been traveling this week so am still catching up on the goings on. Well done Geraint Thomas bouncing back on Tuesday.

slcbob

canam73, I don't think you will be nipping at my heels quite so strongly with your wildcard headed off to Pitcairn Island to recuperate for Le Tour. Sincere regrets, that's a lousy outcome.

diphthong

yah bummer about thomas and now the gorilla folding his tent and going home before the mountains. here come the daily gc shakeups. gaviria is a beast. hope he races the tour.