Hang in there

It has been brought to my attention that the 5count readers are jones'ing for some info on my Italy trip. Hang in there it's on the way. Check out this panorama of Lake Como while you wait (The DMB shot is probably gettin old huh?)



View from the patio of the B&B we stayed at while in Bellagio, Italy!

DMB tonight

Thanks to Jack DiGiovanna from the Team Florida list serve, I was able to get a couple of tickets to tonights Dave Matthews Band concert at the Ford Amphitheatre in Tampa. This is going to be the sixth or seventh time seeing the good ol' DMB live in action. Should be fun!

Landis' statement...

Hear what Floyd said:
click here

In other news...not drug related

On a day with such bad cycling news, here's something cool. I've recently booked a room at a Bed & Breakfast for the "Bellagio portion" of my upcoming trip to Italy. The place is called Il Perlo and it's directly on the route up to the Madonna di Ghisallo chapel. I'll be there for two days before heading over to Bormio to climb the Passo di Stelvio and the Gavio. And we recently switched our plans up slightly in order to fit in a drive up to France so we can climb Alp D'Huez!

In a related issue...
I'll need to borrow a 10-speed Shimano Cassette with a 27 on it.

Holy S***

USA's Floyd Landis celebrates as he crosses the finish line of the 200.5 km seventeenth stage of the 93rd Tour de France cycling race from Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne to Morzine, 20 July 2006. AFP PHOTO / PASCAL GUYOT

Floyd Landis is one Bad A** Mother F*****!!!
Quite possibly the best TdF stage since the 2003 Tour de France (stage 15), where Lance crashed, pulled out of his pedal, and still went on to win the stage to Luz-Ardiden.

TgF Stage 11...the short version

• Long stage, 5 climbs, one HC climb and 4 cat.1 climbs...oh yeah, and it's hot!
• Iban Mayo had an even worse day than the previous stage, yelled at camera man for recording his failure for the world to see, withdrew from the race...sorry sucka
• Disco boys were all dropped eventually...only the Ace hung in long enough to still have a shot at a high GC finish. The rest of the boys will have to go for stage wins in order to salvage their first "post-Lance" tour...booo, hisss
• Cyril Dessel fell only 8 seconds short of holding onto his yellow jersey for the Quatorze Julliet. Not a bad showing on such a hard day, he was a heck-of-a-lot closer than anyone thought he'd be...close, but no cigar.
• Michael Boogard rode like a man possesed in support of his team leader, Dennis Menchov...oh, and he has big teeth!
• Thomas Voeckler got to within 20 seconds of bridging up to the break, but he hit the wall and ended up finishing in 78th place, 33:47 off of the winning time...keep holding onto the memories of your time in yellow 2-years ago.
• David De La Fuente (Saunier Duval) was the most aggresive rider in stage 11. He managed to ride himself into the polka-dot jersey and as a result of his great ride, he got a contract extension as well...cha-ching!
• Floyd Landis became only the fifth American to don the maillot jaune as he finished third on the stage in an impressive display of poise and power...looks like the "man to beat" to me
• Levi Leipheimer found his form once again as he avenged his poor TT performance with a 2nd place finish in stage 11. He wanted the stage win soo bad, but will have to settle with knowing that he's still one bad mutha (now sitting in 13th on GC)...if only his TT wasn't ridden at the speed of ketchup!
• Dennis Menchov had better hope for the TT of his life on July 22nd if he wants to overtake Floyd and stand on the top step in Paris. Either way, this Russian has just let the world know that he's a serious contender!...nice ride, but Floyd's just too much for you!

In Fantasy world...
The 5count Fantasy team is still sittin pretty in the overall standings. The points earned soo far may be enough to keep us in the top 12, thus earning us some free cycling schwagg!

Another Stage win for 5count

Check out the Fantasy Cycling Game homepage...there's a little write-up about how yesterday's stage went, and how 5count won the stage.

We've accumulated almost a thousand points thus far, putting us solidly in third place overall. Hopefully we've earned enough points to hold off the teams with GC guys on their rosters as we now move to the mountainous stages of the Tour.

A Classic...

Some of you may have already seen this little gem, but for those of you who haven't, it's a classic.

5count's Fantasy TdF team...

One of our 5count fantasy teams has won the past two stages of the its fantasy cycling league and as a result has moved into the number two spot on GC (out of ~200 teams).

You can read the blurb that the promoters of the game sent out this morning by clicking here.

If this keeps up, we here at 5count might be looking at actually winning some free schwagg! Stay tuned.

And what's the deal with Eki's HR???

As I was watching stage 4 of the Tour de France yesterday on OLN, I was noticing the heart rate of Discovery rider, Viatcheslav Ekimov. OLN was broadcasting Eki's SRM info during the stage and it was shockingly low compared to others in the field.

While the peloton was in hot pursuit of the break near the end of the stage...strung out...single file...flying down the road, Eki was chillin' with a HR of 108 bpm! 108! My heart rate is 122 while still rolling out of my driveway at 4.5 mph! Other guys were nearing their max HR and Eki, who is like one-hundred and thirty-seven years old, was just loafing along at just over 50% of his max.

Was this correct or did the SRM transmitter have a glitch? If it was correct, I think Eki should've been countering just as Egoi was brought back to the field...with his TT'ing ability and his aparently low HR, he could've easily solo'd to a stage win...right?

P.S. One of 5count's registered fantasy TdF teams just moved up to 4th overall (out of ~200 teams) after finishing 2nd in stage 4! How do you like that Rowdy? (see Rowdy's Mom's comment here)

Cat 4 Danger...

It aint easy being a Cat 4 bike racer. Check out this clip from the Joe Martin Stage Race in Fayetteville, Ark.
...I can so relate to how these guys feel (see: Jacksonville Road Race)

TdF Fireworks

Only two stages into this year's TdF and there has already been fireworks (and I'm not talking about the doping allegations).

• George missed the Mellow Johnny by less than a second in the prologue.
• George sneaks a 2 second time bonus in the final kilometers of stage one making him only the 4th American to wear the Yellow Jersey in the TdF
• Thor Hushovd gets his arm sliced by a fan during the stage one sprint...loses yellow jersey.
• Thor fights for bonus points and regains the overall lead after stage two.
• Robbie McEwan out-sprints all the fast men to take the Maillot Vert in stage two.
• one of 5counts fantasy teams has moved into 8th place overall after stage 2, Rowdy is in 6th overall...but it's a long tour and the sprinters won't be scoring many points when the road tilts upward.
• Jan has gained fifteen pounds during a weiner-schnitzel binge and won't come out of his room claiming, "I'm der Kaiser, you don't mess vit der Kaiser!"

The Results are in...kinda Ironic, huh?

The results from the 5count Tour de France poll are in. The question was, "Who do you think will win the 2006 Tour de France?" Many of you voted, some probably voted many times and now the results are in.

As you can see from the above graph, the majority of you feel as though Ivan Basso (CSC) has the best chance of winning the '06 Tour de France. Jan Ullrich (T-Mobile) was also up there as a contender, but a majority of those votes were probably cast by the same family...we won't name names here but their name rhymes with Fruschlegel. The rest of the numbers came out like this: The irony is apparent...almost 2/3 of all the votes cast are for guys who are now suspended from competing in the TdF. THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING!!!

1 Ivan Basso - 410 votes
2 Jan Ullrich - 370 votes
3 None of these - 160 votes
4 Floyd Landis - 120 votes
5 Alejandro Valverde - 100 votes
6 George Hincapie - 30 votes
7 Alexander Vinokourov - 30 votes
8 Levi Leipheimer - 10 votes

* the number of votes have been multiplied by ten in order to compensate for the embarrassing lack of poll voting

5count's new Podium predictions
1st - Landis
2nd - Valverde
3rd - Popovych
4th - Menchov
5th - Leipheimer
* Hincapie, Cadel Evans, Cunego, Sastre, Simoni and DiLuca could all do something special too?

A New Poll...
Please weigh in on our new poll located in the left column of this site.
Thanks,
5count

Win a Ridley frameset...

You too can ride the same brand of frame that pros like Chris Horner, Robbie McEwan and Cadel Evans ride. The Grand Prize for the overall winner of a new fantasy cycling site is a Ridley Damocles Davitimon-Lotto Frameset.

I know what you're thinking..."I don't have time to follow up on a fantasy cycling team"
But this one is easy. I've done fantasy cycling leagues before, and where as they are fun, they can also be time consuming. This new site only takes about 5 minutes, just log in, create a team name, pick 9 dudes and yer done! Best part is...it's FREE! This league is obviously for the TdF, so you only have 1 more day to sign up.

So sign up and let me know what your team name is...5count will keep tabs on all the teams that are "owned" by 5count viewers and we can see who of us really knows our pro cycling. If there is enough interest and enough people sign up in time...5count will even sponsor a prize for the overall winner.

Editors note: in order to qualify for prize, 5count must recieve an email or a comment post letting us know your team name by July 2nd, 2006

Click here to start your fantasy team for the TdF.

My Deland Race Report...

I havn't really writted any race reports lately so I figure I'd ease myself back into it with a quick little post about last weekends Deland Omnium.

Saturday's Ford Road Race
There had been enough rain to fill all the pot holes with water and bring the humidity level up to about 157%. My race was scheduled for 8 laps of a 7 mile loop. Unfortunately, I would only see about 18 of the 56 mile road race.

For some reason the promoter thought it would be a good idea to cram both the Cat.3 and Cat.4 fields into the same race. So with the "yellow-line rule in effect", it was next to impossible to move up in the field or see anything in the road. On the first trip around the 7-mile course somebody went straight into the biggest pot-hole ever and broke his stem. He didn't go down, but his race was certainly over.

In the laps that followed, the field became pretty nervous as we approached the area that the pot-holes were in...and on the third lap that nervousness resulted in a crash right in the middle of the field. I tried to go around, but others began to go down right in front of me. These crashes always happen so quick and the next thing I know I'm sliding on my head and left shoulder through the palmatto brush that laid next to the road. Luckily for me there was a nice little palm tree that stopped my forward motion. Aside from getting the wind knocked out of me and a collection of little scratches, both myself and my bike would live to race another day.

Sunday's Deland Circut Race
I abstained from the time trial on saturday afternoon. I'd like to say that I was too shaken up from the crash to compete, but while that may have had a little to do with it, I really didn't have much intention of doing the TT in the first place (something about seeing my name last on the result sheet just seemed depressing).

So I ventured back to Deland on Sunday after a restful stay at my folks house in Orlando. The rain was off and on all day which created some slick corners, but fortunately the rain stayed mostly off during our Cat.4 race. I uncharacteristically covered a couple of early breaks at the urging of my teamate which made me feel like a team-player, albeit a tired team-player.

Overall I felt good and stayed close to the front. I was able to go where I needed to go and didn't have any problems following attacks. As the race started biulding to it's climactical finish I knew that I wasn't going to have the legs needed to sprint with the favorites, so instead, I launched myself off the front of the field as we crossed the start/finsh line with one lap to go. I knew the 1.2 mile course was going to be too long for me to stay away, but my intention was to be more of a catalyst for a nice fast last lap, thus giving my teamates a smoother finish as opposed to the entire field trying to squeeze through the last wet corner before opening up into a kamakazi-like sprint. Maybe deep down, after saturday's crash, I didn't really want to be in the field for the last wet corner, and blowing myself up before the sprint seemed like a better alternative?

Anyway, I did indeed blow up after only a quarter mile at 30+ mph. Once caught, I dangled just off the back of the field for the remainder of the last lap and rolled through the finish line healthy, happy and in one piece. My team "leader" took a top-ten finish and was happy with the way we rode as a team...so in the end I felt like the race was a success for me.