For Tour de France riders there's nothing like being the leader and wearing the yellow jersey on the last day coasting in sipping champagne and then standing on the podium. This year's winner Alberto Contador is under investigation after failing a blood test --

[uk.eurosport.yahoo.com]

I remember 2nd place Andy Schleck being a little crabby towards the end of the race but he passed his blood tests.

I guess professional sports people aren't into the sports for the health benefits, but because they're super-competitive, that's why they're always taking drugs for performance.

Professional cyclists must be driven by something. "Blood doping" shocked me, you know that's where they'll have their own blood drawn, stored and then transfused when they get run down. It sounds dangerous.

The beef industry is pressing for investigation now that Alberto Contador is sticking with his excuse of steroid tainted beef. [www.bikeradar.com]

Any Monte Python fans? This is the one with Michael Palin on a cycling tour. He keeps falling off because his pump has caught in his trouser leg.

"It's funny isn't it how disliking bananas and indifferent to cheese one can still enjoy a banana and cheese sandwich."

[www.youtube.com]

Add potholes and ice to my obstacles in the past year. I could be seen recently with a heavy trowel and a backpack half full of stones to cobble my least favorite pothole, the asphalt patch already getting tired and the highway department ignoring it.

loeve,

When I think of you now, it's as the Marauding Pothole Filler. You should have someone sew you a costume, like a superhero(It'd be awesome if someone came and filled the potholes around here without being asked!).

Thermite and chunks of asphalt and gravel are really fun to patch pot holes with...hehehe

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, mirror in the sky
What is love?
Can the child within my heart rise above?
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life?

Haha, I've got a grudge against this one pothole.

Do you make your own thermite? I've got a kilo of fine granulated aluminum which I understand is a common base --

"The melting and boiling points of aluminium also make it ideal for thermite reactions. Its relatively low melting point (660 °C, 1221 °F) means that it is easy to melt the metal, so that the reaction can occur mainly in the liquid phase[9] and thus proceeds fairly quickly. At the same time, its high boiling point (2,519 °C (4,566 °F)) enables the reaction to reach very high temperatures..." [en.wikipedia.org]

Just got back from a ride and noticed a 1/2 inch ground rod along one dirt road twisted over and sticking out a foot into the road and about 6" high, some old relic perfect for tripping someone up. I pulled it out of the ground - now about 2 kilos of copper off in the brush waiting for me to collect some day with my wagon.

dang! thats allot of copper! and yes, I do make my own thermite, although I buy the iron oxide online, as its very cheap vs the quality and quantity, you can get 30lbs of FE203 for about $42 after shipping I believe, if you take into account how much of a pain in the butt it is to make that much high quality iron oxide yourself, you really save allot of money, unless you have some sort of huge system for making iron oxide in bulk already set up for some reason...lol... Also, Im not sure about other states, but I know at least in california, you can have up two 2 lbs of mixed thermite legally, and in every state you can have as much iron oxide or powdered aluminum as you want as long as they are not mixed together, or in close proximity to eachother (not really safe anyway,lol...) And I prefer magnesium core cannon fuse to ignite it, set up to actually ignite a 4th of july sparkler

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, mirror in the sky
What is love?
Can the child within my heart rise above?
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life?

I see now, thermite is a pyrotechnic.

My aluminum is actually aluminum sulfate for gardening. It wouldn't work anyway so I guess I'll stick with my portable oven which will heat asphalt to 450F which is all I need if I ever patch another pothole with anything but cobbles.

The Schleck brothers team has signed a big name --

"Four-times world time trial champion Fabian Cancellara has joined the Schleck brothers' team on a three-year deal, the Luxembourg Pro Cycling Project said on Tuesday.

"The Luxembourg Pro Cycling Project is thrilled to announce that it has signed Fabian Cancellara to a contract that will see the Swiss powerhouse riding for the team for the next three years," the team, who are set to hit the road next year, said in a statement.

Swiss Cancellara, who achieved a rare Tour of Flanders Paris-Roubaix classics double this year, is joining from Bjarne Riis's Saxo Bank team."

[uk.eurosport.yahoo.com]

So Andy Schleck is boss moving forward.

The cycling tour "banana in you" video was actually my first choice, you know the one with bananas ubiquitous in nature and the edible bike. Does anyone have a link?

Monty Python made a bike tour skit sequel though I can't quite place it.

My bike has a mystery squeak when pedling hard. I'm suspecting peddle crank bearings. Time for an overhaul.

Schleck teammate Fabian Cancellara is in the top 7 cycling youtube videos, here in a '09 stage seven descent wearing the yellow jersey --

[www.bikeradar.com]

They say here he's very good in the mountains and helped Carlos Sastre to victory in 2007.

This rider (Pretty girl massive bike crash) goes over the handlebars, does a swan dive and gets up smiling --

[www.youtube.com]

- the girl knows how to fall.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/06/2010 10:37AM by loeve.

It sounds like the Spanish Cycling Federation is likely to find Alberto Contador guilty of taking a banned substance, and then Contador will likely appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport --

[uk.eurosport.yahoo.com]

The new Schleck brothers team sounds like a bright spot in cycling news, against the investigations into Lance Armstrong and Alberto Contador, and "Thor Hushovd won the world championship title in Geelong, Australia, in October, becoming the first Norwegian to take the crown." [uk.eurosport.yahoo.com] - always liked Hushovd and didn't realize he was having such a good year.

"While most will remember the race (2010 Tour de France) for Mark Renshaw's headbutt or Schleck's slip of the chain..." [uk.eurosport.yahoo.com]

I always wondered how Andy Schleck's chain came off... There was a time when riders would slow down to let someone like that catch up so the race would not be decided by something so trivial, the two leaders in this case only something like 12 seconds apart. I'm thinking the Lance Armstrong years when if Armstrong had a mishap his team-mates would signal the rest of the pelaton to wait - and they generally would. Armstrong didn't always reciprocate though, recalling his team US Postal several years ago dropping a main rival who crashed on the cobblestones. I missed seeing the Tour this year, only catching some highlights.

the girl got lucky
good thing there was a lot of leaves and probably soft dirt
it looks like her legs kind of got tucked/stucked and trapped ( sort of)
and her shoes ... maybe it just looked like it did

carry home message;

wear a helmet
esp. if you are not on a leafy soft earthy area

learn how to leap and roll properly
wear a ton of padding everywhere so you look like the Michelin tire guy in the commercials

just in case
so your shoulder won't be rearranged and whatnot

just my two and a half cents



hey.. i just kinda skimmed this thread

what's the deal with all this talk about pothole filling and pyrotechnic

should i read ALL the threads very carefully and see all the videos
to see how that conversation seemed to pop up ( literally)

yeah, i should

i know.. i read too fast sometimes

like a blur

then go

huh??

hahahaha, ltns LV how have you been?

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, mirror in the sky
What is love?
Can the child within my heart rise above?
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life?

In the "pretty girl" video she's probably fallen that way since an infant so it's become a reflex. Going over the handlebars you can be catapulted if you stay in the saddle. She slips down off the seat and slams through the steering post (lucky to be a girl) keeping low to the earth, arching her back and using her forearms as landing gear. Hope it's a once in a lifetime experience!

I went over the handlebars for the first time last year getting scraped and bruised hands and have been back to the scene, a pothole, twice since, the first time with cold asphalt to fill it (should have used heat), the second with cobble stones.

Speaking of crashes, Jens Voigt signed onto the Schleck brothers team. I'll never forget his crash during the '09 Tour --

[www.youtube.com]

He was changing lanes and his bike slid out from underneith him on a slick painted line. I always thought he was knocked out cold but this clip shows him concious.

ouch!

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, mirror in the sky
What is love?
Can the child within my heart rise above?
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life?

hey loeve

yeah but that kind of fall

won't cut it on hard cold cement

but then again

its not like she had fair warning

what matters is that she survived

so who cares

i ve fallen of bikes before

and sometimes you don't even get a chance to roll properly

scrapes hurt quite a bit

still got a scar

not too pretty

oh well

i can cover it up

nicely

though

its called

c
L
o
t
h
e
s

Sure, with a hard flat surface the technique changes. There's a choice between sliding causing severe road rash, and rolling possibly resulting in a broken collar bone or wrist. Like you say sometimes there's no time to react, or the bike or road gets in the way of your plans. My bike seat got tangled up in the back of my rain coat so I went tumbling with bike attached. Jens Voigt was surprisingly unfazed by his crash, saying he was essentially uninjured in any way that mattered to his racing.

There's something special about falling over the handlebars and I've noticed how road racers tend to roll.

A horseman might relate. They hate falling foreward and will grab on to the mane or bridal to avoid falling off and breaking their neck.

Here's Andy Schleck (2009 Tour) involved in a pile-up on a rainy descent --

[www.youtube.com]

He gets banged up but looks alright after a couple minutes back up riding on a teammate's bike.

I remember this 2007 moment of a rider hitting a dog, even after seeing it coming, swerving and skidding to avoid it. The dog and rider seem fine after --

[www.youtube.com]

Here's Andy Schleck on a steep climb. Sometimes the spectators join in on foot --


[search.aol.com]

loeve Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Here's Andy Schleck on a steep climb... --
>
> [www.vancouversun.com]

Here's the article [www.vancouversun.com] to go with that photo. Andy Schleck is in the yellow jersey during 2010 Tour de France stage 14 sitting on Alberto Contador's wheel, Contador unable to drop Schleck but looking forward to taking the lead in the time trial in a stage to come.

falling is sad
but instructive
especially when the scrape goes through the clothes and the cement gobbles up your skin

but its a pretty wonderful feeling knowing that your skull and brain is still intact

and that you can still get up and walk

life is good
GREAT even!

yeah, not being able to walk sucks.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, mirror in the sky
What is love?
Can the child within my heart rise above?
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life?

The YouTubes are nice because you can watch the pros crash in slow motion and really get a sense for their skill at it. The bump, step and role in the above rider/dog collision is impressive. In some cases the fabric they wear must be tough because they seem content to slide on like there's nothing to it.

Black and blue are the team colors of the newly named Team Leopard-Trek of Luxembourg, "Leopard" for their team manager's Leopard management company and "Trek" a sponsor. [www.cyclingnews.com]

May they ride black and blue in clothing only.