Capitulation: by JT Fisher- Bicycle.Net - cycling news, product reviews

Capitulation: by JT Fisher

By VeloGuy on August 4th, 2007

Capitulation

Even the most ardent enthusiast of the sport of cycling deserves a break from the daily fallout of riders gone bad.
Going into this year’s Tour, I for one remained unabashedly optimistic. Notwithstanding chances a scenario as disheartening as last year’s Operation Puerto the night before/ Landis positive the day after might arise, there was hope that the 2007 Tour might provide us with that “new day” when cycling could begin reclaiming its integrity while quietly ushering out the back door any remaining bad actors in the sport.
In retrospect, the 2006 Tour didn’t look so bad by comparison.
It seemed I wasn’t alone in hoping to ignore thunderclouds rumbling in the distance, as the Tour got underway beautifully, and the boredom of several days of flat stages was fully remedied by the splendor of London and the enthusiasm of British fans lining the route. For a moment, it seemed we were back to simpler days, grousing about crashes as the peleton monotonously rode either fast or slow but in either case with much indifference until the final 500 meters of the day, when the sprinters would have their glory and those of us watching on the telly would look on with mild interest, desperately longing for days ahead when climbs in the Alps and Pyrenees would determine who really matters in the race.
If only it lasted.
Who among us wasn’t pulling for Vinokourov, despite his escapades – or perhaps even more so because of them? First we saw him touch the pavement for no particular reason, and clearly he struggled afterwards. And we heard about the 60 stitches that held him together, and how some had to be removed each morning so he could pedal freely. In the face of those odds, who among us wouldn’t have cheered him for winning? Then when the injuries seemingly took their toll, we were treated to a rising-from-the-ashes time trial performance that couldn’t help but beg comparison to last year’s Landis-solo-over-the-mountains win on Stage 17. Ominously, thunder rumbled once again, and Vino was suddenly out of the race, denying all the way back to Kazakhstan test results that found him having another persons blood in his body.
But event this wasn’t sufficiently troubling to shake us from our beloved pastime.
Donning rose colored glasses, we watched on, transfixed, as a daily barroom brawl broke out between mountain man Rasmussen and two feisty young unknowns named Contador and Soler, with such violence that tour “favorites” Leipheimer, Sastre, and Kloden found themselves getting tossed daily out the back, only to crawl home after the other three settled their differences.
But a state of utter disgust was at hand when the Danish federation went out of its way to announce that then Tour leader Rasmussen would be unwelcome on the Danish national team (notwithstanding that he said he’d not yet asked to be on it), because of paperwork irregularities that had made his whereabouts unknown when drug testers had hoped for a moment with him. When the rider explained the discrepancy along the lines of his having been confused about actually traveling to Italy when he’d thought he’d gone to Mexico, or something to that effect, we were all left waiting for the other shoe to drop.
And drop it did.
For the first time in Tour history, the Yellow Jersey was yanked unceremoniously from his bike and quietly ushered home in time to read in the press his team manager suggesting in no uncertain terms that the rider not bother to darken Rabobank’s doorstep in the future, thank you very much. Then they took back his toaster. Just like that, another tour team was decimated, a la Phonak. Worse, the rest of the team had to ride on to Paris with jerseys smelling of something foul that had rubbed off from their decamped team leader.
But hope remains for our sport.
So with the tour gone so awry, cycling fans were arguably more in need of detox therapy than anybody else. I mean, it was as if we found ourselves spending a month among 200 junkies — like we were back in high school, for god’s sake. My detox involved a road trip north with my dad, my son, three bikes, and not a second thought about missing the final stages of the Tour. Awaiting us in the state of Iowa were fifteen thousand like-minded folks, of all makes, models and sizes, brought together by shared fondness for cycling, ambling along in a never-ending “peleton” from one side of the state to the other, in an event called RAGBRAI. Days in the saddle, slow or fast as you please, town to town and met at all points along the way by happy people taking part in their own way as spectators, vendors, or just well wishers, sharing days and nights of fun as this rolling carnival overtook and enriched small towns, and these small towns, in their own way, returned the favor.
Lance was there, so we knew there were pro’s riding in the peleton. Nevertheless, there was little risk substances consumed on this ride might enhance one’s performance, since one generally has to stop and sit while taking on pork chops, Belgian waffles, ice cream, Gatorade, and beer offered at countless feed zones.
Keeping the faith.
One can’t know how many riders, teams and sponsors will ultimately fail the test of time (or the test of lab), and how modest our sport will have to become before it resumes being great. For those of us nevertheless enjoying every moment in the saddle, and every ride, whether out alone or along with our friends or our clubs, it will be worth the wait. Until then, we can only hope that those riders, coaches, and staff in the professional ranks will clean up their end soon, so we can once again be proud of them.