Franco Ballerini 1964-2010
Two-time winner of Paris-Roubaix, Franco Ballerini, has died as a result of injuries sustained in a rally car event. He was 45.
A professional from 1986 to 2001, Ballerini won Paris-Roubaix in 1995 and 1998. The Hell of the North was also his last race as a professional in 2001.
Other significant victories include Paris-Brussels and the Omloop Het Volk. In 1993 he was second to Gilbert Duclos-Lassalle on the line at the Roubaix velodrome.
Ballerini was serving as the co-driver (navigator) for driver Alessandro Ciardi at an event in the municipality of Larciano. The vehicle left the road and crashed. Ballerini and Ciardi were rushed to the nearest hospital, in Pistoia, but despite doctors’ efforts, Ballerini died soon after.
After retirement, Ballerini became the coach of the Italian national team, guiding the Squadra Azzurra to victory at the world championship in his first year, 2002. He was able to rally the team to support Mario Cipollini, giving the team its first victory since 1992. He was universally praised for managing to unite a team whose infighting had resulted in years of silvers and bronzes.
Following Cipollini’s win, the team would go on to support Paolo Bettini to win gold at the 2004 Olympics plus two rainbow jerseys—in 2006 and 2007. The next year Alessandro Ballan made it three years in a row for Italy.
Ballerini leaves a wife and two children.
Images: John Pierce, Photosport International
Travel Writing: The Tour of the Unknown Coast
Diving into the forest on the Avenue of the Giants
Of all the writing I do, some of my very favorite work is travel writing. More than ten years ago, in a job review, I was asked what I wanted my job to be in five years. I responded, “Sniper.” Feature writing is in my blood and bringing to the reader an extraordinary experience in a far-flung locale is more fun than video games.
Some years back, when I was in graduate school and facing an ennui only those privileged enough to go to grad school can experience, I wondered what the hell I was up to. (Big surprise.) Over Christmas break I ran across the book “Out of the Noösphere,” a collection of features from Outside Magazine. It recalibrated my mission, so to speak and has informed my travel writing ever since.
Currently, the only real travel work I do is for Road Bike Action Magazine. Their editor, Brad Roe has given me pretty broad latitude to work. As I’ve written elsewhere, it’s as fun a relationship with a magazine as I’ve had. And given that Hi-Torque’s Mountain Bike Action was only the second magazine I developed a real affinity for (after Sufer Pub’s Skateboarder), to work for a Hi-Torque publication on a regular basis is big fun.
Zap even remembers my name now.
There are those days on the bike, days that are revelations. While a day can be memorable because of your form, your results, your company or your location, the way memory works, the more of those elements you pull together, the more memorable they are.
I had one of those days at the Tour of the Unknown Coast. Held in Humboldt County, California, it is the hippiest of the hippy holdouts. A different sort of place, and a different sort of ride. While there are a great many century rides, the TUC seemed to draw only those riders with a certain love for suffering. Harder than your average bear, Booboo.
If you enjoy travel writing, whether mine or not, I hope you’ll pick up the March issue of Road Bike Action. You might even want to check out the ride, which I can assure you, is one for the scrap book.
USAC Bans Race Radios, Mostly
USA Cycling, in response to a request from the UCI, has banned race radios in almost all road and track events. With the exception of UCI HC or Category 1 races, radios and audio playback devices (iPods and MP3 players to us normal folk) may not be used. Effectively, that means you’ll see radios still in use in all the events that actually result in race-watching tourism: the Amgen Tour of California, the Tour of Missouri, the Philadelphia International Classic (men) and Liberty Classic (women).
Last fall, the UCI banned race radio use in all races with a .2 classification. USAC’s action extends that ban to non-UCI-sanctioned events, thereby ensuring that you won’t see radios in use in any Pro/I/II events. The same is true for similar category European-held events, as was announced a few months ago, but this expansion of the ban—which also includes “audio playback devices”—moves things a small step closer to an outright ban on race radios in the events we cycling fans really follow.
For radio bans to extend further one of the best developments that could take place is for race organizers elect to ban them from their races. The Amaury Sport Organization is the obvious candidate for this as they could try it in a race such as Paris-Nice before considering it in an event such as Paris-Roubaix or the Tour de France.
Team can be expected to fight any expansion of this rule with the fervor of a gang war, but the arbiter will be race outcomes. The success of a suicide break or two will give the UCI all the ammo it needs to push its will into all the ProTour events.
Image: John Pierce, Photosport International
LeMond Litigation, an Update
Greg LeMond and Trek Bicycle Corporation have reached an out-of-court settlement. The agreement spells out an end to all legal proceedings between LeMond and Trek, bringing a 15-year relationship to a close. While most of the terms of the settlement were confidential, both parties agreed to disclose that Trek will pay $200,000 to 1in6.org, a charity with which LeMond is affiliated.
Trek will make two $100,000 payments to the California-based charity. Its purpose is to educate people about childhood male sexual abuse and takes its name from the rate of incidence of that abuse. LeMond is a member of the organization’s board of directors.
While the impasse between LeMond and Trek seemed to hinge as much on LeMond’s belief that Lance Armstrong was attempting to intimidate him as it did on LeMond’s believe that Trek really wasn’t supporting the LeMond brand to the degree spelled out in their licensing agreement.
In preparing for a possible trial, LeMond had begun deposing witnesses, including Kristin Armstrong, Lance Armstrong’s ex-wife. The possibility that LeMond might try to depose Armstrong himself loomed over the proceedings and threatened to turn a fairly straightforward business dispute—nonperformance—into a three-ring doping circus.
Due to the fact that most of the terms of the settlement are sealed, we’ll never know just what brought the case to resolution. However, by any estimation, the single least desirable result would have involved Armstrong on the stand. In this regard, LeMond had Trek over a barrel; they had two reasons to avoid testimony by Armstrong. While it is safe to assume Armstrong would have said nothing to incriminate him or Trek, his mere presence would have turned the proceedings into front page news. And then there’s the aftermath to consider. Armstrong’s ire has a history of its own and Trek really can’t afford to take any action that would alienate the seven-time Tour winner.
Litigation for LeMond isn’t at an end with the resolution of the Trek suit. As one of the creditors of the bankrupt Yellowstone Club, LeMond, joined by his in-laws, David and Sacia Morris, is contesting the sale of a parcel of the millionaire-only Yellowstone Club in Montana. Membership in the club is ultra-exclusive and includes Microsoft founder Bill Gates and L.A. Dodgers owner Frank McCourt. LeMond and the Morrises wish to make their own bid for the property.
The parcel in question was the “family compound” for Yellowstone Club co-founder Edra Blixseth and her family. It is being sold as part of a liquidation of Blixseth’s assets due to bankruptcy.
LeMond and the Morrises are taking issue with the price offered by CIP Yellowstone Lending, LLC, another Yellowstone Club creditor. Less than two years ago CrossHarbor Capital Partners offered Blixseth $56 million for the 160-acre parcel. Recently, CrossHarbor offered Blixseth a mere $8.5 million, with only $500,000 coming in actual cash; $8 million would be “paid” in debt relief to Blixseth in the form of debt forgiveness. Court papers filed by LeMond and the Morrises argue that the bid has no relation to its actual value.
When the real estate market crashed, sales at Yellowstone Club stalled. Blixseth and her then husband Tim Blixseth took out a $375 million loan with Credit Suisse. Rather than using that to help the faltering Yellowstone Club, the Blixseths put the money into other ventures. When the pair’s marriage hit the skids in 2008, bankruptcy followed, both individually and for the club.
While Blixseth’s parcel is only 160 acres within a 13,600-acre resort, the location of the land make it particularly attractive and its sale is seen by some as key to reviving sales of new parcels in the Yellowstone Club.
As original investors in Yellowstone Club, LeMond and the Morrises should have shared in the proceeds of the $375 million Credit Suisse loan. That suit was settled for $39.5 million, and while a settlement was reached, a fair chunk of that settlement remains outstanding. As a result, LeMond and the Morrises hold a $13.5 million lien on the Blixseth family compound—more than the value of the CrossHarbor bid.
John Shaffer, one of the attorneys representing LeMond and the Morrises asked the judge overseeing the bankruptcy to reject the CrossHarbor bid and to give them 120 days to put together a bid of their own. A ruling on that request is still to come.
The full text of the Trek/LeMond joint press release:
Joint Press Release of Greg LeMond and Trek Bicycle Corporation
Cycling legend Greg LeMond and Trek Bicycle Corporation announced an agreement to close out all remaining issues for the business venture they began in 1995, and to provide funding for a charity near Greg’s heart.
“Greg has a hard-won place in the Pantheon of bicycle racing, and we are proud of what we were able to accomplish together,” said Trek’s President John Burke. “Trek respects Greg’s efforts and commitment to the charitable foundation, 1in6.org, and Trek is pleased to lend its support to that very worthwhile endeavor.”
Three-time Tour de France winner LeMond said: “I am pleased to resolve the issues between Trek and myself and am happy to be able to move forward with the things important in my life. I appreciate Trek’s support for the work of 1in6.org. I take deep satisfaction in this resolution and believe it will have a positive impact on those that can benefit most from the purpose of 1in6.org.”
Image: John Pierce, Photosport International
Cyclocross Worlds: The Unthinkable
Since 1998 the Belgians have had a stranglehold on cyclocross the way the moon has a stranglehold on werewolves. Before today, ten of the last twelve men’s world championships have been won by Belgians. The two years they didn’t win were taken by Dutch riders. From 2003 to 2005 the Belgians swept the podium; they would have done it again in 2006 were it not for interloper Francis Mourey stealing bronze.
World Cup champion Zdenek Stybar has been on form all season, and put everyone on notice that yet another silver at worlds (following his second place finishes in 2008 and 2009) wouldn’t suffice. But did anyone really think he could overcome the Belgian mafia? Home court advantage or no, the Belgian team showed up with three—three!—former world champions. They could in-fight their way to another podium sweep.
But it wasn’t to be. While the Belgian team did put two riders and the podium and three in the top ten, the best-placed Belgian was newcomer Klaas Vantournot. Sven Nys was the only former world champion to finish on the podium, in third. Meanwhile, Bart Wellens was tenth and Erwin Verveckin finished a dismal 16th.
You think that’s surprising? That’s not the half of it. The Czech Republic team had plenty of ammo, not just Stybar. The Czech team placed four riders in the top ten—Martin Bina in fourth, Martin Zlamalik in sixth and second-generation ‘crosser Radomir Simunek in eighth. As a result, the Czech Republic and Belgium accounted for seven of the top-ten spots.
Post-race Nys said he had to admit that retirement age loomed for him and the other riders of his generation. But is this the end of Belgian dominance in cyclocross? Hardly; in taking the other two podium spots, the Belgian team shows depth and consistency. The real story is that 2010 will be remembered as the year of the emergence of the Czech Republic as a cyclocross superpower, a team prepared to go toe-to-toe with the Belgians and the Dutch.
Bicycle History: A Book Review
Every bathroom needs at least one cycling volume. Back when I had roommates I used to leave a history of Mont Ventoux, in French, on the tank of the toilet, just to mess with them. When I was younger, my volume of the Rolling Stone Record Guide occupied the coveted tank spot.
I’ve got a new book to occupy those trips to the reading room. Title rather simply, Bicycle History the first book from Bill and Carol McGann’s new venture, McGann Publishing, is a year-by-year assemblage of bicycle trivia, spanning 1860 to the present.
For the suspiciously minded: Frequent readers of RKP will recall that Bill McGann has contributed to RKP. Anyone who purchases a copy of the book will find a cover blurb I wrote for it. In neither case did any money change hand. I like what he does and he seems to have some regard for RKP. That’s as far as this goes. End of full disclosure.
Imagine a perfect world. In Utopia, I expect there would be a game show devoted to bicycle trivia. Who won the 1952 edition of Paris-Roubaix? When was the toe clip invented? And by whom? This volume could serve as the perfect source material.
Bicycle History is a compendium of facts unbridled from the constraint of a narrative in which the author might seek to impress upon the reader a larger truth. As a result, it’s an easy, if compelling read. You can sit down with 1951; maybe you’ll make it through the whole year before you’ve finished your business. What sense there is to be made of the facts is left up to the reader to decide.
Frankly, the disparate details the book includes are a bit like Lay’s potato chips. You won’t stop at one. Or two.
Each year’s chapter is a bit like a time capsule encompassing racing results, the births of future stars as well as the deaths of former greats, technological developments and sometimes business transactions as well.
Interested? You can order it here.
The 313 Life
Winter storms can have a curious effect on a dedicated cyclist. Their greatest effect is to curtail riding. Whether it is snow, rain or something more ambiguous, any precipitation in cold weather makes riding less convenient at the very least, but has the ability to make it downright impossible for days at a time.
But for other sports, namely skiing and surfing, winter storms are the Promised Land, Christmas day, the prologue of the Tour de France. It’s times like these that I start thinking it’s time to broaden my horizons again.
Each of these sports shares some similarity in appeal. They require a fair amount of balance and coordination. They are also much easier to participate in if you have some fitness and strength. That’s why you never see zombie skiers, surfers or cyclists; they have mad strength, but terrible coordination.
Skiing—any variety of it—and surfing both have the advantage of being less equipment-intensive than cycling and, therefore, the potential to be less expensive as well. Yet for every feature that makes these sports attractive, I can think of a few reasons why cyclists are more fortunate. Now, given that you’re already reading this blog we can assume you are a dedicated cyclist and therefore need no sales pitch on cycling. However, a celebration, even at this time of year, of just how good we have it can’t really hurt.
The first and perhaps most obvious difference between cycling surfing and skiing is its lack of restriction due to geography or season. Surfing is confined to the coasts, so if you’re a waterman in Salt Lake City, yours is a life of ennui. Even if you live near the beach, there are plenty of days when the surf is just kind of eh. It’s even worse for skiers. Skiing is but a vacation endeavor if you live in Texas. But living near the mountains isn’t enough; the best ski areas are still open fewer than six months. Sure, there are wintery days when getting on the bike would be no fun, but there aren’t many places where you can’t ride at all for six months and terrain isn’t much of an issue. If there’s a road, you can ride.
My favorite feature of cycling is that it has the ability to be social in a way that skiing, surfing and virtually every other sport is incapable. Sheltered within the bubble of the peloton or just out on an easy ride with a friend, we can ride in close proximity, pedal and chat, all at the same time. Just getting close enough to another skier to speak while moving can be suicidal. I really cherish that ability to do and share simultaneously.
It’s true that straddling a surfboard and waiting for waves can be a great opportunity to catch up with friends. Similarly, the trip up on the lift is best spent chatting, so that you don’t focus on the cold. The problem for me is, compared to cycling, both of those periods are not doing. Compared even to soft pedaling deep within the group, that still counts as riding.
Here’s one of the unfortunate corollaries to cycling’s more social nature: With surfing and downhill skiing, much of the sport is about taking turns. While that’s a good way to learn social graces, it does hold the potential for conflict if someone doesn’t much feel like waiting their turn. Even getting a wave at a surf spot you are new to can be very difficult. I’ve never had someone tell me I couldn’t ride a road, though.
And whether you’re talking about downhill or cross country skiing, going downhill fast—as fast as possible—is rarely an option unless you’re in a race. Odd to say, but in cycling, many of my fastest descents came on roads I wasn’t racing. Even more frustrating for me was the fact that the steepest trails I most wanted closed during a cross country ski race—so that I could utterly rip them without fear pile driving another skier—never were used in races.
Let’s not forget the front door quotient, either. Being able to step out of my garage and swing a leg over my bike instead of having to load up equipment and drive anywhere from five minutes to five hours to enjoy my sport of choice really helps me maximize my time. There’s no doubt that Mammoth Mountain is worth the drive, but it really can’t be part of a practical daily regimen.
Ours is an opposite problem. We have the opportunity to do our sport too much, to overtrain. In some places, riding 365 days per year is possible; as a result, we actually have to choose days not to ride. If you make sure to take one rest day per week, that works out to about 313 days of riding per year. We never get that many days of riding, but it’s nice to know the 313the limitation is more inner than outer. Skiers and surfers can barely fantasize about so many days of their favorite sport in a year.
I’ve thought about what life would be if I, as a cyclist, faced the challenges found in other sports. What if I got a hostile reception on an unfamiliar road? What if I didn’t live near roads where I could ride? What if I could only ride during vacations? The reality is, I’d want a new sport.
That thought scared me, made me wonder if my devotion to cycling is less than a surfer’s who may wait years for a massive swell to hit his favorite break. What I realized was that my desire is no different from the motivation to get married. I want this thing in my life on a daily basis. I’ll take the mundane of base miles, the could shoulder of the wind, the disappointing days when the form just isn’t there. I’ll revel in the big days where every climb feels like a honeymoon. I love it enough to take it all and not just wait for date night, for vacations.
Friday Group Ride #6 Wrap
It’s tough to boil down allegiances to teams, to isolate love for a formation independent of its riders and it showed in your answers. No matter how much we might want to identify a team’s personality with precepts of management, director style or strength in a set of races, we still track back to the names flying the colors.
To this end: Were Quick Step not the dominant team in the Northern Classics, they wouldn’t have made this list. At all. Their lack of native English-speaking riders loses them the jingo vote and without an ongoing streak of wins on cobbles, there wouldn’t be much to love. Let’s not be too surprised. We love them precisely because they kick ass.
The revelation was your love for Team BMC. By signing Big George (media outlets are contractually bound to use the adjective “big” before any mention of Lance Armstrong’s former lieutenant), Alessandro Ballan and—more important—Cadel Evans, BMC led the voting nearly three to one. What?
Reader Blue summed it up best when he called BMC an “underdog supergroup.” I’m still trying to get my head around that image. It’s like pairing John Paul Jones (everyone’s favorite invisible bassist) with David Gilmour (the world’s most impressive withdrawn guitarist), Anthony Kiedis (a truly underrated singer and songwriter) and Pete Thomas (who modestly backed up Elvis Costello on album after great album). An underrated supergroup. God, I’d buy that album without ever hearing a single song. Asia wouldn’t stand a chance.
Cervelo Test team got the next most votes and that illustrated a curious point: This underdog love thing isn’t just talk. The two teams that got the greatest number of points are both Pro Continental teams, not ProTour teams. How weird is that?
The strange corollary to this point is that only two teams, Radio Shack and HTC-Columbia got some negative votes. Consider these the hanging chads of the cycling world. HTC-Columbia is so dominant in field sprints that a win by them has the ability to downright disappoint some of you. Worse yet, there’s some noticeable backlash against Team Radio Shack before the first European race has ever been run. (Especially strange was how one reader disliked a team composed of old guys, but still digs Jens Voigt. Perhaps it’s a good thing the German powerhouse didn’t join an American team for his final season).
Garmin-Slipstream would almost certainly have faired better had they not joined the ProTour, but they scored as well as Quick Step, The Shack, Sky and HTC-Columbia, unless you figure in The Shack’s negative votes, and then they don’t fare so well.
If RKP had the ability to control race outcomes just to keep you folks happy, we would do well to make sure that Saxo Bank wins every tenth race that BMC or Cervelo doesn’t win. Settling the Grand Tours could be hard, but in this scenario, neither Astana nor Radio Shack would have a chance.
Sky may have bought themselves a world class team, but they have yet to buy your love.
Image courtesy BMC Cycling Team
Surprise
All the big teams have had their presentations for the 2010 season. The season’s goals have been laid out, some publicly, some not as. So what’s likely to happen?
I got to thinking about what I’d like to happen. There are probably a great many of you who think I’ll be at the prologue of the Tour with sniper rifle trained on Alberto Contador. My equipment will be loaded, to be sure, but only with a 2 gig memory card.
Would it be interesting to see Cav win Milan San-Remo going away from the field? Sure. Would it be amazing to see Tomeke equal Roger DeVlaeminck’s record at Paris-Roubaix? Absolutely. Would it be great to see Contador battle Armstrong and Schleck until the field quit in submission? Truly, it would be riveting.
There’s just one problem. Not one of these outcomes would be surprising. Even those of you who hate Armstrong with the level of detestation ordinarily reserved for the intestinal flu must admit that an Armstrong victory is a possibility, no matter how damnable you think that version of the future might be.
And so, with five hours of me, a bike and an average heartrate lower than the speeds I drove as an irresponsible youth, I thought about the coming season.
Obsessed may be more like it.
I asked myself how I’d feel about Cav winning in San-Remo. Blah. Tomeke enter the velodrome in Roubaix alone? Equal parts thrilled and bored. Contador in yellow in Paris? Less ennui than I felt when Indurain won his third, if pleased to see him equal Thevenet’s and LeMond’s record. What if Armstrong stood atop the podium. Stunned. Plain damn stunned. Can you think of another rider that more teams will be riding against at the Tour? Has there ever been another rider that more teams will have deliberately ridden against? Did Merckx inspire that kind of opposition in anyone other than DeVlaeminck?
The answer, in my case, is that I just want some surprises. I don’t really mean of the Dirk Demol or Jean-Marie Wampers variety, you know a guy who doesn’t even get named as a dark horse, but rather, a guy who is a 10 to 1 or a 20 to 1.
It means seeing a break succeed at Milan-San Remo or—better yet—a tactical checkmate that leaves Quick Step chasing all the way to Roubaix—and off the podium. Not that I’ve got anything against them, I just want some finishes that I would never have guessed. And given the enormous limitations of my memory and creativity, it really shouldn’t be that hard.
So what would it require? Well, here’s the thing that occurred to me somewhere around Hollywood’s coastal outpost, better known as the Colony: Race outcomes were more uncertain—say it with me, people—before race radios.
There is plenty of dislike for race radios among the RKP readership as it is. I’ve straddled the line. Those of you who have been readers of VeloNews for a long time may recall Bob Roll’s account of riding the Giro d’Italia in the 1980s and entering an unlit tunnel only to plow into a pile of bricks in the middle of the road and fall in a puddle of diesel. Race radios might have helped him. They have done much to help team directors alert riders of coming course difficulties. On the other hand, the race courses are generally better scouted and selected today.
What of TVs in the cars? Honestly, I think these are as much a problem as the race radios. Do you suppose the team directors would be ordering their riders to the front to pedal hard quite as often if they couldn’t see live feeds of the race on TV in their cars?
So back to the old question. Should race radios be banned? If the team directors had less information about exactly what was happening from one moment to the next they might not bark quite so many instructions to their riders, ordering them to the front to ride.
Had radios been in use in ’88 and ’89 it is highly unlikely Dirk Demol and Jean-Marie Wampers would have stayed away to win Paris-Roubaix, and while I was non-plussed that a rider I had never heard of won Paris-Roubaix in ’89, I’d be grateful to see more uncertainty injected back into the racing.
So one thing is certain: At the very least, the TVs ought to be outlawed, even if the radios persist. It’s a miracle, if minor, that some DS, apoplectic over his riders’ inaction in the face of an attack, hasn’t crashed his car while glued to the feed.
Meh. So there it is, I’ve come around to wanting race radios banned from the peloton. I want the TVs yanked out of the cars, the radios left at home and team staff forbidden from watching TV at some hotel and calling the DS to update him on just what’s on the tube. So maybe the cell phones should go—just during the race, mind you—as well.
I risk seeming a Luddite. I’m not against technology, but what I want to avoid is the near constant feedback that tells the pack they are bearing down on the breakaway. The GPS data that reveals what the gap to the break is—5:10, 5:05, 5:03, etc.—is tantamount to the live TV feed. While it’s great for the home audience, I’d like to see anything that can give precise enough feedback to let the pack know the gap is coming down 10 seconds per kilometer find its way to Salvation Army.
After all, shouldn’t part of racing be based on your ability to do math when you’re at or above your lactate threshold?
So what’s going to happen? The call for radios to be banned will grow louder, that is what’s going to happen.
Image: John Pierce, Photosport International
The Versus Petition
Here at RKP World HQ we pay for the questionable service of Time Warner. A great many of RKP’s readers have let us know that they are unwilling to endure them and instead subscribe to DirecTV. However, DirecTV isn’t carrying Versus, which is precisely why this household is willing to endure erroneous billing, service interruptions and impossible customer service. It seems a reasonable price to pay to make sure we get as much bike racing on TV as possible.
While there are an ever-increasing number of options for watching bike racing on TV, many folks would prefer to lounge on the couch with remote in hand. For all those of you who are DirecTV subscribers wishing they would carry Versus, the network has a petition to which you may add your name. Your voice could help encourage DirecTV to make bike racing available to hundreds of thousands of subscribers.
