Chad's spot for various thoughts, musings, poetry, ideas and whatnot

Friday, May 11, 2007

So the Giro de italia kicks off tomorrow. Last year's champion is not starting because he's a doper (regardless of what he might say about just intending to dope) and several other riders are being held out because of the increasingly long shadow of Operation Puerto. Their are still several interesting riders coming to the start line but one has to wonder whether the race will be as exciting as it might have been. I have to say that it seems to me like the Italians are ahead of everyone else regarding keeping questionable riders out but I have to say I wish they had invited Team Chipotle-Slipstream as a wild card. Jonathon Vaughter's young squad has been so far ahead of the curve on keeping its riders clean that I think they should be rewarded somehow. I can't really blame the Giro organizers for inviting the local Pro Contentental teams but maybe they should have thrown out the Tinkoff team just for having the termidity of submitting Tyler Hamilton's name on their first start list.

Now, for my completely worthless predictions.

The contenders are the usual suspects for this race: Simoni, Cunego, Garzelli, and Salvodelli. Add to those the dark horse contenders of Di Luca, Popovitch and Rasmussen. Here's how I see it: I'm still not convinced Cunego is the real deal and that he won a few years back clean. Maybe he did but he had no previous results and just seemed too good. Simoni's getting a bit long in the tooth but if you take out the dopers in last year's Giro, he wins the thing. Definitely podium for Gilberto but I think he'll get stabbed in the back by his young teammate and we'll get to listen to him whine for a couple of months. With this he'll sew up the title of "Cycling Crybaby of the Millenium". Garzelli was Pantini's protege and there's a cloud there. He's never really ridden at the top level since leaving Marco's side (and possibly pharmacist). Top ten for sure and maybe top five but I'm doubious. Looking at the dark horses you've got to like how Di Luca's riding but he's not a pure climber and this Giro is all uphill at the end. Popo is good in this race but he's been preparing to support the now departed Ivan basso and I wonder if he can shift gears in time.

I think Salvodelli has to be the favorite if his allergies can be controlled. He's got to want to show Discovery that they made a big mistake letting him go. He time trials better than Simoni and I think Astana is built more like Disco and CSC with an all for one attitude. One of the problems the crop up on the italian teams is a certain level of discord that may have been exciting at one time in cycling but is now a recipe for losing a grand tour. One final thoght regarding Simoni is that he was thrid up the Brasstown Bald climb in Georgia behind two guys who weren't even prepping for the Giro. Now maybe he was holding back and just sort of testing his form, but I was less than impressed with that performance and his fifth place finish in the uphill time trial here.

So, read and then proceed to ignore.

Overall: (1) Salvodelli, (2) Simoni, (3) Di Luca, (4) Popovitch, (5) Cunego, (6) Garzelli, (7) Rasmussen, (8) Belohvosciks, (9) Caucchioli, (10) Voeckler

Points: (1) McEwen, (2) Petacchi, (3) Bettini, (4) Haedo, (5) Hushovd

Mountains: (1) Simoni, (2) Rasmussen, (3) Arekeev

Given the tendancy of the Giro organizers to put together courses and finishes that are dangerous, I expect crashes to take out a couple of big names before the finish. I expect Bettini to win a stage or two and I expect Di Luca to win a stage early and to wear the Maglia Rosa for a while but I see Salvodelli grabbing the jersey in a time trial and clinging to the lead on the penultimate stage.

Hopefully it'll be interesting.

Thanks for Reading.

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