Startling blue sky

As occasionally happens after a stormy day the turbulence of the storm seems to have moved not only the storm away but most of the ambient air pollution that usually hovers over a metropolitan area of this size.  The sky was blue, really, really blue.  Startling even.

I waited until after the first game before heading out.  Foul or no foul?  But no matter which way you decide on that how about those Dutch?

I wanted to ride down to the river to get at least a peak at it while it is still near flood stage.  The wind was pretty punitive so I wavered on my commitment to the river and logged some State Fair miles.  For the first time the pavement leading up to the refurbished arch was available.  Naturally, I rode on it.  I have only seen the arch from the Fair side but today I could get just barely past it to see what was on the other side.  A new paint job at what will officially be the West Gate.

The wind was so strong from the south and west that eventually I headed down the hill towards the campus.  Easy enough into the wind because it was downhill, expecting easy enough on the way back uphill with a strong tail wind.

I rode on the trail over to the pedestrian bridge.  The last time I was there there was construction and loose gravel before you could even get off the bridge approach on the far side of the river.  A lot of that has been cleared up allowing me to explore a bit farther.

This is going to be good.  Just on the other side of the bridge there is a tunnel under 35W leading directly into downtown.

This promises lots of potentially interesting new routes.

I stopped on the bridge on the way back to get the view of the river that originally motivated me to try to ride in that direction.

Particularly for a Sunday it was quite a nice ride.

I think Contador.  I watched the final stage of the Critérium du Dauphiné a couple of weeks ago.  Talansky had escaped and eventually got far enough away from the leaders to allow him to win the overall.  Meanwhile Contador and Froome were in a group together a few minutes behind the Talansky break watching each other.  Eventually Contador decided that he wasn't going to win the race riding with Froomy and he attacked the leader group alone.  And absolutely rode away leaving them all behind.  He had left it too late and never was able, riding solo, to get within reach of Talansky but he absolutely annihilated the Froome group.  Froomy looked very vulnerable, even with teammates to help he had absolutely no answer for Contador.

My take is that Team Sky has had to scale back the "medication" program.  The testers occasionally make inroads into the advantage usually held by the "elite riders".   My belief is that Wiggins "medicated" to win the Tour the year the Olympics were being held in the UK and rode that medication advantage to the Olympic gold medal.  Having won the gold medal the economic incentive for Wiggins to continue to medicate and risk exposure was markedly reduced.  Froome moved to the forefront and won last year's Tour.  But it appears that Team Sky is being a bit more conservative now and Contador's doctors have taken the lead.

Just my opinion, I could be wrong.

It won't be Evans.