With Liggett and Sherwin rooting pretty openly for him, the current dope leader produced a completely unexpected and unexplainable ride and retained the lead in the Tour de France. According to Phil and Paul and also to Rasmussen's comments after the stage, we are supposed to believe that somehow being in yellow completely rendered a lifetime of time trial results no longer relevant, that merely by donning a shirt he became what he has never before, even a single time in his life, been, a competent time trial rider. Sorry, I don't buy it.
No less an authority than Bernard Hinault predicted that Rasmussen would lose about 4 seconds per kilometer to his closest rivals. Instead, over 55 kilometers, the Chicken actually finished ahead of the former 2nd and 3rd placed riders. He lost time to only 4 of the remaining 7 contenders. He lost 3 seconds to Leipheimer, 37 seconds to Contador, 76 seconds to Klöden, and 101 seconds to Evans. His lifetime results caused a multiple time former winner to predict that he would drop about 220 seconds to each of his rivals, instead he dropped a total 217 seconds to four rivals. The man is not riding clean.
The latest accusations, apparently only reported in full in VeloNews are that Rasmussen has used a blood substitute. The substitute is intended for use in dogs and/or cows. It is apparently a treatment for anemia in dogs. This, of course, mirrors the legitimate human use of EPO. The man is not riding clean.
With the wind dictating direction, the riding companion dictating distance and a third criterion which the Babe will have to describe largely limiting destination, we ended up at Minnehaha Falls. This photo is from the bridge over the creek just above the falls, looking down into the creek gorge.
On the way home, believe it or not, we came across another unicyclist. This one was a kid and still not as competent at riding a single wheel as was yesterday's rider. The kid was coming to the curb cut at the end of the block as we neared the top of the hill on Como east of Snelling when he obeyed the instructions printed on my bicycle frame and looked at us instead of where he was riding. Down he went. He bounced right up, the young don't hurt themselves in a fall of such short distance.The corn continues its amazing progress.
The Babe is in there for scale but I just don't know if we can use this angle any more. She has disappeared into the stalks and leaves and if I let her keep going in there I am afraid that she will not be able to find her way out.So we may have to start using this angle to measure progress.
I hasten to point out that it was not I who peeled the husk back on this ear of corn. It's not my corn, I would not damage someone else's crop. But this one is right on the edge of the field and pretty clearly shows that ears have formed.
3 comments:
It seems pretty certain that he is a doper -- it makes it hard to get too wrapped up in the outcome. Vino's comeback made more sense to me -- but even though the Vino subplot is perhaps the most interesting part of this tour, he was suspect before the race started. Very sad. You have to look hard to find your model in that corn field. Amazing stuff. SS
I see BB standing there in the corn field right next to Waldo, the guy in the red shirt.
The TdF will go to the rider with the best druggist. It looks like Rasmussen may be tough to catch. I'll watch it anyhow, because it's pretty good drama, but I'm not buying any of their mechandise.
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