A cool tidbit about Vande Velde
 

It wasn't always that way. In the late '90s, Vande Velde, who grew up in Lemont, Ill., in the south suburbs of Chicago, enjoyed the fact that he was hailed as a great young talent. It ran in his veins -- he comes from a family of Belgian cyclists, and his father, John, was a member of the 1968 and 1972 U.S. Olympic track cycling teams. John Vande Velde earned an additional 15 minutes of fame when he was cast for a bit part in "Breaking Away" as one of the villainous Italian riders who knock earnest wannabe Dennis Christopher off his bike

I might have to bust out my dvd and try to find him.

SPOILER IN THE POST!!!!




vandevelde rode a great race today. 4th isn't bad. Schumacher was imporessive too. That's two wins in the ITT and he showed some moxy in the motnauins. If he can control the mountains a be a little more strategic there, maybe he can show more next year.

Any thoughts on whether the race was more or less drug free this year?

Maybe I want so badly for it to be clean that it has clouded my judgement a little but I bet this was the cleanest tour since the late eighties. The site of Ricco being lead away by the cops has got to make a lasting impression on the rest of the riders.

As a side note I find it a little funny that Luxembourg can place three riders higher then the leading French guy.

disappointing that only 4 Americans in the tour, despite 2 American teams.

Vandevelde was really a bright spot for the Americans to latch onto, although none of us probably thought he could win.

Hopefully next year will be a stronger on for America. I'd like to see an all-American team.

I'd also like to see a black and asian American on the team someday as well.

I have never seen a black man on a road bike. Ever.

I enjoyed watching Vandevelde this year. Schumacher while attacking on the last two stages of the alps, never seemed to have the gas to climb with the leaders, so he will have to work on that.

I felt it was cleaner. I never saw this year one or two riders that just flew off the front of the pack and took 3-4 minutes on one stage, (with the exception of Ricco, who was caught). this always seemed to happen before.

Cavendish was amazing as well, and I hope he finishes next year to see him sprint the last stage.

One cracked me just last week on a ride. He killed it.

Northern Cali 1) probably has fewer blacks % than Dallas, 2) where you live just has plain less people.

Blacks are underrepresented among road bikers here in Dallas, but they do exist and are frequent enough to not be surprising.

One of the best guys velodrome, believe he is national champion for his age. He is black. He might be 40+.

Very cool.

I had seen very few until the first time that I rode the Death Ride, as well as the other two since. There is a team from Oakland that is well represented by black men, some of them very fast. Of the 10 or 12 that go to the Death Ride, most of them appear to be in the their late 40s or early 50s. A couple that I saw this year looked like they were in their late 20's or early 30s. And these were not stuffy, executive types. The younger guys were talking like they were straight out of the hood. It was kind of fun to sit back and watch at the rest stop as they worked their way toward the food tables among these skinny white guys.

There is also a school for troubled kids out in Minden Nevada that mans one of the water stops on the second climb. They bring about 20 boys and line the side of the road. They run up to you, take your water bottle, run ahead and fill it up and then run up and catch you without you having to miss a pedal stroke. The whole time these guys are cheering like the Basques cheered for Basso a couple of years ago at the Tour. It is very cool to see. Most of the kids are either black or hispanic. There were 2 of them (both were black) that did the entire Death Ride, finishing 20 or 30 minutes behind me.