Velogames no-show forces Vuelta Variation

Like a bicycle with two flat tyres and a rusty chain, the blog has suffered from some neglect since the end of July. It's been a while since all the excitement of the Tour De France. I'd like to pretend that I was busy on the lucrative post-tour criterium circuit, and making this scale model of a mountain stage from this year's TDF.... but it wouldn't be true.

As the Vuelta a España starts in Sevilla with a short Team Time Trial on Saturday, it's time to get things up and running again. So consider this the blog equivalent of a top-up of air and a drop of oil.

Like Carlos Sastre, I might be ready for my third Grand Tour of the year, but I'm not sure that George 'Velogames' Chapman is quite so willing. If you pop over to the Velogames site now, you'll see that there's no rider list and you can't pick a team yet. George let us down last year with a Vuelta no-show, so I've decided to go with a plan-B and find a Fantasy Veulta game elsewhere.

Yes, I present to you the Road CC Fantasy Vuelta game. Like Velogames, it's free to play once you've registered, and there's even some prizes to be won, (not that I'm expecting to win anything). Unlike Velogames there's the opportunity to make transfers in and out of your team as the race goes on - it sounds a bit like hard work to me, but we'll see how we get on.

Anyway, I've got the Bile Beans picked - or at least the initial Bile Beans line-up. And I've set up a Tour De Pance minleague. So let the fun begin.

Your league was created and its ID number is 16357. Give your friends this ID to allow them to join your league. You have automatically been added to your own league.

Stage 20 - Cav wins stage, Contador wins Tour

Much to no one's surprise, Mark Cavendish won yet another stage of the Tour in Paris. It wasn't enough to get hold of the green jersey though, which went to Petacchi after a closeley fought battle with Thor Hushovd.

In the overall classification it was a closer run thing than expected, but no one should have been surprised to see Alberto Contador getting the better of Andy Schleck - who did have the consolation prize of being the best young rider. Maybe 2011 will be Andy's year?

Some Frenchman won the mountains jersey and team Radioshat won the team competition in order to save some of Lance Armstrong's pride.

The final Velogames scores have yet to come in, but I think I can safely say, that unless there's a big scoring cock-up from George then the Gherkins will win. So congratulations to Ged for picking a classy team that performed excellently.

I'm still on my travels, so normal blogging service has not resumed yet. Keep an eye on the blog for more stuff when the final scores are in. And remember that the fun starts again in September for the Tour of Spain.

Also for those of you in York, I should be doing a Pancernal appearance on the 30th of July. Most likely involving a trip to the Tap & Spile and a nearby curry house.

Stage 19 - Cancellara Crushes Competitoin

It all went much as expected in the time trial yesterday. Cancellara won, some beefy Germans from HTC-Columbia were shortly after, and Brad Wiggins was underwhelming. Contador did enough work to keep Schleck in check and make sure he had enough time over him that the chain thing made no difference in the long run. In the fight for third place, Sammy Sanchez lost out to the superior TT abilities of Denis Menchov, which is a bit of a pity if you ask me as I like Sammy.

Those Velogames scores are too confusing for me to work out. The minileague currently looks like this.

Rank Team Directeur Score


1 The Gherkins Ged K 4329
2 Team BBC David Ward 3744
3 Bile Beans Vestan Pance 3704
4 down & out Neil Boonham 3399
5 Dickies Dirty Devils Richard Ginn 3378
6 Team O.Y.F.B denspeck 3310
7 Maillot Jenn Jennifer Harmer 3302
8 The waca racers Warwick Anderson 3292
9 Romanian Riders Matei Victor 3265
10 Evil ChanBots ChanBot 3101
11 The Achilles Squad dave 3073
12 Barmbyworld Clive Jeffery 2804
13 Smugblokes Mark Philo 2795
14 Charlton and the Wheelies Andrew 2723
15 Miffy`s Random Riders Helen 2562
16 Harrisons Pharmaceuticals Richard Harrison 2559
17 KN Kadence Kings Kevin Norman 2423

I'm not quite sure how this relates to the spreadsheet, which is now running a few days behind. It doesn't look like I'll have a chance to update it soon, so I've allowed some trusted Directeurs to edit it if they see fit.

Stage 20 is the last ever stage of the 2010 Tour De France and I'm crying so hard that I can hardly type this. It's pretty much the same every year. The bunch will have a relaxed ride to Paris, drinking champagne and engaging in some light-hearted high-jinx. Then the racing will start when they hit the Champs-Élysées and they'll go round and round a few times before there's a bunch sprint that Cav will win.

Stage 18 -

Sorry about the recent poor coverage of the Tour. I've been travelling and the like you know. At the moment I'm in the wilds of Norfolk and normal service may not be resumed quite yet.

Anyway, as I predicted Cav won another sprint yesterday. While Petacchi got the Green jersey back.

Stage 19 is the much anticipated time trial. It's long and flat. It's happening right now in fact.

Stage 17 - Tourmalet Torture

Before we start, lets check out Lance all pissed and moody after not winning stage 16. Don't get in his way. He might run you over



The hot weather that the race has been experiencing came to an end today and it was wet and a bit cold at the start. Wet roads make for crashes, and today it was the turn of Sammy Sanchez to hit the tarmac. He was soon on his way again though and finished well. Carlose Sastre meanwhile, spent most of the day out in no-man's land between the break and the buch. I'm not sure why, it looked like hard work and he eventually finished way down.

In case we hadn't already noticed, the two best climbers of this year's Tour appear to be Andy Schleck and Alberto Contador. Andy did his best to get away from Bertie, but they seemed as evenly matched as two people riding the same bicycle, up the same mountain can be. Contador had the decency to let Schelck take the stage. But he won't bw winning the race.

After all the action today, the GC men will be taking it easy and resting up for the time trial on Saturday, when we get to see just how much time Andy Schleck will lose to Contador. Tomorrow's stage to
Bordeaux is one for the sprinters, and any breaks are likely to find themselves reeled in before the finish. If you're lucky there might just be enough time to get down the bookies and put some money on Cav.

Rest Day 2 - Schleck Promises Schowdown On Tourmalet

There's not much going on at the Tour today, as the riders kick-back and take a well-earned rest. Not a lot of news to report then.

Andy Schleck seems to have forgiven Contador for that chain-thing, but he's not going to forget and he'll be out on the attack tomorrow. I fear he won't be able to get the better of Bertie on the Tourmalet. And even if he does, he'll be very lucky to get enough time not to lose any advantage in the time trial.

A look at the profile shows it's another though day. It starts off a bit flat though, so maybe Thor will try and get in a break to get those sprint points. It soon gets pretty hilly, although most of the real action is likely to happen on the Tourmalet itself.

I'd also like to give a shout-out to my former homies in York, some of whom will be out on Ged's annual TDF ride tomorrow. I'm sure he's got a lovely route planned out, with some nice little climbs in the North York Moors.....followed by the Tour on telly and some nice grub. I'm sure you'll have a lot more fun without me racing everyone on all the hills and then trying to steal the best spot on the sofa.

Stage 16 - Fedrigo Goes Well

With all the fuss about "chaingate" it seems that the biggest bit of unsportsmanlike behaviour yesterday was mostly overlooked. I am of course referring to the refusal of  "baldy French climber" John Gadret to give his team-leader Nicholas Roche a wheel after he punctured.

The much discussed "unwritten rules of cycling" state that when your team-leader, who is doing well on the GC, needs a wheel, you give him one and wait at the side of the road for a replacement. Not so for Gadret, who said 'non' and kept riding. To make matters worse for Roche, when he did get a wheel from the Mavic neutral service car, the change took forever and they gave him an R-Sys wheel - which is mostly famous for exploding.

So incensed am I by the injustice done to Roche, (he's in my team you know) that I have been searching for some way of letting my displeasure be known to Mr. Gadret. You've probably noticed the presence of some yellow writing on the road courtesy of the Nike Chalkbot. So I composed this message, in the hope that it will be seen by the French bastard.

I'm not sure that this message is 'motivational' enough however. And it seems that I may have fallen foul of some swearing filter, as I didn't get a confirmation email. I may have better luck with this message, but I'm still not sure it fills the motivation requirements - at least there's no swearing.

Compared to yesterday's controversies, today's stage was pretty uneventful from a GC perspective. The race favourites decided to take it easy and wait till Thursday and the finish atop the Tourmalet. So, while the big boys started resting a day early, there was a break that was up the road fighting for the stage win. Among the group of nine was Lance Armstrong, but his attempt to salvage a stage win from a disappointing Tour came to nothing. Pierrick Fedrigo was first across the line and Lance a lowly sixth.

If the yellow jersey stayed put today, the same cannot be said of the green jersey. After hanging with the big boys for the day, Thor Hushovd managed to sprint for tenth place and so moved ahead of Petacchi in the points.

Bad news for Petacchi then, but probably not the worst thing that happened to him today. It's been revealed he's being investigated for allegedly taking all kinds of drugs - including PFCs, which despite a few rumours I don't think anyone has been done for yet.

Scores are now in for stage 16 and the minileague now looks like this.

But the spreadsheet tells a different story. And after a bit of checking I think I'm right and George is wrong.

Those pesky Gherkins are still winning, as The Bile Beans, Team BBC and down&out, (not to mention Drew's Druggies) are all battling for second place. And at the other end of the table the Kadence Kings are still in last place.

It's a rest day tomorrow, which should give the bunch a chance to put their feet up and rest their arses before the predicted big showdown between Andy and Bertie on Thursday. I can hardly wait.