Cycling

David Zabriskie, Tejay van Garderen and Levi Leipheimer struggle to stay with Robert Gesink near the summit of Mount Baldy during the 2012 Amgen Tour of California. Photo: Casey B. Gibson | www.cbgphoto.comLevi Leipheimer made it official on Sunday as the 2013 Amgen Tour of California concluded in his hometown of Santa Rosa — he’s no longer a professional cyclist. Leipheimer was a witness in the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency’s case against Lance Armstrong and detailed his use of performance-enhancing drugs in a sworn affidavit and in an op-ed for the website of The Wall Street Journal. Last year, Omega Pharma-Quick Step fired him after he admitted using performance-enhancing drugs and methods while riding for Saturn, U.S. Postal Service, Rabobank, Gerolsteiner and Astana. Leipheimer and four other active riders — George Hincapie, Christian Vande Velde, Dave Zabriskie and Tom Danielson — received six-month suspensions and were stripped of results. Hincapie retired; the others resumed racing this year after serving their time. And Leipheimer hoped to do the same when his suspension ended in March, but could not find a team. On Sunday, he told his hometown newspaper that he had begun “transitioning into the rest of my life.” “I’m retired,” he told The Press Democrat. “It’s just been an unceremoniously retired.” Leipheimer told the newspaper that his focus now is promoting the GranFondo, a mass fund-raising ride that attracts thousands of cyclists. “It’s not about professional cycling, it’s about sharing the love of the bike,” he said. “That’s what it’s always been about.”

Signs a no doping declaration to guide next generation

The anti-thesis of Henry Ford; Wear it in any colour - as long as it's a "T". Above: "Absolutely... For the full photographic glory and the rest of the text, you know where to go. The Original Cycle Chic awaits.

Stage 8 started with a trip over the Golden Gate Bridge. Photo: Casey B. Gibson | www.cbgphoto.com

The 2013 Giro d’Italia is now 15 stages old and the riders have a second and final rest day to look forward to. Since the previous rest day, after stage 9, we’ve seen six days of great racing, some notable withdrawals, and some truly horrendous weather. The weather has been so bad that the climb and descent of the Sestriere, scheduled for stage 14, were removed from the race. There was plenty of suggestion that the Col du Galibier would be removed from stage 15 as well, or that the stage might have been cancelled entirely, but in the end the stage did finish on the Galibier, albeit 4km from the summit. Mark Cavendish (Omega Pharma-QuickStep) has been in typically unstoppable form, claiming the 100th professional victory of his career when he won on a wet and miserable stage 12. He wasted no time in getting to 101 victories, crossing the line first on the following stage as well, taking his 2013 Giro d’Italia stage victory tally to four. Orica-GreenEDGE sprinter Matt Goss has been noticeably absent since finishing third on stage 6, finishing outside the top 100 on each stage since. But it’s been good to see Brett Lancaster step up for Orica-GreenEDGE in the sprints, taking fifth place on stage 12 and fourth on stage 13. Race favourites Bradley Wiggins (Sky) and Ryder Hesjedal (Garmin-Sharp) have both withdrawn from the race, leaving Vincenzo Nibali (Astana) with two less challengers in the race for the general classification. Australia’s Cadel Evans (BMC) has held on to his second place behind Nibali but has lost some time after dropping Nibali’s wheel on the mountain-top finish to stage 14. But with Cadel looking set for a podium finish to the Giro, and with Tejay van Garderen winning the Tour of California over the weekend, BMC finds itself in a great position leading into the Tour de France, regardless of who the leader might be. And speaking of team leadership, what effect will Wiggins’ early withdrawal from the Giro mean for the Sky leadership come Le Tour? Will Wiggins have rested enough to be Sky’s best chance of a GC win? Or will Froome still get the nod? Regardless, there’s plenty of excitement still to come in the Giro with six stages remaining, including a 21km uphill time trial. Don’t forget to enter our Giro d’Italia quiz for a chance to win some great prizes, including a GoPro HD Hero 3 Silver Edition and a Garmin 510 courtesy of Bike Bug. Entries close tomorrow evening at the start of stage 16. In the meantime, we hope you enjoy these photos from stages 10 to 15. Click here to see a gallery of great images from stages 1 to 9. And follow this link to see the results from stage 15 of the 2013 Giro d’Italia and the overall standings with six stages remaining. p.wp-caption-text, dd.wp-caption-text { width: 1150px; }

No offers forthcoming after six-month ban

Tejay was just stronger, says Australian

As in newbies? Well, okay. Some people who had been lurking on our club’s Yahoo group turned out for a neighborhood ride last week, and I invited them to ride the roads as part of the B ride Sunday. It was a good B ride turnout, augmented by some A riders who needed a recovery from grueling efforts the previous day. Yasmin and Frank joined us for the first time,Victoria for the second or third, and Penny came out for the first time in about a year. I chose a route to Buda, about a 30-mile round trip. Any concerns I had about the new riders’ ability were dashed when we reached Davis Hill, about three miles into the ride. I couldn’t catch the newcomers going up. Thank goodness for stoplights, so I could work my way to the front of the pack again. The ride south was made difficult by the brisk headwind we faced, but it was far from the worst I’ve seen. Just a couple of miles north of Buda, here comes George from the A ride. He had won the sprint into the Walgreens store in Buda, and while the rest of the A’s continued south, George decided to ride the rest of the way with us. The Walgreens, at 15 miles into the ride, is a traditional rest stop. We swapped stories about club members who had broken bones while riding, which I’m sure didn’t ease any concerns the New B’s had. But instead of turning around at that point, we decided to keep going, at least for a few more miles. Victoria peeled off to head home for a family obligation, and the rest of us headed back to Buda. Here’s where we hit our first glitch. Buddy was looking back to make sure everyone had made the turn onto Main Street, when his front wheel went into a curb. He did a nice shoulder roll and landed mostly on grass, but complained of a wrenched back. However, he decided to keep going all the way back and deal with the soreness when he got home. Buddy (second from left) is rolling again after his mishap. The group strung out on the way back, and we made several stops to regroup. Our highlight was when we reached Slaughter Lane. That’s a four-lane divided road with no shoulder. We opted to form a “bus” and occupy the right lane for the two miles back to Starbucks. It was a good move. For the first time ever, not one car honked at us while going past. The get together at Starbucks is often as much fun as the ride itself. Janice, who is killer good with the A’s, couldn’t wait to see if she had regained Queen of the Mountain status for a Strava segment on the A ride. She had, and spent some time extolling the virtues of Strava to Yasmin, who appeared anxious to join the Strava herd. Judy, George, Laura, and Penny unwind after the ride. Pippa (l.) learns from Janice (r.) that Pippa’s Queen of the Mountain is no more. Mike, an emergency room physician, performed a field amputation of some excess chin strap on Penny’s helmet. “This will keep you from looking like a newbie,” he told her. She wasn’t convinced, and was concerned that she would have too little strap to work with when adjusting her helmet. The jury is still out on that one. “No!” says Laura, Mike’s wife. “You’re cutting it too short!” All in all, it was a good ride. We did 34 miles at a reasonable — and sometimes quick — pace. The new B’s held their own with the pack, and it looks like they’ll be back for more. Frank has already checked into buying some club kit. Filed under: Rides Tagged: B ride

1. Daniel MCCONNELL (AUS), 1:42:36 2. Sergio MANTECON GUTIERREZ (ESP), 1:42:38 3. Jaroslav KULHAVY (CZE), 1:42:49 4. Maxime MAROTTE (FRA), 1:42:53 5. Lukas FLÜCKIGER (SUI), 1:43:07 6. Martin FANGER (SUI), 1:43:21 7. Max PLAXTON (CAN), 1:43:42 8. Fabian GIGER (SUI), 1:43:45 9. Thomas LITSCHER (SUI), 1:43:47 10. Stéphane TEMPIER (FRA), 1:44:00 11. José Antonio HERMIDA RAMOS (ESP), 1:44:14 12. Ondrej CINK (CZE), 1:44:29 13. Rudi VAN HOUTS (NED), 1:44:39 14. Henk Jaap MOORLAG (NED), 1:44:52 15. Geoff KABUSH (CAN), 1:45:29 16. Marco Aurelio FONTANA (ITA), 1:45:53 17. Florian VOGEL (SUI), 1:46:06 18. Nino SCHURTER (SUI), 1:46:06 19. Marek KONWA (POL), 1:46:26 20. Emil LINDGREN (SWE), 1:46:43 21. Alexander GEHBAUER (AUT), 1:46:52 22. Martin LOO (EST), 1:46:54 23. Fabien CANAL (FRA), 1:47:00 24. Mathias FLÜCKIGER (SUI), 1:47:07 25. Kevin VAN HOOVELS (BEL), 1:47:27 26. Jiri NOVAK (CZE), 1:47:48 27. Marcel WILDHABER (SUI), 1:48:05 28. Uwe HOCHENWARTER (AUT), 1:48:27 29. Jürg GRAF (SUI), 1:48:52 30. Jochen KASS (GER), 1:48:56 31. Nicola ROHRBACH (SUI), 1:49:04 32. Sepp FREIBURGHAUS (SUI), 1:49:19 33. Gerhard KERSCHBAUMER (ITA), 1:49:24 34. Ivan ALVAREZ GUTIERREZ (ESP), 1:49:37 35. Karl MARKT (AUT), 1:49:38 36. Derek ZANDSTRA (CAN), 1:49:38 37. Michele CASAGRANDE (ITA), 1:49:41 38. Hans BECKING (NED), 1:49:59 39. Jan SKARNITZL (CZE), 1:50:09 40. Sergji RYSENKO (UKR), 1:50:26 41. Miguel MARTINEZ (FRA), 1:51:05 42. Mitchell HOKE (USA), 1:51:19 43. Martin GUJAN (SUI), 1:51:24 44. Pascal MEYER (SUI), 1:51:25 45. Raphael GAGNE (CAN), 1:51:46 46. Paolo Cesar MONTOYA CANTILLO (CRC), 1:51:49 47. Sebastien CARABIN (BEL), 1:51:51 48. Filip EBERL (CZE), 1:51:59 49. Lucien BESANCON (SUI), 1:52:09 50. Andrea TIBERI (ITA), 1:52:23 51. Andy EYRING (GER), 1:52:31 52. Simon SCHEIBER (AUT), 1:52:40 53. Andras PARTI (HUN), 1:52:54 54. Patrik GALLATI (SUI), 1:53:05 55. Catriel Andres SOTO (ARG), 1:53:10 56. Ismael VENTURA SANCHEZ (ESP), 1:53:25 57. Philip BUYS (RSA), 1:53:39 58. Tim WYNANTS (BEL), 1:53:49 59. Cameron JETTE (CAN), 1:53:58 60. Pavel PRIADEIN (RUS), 1:54:01 61. Alexis VUILLERMOZ (FRA), 1:54:02 62. Timo MODOSCH (GER), 1:54:40 63. Matous ULMAN (CZE), 1:54:48 64. Robert WARDELL (GBR), 1:54:57 65. Martino FRUET (ITA), 1:55:17 66. Carl JONES (NZL), 1:55:52 67. Maximilian HOLZ (GER), 1:56:46 68. Marcel FLESCHHUT (GER), 69. Pierluigi BETTELLI (ITA), 70. Jonas DE BACKER (BEL), 71. Daniel EYMANN (SUI), 72. Cristofer BOSQUE RUANO (ESP), 73. Jonas BAUMANN (SUI), 74. Shlomi HAIMY (ISR), 75. Simon GEGENHEIMER (GER), 76. Lukas SABLIK (CZE), 77. Silvio BUSSER (SUI), 78. Umbert ALMENARA VERGES (ESP), 79. David Joao Serralheiro ROSA (POR), 80. Gareth MONTGOMERIE (GBR), 81. Ludovic DUBAU (FRA), 82. Marco SCHÄTZING (GER), 83. José Juan ESCARCEGA (MEX), 84. Florian THIE (SUI), 85. Michael BRODERICK (USA), 86. Davy HUYGENS (BEL), 87. Pete OSTROSKI (USA), 88. Umberto CORTI (ITA), 89. Wolfram KURSCHAT (GER), 90. Renay GROUSTRA (RSA), 91. David ESCOLAR BALLESTEROS (ESP), 92. Brice SCHOLTES (BEL), 93. Robby DE BOCK (BEL), 94. Steffen THUM (GER), 95. Colin CARES (USA), 96. Sang Hoon NA (KOR), 97. Mario MATIJEVIC (BEL), 98. Ali ÇAKAS (TUR), 99. Besik GAVASHELI (GEO), DNF Simon STIEBJAHN (GER) DNF Julien ABSALON (FRA) DNF Torsten MARX (GER) DNF Giancarlo SAX (SUI) DNF Ola KJÖREN (NOR) DNF Zsolt JUHASZ (HUN) DNF Cristobal SILVA IBACETA (CHI) DNF Alban LAKATA (AUT) DNF Franz HOFER (ITA) DNF Todd WELLS (USA) DNF Kohei YAMAMOTO (JPN) DNF Sven NYS (BEL) DNF Matthias WENGELIN (SWE) DNF Kristian HYNEK (CZE) DNF Daniel FEDERSPIEL (AUT) . Mykhaylo BATSUTSA (UKR) DNS Manuel FUMIC (GER) DNS Michal LAMI (SVK) DNS Robert MENNEN (GER) DNS Mirco WIDMER (SUI) DNS Adam MORKA (CAN) DNS Dmitry MEDVEDEV (RUS) DNS Mirko PIRAZZOLI (ITA) DNS Rafal HEBISZ (POL)

American believes he can be a contender for the Tour de France