On Thoughts On The Tour

One day someone will need to explain to me why so many elite athletes are such elitists. Alright we all, already know why, we live in a society where that sort of behaviour, like the Lance Armstrong Alberto Contador spat, is actively encouraged. After all that soap opera makes (made?) for some great food for the journalists, besides hero worship is burned into the human condition. But I think we owe it to ourselves to remember that a garbage collector makes a greater contribution to the quality of life for the average person than any number of athletes no matter what the sport.

Anyway I have been trying to find athletes in the tour who behaved with decency, sorry Armstrong fans but the Livestrong idea would seem a more genuine act of goodness if Lance did not have cancer prior to starting his little venture. Not to say Livestrong is a bad thing, it just seems to me that the inspiration is not as altruistic as I would like. Although I have to admit when all you know is what these guys do on the saddle it is hard to judge character.

Do any of the athletes adopt kittens from the local animal shelter? In the off season do they donate blood? Do they give back to their community by going to public schools and telling the children to study hard? Sometimes I think giving a yellow jersey to the guy who happens to have the fastest legs or the strongest EPO or the best technology too arbitrary. Well alright the organizers of The Tour seem to have done a really first rate job of flushing the drugs out, now if only there was a way to flush the obnoxious behaviour out. Let's face it, every time an athlete behaves like a baby it hurts the sport as a whole.

One thing I do have to admit really impressed me was what Andy Schleck did for his older brother on Mont Ventoux. Very likely Alberto Contador had won the tour at the second individual time trial but Andy still had one last shot to clobber Contador if he could just hammer up the side of the mountain. A bunch of times Andy attacked but every attack he would look back to see if his brother, Frank, was in his (Andy's) draft. As soon as Andy saw his brother had dropped off the back end Andy throttled back thus ensuring that Andy would not win, but trying to help his brother none-the-less. To me, that is class.

Or how about when Fabian Cancellara pulled the guys to the base of Mont Ventoux. I was watching thinking, 'that guy needs to save his legs for the mountain'. Then I realised Cancellara was sacrificing himself, he is no climber. Cancellara might very well get disqualified for taking to long to get up the mountain but at least the Schlecks, his teammates, would be well rested for the ascent. To risk getting disqualified 20 days into a 21 day race, the biggest event of the cycling calender no less, oh sure it ultimately is to Cancellara's benefit if Andy or Frank could get The Yellow Jersey, but try telling most athletes, "you should give up everything you have worked towards for the good of someone else". That to me is also a really decent thing.

I have to say the management of team CSC/Saxo-bank really impress me, getting guys that work so hard for the common good.

It has been a week now since Paris and the end of the Tour. The Armstrong/Contador spat has gone from ugly to pathetic and immature. Team Astana is historical with all of their strong riders clearly planning to pack it in and move on. And the thing that amazes me? An American cycling journalist, yes the same guy I mentioned earlier, was complaining that the cost of driving (road tolls and gasoline) in France was too expensive. Alright I'll be the guy to say it, you are in France, watching a bike race, are the train engineers on strike?! There is a reason Europeans are healthier than us, they drive less!

Its an interesting thing, but every year my opinion of the French goes up a little. Once I was really disgusted by the nuclear tests in French Polynesia. But over the past few years the health care available to everyone, the child care, the overall quality of life. I've got to hand it to the French they know how to live. I just wish I could speak the language better. Not to say I dislike Canada, If I did I would leave, but I think we could do well to look at how Europeans, The French, The Germans, The English, The Scandinavians and so on, do things, they have lots of good ideas, why do we only consider how things work in America? Sometimes I think if Canada packed up and moved a little South East, maybe annex the Canary Islands, we would be much better offer, warmer weather and closer to Europe while safer from the Americans.