This Week in Road Cycling: August 11 to August 17

Local Racing

Races in August
-Tortilla Flats RR (the last one): Aug 12; http://www.azcycling.com/08cal/FLYERS/tft_08.pdf
-Kitt Peak TT: Tucson, AZ - Aug 17; http://www.saguarovelo.org/infokitt.htm
-Skull Valley RR: Skull Valley, AZ- Aug 24; http://wmrc.org/skull/index.htm

The Olympics

Men's Road Race
-This years course was said to be the hardest Olympic road race ever. Looking at the profile, as well as the short list of riders who finished (90 of 143), and it's pretty believable. The day started off with an escape by two men, Patricio Almonacid (Chile) and Horacio Gallardo (Bolivia), who at one point had a gap of over ten minutes. Some time after that, a 26 man group of riders split from the rest of the peloton in an effort to hunt down the fugitive South Americans. This was a very dangerous group, and it looked like the new olympic champion would come from this group. Some riders in the group included: Carlos Sastre (Spain), Jens Voigt (Germany), Marzio Bruseghin (Italy), and Kim Kirchen (Luxembourg). It wasn't to be though, and the huge break eventually was brought back. Once the race hit the hilly finishing circuit, the attacks started, and after a lot of aggression from a lot of riders five men went clear on the final lap. Those riders were Andy Schleck (Luxembourg), Davide Rebellin (Italy), Samuel Sánchez (Spain), Michael Rogers (Australia) and Alexandr Kolobnev (Russia). On the last major climb, Rogers and Kolobnev were dropped by the awesome riding of Andy Schleck, and it appeared that the three remaining riders would fight it out for the podium. That was, at least, until Fabian Cancellara decided he was bored, rocketed out of the peloton, caught Rogers and Kolobnev and pulled them back in contact with the front three. That left a six man spring for the win, and Samuel Sanchez took it with Rebellin in second and Cancellara in third. The finale of this race was just amazing to watch. Cancellara is just fun to watch on the bike, and Andy Schleck was climbing head and shoulders above everyone else (it's a shame that the Schlecks can't sprint).

Two things that I thought were pretty interesting from the end of this race was the continued strength of CSC-Saxo Bank and the presence of Michael Rogers. Three out of those final six men were all riders for CSC (Schleck, Cancellara, Kolobnev). Of course, they weren't riding to help each other, which is seen by the fact that Cancellara's final burst of speed meant that Schleck was unable to medal, but the depth of that team always amazes me. In regard to Michael Rogers, it was just good to see him riding well again after his disaster at last years tour. Hopefully he'll do reall well in the time trial this week and maybe beat Cancellara.

This week will be the time trial, and next week the riders will move to the tack.

-Anthony