Slam of the Tongue: Racing and Portaging

Did you know there's a three-week bicycle cycling stage race taking place in France right now called the Tour of France? There sure is. And even though it's the very first one, the cycling media is all over it. For example, Bicycling magazine has put their very best writers on the race. They've also put their worst writer on it--me--and here's my most recent Tour of France-related post. Also, here's other stuff I have wroten for them over the years. And here's a pretty picture of an egret. And here's a kid wearing an ALF t-shirt.

I realize that's a lot of stuff, but I'm just doing my best to please everybody.

Still, as hard as I try, I always manage to forget something. For example, you'd think that between the Tour of France crap and the egret and the kid in the ALF t-shirt I'd have satisfied every demographic. However, someone's always left wanting more--like the commenter who wanted to see Cadel Evans throwing his backwash onto Mark Cavendish:

Anonymous said...

Where is Cadel 'accidentally' throwing water at Cav?!

July 12, 2011 12:38 AM

Well, here it is:



Note the surreptitious manner in which Evans throws the water at the Vittel guy:

And them immediately supplicates himself before an angry Mark Cavendish when he's caught in the act, like a submissive dog exposing his belly:

It's clear who's the alpha male in the peloton, and I think mischievous heel-nipper Cadel Evans might benefit from a week with Cesar Millan:

(The Cadel Whisperer)

Also, speaking of creatures who can't control their tongues, here's Thomas Voeckler's wild Stage 9 tongue action via Cycling Inquisition:



I think he may have taken that old Sam Kinison routine about "licking the alphabet" a bit too seriously. Actually, it looks like he's spelling out "maillot jaune" with his tongue.

Moving away from the glamorous world of professional bicycle racing and on to the sordid world of amateur unsanctioned bicycle racing meant to generate images and marketing copy for luxury cycling apparel brands, yesterday I complained that my team didn't make it into the 2011 Rapha Northeast Gentlemen's Race video. Well, the filmmaker was kind enough to visit the comments section and offer an explanation:

Stebs said...

Sorry I missed filming your team! We were all over the place and unfortunately missed a lot of racers...

July 11, 2011 1:32 PM

Right. WHAT-everrr. You can make it sound like a coincidence, but I know it's all about looks. I bet we would have been all over that video if we had sweet integrated aero-beard face fairings like this guy did:

I guess he couldn't afford the Rapha neck gaiter and so he just grew one instead.

Also, in other cycling apparel-related news, a reader tells me that Conan O'Brien and actor Mark-Paul Gosselaar recently had a chat about Lycra and leg-shaving:



By the way, if you look up Gosselaar's race results, he's got fairly impressive palmarès for a famous actor:

Certainly way better than that Andrew Tilin guy who doped yet never made it out of the 4s:

And then wrote a book about it:


I've actually been reading this book for weeks now but I'm still only on page 125. If I ever do manage to finish it I'll let you know what I think, but I may have to take some kind of literacy-enhancing drug to get there.

Anyway, as far as I know Conan O'Brien doesn't have any race results, but he does ride a Serotta and looks like an elongated Alexandre Vinokourov:

Meanwhile, in the world of non-competitive (except for Cat 6 racers of course) cycling, local site Gothamist recently reported on perhaps the most offensive bike lane television news story I've ever seen:


In it, the reporter says of a bike lane that would pass the Israeli Consulate:

"Imagine if the man on the bike was a terrorist!"

Right. Remember those bicycles that bombed the World Trade Center in 1993, and then destroyed it in 2001? Neither do I. That comment has to be one of the stupidest things I've ever heard anyone say about cycling or terrorism--on TV or off--and I would have given anything to see her get hit by that cab when she stepped out into the middle of the street at 1:06:

Not enough to injure her seriously, mind you, but just enough to keep her off the air. Actually, maybe that already happened, because a severe head injury is the only thing that could possibly explain her idiotic reporting.

Idiot reporters aside, I'm very thankful for bike lanes, since they greatly facilitate child-portaging. I'm constantly refining my child-portaging technique, and I recently realized that I had installed my Xtracycle PeaPod LT a little too far back:

Now, though, I'm running it totally "slammed:"

I was proud of my aggressive new setup, and I even boasted about it by means of the Tweeter, though commenter "ce" totally humbled me yesterday:

ce said...

Snob, slam your kid seat properly by ditching the deck and the various bracket bits. Attach the seat directly to the V-Racks with SuperHooks. Then cut the LawyerLegs off the seat to clean up the lines of your cargo area.

The bit about the LawyerLegs really stung, and as a child-portaging "noob" I had no idea I was doing the smugness equivalent of "palping" a pie plate.

Slam That Stem was even tougher on me:

Eventually I'll get it together, though I'm not sure I'll ever attain this level of child-slammage:

Now that kid is slammed.

Posted in: cycling in new york city,road racing