Them toes goes to France....

Everything is in the rush mode today - Day Before Depart... The worst part is trying to get all my business stuff completed, with all my business ducks, so to speak, in a row before I leave. The packing, etc. for the Tour is very routine by now - it's just all the other junk that is time-consuming and tedious.

So it appears that you may see Velogal from time-to-time on The Paceline after all. I guess they reconsidered their decision, and have asked a few of us "old-timers" on the site to contribute once in a while. I've heard from many, many of you fans that were disappointed, so please know that while I will post daily to this blog, I may also write a feature for The Paceline if something happens that I think you might find interesting. Thanks again for being such loyal fans!

So I leave quite early tomorrow morning and travel all night, then grab my car and head out of Charles De Gaulle for the Vendee area. So you will find that my blog entry may not happen for a day or so! Unfortunately, American Airlines does not have wifi like Lufthansa does... If I get stuck in an airport somewhere, I'll try to post from my T-Moblie IPAQ. Also, later on, my Web Guru and I will be trying to fix a couple of glitches in the coding for this blog, and maybe figure out a way to post images without screwing the blog up again. So if you are reading some test stuff and seeing weird stuff later tonight, it's just us!

The Monday morning Lance Armstrong Live Strong Sirius Faction Radio Report: Re-run.... The show that started with Lance picking his teeth - the one right after the Live Strong Gala in Austin.... the one right after Luke had his tonsils out...

I really want to thank all of you who have written to me about not having the Paceline gig this Tour. I guess that I hadn’t realized how many folks like my Tour de France reports, and how much you all like them! So, I promise you that I will continue with the same reports here on my blog, and pics on the smugmug gallery.

And, yes, the infamous Go Lance Hat still exists - I won’t give it up, or change to a new one. The same Go Lance hat that flew off my head at the 2003 Ride for the Roses, while I was riding in the back of the Media truck, just ahead of Lance and the riders. The wind blew it down the road, hopelessly and impossibly out of my reach or retrieval. Back down the road, Lance leaned over low on his bike, snagged my Go Lance hat with one hand, held it with teeth, stood up on the pedals and accelerated up to the tailgate of the truck. With a grin and a “You owe me one”, he handed my precious Go Lance hat back to me.... He instantly became my Hat Hero. Click on the link to read my story and see the pics.....

My Go Lance hat will go to the Tour for the 5th time this year. Since it has proudly worn the US Postal Service logo every year, it needed to be modified slightly. I took LiveStrong stickers that I got from Jerry and Angie at the LAF booth in the Tour of Georgia and glued them on top of the USPS logos.

Now, I must tell you that I flunked Cut-and-Paste in Kindergarten, so my revised version looks a little schlocky, but well-loved. Well-worn, well-loved and a little wrinkled. True for me and my hat.... I’ll do a Tour 2005 hat pic real soon - maybe before I leave on Wednesday morning.

Thanks to my Belgian Connection, I just got word that Lance had a training crash, and has a shiner (and I don’t mean Shiner Bock, either). From Nice, he says it was a “silly crash”, but he hit hard enough to break his helmet in two, get a black eye and road rash. Nothing broken, no stitches, but the usual road rash, and “feeling a little beat up”. Our Man says he’s fine and in great shape to start the Tour... So we may see him with a shiner at the start of the Tour - I bet the press will go into their usual frenzy over this... You know they will....

I’m charging batteries like there is no tomorrow. So damn many batteries to take that my luggage weighs a ton. Chargers, adapters, converters, surge protectors, car chargers, and on, and on....

Of course, I have to take a few Podium Girl Gone Bad books and a couple of thongs and some stickers. I put a PGGB sticker on both my check-ins. Nobody else will have on, so I can spot my stuff real easy....

I’m gonna do a test run with my Belkin AC Anywhere (these people should pay me for advertising). I’ll hook it up, and then hook up my laptop to see if it will charge it, and then also will set up my Garmin 10 Bluetooth GPS and see if it functions... Maybe I’ll route myself to the Starbucks across town and see if it works.. I’m gonna tell you, if my laptop gets fried, you are gonna hear a screech - I don’t care where in the world you are, you’ll hear it!

I helped a friend move today - started pretty early this morning, so today we have an evening blog. I spent quite a bit of time last evening on the blog site,after getting flicked by Flickr. But for the past couple of hours, I have been googling all my Tour lodging reservations and printing out the hotel websites with directions, etc. Hotels on the Autoroute are well-signed, with neon lights just like here in the US. But when I’ve stayed in small villages, sometimes there is only a tiny, unlit sign, or none at all - very difficult to spot where you are staying in the dark, or even in the daylight.... And street signs can be pretty rare in small towns and villages, too. I often use Via Michelin to get route directions....

I started to program in some waypoints on my Garmin GPS 10, but the first couple of towns (like first start town, Fromentine) wasn’t even on the drop down list of waypoint choices. I hate those damn drop-down menu lists of towns (or anything else) that won’t let you type your own choices. So I get a list of six or so places that start with Fromen..., but none are the right place. Hope this is not an omen, or indicative, of how my GPS experience is going to be.... Oh well, I’m a great map reader and I’ve always done that, so I’ll just navigate the old-fashioned way, while the German and French TV folks fly be me on the roads with their fancy GPS directions.

I surfed over to Fumy’s website and see that they are putting up some pages in English. The link below will take you there. Fumy is a real cool dude, with some great pics on the site. Fumy has been cycling and competing since he was seven or eight years old - check out his Biography. Fumy is really nice and he is so funny - but he is also determined and tough when he is riding. His family has very high expectations of him with the Discovery Team, and he is not gonna let them, or the team, down... As a successful U23, he’s in the learning mode with the team this year (so is “Billy” Bileka) - Johan and Dirk are excellent with young riders.

If you read my blog from last January, you will recall that during training camp in Solvang, I drove Fumy down to the shopping center, and went with him for his first-ever American shopping trip. He was very cool about paying in US dollars. I thought it was really cute that one of the first aisles we went to was the candy section.... I didn’t say a word.... But he very gallantly and politely bought some candy for me, too.

Gadget Geek Gal figured out how to fix it, after many trial runs, but not what really happened. My fix is not sophisticated, but works....

YIKES!!! Beware of Flickr!! I just did a test post with a photo from Flickr, and now this template is screwed up. I don't know how to fix it, so bear with me while I do something - maybe run to a phone booth and jump into my Gadge Geek Gal kit...

Tour de France Departure is only a few days away. And I am very bummed to hear from Chris Brewer that there has been a CSE corporate decision that the only Tour reporting on thepaceline.com this year will be from internal staff. They feel that they will have enough staff people at the Tour to give you great coverage. So I am very sorry to tell you that I will not be able to do my Velogal Reports for Lance in this last year of his pro career. Big-time Bummer...

Of course, I will focus on this Velogal Race Blog for my reports, and probably put photos up in my Smugmug gallery or perhaps on Flickr, whichever is fastest. Most likely on Smugmug. And the infamous Go Lance hat will still be Touring along with me. I’m sure you will still be seeing it pop up in strange or interesting places....

Be on the lookout for one of my photos in the Velonews issue dated July 5th. It’s one that I took of David Clinger, and I think its supposed to be on page 56. I haven’t seen that issue yet - my subscription arrives after VN is on the newsstand, and will probably arrive after I leave for the Tour.

I’m wading through lists of piddley stuff that needs to be done before I leave - the packing and all that is no big deal, it’s pretty straight-forward. It’s just all the little details for the month that I’m gone that are time-consuming....

In Philly, I was talking to Dirk Demol, and he told me that Eki just had back surgery. Now we hear the story about his hardware that was inserted: screws and plates to hold his broken vertebrae in place. You know how bad that back injury was to need that kind of procedure. He’s stiff and sore and has a hard time sitting down. But, Eki is lucky that he wasn’t paralyzed from that injury. He is determined to come back, and is looking toward the World’s in Madrid - that’s his motivation to get back on the bike. Go Eki - we love ya, man....

I meant to tell you about the story at operationgadget.com a couple of days ago, about how OLN actually gets the TdF to you. Dave Aiello did a great job of getting the scoop for us. Click the link below to see one pic that I took at the Tour last year, showing just a tiny slice of the miles of cable that was strung all over the technical parking area. The shot is up on Flickr.com - I was hoping to use Flickr to post pics here in my blog, but the test posting I just did screwed up my whole page.

I touched briefly on the process in my Chapter 10 of the Tour de France for Dummies, “Perfecting the Art of Spectating from Home”. It’s just a mind-boggling experience to walk around in the restricted area where all the TV and Radio big rigs are parked - you just would never believe the tons of cables, generators, and other equipment that are moved from stage to stage every day. Keep in mind that there are hundreds of media vehicles that move with the Tour each day, and many of them are huge equipment trucks.

The crews tear down, travel at night and set up early in the mornings - let’s just say that some of them speed along.... And getting everything hooked up correctly! I watch them dragging the myriad of cables around, and I totally don’t see how they know what to hook up to what. The crews are tough-looking guys, most with a cigarette hanging out of the corner of their mouth while they work. They have their own unique culture and bonding, and are probably the most hard-working and hard-partying crews in the ASO staff.

The Tour de France team has just been announced:

2005 DISCOVERY CHANNEL TOUR DE FRANCE ROSTER:
Lance Armstrong (USA)
Jose Azevedo (POR)
Manuel Beltran (ESP)
George Hincapie (USA)
Benjamin Noval (ESP)Pavel Padrnos (CZE)
Yaroslav Popovych (UKR)
Jose Luis Rubiera (ESP)
Paolo Savoldelli (ITA)

Yesss... Garmin is working and life is good. Persistence pays off - I called Garmin tech support and talked with a guy named Byron, who was just super. We tweaked and dinked around and Voila! Suddenly, I was acquiring a satellite - no, two satellites - and more! Holy Navigation, Batman, I’m in business... I immediately sang a bit of Ode To Joy for dear, patient Byron Tech Supportman: Alleluiah, Alleluiah, Al-le-lui-ah! And thanked him profusely. He said he was blushing and we said farewell....

I just did a twenty minute interview for Paul Terry Walhus, who is putting together the big Tour de France celebration in Austin called Tour Watch 2005. It’s gonna be in Central Market in Austin, with two huge TV screens from Circuit City going from 8 am to 9 pm every day of the Tour, showing OLN’s coverage. There will be a ton of events and fun things going on every day - the LAF will have a booth there, and tons of people will be podcasting non-stop. The Discovery Channel folks are going to film part of the Tour Watch 2005 for one of their Lance specials. Read all about it on the link below...

My interview this morning will be podcast, and if the Tour Watch can get funding for me, I will do several live cell phone podcasts direct from the Tour, which will be part of the daily events at Central Market. If you’d like to chip in a few bucks to cover costs - click on my Donate button, and every little bit helps. Really! If everyone who reads this blog gives a few bucks, the expenses would be covered for the Tour podcasts. One of my faithful readers, Kevin, told me that he sees it kinda like a subscription, and sends some bucks now and then.

However, we now have another goal, and that is to let you all hear the podcasts, and I’m sure they will be up on the www.touroftexas.com website, as well as at the Austin event. Everybody can listen to a podcast on their computer - if you haven’t yet tried it, then get ready and go! Google podcast and find out all the info you need....

My Belgian connection tells me that the newspapers there are quoting Johan as saying that Lance will be training in a measured way, so that he will be in peak form at the right time. Also that Lance and Sheryl are flying to Nantes (oops, I messed that up in my original post) in a private plane - for training, and I am corrected from Belgium, that he may stay in Nantes until the Tour begins.. Or who knows, .... only Lance.

Wow - The morning has flown by and why? Well, I’ve been wrestling with the intricacies of setting up my Garmin GPS 10 receiver with my Belkin Bluetooth adapter on my laptop. Basically, getting them to pair up and recognize each other. I’m pretty good at this gadget stuff (Gadget Geek Gal is us), but there’s a hitch that I can’t find and neither can the Garmin tech support.

Hmm - Garmin tech support. Very nice, knowledgeable, helpful folks. I’ve called twice before, once with a question about installing both the map CD’s that I bought, and then yesterday with an unlock problem for the additional City Select Europe version. Questions answered very efficiently. Now this morning, I waited on hold for over a half hour to get through - when I did, the tech guy was nice and helpful, but he couldn’t figure what the problem was - we were on the phone for another half hour or more. Then suddenly, the line was disconnected.

There I sat, holding a dead phone, thinking of all the time I just spent on hold, with visions of another half hour of my busy time waiting to get connected again. re-run, re-run... Hmmm - I thought, was this really an accidental disconnect? I’ve had this happen before... a little paranoia creeps in.... When the problem gets sticky, when no solution is in sight and the tech person on the other end has exceeded some time limit protocol per customer - Poof - you’re history and they’re on to the next call. Nah - that couldn't be... Could it?

I just looked a the blue blinking light on my Garmin receiver and the blue blinking light on my Belkin adapter - two feet away from each other and not able to communicate one iota.... Hmmm- I thought - it’s just like being married. With that in mind, I pulled the plug, disconnected and went on to other things... Like this blog...

As Scarlett O’Hara said, “Tomorrow is another data”.

It’s time for the Monday morning Lance Armstrong LiveStrong Sirius Faction show report.... This time it was a rerun of an April show, I think right after Paris-Nice. The one where Lance was in Spain and Higgs was in Austin talking about the South By Southwest Festival. The one where Lance was annoyed because some guy had emailed saying that he thought the show would only happen when Lance feels like it...

Be sure to check out the Sirius Faction show that starts on July 2nd - it’s Lance in France - Off the Bike and On the Mike. Lance will give a daily report on the Tour haps. I think the schedule is 4 pm Eastern, with re-runs scheduled for later in the day and the next morning. I wrote to Sirius to request that one of the Sports Channels broadcast the Tour daily by hooking into France 2/3 radio. Well, it doesn’t hurt to ask! Yeah, its in French, but I bet a lot of folks would listen - it’s not too difficult to get a handle on what’s going on. I also told them that I would do a daily Fan Report from France for them, but I don’t think I quite fit the profile for their show hosts....Ha-Ha. But how cool would it be to hear live from Velogal who is right there on the scene - live action from the cycling mosh pit? I could do a damn fine job of it, too!

Did you see the comment from Ann, in response to Leif getting DQ’ed at the Tour de Suisse? She says that a well-know photographer got thrown off the race course because he was wearing shorts! Nah, it wasn’t Graham. But is that dumb or what? Would they have ousted women in shorts, too? Soigneurs? Drivers? FYI - Dress code: Business Casual for the Tour de Suisse...

And, thanks to Dave Aiello of the Operation Gadget site for the great comments about my Cameron Stewart post, and for the positive book review of Tour de France for Dummies... See link below.

Our DC team has the greatest guys: they’re just plain nice people, hard workers and have determination and guts. But they are also human... Just like us, sometimes they really get pissed off about happenings in the race. I see where Leif got DQ’d at the Tour de Suisse after Stage 7 - they said he spit on a commissaire’s moto, but he denies spitting. Evidently the moto bumped into him while he was riding the stage, and he got mad. Maybe Leif was so mad that he was foaming at the mouth...

Now, in races, the job of motos is also to stay out of the way of the guys who are racing. Whether a moto official or a moto photographer, it is their responsibility to be aware of where the riders are, and to stay the hell away - front, back or beside. If they cause a pile-up, there could be riders who break collarbones or worse, which could be the end of the race, or even a career, for some racer.

I guess there was also another incident a bit earlier in that same stage, where a moto official had actually crashed right in the middle of the peloton. It sounds like there were some unqualified moto folks out there. But, I hear that Leif went up to the moto guy after the race and gave him the what-for, and ended up being disqualified.

In Philly (maybe you’ve already heard), some beer-guzzler grabbed onto Mike Creed’s jersey as he was slowly climbing the Manayunk Wall at the rear of the peloton. The idiot nearly pulled Mike over, and then the guy was high-fiving his buddies about what he’d done. Well, MC is a dude who doesn’t take crap from anyone, so he stopped his bike right on the hill and gave the guy a choice word or two...

At one location where I was shooting on the Wall, I was jammed next to a guy, his girlfriend, and a bunch of boozing buddies. They looked like they’d had beer for breakfast, and were still having breakfast. This one drunken guy was leaning out over the barricade, giving the one-finger salute and shouting “F... You” at the top of his lungs to every racer. His girlfriend kept trying to make him stop, but he thought it was really funny... I wonder if it was that same guy who grabbed Creed...

Going to the Tour? Wanna ride and blog? Well, I just got a gmail from the folks at Race To The Tour (link below). They have a Tour Sweepstakes sponsored by Subaru, where you might win a blogging/cycling trip to Le Grand Boucle. Here’s what they said to me, “We were surfing cycling blogs and we wanted to tell you we really liked yours a lot. We thought we would give you a heads up on a sweepstakes from our sponsor Subaru. We have our own Tour de France blog and are giving away two chances to win a biking trip through France as well as an opportunity to blog live from the Tour de France. We even set you up with a bike and blogging tools. The drawing started June 12th and runs through July 1. The first winner will be selected the week of June 2, and the second around July 1.”

So if you can ride and climb long distances on the Tour route, and you have blogging skills, maybe you wanna enter. For me - I can barely stand up carrying the 40-50 pounds of photography equipment, much less ride a bike carrying it! And I have two other lens (or is it lenses?) on order from B&H in NYC, so add at least 6 more pounds to the load. They should arrive today or Monday. Gadget Geek Gal loves photography gadgets, too.

Ok - This is very cool... I'm posting from my Ipaq as a test. Just saw the startlist for Eindhoven TT - Stijn, Benoit, George, Pavel, Popo and Benjamin.

Today’s blog is gonna be all about a different cycling champion - he’s now putting in his miles on the road on his Dad’s old Trek. His determination, perseverance and courage are just like Lance’s. And yesterday, he celebrated his “Birthday” (just like Lance does) for his Five Years in Remission. This little guy is eight years old and his name is Cameron Stewart.

I first met Cameron and his family when I volunteered to help the LAF with Lance’s appearance at Stanford University on November 1, 2001. I was helping with ushering folks to their seats, and just by chance I began chatting with Cam’s father, Paul Stewart. Paul told me that Cam had ALL Childhood Leukemia, and had been (and still was) undergoing painful treatment. He was in chemotherapy and still had a year and a half of chemo to go. I saw this bright-eyed, cheerful little three-year-old guy, who was actually going to get to meet his hero, Lance. I saw the effects of the chemo on Cam’s face and body, and the weariness and dull fear on the faces of his parents. Yet, they were positive, upbeat and seemed like the greatest parents a kid could have.

Paul told me that Cam had sat on his lap that summer, watching Lance win the Tour on OLN, while enduring treatment that made the little guy so very ill. Paul’s lap was his comfort, so father and son cheered Lance along every stage. Cam told his Dad that he wanted to get well and have strong legs like Lance. Lance became the inspiration for this three-year-old survivor, and for his family as well: Linda, his Mom, and baby brother, Ben. While they cheered Lance on to victory, they were really cheering Cam on to victory over his cancer.

I knew immediately what I wanted to do to support my new little friend: I put up Cameron’s Page with a Guestbook on my Unofficial Lance Armstrong Fan Club website. During the Stanford visit, The Lance Armstrong Foundation had made arrangements for Cam to spend a little time with Lance, meeting in Lance’s hotel room, so Cam had photos taken with Lance. These were some of the first pics on my Cameron’s page. this page has chronicled Cam's victory over Leukemia with photos since 2001.

Over the years, Paul has sent me photo updates on Cam’s progress, and I got invited to Cam’s birthday party a couple of years ago. I drove up to the hills outside of Sacramento and met the nicest group of people you’d ever want to meet. All great folks and supporters of Cam. I’ve seen the Stewarts at the Ride for the Roses, and Paul has just become a Regional Mentor for the LAF.

So when the Discovery Channel folks contacted me, wanting to know if I knew anyone who had been inspired by Lance, it took me all of two seconds to recommend Cameron. Now Cam is being followed around and videotaped by the DC camera crew, and may end up going to the Tour, courtesy of Discovery Channel. Cam was filmed during his visit to Capitol Hill for Live Strong Day, and with his sign, "I am a Survivor" at the Today Show in NYC.

Cam and his father, Paul, are great spokespersons for cancer research and funding. Cam is growing strong and healthy, and he is determined to ride all the steepest hills, just like his hero, Lance Armstrong....

Go to the link below to visit Cam’s page, see all his photos, and be sure to leave him a message... The page loads slow 'cause the photos are big, but a guy like Cam deserves big photos.

So the buzz now is all about the possibility of Vinokourov joining the DC team. I know that Lance likes and respects Vino and so does Johan. It would certainly make a fierce-some, awesome team next year! And, I imagine that some of our team right now is being solicited by other teams. However, I think that Johan and the other DCs, and our team management, treat the guys on the DC team better than any other pro teams are treated. And I think Bjarne Riis also is great with his CSC guys.

I read that Bicycles Unlimited in Fayetteville, GA is having a giant good-luck card signing for Lance, wishing him victory with Number Seven, and donating $100 for each Tour win. Fayetteville is a neat little place, and they really loved Lance. I think I told you about the course marshals there during the TdG teaching me how to pronounce Fayetteville. It’s kinda like “fate-ve-o”, said really fast with a whisper of an L on the end. Y’awl...

I am pretty impressed with the delivery speed of both Garmin and Amazon. I ordered my City Select Europe v7 from Garmin on Friday night, the 10th and it arrived yesterday afternoon - UPS. I ordered my Garmin GPS Deluxe 10 (thru the Operation Gadget site) from Amazon that same Friday night, and it arrived yesterday - Fed Ex. Now all I have to do is install everything without screwing it all up...

So, thanks to blog fan Fiona, we have the definitive word from Chris Brewer (Web Guru, Internet Content Manager and Key Guy of thepaceline.com) that Lance will not ride in the Eindhoven TTT on the 19th. But I hear from Sheryl that Lance is in great shape and is gonna do some serious kick-ass at the Tour. Yesss....

I see that one on my co-authors of the Tour de France for Dummies is receiving a Royal Award. Phil Liggett has been placed on The Queen’s Birthday List and nominated as a MBE in the Royal Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. MBE (I had to google it) means Master of the British Empire - Well now, we already knew that when it comes to cycling talk, didn’t we?

This award is an Order of Chivalry, part of the UK Honors System, that recognises merit in terms of achievement and service to the country. The honorable Mr. (or is it now Sir?) Liggett will go to the Palace to receive his medal - if it isn’t during the Tour de France. In that case, the Queen will just have to wait a bit... The cycling world needs him for three weeks.... Sir Liggett’s service is to the world, not just the British Empire.

I haven’t heard from Eki in a while - hope he is doing well. Dirk told me in Philly that Eki had some complications with his back injury healing, so he may be off the bike a bit longer than we first thought. But I know my Iron Man, and I know he’ll be back training on his turbo trainer as soon as he can, if he isn’t already spinning away.

My friend, Dave Aiello of www.operationgadget.com, better watch out! I am becoming a gal gadget geek to the max. I bought a Z1RA Sony Viao during the first Tour of Hope, when my older laptop crashed. I thought it had everything, but it was pre-Bluetooth, I guess. So, I’ve been missing that, and especially now that I have ordered a Garmin 10 Deluxe GPS with Bluetooth to use at the Tour. I ordered it to use with my T-Mobile HP IPAQ 6315, but if that messes up, I want my laptop as a back-up. So I surfed all kinds of forums and message boards about adding Bluetooth, and read where guys were adding PCMIA cards, and configuring and tweaking and cussing, and one-upping each other as guys do, to get Bluetooth on older laptops.

So I went to Fry’s and bought a Belkin Bluetooth USB Adapter for $36.09 (the package was torn and Fry’s gave me a whole $1.90 off the list price), and in less than 15 minutes, I now have Bluetooth on my Sony....

Gal Gadget Geeks Rule...

Heads Up! Outside Magazine just sent me a freebie July Tour de France issue, which is all Lance (well, almost all). The B&W photographs are by a guy named Cliff Watts, and they are really fine work. There's a great shot of Lance and Sheryl (with his arms wrapped protectively around her) that is a total winner, and a super, sexy bare-chested shot of Lance. Zap! Zowie!

The main article is titled "Breaking Away", and it says,"As he rolls for number seven, wrap your mind around the life and legacy and farewell Tour de France of Lance Armstrong - hero, dad, six-time King of the World, rock-star arm candy, and(sometime after '06), the next Governor of Texas!"

Whew - that's one big, long sentence, but then Lance is one big legend...

Then there's one full page of small, candid shots of Lance mugging and making faces for the camera... It's that silly, mischevious, little-kid part of Lance that is so endearing to those who know him well. And that is so loved by his kids....

If you are a Lance fan, then you just gotta get this magazine...

OK - time for the Lance Armstrong Live Strong Sirius Radio Monday report. Ta Dah... it was a re-run, but one that I hadn’t heard. Lance and Higgs were in Europe, just returning from the Live Strong Gala. Lance had a whirlwind weekend in Austin before they left. He’d done some voice-overs for a Dasani commercial, and went to the Grand Opening of one of three 24-Hour Fitness centers in the Austin area. Higgs said there were 300 spinning cycles out in front of the place and over 900 folks signed up to spin and raise $$ for the LAF. Said that the 24-Hour Fitness boss guy donated $24k to the LAF that day.


They talked about the Gala and Trek having seven tables reserved (I think the tables are somewhere around $10k a table). Trek really has a big presence at the Gala, with rides for their dealers with Lance, pics and stuff. They talked about the three honorees, and Lance told a funny story about Heidi Adams, the gal who was honored for starting the website Planet Cancer. She uses humor to help younger people deal with cancer. Lance said when she got off the stage after her award presentation, she said, “ Oh no, I forgot to give you the F... Cancer coffee mug that I brought”. Lance thought that was really funny.

Lance and Higgs joked about the rumors that he and Sheryl had split, and Lance said that he had attended the Gala with four females... Sheryl, Grace, Isabella, and his mom, Linda. Said that the twins, at three years, didn’t find the Gala to be very interesting, so they made an early exit from the evening’s activities. Lance said that Luke had just had his tonsils out, so he couldn’t go with them.

Lance said that he had played golf with some of the guys who were at the Gala, but that he just really can’t get into golf... Said that he’d hit some good shots, but golf just isn’t his thing.

Watched the OLN broadcast of the Philly race. It’s always fun to see, ‘cause just like the Tour, I see interviews and stuff and know that I was right there, just standing outside camera range, or standing right beside the camera guy. I sent some pics to Mike Creed’s website guy - he has a few of my shots of MC already up. And the Race Commissaire asked me to take some shots of him (a la Jean Marie LeBlanc), so I sent a few pics of him looking very much in charge of the race, while standing head and shoulders out of the sunroof of the lead official car . And I sent some pics to the great folks at Bliss Restaurant. Sorting thru a couple of thousand images to find specific pics is really time-consuming, even though each race is in its own folder. But, it's OK, I always believe that what goes around, comes around...

WOW! A Discovery triple! Stage 7 of the Dauphine is Discovery Day - George takes the stage, Yaroslav is second and a certain Mr. Lance Armstrong is third. An all-Discovery Channel Stage 6 podium.... Sweeeet....

Can't wait to see this on OLN this afternoon... There will be quite a celebration tonight in the DC digs..... I bet the DC sponsors are quite pleased right now - this does a lot for their big summer Lance promotions. Be sure and catch the program tonight with all the voting for The Greatest American - You know that Lance is in the top 25 - Vote early, vote often is the American way, right?

Heads Up! Eurosport is carrying the Dauphine with live reports....

I saw that Chechu crashed yesterday during the climb up Mt. Ventoux at the Dauphine - he finished the stage, so hope he is OK. Road rash and bruises ... I bet somebody did something stupid right in front of him and down he went. Lance was interviewed and said he’s looking forward to being a “hairy-legged guy” after he retires. I don’t think so - he’s still gonna be on his bike... He and Sheryl are going on a two-week vacation with the kids right after the Tour ends...

I was surprised about the amount of interest in our Tour de France for Dummies book while I was in Philly. One of the Borders Bookstores sold out (Yeah, I know - they may have only ordered three copies and I had to buy one of them so I could show it to everyone). Everyone was looking through it - Of course, the first guy who looked at it turned right to an error in spelling of Raymond Poulidor’s name. Dude, I said - it wasn’t in the part I wrote - don’t tell me about it... Unfortunately, there are a few typos and errors that should have been caught....

Well, the big Bike Naked Day is going to be on tomorrow in London - last year they had a police escort. Nope, not to jail, just around Hyde Park. Bobbies for Boobies and Bottoms, I guess. Yikes, forget that I said that, OK? But you can check out the link at the bottom (‘scuse me) of the post...

Can you believe the great racing at the Dauphine and we can’t see it at all? Cycling.tv, OLN live streaming - where are you? Stage Four sounded like it was a great one to watch, dammit! Lance is now second in the GC by 21 seconds. Makes me want to catch an overnight flight, you know, like leave for the Tour a few weeks early and catch the Dauphine....

I received a gmail from a guy I met at the Ride for the Roses about four years ago, a TC survivor named Bob Hammer. He sent a pic of the most adorable, cute kids... He is a strong supporter of the LAF and here is his story:


I am organizing a golf tournament in Sunnyvale, CA. on Sunday July 24th, 2005 to raise money for Lance's Foundation, which is extremely dear to my heart considering Lance and his Foundation are responsible for the birth of my son, Joshua. Here is some information on our event.

I am a two-time Testicular Cancer survivor. I had just finished 26 rounds of Chemotherapy in April of 2001 when I raised enough money to participate in Lance's annual Ride for the Roses event in Austin. I met two men there who introduced me to Lance's doctor, Dr. Craig Nichols. I was scheduled to have a surgery the following week at Stanford which would have prevented me from ever having children again.

Long story short, I did not have surgery, and Josh Hammer, who was conceived naturally after Testicular Cancer, is currently 2 years old. I have a goal of $25,000 to Lance's Foundation.

I have brought aboard fellow Peloton Member Steven Seaweed to help me on this event. He is a DJ for the #1 Classic Rock station here in the San Francisco Bay Area. Many people know Steven, as he has been a prominent D J in the S.F. Bay Area since 1973. He is also a recent cancer survivor.

We have our own website Have a Ball Golf Tournament and I have even established the "Have a Ball Foundation" with goals of grants for research, as well as cancer awareness for young adults via visits to local High Schools about cancer awareness.

Ok, Lance Fans, if you’re a golfer and in the Bay Area, why don’t you head on over that Sunday and Have a Ball supporting the LAF? I’m gonna be in France with Lance, but if I was here, I’d go! Check out the link below that Bob sent from an article last year on ESPN Sports.

I put some Wachovia Cycling Series shots up on my smugmug gallery, and will add some more of our DC guys later today. I took a few shots of the teams sweating and suffering up Manayunk. It was very different for me to have the sponsor shoot assignment instead of my usual race photos.

I think I’ve finally got my head above the water of about 3,000 images that had to be sorted and resized, burned to CD, then sent to my bosses at Threshold Sports. My job this year was doing the sponsor and branding photography at all three Wachovia Cycling Series races, plus photography for all corporate/sponsor events. Although I utilized the three-times a day that I spent doing my second job at Threshold, as the Food Police for team meals, it still wasn’t enough time to sort thru all the pics. I did finish most of the Lancaster and Trenton images, but wading thru Philly Sunday pics has monopolized the last two days.

I will put some images up in my smugmug gallery, hopefully later today or tomorrow morning. Now I am realizing that I have a whole lot to do to get ready for the Tour, since it is now 20 days till I fly to Paris. One of my best sources of assistance and information is Dave Aiello, who has my favorite geek site Operation Gadget . Dave is doing some research on GPS systems which will be compatible with my T-Mobile HP IPAQ 6315. Surf on over to his site to see what he’s come up with so far.... Check out Dave's site whenever you need info on the latest techno gadgets, or with what you have now. He's gonna be my Gadget Guru from now on....

So Lance is showing himself pretty well at the Dauphine: he was third today in the TT. While folks are trying hard to interpret it that he is not gonna cut it at the Tour, I might point out that he was ahead of Floyd Landis and Vinokourov, who may some of his main competition in France.

There is a great article by Sam Abt about Life After Lance for the team at the end of July... go to the link below to read it.

Well, Well – didn’t the US have a great Wachovia Cycling Series Sunday? Out of the top ten finishers, five were American racers – including the top guy, Chris Wherry. Was he ever stoked about his win! He was jumping around and hollering – it was good to see somebody who was genuinely showing his elation about his victory. Chris is a great guy and just a totally good person. I remember hanging out and chatting with him at the top of the Redlands Bicycle Classic Oak Glen Road Race stage a couple of years ago. Chris waited for all his teammates to arrive before he rode back down the hill to the motel.

And how about George in the Dauphine – way cool to see him win the Prologue TT! Lance was so pleased about George’s win… Did you read the funny article by William Fotheringham in the Guardian about Lance and Jan running into each other while doing reconnaissance of the Pla d’Adet? Jan and three teammates were already riding it, so Johan and Lance drove on up the road and started in front of the T-Mobile guys. Psychological strategy, anyone? Then Lance said he kept looking back to make sure that Jan and his guys weren’t catching up with him. Lance admitted that he climbed it faster than he usually would on training ride. And... Lance said that Jan’s form looked terrible. (Even if he says that Jan is his main rival for the Tour).

I’m heading home early afternoon. This week has been a mixture of exhaustion and elation – doing two jobs here has been both a challenge and a reward. The 21st running of the Wachovia Cycling Series was a huge, huge success, and I hope we see Wachovia on the banners for years to come. I took some shots from the podium, looking out at the crowd for the final ceremonies, and there were hundreds of people in the street – it was a jam-packed, elbow-to-elbow crowd. Plus, there were over two hundred media people this year, and they were all cramming into a small media area right in front of the podium. One of the waitpersons here in the hotel told me this morning that every restaurant in town was full last night. Philly does love the Wachovia Cycling Series, yes, they do!

Thanks to Mark for this link...

The Wachovia Cycling Series in Trenton was a pretty cool race – Freddie got a second again. I bet he wasn’t too happy about that. Health Net is really strong… Our DC guys are saving up for Sunday, I guess. It’s raining really hard, but they are out riding today. What a great bunch of guys. I’m getting to know Roger better, and he is just a great person – great sense of humor, too. He is really a hard working rider and totally dedicated to the team.

Yesterday, I was shooting at the Trenton sign in ceremonies. The announcer was interviewing Greg Henderson as Mike Creed stepped up to sign in – he grabbed Greg’s hand and raised both of their arms up in a podium victory salute. Creed is really full of P&V….

I got a press release about Lance’s newest commercial for 24-Hour Fitness – I guess he is depicted as the Pied Piper of Fitness. He's jogging and people are dropping everything to follow him... Haven’t seen it yet. And Discovery Channel has launched a blitz of Lance programs for the summer. They were talking to me about being on one of the programs, but I guess I didn’t make the cut… The people who do are gonna be very happy!

Somebody asked me about other eating places around Philly. I'm not from here, but I like Tir Na Nog, an Irish Pub a couple of blocks away, and Le Bus in Manaynk.

The Wachovia Cycling Series race in Lancaster yesterday was super fine. The finish was a nail-biter, photo finish between Freddie Rodriguez and Greg Henderson. Greg just barely pipped Freddie for the win. At the press conference later, Freddie was sorta joking about all the stuff that had gone wrong for him. The team was delayed on their flight and it took them 25-40 hours to get to Philly, plus some of their stuff was lost. (Same for the Liqui-Gas team, who still haven't received their baggage!) So Freddie rode with only one teammate and no team car.

Freddie has had bad luck in past American races with mechanicals: this day was no exception. One of his pedals fell off, and without a team car, he had to get a pedal from the Mavic support guys, ride with it to the feed zone, where his team support staff was. Halfway up the feed zone hill, somebody ran into his back wheel and messed up his derailleur. So Freddie had get off the bike and run up the hill with it, give the bike and pedal to his wrenches, and jump on spare bike. Turned out the seat wasn’t adjusted to the right height on the spare bike, so he rode one lap with everything out of whack.

In spite of that, he managed to finish second. Some smart, gutsy riding and pretty impressive determination. Watch out for Freddie on Sunday….

I’m hearing from the DC guys that Lance’s training is coming along really well, and he’s looking mighty good for July. I’m told the guys are really motivated, especially with the Giro win. And so are the CSC guys – they’re the team that is gonna give Discovery a run for their money at the Tour.

So I’m having a blast with the teams who are on the meal plan here – I see them three times a day, being the food police. We have a ton of fun with it, and it’s a great way to get to know the guys on European teams. The DC guys are great – they are just the best guys. I tell you, Tony is the leanest I have ever seen him, after the three week Giro. It’s the same thing after the Tour, every guy loses 8 or 10 pounds or more. Their bodies are just depleted. This new Pro Tour thing is forcing the guys to ride too many races with too much traveling, and too little, or no recovery time. We’re gonna start seeing injuries and illnesses in all the teams from the constant stress on their bodies, and not enough recovery time.