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Location

Well the Tour de France route for 2009 has come out, and there's some new old stuff, like the Team Time Trial is back. Some say this makes Lance Armstrong more likely to show up, some say less, and he seems to want some assurances from the organizers about respectful treatment or some such.

Meanwhile Contador sounded welcoming at first, but lately perhaps less so, and Vino's name has surfaced as well. Nothing solid here from me...just some impressions.

Good stuff from Velonews about Team Garmin-Chipotle and how Dr. Allen Lim improved performance and recovery by keeping the riders cool:

The team believes dealing with heat is more than just an issue of comfort.

Location

OK it's not too important, but I'm always fascinated by any mention of the inline skating police in Paris. This seems a not so wonderful way to catch criminals, so I guess their duty is limited to situations where they're just a helpful resource. Only in movies where the thiefs run straight down a sidewalk or road conveniently would the skates be that great for the chase. However, being included in any honor guard that includes motorbikes and firefighters is pretty nice. We're on a thin schedule of reinforcement, we skaters!

If you get a few minutes, please take a look at some bicycling, touring and vintage bike photos of Italy from Dale Brown at Cycles de Oro. There are lots of nice photos of the buildings, streets, people, and of course, classic bikes of Italy! Thanks for sharing, Dale! You're making us really jealous of your time in Italia. I just wish I could hear the narration that goes with this slideshow, because I know Dale has tons of great stories.

Good vibes all around from London, England and the UK from hosting the Tour de France, or so it seems. I thought it was interesting and fun, and especially since the weather was so great for those days. The English really came out to look and seemed to be enthusiastic. I'm glad they're not piling on as there are enough piles to go around already. Mo' bettah testin' throughout the ranks I say and careful living for the riders it seems. It's a job many of us would gladly take!

As timv has noted, David Millar can spin a yarn nicely in his TdF Diaries. As a doper who had done his time, he's uniquely qualified to share several perspectives. And he was there for his own "Say it ain't so, Joe" moment when Vino's non-negative was first announced. I'll leave most of the piece for you to read on the Bicycling site, but here's a brief sample of that moment:

During the rest day, I've been speed-reading through various reports and blog entries for the first nine days of this year's Tour. My favorite story so far comes from David Millar's Stage 5 diary account of rookie British sprinter Mark Cavendish on his first-ever hilly TdF stage:

Just a quick note to say that on today's stage of the Tour de France, some inline skaters made the video coverage and were even commented upon favorably by Phil Liggett (and maybe by Paul Sherwen too).

The first view was of the solo race leader with a solo skater in a low race position making good time on a road parallel to the TdF course.

The second view a few minutes later was of four skaters on the parallel road, behind the full peloton, with fields of sunflowers in the foreground and between the two roads.

For those who don't have cable television but do have high-speed internet, here are some links that may (or may not) work for you to watch some worldwide television. Currently, of course, this is of interest because of the Tour de France. Look below for some links to the live data for GPS (location), power, heartrate and more. It's amazing to watch the video as the riders pass through a town and make a turn and to see this happen on the Google map while viewing HRM data.

This is a nod of thanks and memorial to the poor souls who either perished, or lived through the nightmare of the pivotal battle to liberate France at D-Day on 6th June 1944.

An article in my homecounty's newspaper, the Dorset Echo, has a little write up about the many boats that left Dorset's Weymouth Harbour to cross the English Channel: