2007 in Sardinia

You can read the official report on the PMVC website.
Below the version from my chronicle.

The next morning [May 19, after the near-epic Steven Rooks Classic--95 miles through between Maastricht and Remouchamps, Belgium] it was on to Brussels, where I hooked up with Steve and Dusty. After arriving in San Vero, we manged to do a version of the Cuglieri ride (46). I didn’t feel very good at first. Legs wouldn’t move and my shoes hurt my feet, a problem that would return frequently. But on the fast downhill sections, starting in downtown Cuglieri, I began to improve, and the three of us rode quite hard at times going home. One gelato stop. First full ride on Sardinia was the Ghilarza ride, which I had missed three years ago and which we didn’t get to last year. A nice ride with several medium long, not very hard climbs, and the weather was beautiful also. At 77 it would turn out to be the longest ride of the whole week. Monday we went to the East Coast to do a new ride from Nuoro. A bit busy going through Oliena toward Dorgali, but pretty also. From Dorgali we went up the hill, through the tunnel, and down the hill into Cala Conone, the first time I had truly reached the East Coast. Leaving after lunch, I lost the others and rode back alone, following, it turned out, a different route from the others who rode back the same way we had come. I instead took the steep, little road going north and then back into Dorgali through the backdoor. It was quite steep and I had to work hard to get up it in the 25, in part because the pavement was concrete plates, not asphalt. After the first pass, the road turned into asphalt for a little bit of downhill before more climbing. It was a cool road, even though the climb back to the tunnel would have been nice too (but more like other climbs we do on Sardinia). Getting to Dorgali, the water bottles we hadn’t quite finished on the way out were still outside at the supermarket, and I drank some and filled my bottles from them before continuing. Climb back into Nuoro—again I took a different route from the way out, this time inadvertently—was trafficy but also fairly steep (57 miles). Tuesday we went to Bosa where in the first town a few miles out Oscar asked for the keys to the van because he was feeling terrible. Couldn’t breathe, and later that night he ended up in the hospital for three nights. The rest of us rode on to Villanova Monteleone, seeing maybe two cars the entire way. Dusty, Michele, and I reached Alghero first, and we rode right through it (it really was too early to stop again). The three of us rode most of what is probably the most beautiful stretch of the entire trip together, causing me to take it easy, but I really wasn’t that eager to go hard or far all week (the Steven Rooks Classic definitely had taken the edge off). This way, I was able to enjoy the ride along the coast even more (68). Back in Bosa I had very little interest in riding back to San Vero, and unlike Steve (who was o.k. with it then) I still have no regrets. [o.k., now, October 2008, I do] Driving home, we took a different hill out of Bosa, toward Macoma, the one the Giro must have taken after arriving in Bosa. Wednesday was a rest day, in part because of visits to Oscar in the hospital. After accompanying Michele to the hospital in the morning I rode an easy, flat loop past Putzu Idu and Riola in the afternoon (26). Thursday we also stayed close to home because it appeared that at 2 pm we could take Oscar home from the hospital. We did the Paulolatino-Ula Tirso-Solarussa loop quickly. Michele and I hammered home from Fordongianus to get panini. I pulled the whole way, getting a little tired at the end, but we did get to the store just before closing time. (57). Friday was the actual day Oscar was released, but we did a full ride nonetheless, Teti-Desulo. I was getting tired—although riding with what now was just Dusty, Steve, and Michele really wasn’t hard. Enjoyed the Desulo climb the most that day. Just rode a steady pace in the 21. I had dropped Michele already before Desulo. Decided to stay out of the 23 all the way to the top, which wasn’t too difficult, so I cannot have been too tired (68). Initially we were going to do the Laconi ride on Saturday, but during breakfast it became clear that Michele wasn’t up for it. I really wasn’t eager for it either, especially because it would have meant riding pretty much the whole ride ahead of the other two, and on my own. There was also the matter of the van ride, which didn’t appeal too much to anyone. So the four of us ended up doing another Cuglieri ride, this time taking the high road all the way from Narbolia. Dense fog on the Cuglieri side of the hill. In town we ran into a wedding, with the bride leading the party on foot right through the middle of town. Things started to clear on the fast, downhill section to the little coastal villages. We stopped in the first one, and I had gelato at the same place as the first day. A very good decision to ride from “home” (50).

These are Dusty's mileage and climbing statistics from that blissful week:

monteferru 47 3440  (steve, dusty, ruud)
ghilarza 74 7500
calle gonnoni 55 5400
bosa 68 6175
tharos 46 862
paulilatino 52 3156
sarule desulo 69 6524
monteferru 48 3200

total 459
alt 36,257

Blindness to Nuance

InU.S. Third World policy during the Cold War (with "communism" blotting out local particularities and making for ugly interventions--see for example Iran, Guatemala, Vietnam), and today, in the "war on terror," for example in Somalia. We will argue for a long time over the exact role of the U.S. in the Somalia disaster (as we continue to argue over Cold War cases such as Vietnam), but Somalia is not the only recent case that makes one wonder about the extent to which a superpower such as the U.S. is able to learn from past experience. Remember, for example how unprepared the U.S. was for the occupation of Iraq (how many speakers of Arabic again, early on?) and, even more important, how irrelevant decisionmakers believed this to be? Granted that the choice in these cases often is from a range of bad options, but if you're considering steps with the potential of turning a society or government upside down, at least do your homework. As Vietnam, Iraq, etc. show, long term that's in your own interest also.

Catching up

It rained yesterday in Holland, but it didn't matter to me, because I was in Milwaukee, where the skies were mostly blue, the wind brisk, and the riding just right for late October. We had 12 or 13 people at Atwater Park, and together we inspected the nice new pavement on Bonniwell before turning North, and then back East to end up for a first coffee stop at the Alterra in Grafton. We even sat outside. Earned our keep on the way home (Green Bay Rd, River Hills) and assembled for a second cup at the original Alterra, on Prospect. At that point, there were still six of us. The riding (I also did a somewhat unusual Wednesday ride) wasn't the only reason for this trip; one would have to say that it wasn't even the main reason. The main reason was work: a conference on "1968" for which I'm one of the co-organizers. That's where the Cold War comes in again (and in a post, no less, which also deals with cycling!). But I'll have to write more about it later, as I'm just back in Holland, and a full day of teaching awaits tomorrow. But it sure was nice to be able to catch up a little with so many friends, on campus and out on Southeastern Wisconsin's open roads.

Good Fall Riding

Friday I got out for a quick 20 miler at the end of the day under a spectacular "big" Dutch sky: partly cloudy and a setting sun. The light is magical at those moments. Lots of poor commuters sitting in long lines at traffic lights as I spun by doing about 19 in the small ring, enjoying almost perfectly calm conditions. It's tights weather now, and Friday I was also glad I put on three long sleeve jerseys. Just made it home before dark, although I did have to turn on my flasher the last ten minutes or so. When daylight savings time ends, next week, these little rides won't be possible again until next March or so. Today, was another nice fall day. A little more wind, but also clearing skies half-way through the morning. The three of us had chosen to do the Nieuwkoop loop again, the same ride we did in foggy conditions a few weeks ago. Headwind going out, but really not bad. This time we could actually see the beautiful area surrounding Woerdense Verlaat, Meije, Zwammerdam, and Nieuwkoop, and for any visitors I think this will have to be a mandatory ride. Tailwind the whole way home, and even though it's fall, there were many sections where we happily did around 23. A strong wind at your back and nice road conditions can give you the feeling you're quite the rider, and there were several (short) sections where we succumbed to that feeling and took the speed up close to 30. I'm feeling all that now, but having this feeling (and needing a nap half-way through the Sunday afternoon) is a great privilege. Almost a metric century, almost 20 average.

The Always Present Horner

This year's Tour of Lombardy was a pretty moderate affair, in part because of the lack of stars at the starting line, in part because I'm sure for many riders it has been a long season. But it was very nice to see Chris Horner back in a European race again. As always, he was there to race. Whether he expected to contend for the win I'm not sure (he may have been trying to set things up for his teammate Brajkovic), but he did make a gutsy move on the penultimate climb, one only Cunego and one other rider was able to follow. And he was still in the front lines on the final climb. By that time, the only guy in the field I've ever been in a race with, Mike Friedman of Pittsburgh, had probably already abandoned.

Doping, Cycling, and Germany

If there's one thing we've learned about professional cycling in the past year(s) is that if a rider's performance seems to good to be true, it probably is. Think of Basso in the 2006 Giro; or Vinokourov's "gritty" victories in last year's Tour; or the cases of especially Ricco and Schumacher this year. Kohl, I guess, too, although I personally didn't immediately suspect him last summer. Too good to be true on the face of it also means: never having a bad day, which reminds me of another prime example: Emanuelle Sella in this year's Giro, especially these back-to-back stage wins in the mountains. All these guys, and others have been caught, although I'm sure there remain others who still get away with it, in part because this will always remain a game of catch up between cheaters and inspectors. There will always be new means to boost performance illegally, and there will always be people willing to try them. But there's no question that cycling is working very hard at making it difficult and potentially very costly to cheat (much harder than many other disciplines). Here's a good source to keep up with the latest on all this (not that I always do). In fact, the tolerance for any infractions has become so limited, that genuinely honest mistakes now also tend to be punished very harshly. What's the name again of the Belgian rider earlier this year who got banned because of a stupid mistake by his doctor or soigneur? I think that's been reversed recently, as it should have been, because in a sport where so much is asked of the body so frequently athletes will always need to rely on doctors and pharmaceuticals just to stay healthy enough to show up for work. (Given the various interests at stake, not showing up for "work" is often highly undesirable, although it should probably be made a little easier at times for a rider just to sit something out, as some of the multi-day races should also be made just a little easier to handle in terms of distance and maybe total number of days). The bottom line is that cycling is doing a lot to make things more honest and transparent. But it doesn't get enough credit, certainly in comparison to other sports. Take the recent developments in Germany, where the main tv organizations now won't televise next year's Tour de France; where the Stuttgart Six-Day track event has just been canceled; and where they now won't have their national tour, the Tour of Germany, next year either. This is all because the sport has lost credibility in the eyes of many Germans, and down with it has gone sponsor interest. Germany is an exceptional case, perhaps because it doesn't really have a long, deeply-rooted cycling tradition. There have been many good German cyclists, but the sport didn't really acquire a mass audience until the 1990s when Jan Ulrich began his tragic rise. It's hard in Germany to put cheating (always has been, always will be part of the sport) in its proper, wider context. Of course, the English-speaking world hasn't really been part of the hard core of the world of (road) cycling either (France, Italy, Belgium--maybe Spain and the Netherlands), but there sponsors seem to view the glass as half-full: much concern about doping, but much support for new anti-doping policies. I'm sure both the German critics and the Anglo-Saxon optimists see themselves as realists. For now, I'm going to side with the latter. With more than 24 hours to go, I'm already excited about watching the Tour of Lombardy tomorrow afternoon.

The Problem with Ayers

Thomas Frank has a characteristically forceful and well-reasoned column in today's Wall Street Journal on his friend Bill Ayers, of Weathermen fame. It is a good piece, and Frank succeeds in adding nuance to the Ayers picture, certainly the one we've been getting recently via campaign rhetoric. There's one weak passage, however, which points to the reason why Ayers still poses problems, also for Obama:

I do not defend the things Mr. Ayers did in his Weatherman days. Nor will I quibble with those who find Mr. Ayers wanting in contrition. His 2001 memoir is shot through with regret, but it lacks the abject style our culture prefers.

It's a weak passage, because the rest of the piece really ignores the issue of contrition, to the point of implying that it's pretty much irrelevant. Without expecting what Frank calls "the abject style"of contrition people today may expect from former terrorists, would it have been terribly difficult for Ayers simply to come out and say that it was plain wrong to bomb all these sites in the 1970s? And if so, why? It clearly was difficult for Ayers, to put it mildly, because in 2001 (before 9/11, not on that day) he said that he had no regrets, that the Weather Underground should have planted more bombs. I have no reason to question the multiple accounts of all the good works Ayers has undertaken recently. But especially for such an upstanding citizen, why no clear repudiation of the bombs? Frank is right, the Republicans have exploited the Ayers connection in a "vile" manner. But this lack of a clear repudiation of the bombings continues to be a problem; also, whether he likes it or not, for Obama.