I love the Vuelta as much as any self-respecting cycling fan with a penchant for hot weather and steep hills, but as we’ve reached the first rest day in the big Spanish race, it’s a perfect time to go ‘around the grounds’.
There’s been a lot happening in cycling outside the Iberian peninsula, here are my picks.
1. Tour de l’Avenir
We say this a lot, but Australia continues to develop some really outstanding young riders.
This year’s Tour de l’Avenir produced some outstanding results for the Australian team (it’s an U23 race and riders represent national teams), particularly Robert Power who finished second overall.
Some recent riders who have made the podium in the race include Bauke Mollema and Tony Martin (2007), Jan Bakelants and Rui Costa (2008), Tejay van Garderen (2009), Nairo Quintana (2010), Esteban Chavez (2011), Warren Barguil (2012), and Adam Yates (2013).
To win or podium at this race is a good sign of impending World Tour contracts and big-time success. You’ll also notice a lot of Colombians win it, and this year was no different, with Miguel Angel Lopez taking the title. Watch out for him.
Power, who rides for the Jayco-AIS World Tour Academy team, has perhaps been less widely heralded than some of his contemporaries. That will change, now that he’s become the first Australian to reach the podium. It’s a big deal, especially when you consider he’s only 19.
His teammates also had a big week: Campbell Flakemore won the opening prologue and wore the leader’s jersey, Caleb Ewan won a stage, and Jack Haig finished 12th overall. The production line of Aussie road talent continues.
2. Goss to leave Orica-GreenEDGE
Matt White has confirmed to Cycling News that Matt Goss is leaving the team in 2015. It’s sad to see the departure of the team’s original marquee rider, but the last two seasons have been disappointing for Goss.
He simply hasn’t won enough races, and the team has moved on, with Michael Matthews proving a more than able replacement in the sprints.
What’s next for Goss? He turns 28 at the end of this year, so he’s still got plenty to offer if he can recapture his spark. The rumours are that MTN-Qhubeka are interested, and that would be an interesting parallel with another former Columbia/HTC-Highroad alumnus Gerald Ciolek, who has successfully rebooted his career with the African Pro Continental team.
Goss could also be a hugely valuable contributor in the World Tour as a lead-out man. He made his name leading out Mark Cavendish, and a return to that role might be a viable way to keep himself in a big team at the big races.
I don’t think anyone could say they were surprised to see Goss moving on. For whatever reason, things just haven’t been working.
3. Tiffany Cromwell rides into top ten at GP Plouay; stakes claim for World Championships spot
Tiffany Cromwell should be the first Aussie rider picked for the women’s road race team at the World Championships, if recent form is any guide.
After missing a bronze medal by a tyre’s width at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, Cromwell bounced back to claim fifth overall at the Tour of Norway, and then an aggressive 10th at the GP Plouay this week (read her race report for Cycling Tips here).
The good results against the best in the world are becoming more and more consistent, and Cromwell has shown she can perform well on tough courses. First picked, I tell you.
4. Daryl Impey is back
Orica-GreenEDGE’s South African sprinter Daryl Impey has beaten his doping rap, and will return to racing this week at the Tour of Alberta.
His defence team successfully demonstrated that his positive test for the banned diuretic Probenecid was due to contaminated gel caps sold by his pharmacist, who’d been dispensing the banned substance to a previous customer.
Plenty of people will be sceptical – we’ve hashed this one out again and again, and people’s views don’t tend to shift much – but I feel for Impey. As he said on his website, he’s been put through hell because his pharmacist got sloppy:
“It has been definitely the hardest two months of my life, it has been a huge financial loss and has been tough on my whole family. But I was determined to show that I am clean and that I would never cheat to try get an advantage over my competitors. I am so relieved that this has now been proven.”
The stress on athletes that occurs because of the extreme rigour of anti-doping protocols is enormous. It’s not just the early-morning door knocks and post-race urine samples, it’s keeping your whereabouts updated every day, reading the labels of everything you ingest. But the most difficult and frustrating thing is that athletes are quite literally trusting their careers to strangers, and feel like they have no control over their fates.
Plenty of people simply won’t believe Impey, or will argue that he got off on a technicality (as with Michael Rogers). I’m starting to wonder if the combination of strict liability, a huge ever-changing list of banned substances, and incredibly sensitive testing methods is actually damaging the athletes it’s supposed to protect.
If your career can be ended by having the bad luck to have a sloppy pharmacist, then the whole anti-doping system starts to look like a big dumb lottery.
Have we reached a point where we’re jailing people for jaywalking because of a recent spate of murders?
Wombat
Roar Rookie
Ewan is a loooooonnnggg way off at this stage. His rides at Comm Games & Ride London showed that he is not nearly strong enough to make moves stick or mix it at the sharp end with the big boys. Goss as a lead-out man ? Whilst he was sometimes drafted into the Cav lead-out train at HTC-Columbia, he was never the key/final man. His fitness levels, or lack thereof, have been a major part of his demise at OGE but I feel people have overlooked his other key failing; his lack of mental toughness. He had a reasonable 2012 where he was al least competitive in big races and picking up high stage placings however a key trait showed up. Taking a tumble and/or copping an adverse call from the commissaires is part of the deal of top level sprinting and, barring some injury that rules them out, the top sprinters pick themselves up and are Up for the next one. Not M.Harley Goss who seemed to crack the mopes, throw in the towel mentally and be "out of commission" for days to come.
Tim Renowden
Expert
I will add - my view is that this is dependent on the substance. I know there are plenty of people who think that "doping is doping is doping" but the reality is that not all banned substances are equal, and they shouldn't be treated as equal. You might not want to let people off with a warning for EPO, HGH or anabolic steroids, for instance (but deciding which ones should have a threshold is a matter for the pharmacologists).
Bones506
Roar Guru
ha ha - great call. He is a massive talent but has never pushed on. OGE have Bling and Caleb - who i believe will ste the world on fire in about 2 years time.
Rob Gremio
Roar Pro
Very sensible suggestion - A threshold, and those below the threshold given a private warning. I agree that there is no reason to be naming and shaming at the first instance, especially if the level is low.
Tim Renowden
Expert
I was trying to avoid saying it so plainly, Bones! He needs to stop turning up to races looking like Jan Ullrich on a bad day.
Bones506
Roar Guru
Tim, The reason things haven't worked for Goss is that he is lazy. He doesn't train like an athlete of his capability should and that is why he has not produced results. He is very lucky he won MSR - he basically dined on that win for nearly 3 years. The best he can hope for is Pro-Conti.
Tim Renowden
Expert
Hi Rob, Yes, I think I should probably come back to this topic in a longer piece, because it's obviously very complex and needs more treatment than I've given it here. The balance between catching genuine micro-dopers and genuine innocents is so finely tuned it's almost impossible to see how any policy could get it 100% right, but maybe there needs to be more opportunity for riders (and athletes in other sports) to make a defense before they are publicly named and shamed. I also think they need to look at setting reasonable threshold doses for some substances (like clenbuterol or probenecid where the detectable quantity is far, far below any active dose), to reduce the risk of false positives. They could issue athletes who test positive but below the threshold a private warning, and keep monitoring them closely to make sure it was a one-off.
Rob Grêmio
Guest
Tim, Very interesting and thanks for the "around the grounds" update. On Impey, it's a shame that this happened to him, and if the "sloppy pharmacist" story is indeed true, it suggests that the doping tests are now extraordinarily accurate. That makes your statement about a "dumb lottery" ring ever more truly. While Impey was unfortunate, would we not prefer this level of analysis, which may prevent micro doping and catch systemic dopers? However, riders like Impey, who have been proven innocent should have some recourse to compensation - professional reputation, possible earnings from races, etc, all lost due to the adverse finding that was overturned. Perhaps this might limit the damage you referred to? Of course, we might just be able to turn the other cheek, a la the NRL and ASADA in the Cronulla Sharks debacle... (No thanks!)