For the first time in nearly 20 years I am back in Belgium. I probably don’t need to point out that the 94th edition of the Ronde van Vlaanderen was a good one — perhaps one of the best I can remember. The two top favorites fought it out to the end, giving the thousands of rabid fans a great show. Perhaps the best thing I was reminded of, however, was that the Belgian fans simply respect the sport. The average old granny knows more about cycling than your garden variety American Tour de France watcher. As Cancellara crossed the line yesterday, the café in which we watched the last 40km filled with applause — not golf-clap applause either, but honest, heartfelt appreciation kind of applause.
Being absent from this here web-log for the past few weeks (and scarce for the past few months) has been an exciting, but lonely time for me. Lonely because I truly enjoy chatting with you fine people, but exciting because I have been living life on the rivet, to a great extent, for the past couple of months since taking the job at Bike Magazine. Learning the ins and outs, and trying to live up to the high standards left to me by my predecessors has proved no easy task.
But there’s light at the end of the tunnel.
As I write this, I am at flight level 360, or somewhere thereabouts, staring out the window at a nearly full moon, heading for BRU. That’s Brussels for those of you who do not have the entire list of airport indicators memorized. If you are reading this site in the first place, I think it is safe for me to assume you know the reason why a person like me would be headed to Belgium for Easter Sunday.
As it turns out, the fine people at the magazine corporation saw fit to give the staff of Bike an extra assignment; make another magazine—just one issue—about whatever you want. We chose to do one about pavement, instead of dirt.
So hang tight sports fans, because for the next few days I’ll be coming at you direct from the place where it all started. And yes, as a matter of fact, I have been promised 6 days of rain. You can almost smell the fritjes, can’t you?
I've been gone for a while, but I have a good excuse. A little more than a month ago, I was offered the position of Editor-in-Chief at Bike Magazine. I accepted the offer, packed a few things and headed south. Bike's Editor, Lou Mazzante, decided it was time to fly the coop, but stuck around until the 19th of February, in order to put his final issue of the magazine to bed. On February 22, I took over the reigns.
My head has been spinning since I walked into the office for the very first time. Bike is a very strong magazine, so I have my work cut out for me. But it's gonna be cool.
It was an assignment for my school newspaper that first got me interested in cycling. Once I'd gotten a bike and started riding a bit, it was a magazine first began to fuel my daydreams about becoming a bike racer. I guess you could say that my life in cycling has come full circle.
If you're a hardcore road racer or cross-country mountain bike racer, you might not have given Bike a look. Racing has never been a focus of the magazine, but that is fine by me—I've already used up all of my angry pedal-strokes. But if you like beautiful photography, and stories about some of the other things that can be done on a bike, check it out.
As I come up to speed, I might be a little slow here on this weblog, but I will still be here.
I'm sure that many of you know by now that Bob Roll was seriously injured in a skiing accident. In the crash Bobke managed to break three ribs and his femur. I've been friends with Bob for twenty-five years now, and have always known him to be a tough dude. I've broken my own fair share of ribs, and would wish that incredibly inconvenient pain on no one but, according to the Blob, breaking a femur takes pain to a whole new level.
When I was racing in Belgium, I would always know when my competitors were, shall we say, chemically altered with any number of drugs in the amphetamine category because they could
Since this year’s Tour de France will be contested on the narrow, wind-swept, and cobblestone streets of Belgium during its first week, many of the top GC contenders have started making some noise about spending some time in that country to brush up on their cobblestone riding skills. Lance Armstrong, for one, is set to ride the race most consider the most difficult of the “flat” classics, the Ronde van Vlaanderen. Alberto Contador, has also indicated that he’ll be spending some time on the Belgian stones, in order to acclimate to the feel, so to speak. Other GC men will surely follow suit, since a rookie mistake on the cobbles during the fast first week of the Tour could take a rider out of contention in a heartbeat.
A Dog in a Hat celebrates the glory of bike racing, but thrillingly tells the hard reality of professional cycling and sheer physical agony of racing day after day. Buy the book.
For the first time in nearly 20 years I am back in Belgium. I probably don’t need to point out that the 94th edition of the Ronde van Vlaanderen was a good one — perhaps one of the best I can remember. The two top favorites fought it out to the end, giving the thousands of rabid fans a great show. Perhaps the best thing I was reminded of, however, was that the Belgian fans simply respect the sport. The average old granny knows more about cycling than your garden variety American Tour de France watcher. As Cancellara crossed the line yesterday, the café in which we watched the last 40km filled with applause — not golf-clap applause either, but honest, heartfelt appreciation kind of applause.
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Being absent from this here web-log for the past few weeks (and scarce for the past few months) has been an exciting, but lonely time for me. Lonely because I truly enjoy chatting with you fine people, but exciting because I have been living life on the rivet, to a great extent, for the past couple of months since taking the job at 
I'm sure that many of you know by now that Bob Roll was seriously injured in a skiing accident. In the crash Bobke managed to break three ribs and his femur. I've been friends with Bob for twenty-five years now, and have always known him to be a tough dude. I've broken my own fair share of ribs, and would wish that incredibly inconvenient pain on no one but, according to the Blob, breaking a femur takes pain to a whole new level.
Since this year’s Tour de France will be contested on the narrow, wind-swept, and cobblestone streets of Belgium during its first week, many of the top GC contenders have started making some noise about spending some time in that country to brush up on their cobblestone riding skills. Lance Armstrong, for one, is set to ride the race most consider the most difficult of the “flat” classics, the Ronde van Vlaanderen. Alberto Contador, has also indicated that he’ll be spending some time on the Belgian stones, in order to acclimate to the feel, so to speak. Other GC men will surely follow suit, since a rookie mistake on the cobbles during the fast first week of the Tour could take a rider out of contention in a heartbeat.
