It occurred to me that VeloVeritas had never spoken to the man who won the last edition of the famous Tour of Britain Milk Race back in 1993; Chris Lillywhite. A quick message to our friend Martyn Frank, who was on management with Chris on the late, lamented Wiggins team and we were in touch.

It’s always cold at the Bremen Six Day, the Baltic is just up the road so you get cold or cold and wet; today it’s the latter but the cabin has a window so we can at least see the sky – not like the usual breeze block with no windows.

Just about everyone – except us – was late to the track on Sunday afternoon for the Copenhagen Six Day 2019; no surprise after a late Friday, early Saturday then late Saturday. There was a definite lethargic vibe in the cabins not helped by us losing Achim to a bad throat – he came in to see the doctor and organiser but looked terrible and Kris took him back to the hotel.

It’s with much sadness that VeloVeritas reports the passing of Canadian Cycling Legend, Jocelyn Lovell on June 3rd at 65 years of age. ‘Controversial,’ ‘outspoken,’ ‘colourful,’ are all adjectives which have been used to describe the sleek, blond kilometre specialist but for me he’ll always simply be, ‘one of the coolest.’ Always immaculate, slim and long limbed; astride a track bike with that beautiful pale blue with white sleeves and maple leaves Canadian national jersey on his back he looked like he’d been born to perform the role.

Tim Mountford was one of the pioneers of US professional cycling in the 60’s and 70’s; he recently gave freely of his time to tell VeloVeritas about his adventures in what was a golden age for European cycling.

It was a tough one to Porto Porto Sant-Elpidio - Farrar, Feillu and Hushovd all go home. The dream is over for Navardauskas - he lost 15 minutes. But his Garmin team mates Ryder Hesjedal and Christian Vande Velde move up to third and fifth on GC. Garmin will burn up the watts in search of more pink - they know it'll be harder to come by when the Gazzetta stage ranking is a 5* and not a 3*, as yesterday's was.

I haven't written on this blog for a while. The reason for this was that I was kind of getting tired of whining on about bad luck, hard times and other problems. No one wants to read that and no one cares. So I decided to keep calm and hang tight till good news come along. Writes Tomás Swift-Metcalfe.

It's 06.30 on Monday morning and we're in Macomer, Tempio Pausania, Sardinia. It's going to be another beautiful day; there's not a cloud in the sky and the sun has begun its climb. Yesterday was one of those days that makes you realise, you only think you know about pro bike racing.

We're in Montargis today, talking about Mark Renshaw; he has some nice wins in his palmares; the 2006 Tro Bro Leon, a stage in the 2008 Franco Belge and a hand in shattering Garmin's dreams to win the TTT in the 2009 Giro.

With the release of the list of Scottish squad selections for the Commonwealth Games cycling events we thought it would be good to catch up with a few of the riders; some ‘old friends’ and some new names to us. Lauren Bell burst on to the GB track scene by winning the 500 metre Time Trial and Keirin at the 2020 British track championships, as well as taking Sprint bronze.

To my shame, I couldn’t tell you who the reigning BBAR is, but if this was the 80’s I‘d have little problem in informing you. Cycling Weekly printed regular updates of the table standings, with the final ‘50’ on Boro’ always a big deal – that race could make or break your bid for the prestigious top twelve.

We've completed our stint at the Giro d'Italia 2010, but we miss the turn for Rimini airport, the signage is dire, we're late already, off at Rimini Nord, through the tolls, U turn and back down the other side of the autostrada, there it is, dump the car, limp to the terminal. 'You're baggage is overweight sir,' abandon my shorts, T-shirts, carry my sweat shirt and jacket - still over, even though I can tell the bag weighs nothing like the 13 kilos they say it does.

Nationals apart, Gary Hand (Endura) has dominated the Scottish domestic scene in 2009; he continued that superiority with another win in the Super Six Series in the Tour of the Lowther today, on tough roads around Britain's highest village-Wanlockhead.

"I was needing a win! I've had too many second places!" was how Gordon Murdoch (Pedal Power) explained his strongman's victory over 62 windy, potholed, crash-plagued miles in Saturday's Dooley's Grand Prix, part of the Scottish Cycling Super 6 series, high on the bleak moors to the south west of Paisley.

"Hello Mr. Sercu, how's life?" I ask at the Rotterdam Six Day 2011. "Well, I'm still alive!" comes the reply. He's a 'glass half empty' kind of a guy is Patrick, sometimes. But he's sport director here at the 6-daagse Rotterdam and not to be messed with. And he has a lot on his mind; his 'boy' Iljo Keisse may be smiling out at me from the 'programmakrant;' but there's no one smiling at UCI HQ in Switzerland. They've instructed Frank Boele, the organiser here, that Iljo is not to start...