Former British pro champion and team-mate of Lance - that's Brian Smith? Apparently he's a dad now, and has been spotted running marathons in the states? - we needed to find out more!
It was warm today at the World Road Race Championship 2007. It's a cliche, but what a difference nice weather makes. The ladies race was on first: I have to rant, I'm afraid. What is Jeanie Longo doing? What is the French Federation doing? What is the UCI doing? It's not good for the sport for a woman who looks about 60 to finish in the bunch; she's a remarkable athlete, no doubt. But that's not the point, it's time to stop, Jeanie. Now! OK, I feel better now.
On the home straight now! 80 something miles and 3 category three climbs today! Not too hard we hoped, especially after the last few days. But boy were we in for a surprise, here at the Tour Nivernais Morvan!
If you’re a regular VeloVeritas reader then you’ll know we try to buck the superlatives trend – ‘iconic’ and ‘awesome’ are words you won’t see on our pages too often. But we have to use a superlative when we talk about today’s interview subject, the Ukraine’s Yuriy Metlushenko – ‘Legendary.’ He’s been winning bike races across the globe for a decade and a half and shows no sign of slowing down.
It doesn’t seem like it but it was season 2017 when last we
spoke to Ross Lamb, a David Rayner Fund man ‘doing good’ in
The Flatlands. Flanders gets under a man’s skin so we were surprised to hear he was moving to La Belle France – that said, times are tough with teams folding everywhere from the UK to Columbia and all points in between. But that was our first question...
One good thing to come out of the washed-out British Madison championship at Meadowbank over the weekend was that there was plenty of time for VeloVeritas to talk to one of Britain's best roadmen, Dean Downing. The 32 year-old from Rotherham had originally intended to kill two birds with one stone; ride the champs and show his fiancee the sights of Edinburgh. The way it worked out, his fiancee had a wedding dress fitting and the race was rained-off. Never mind, he got to talk to us instead.