One Is the Loneliest Number

If You're Ivan Basso, Anyway: my, I know St. Ivan of Varese has well and humbly reformed and all, but from his little chat with cyclingnews waxing rhapsodic about how honored and delighted he is to be officially "co-captaining", as was previously rumored, with Franco Pellizotti at the Giro for Liquigas, and how wonderful and deserving Pellizotti is, and how sure he's had experience sharing with others as shown with Carlos Sastre at CSC (tho' as I recall Basso was actually the *leader* at the '06 Giro, but what's historical accuracy worth anyhow?), you'd think the boy had barely ever competed as a waterboy in the Giro, much less personally won the thing. Okay, one might detect the slightest hint of resistance to his apparent fate when he alludes to figuring out the real team leader on the road, but I am the only one wondering if team management's hedging their bets for fear their gilded angel ain't gonna be quite the rider he was before he didn't dope in 2006, and is having perhaps the wee-est bit of (incredibly expensive) buyer's remorse? You say you're back to training?--you've still got the Giro di Trentino to win a race and prove my suspicions dead wrong, Ivan!

Eat It, Damiano!: as Cunego takes off for a couple of weeks of high-altitude training in prep for a fruitless run at a second Giro win, new BFF we love Gilberto Simoni is already taking a stage over such formidable mountainmeisters as Floyd Landis and Tyler Hamilton and sitting on the overall at the Vuelta a Mexico, and though there's no denying that Classics Boy's got prettier pictures of himself on his website, the Simoni tifosi are going absolutely wingnut for their "old man"'s form ahead of May. Forza Gibo, and put that punk-!@# Cunego in his place (suckin' down the dust from your wheel) in the Dolomites!

You Can't Make This Stuff Up: and, I see the latest person to proclaim "justice served" in LPR being denied a spot in Milano-Sanremo and dirty pigs Di Luca and Petacchi being thus excluded is resurgent sprint king Tom "Sniffy" Boonen, on the grounds that if they won't commit to antidoping efforts so strongly as he has, they deserve whatever they get. Now, having defended our strapping boy's, say, more powdery escapades in the recent past, I won't be so unkind as to point out the obvious (and to be quite fair, at least "the obvious" wasn't intended for performance enhancement), but I *will* note that Patrick "30 YEARS OF DOPING" Lefevere's Quick Step, which as you might recall dear Tommeke is on, was one of the very last teams (along with CSC) to sign that stupid antidoping virginity pledge ahead of the Tour. What's next, Bjarne "Guess How I Won My Tour de France?" Riis going off on how committed to the cause he is? Oh, wait...

Happy Birthday, Barbie!: finally, a toast to girlhood icon Barbie's 50th birthday, and if you're wondering what the hell this has to do with cycling, it's because I hereby call upon Mattel to forthwith issue a commemorative Marianne Vos I'll Crush You Like the Worthless Weaklings You Are Barbie, a Marta Bastianelli Body Image Issues Barbie, and, of course, a Tom Boonen Jailbait Girlfriend Barbie complete with fake ID and Hello Kitty backpack. Toss in a Faux-Repentant Busted GC Contender Ken with special IV attachment, and a Hypocrite Enabler Directeur Sportif with cash-stuffed briefcase, and we've got ourselves a ProTour squad!