And We're Off!

Score: Armstrong, 1!: okay, I'm woman enough to own it: forget this "I'm happy with my result" spin-city crap, Lance Armstrong dealt a massive psychological atomic wedgie to spindly twerp Alberto Contador in the prologue. 5 seconds? I don't know if you were watching the same coverage I was, but for the look on Alberto's face as he saw his time it might as well have been five minutes. Of course, Alberto'll still kick the !@#$ out of Lance in the mountains, but man, our precocious baby did not have a good day. Anyone else thinking Alberto's unfortunate mechanic and soigneur still have visible slap-marks on their faces this morning?

Save Me!: speaking of coverage, and with all due respect to Phil and Paul who were clearly entirely manipulated and strong-armed into this disgusting orgy, I swear that by 10 minutes into Versus' slutbaggy non-stop lip-licking "Lance vs. Contador" showdown idiocy I was ready to get all the commentators a room stick a "do not disturb" sign on the door shut off the lights hand 'em all a pack of cigarettes and tell 'em not to come out until it's all over. Oh, and did you notice there are actually other GC contenders this year? Well, damn, two hours into the TV show I sure didn't! Please, please, not three weeks of this lurid "battle of the giants" rival fetishism--at least not in public for heck's sake!

A Tale of Two Sprinters: turning to the fast men and today's bloody uncoordinated carnage, and leaving aside that Oscar Freire was completely screwed out of the uphill stage win he inevitably triumphs at so I was more than irked except that Petacchi who only just today was telling Tuttobici that Mark Cavendish's general assiness has brought the entire peloton's loathing onto himself cannily snagged the win, am I the only one who thought Cav was the twitchy chump responsible for bringing the boys down tantalizingly close to the finish cutting over like a nursery-school bully into the snack line? Contrast (by contrast) class act Tyler Farrar, who delicately shrugged that the AG2R gentleman apparently just thought it was a good time to run his back wheel into Tyler's derailleur and refused to blame anybody other than everybody equally for the nervous-nelly spazzes that took half the riders into face-plant makeout sessions with the tarmac. Can this boy *get* any cooler? Of course, for all I know it's all an act and he secretly steals lollipops from babies and trips up little old ladies in crosswalks, but I'm still romanced enough by this glorious ridiculous sport to give the man the benefit of the doubt til he breaks my heart and sends it hurtling into the Iban Mayoesque underworld of death'n'despair. So Tyler, don't !@#$ this up!

Il Grande Giro: meantime, sprint bad-girl Ina-Yoko Tuetenberg's got the lock on the Giro Donne for the third straight stage in the row, which means, unfortunately, that the azzurri are starting to look even worse than the French men's peloton in their own race. Step it *up*, sisters--do you *want* to look like those desperate pathetic never-gonna-bes in the Tour de France?

Music Soothes the Savage Breast: finally, in honor of poor injured Tom Boonen whose noble renouncing of the coke-studded club scene didn't even result in a spot in the Tour de France this year, I bring you Kraftwerk's extremely Teutonic tribute to the Tour: