Yer Random News Roundup o' the Week--Rider Smackdown Edition!

Tyler Extends the Olive Branch: y'know, I was gonna post a whole bunch of sweet sentimental ponderings today on dreamy Cav's impending fatherhood and Rodriguez's adoration of Team Katusha, but !@#$ that--for my money, the best tweet o' the week is traitorous Lance Armstrong defector/men's-room beatdown rival Tyler Hamilton, generously letting Lance know that if he wants any restaurant recommendations while he's in town, silly inconsequential betrayal to the feds and impending legacy destruction or no, Ty's still his man. Note to Lance (who shockingly, however, hasn't apparently yet responded)--if you end up in some cockroach-ridden Southie back-alley with Tyler and a posse of black-clad goons at 2 a.m. "looking for the entrance", he ain't takin' you to Legal Seafoods for chowder. See, I can be nice!

BMC See the Bloody Remnants o' Yer Carcass Next Season, Thor!: and, unstoppable Velo d'Or Philippe Gilbert is already amping up the love at Team BMC, ruminating on his chances for dominance in Paris-Roubaix for 2012 and, one assumes, really reassuring Thor Hushovd that besides being demoted to Cadel's water-boy at the Tour de France, he can also look forward to being Gilbert's b!@#$ at the Classics next year. !@#dammit, has ever a recent World Champion been so nut-kicked in such swift succession by squads that oughta be backing him up? Yap, yap, Thor's a whiner, yap--much as I love Cadel and Philippe, he should be freakin' howling at the moon like a werewolf and going all Wolverine on their !@#es, and they should thank him extravagantly for doing it!

The Racejunkie Review o' Books: yes, all that fancy lit-crit is for weenies, because my spankin' new Ivan Basso autobio has just arrived on these very shores, and, faster'n you can say "Birillo," I hope to be posting the more salacious details of his career--which, I fear, may be sorely lacking in this edition--for both yer entertainment. Oh well, what it may lack in potentially-litigious peloton gossip, it'll certainly make up for in really pretty pictures. Woo-hoo!

Jens, the Next Generation: finally, I see total god Jens Voigt has tweeted that one of his Jenslets just competed in--and, inevitably, won--his first-ever bike race. me, I'm thinking that with approximately 563 offspring to his credit, Jens derivatives'll pack to the peloton enough within the next ten years that there'll be no-one left *but* a Jens and Jensette in the ProTour ranks, all joyfully bounding ahead of each other on the road whether their DSes want them to or not like labs after a just-tossed tennis ball. Bow, peons--and with that many of 'em coming up, we're gonna have to get used to doing it *often*!