It's Yer Incredibly Prestigious 2019 racejunkie Awards!

Yes, it's another marvelous, and also appalling, year o' cycling done 'n' dusted, and in this gaudy self-congratulatory awards season where reality-TV celebrities strut the red carpet wearing godawful dresses that cost more than a pro road bike fer chrissakes, and movie stars explain away yet another incriminating photograph, we all know that what's *really* important is celebrating the good, the bad, and the !@#damn ugly in the marvelous world of pro cycling! Prizes--I swear, if anyone should be so bold, so wiseass, or so desperate to claim 'em--a custom-embroidered racejunkie cycling cap to adorn your shameful head; a passel o' dashing racejunkie stickers to slap on that jackwagon Team Skineos, or yer best friend; and a handsome, genuine abandoned promotional jock statuette trophy sustainably sourced from my local second-hand store with yer name personally written on it by me in indelible, irrefutable permanent ink.  So without further ado, stand up and accept your prizes with pride!

Paranoid Conspiracy Theory o' 2019:  He fell at high speed in a training run, breaking 86 major bones 14 rather important organs and ripping off 93% of his skin from road-rash, and yet, despite the faithful testimony of an eyewitness teammate that "that !@#$ looked *bad*", Chris Froome's deliberate failure to contemporaneously post sufficiently disgusting gory selfies of his being tended to by the 20 different medical personnel who were surrounding him, plus the hospital's apparent mishigas about promptly cleaning up blood from a healing recovery room instead of leaving it looking like the freakin' elevator scene from "The Shining" for two weeks, gave joyful credence--or at least roughly 12 jillion characters of Twitter space--to the notion that Froome was in fact relaxing in a secluded castle in Montenegro having his entire bloodstream replaced by liquid HGH cocaine amphetamines EPO espresso and Red Bull while nursing, not catastrophic and potentially career-ending injury, but a vicious paper cut sustained while opening his squad's latest Amazon shipment, all in a wily elaborate fiction designed to evade the narcs, make his crappy team look even more repulsive, and increase scrutiny of an improbable arachnid superstar with the approximate credibility of Lance Armstrong.  Froomey, collect yer prize--if you can!

Smack Talk Award: Giro frontrunner Simon (?) Yates' smug pre-race warning that his hopelessly outclassed opponents oughta be "!@#$ting in their pants right now."  Which they were, if only in helpless laughter as they left him far, far in the dust for 21 consecutive stages.  Congratulations, Simon (?)--in a field normally crowded with racists, punks, and eejits, you win for sheer audacity!

Mystery Transfer o' the Year: Nairo Quintana to Arkea. Seriously, I mean, whose wheel is he even supposed to suck in the mountains *now*?

Fan !@#$wit Award: you know, there's usually no shortage of contenders here, and with idiots wrenching bidons outta passing racers' hands, causing crashes by popping up like deranged clowns in unexpected corners of high-speed descents, and flat-out tossing random bicycles into the charging peloton, this year's been no exception.  But is 2019's winner a standout: yes, that total blockhead who figured that the opening team trial of the beautiful Vuelta was the perfect time to flood his poor dehydrated garden and, naturally, a twisty section of the race course, thus wiping out almost the entirety of an unsuspecting Jumbo-Visma and UAE, and damn near making an even more confused Quick Step plow head-on into a Jumbo car that apparently didn't place a high priority on getting this !@#ses outta the way.  Where's Noah and his freakin' Ark when you need 'em?

Lying Lying Liar Prize o ' the Year:  if you say you remotely even predicted Mads Petersen men's World Road Race Championship victory in Yorkshire--and yes, that counts even if you *are* Mads Petersen--honey, you are *it*.  Mads, get ready to prove us all wrong next year!

TMI Award: look, from "marginal gains" to personal pimped-out campers to jiffy bags to special fluffy pillows for the delicate flowers to lay their noggins on, to rampant sexism and immediate backlash for whistleblowing, to pack-fodder donkeys transforming into Triple Crown racehorses overnight, we all know British cycling as a whole, are a bunch of dirty, doping, bull!@#$ting bastards.  So *why* must we sit through the unduly explicit testimony of dueling deniers/classless emasculated !@#holes Freeman and Sutton, one accusing the other of erectile dysfunction--which ought to be treated with sympathy, not derision, anyway--and the latter asserting his wife LOVES HIS STUDLY NATURALLY-NON-STOP JUNK?  Jaysus, I miss omerta!

Classics Upset o' 2019: sure, your first professional win--spectacular an achievement though it is--is likely to be a minor stage in an obscure race given the UCI stamp of approval only after a truly epic night of drinking, debauchery, and serious cash payments, but for my money, if you're gonna win ever, you might as well make it a big one, as stalwart EF worker Alberto Bettiol shocks the field and bags Ronde Van Vlaanderen for his inaugural stomp on the podium.  Well done, kid--now Sagan, don't get complacent!

Giro d' Netherlands Award: look, you're hard pressed to find a more beautiful race in the peloton than the Giro Rosa--and a more legendary bunch of hometown heroes, from sprint bad!@# Giorgia Bronzini to Eliza Longo Borghini to Fabiana Luperini, to dominate it.  But this year, from Van Vleuten to Vos to Van der Breggen, it was nearly an all-Dutch wipeout.  The exception?  Exciting breakout sprinter Letizia Borghese.  C'mon, azzurri--you've got this next year!

Law of Obvious Unintended Consequences Prize: !@#$in' hell, Movistar.  You *know* this trident team leadership at the Tour scheme never works.  Couldn't you just have !@#$ed Landa over without making him schlep all over France for three weeks?

Superdomestique o' 2019: Stage 19, Vuelta a Espana.  Wee youngster James Knox, a surprising Top Ten in the overall standings, goes down hard in a nasty crash, and takes, as one might expect of a cyclist, the start on Stage 20--barely.  So who shepherds this kid the entire way on the hard-driving penultimate day?  Damn straight, that's the legendary Classics and breakaway champion Philippe Gilbert, with the ever-intimidating Zdenek Stybar to boot, tenderly nursing this kid over mountain after mountain and right across the finish line.  *Dang*, Quick Step--you *seriously* didn't give PhilGil a contract for next year?!

All Hail the Chief (For Not Calling This Off) Award: after years of grim photos of hypothermic cyclists shivering under enormous drool-icicle pornstaches, quivering like wet Chihuahuas at an ice sculpture convention, and even gnarlier reports of wizzing on their own hands to fend off frostbite and enable their numb hands to even halfway manipulate the brakes, a sympathetic, rational UCI finally institutes an Extreme Weather Protocol.  What *doesn't* bother the high honchos snugged cosily in their space-heated VIP tents?  *that's* right, these fragile boys being bombarded with ice balls the size of their heads, as a freak Vuelta hailstorm sends the poor battered things diving for cover under any thornbush, overhang, or big Belgian Classics man they can find.  FFS UCI, you need these guys to be blitzkrieged by actual dinosaur-destroying meteors before you call it a day?

Crash o' the Year (Disc Brakes Are Better Edition): Wout van Aert vicious deli slice of a wipeout, just like the riders have been warning about for years.  Never fear: happily, the boy's already back on great form at this weekend's cyclocross races, and fortunately, his full recovery seems assured.  Glad you're back--now back on to rim brakes for you!

Orange You Glad I Didn't Say Banana? Prize: yes, a year that saw tender fluoro-carrots Fundacion Euskadi amass a pile o' mountain stage wins, then horribly collapse, also saw--through Mikel Landa's endless efforts, a whole lotta fundraising, and fans who were about to riot if this didn't happen--our precious Euskaltel, Orbea bikes and all, reborn as a World Tour team for 2020.  Aupa Carroooooooooooooooooots--and watch out for the damage in the high passes, the rest of you saps!

I'm So Pissed Off I'm Not Even Going to Name This Award of 2019: You *suck*, Tour de France. You can't run a three week women's Tour to honor one of the most formidable all-terrain talent pools the peloton has ever seen, when you've already got a group of women riding the entire race a day ahead of the men's event dodging traffic, pre-Tour road closures, and rampant-running livestock with barely an unexpired gel and a half-patched replacement tube for support?  How about just handing Van Vleuten Vos and Borghini a !@#$in' broom dustpan and garbage bag to neaten up the team bus area before the all-important boys arrive, and show 'em how you *really* feel about women athletes?

Don't Give Up Yer Day Jobs Award: god love 'em, but Astana's fearsome rap video darn near broke the cycling internet--and our eardrums--with the mellifluous stylings of founding Run-DMC member Jakob Fuglsang, a scary as hell start-off by Alexander Vinokourov, and all the crotch-grabbing, handsign-throwing bravado we've come to expect from drunken fratboys on an ill-advised YouTube spree. I love you, Astana, I do, but--come to think of it, Vino, just please don't hurt me!<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rMIv5Dsmuf8" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Snit Fit o' 2019: y'know, it takes guts--and a truly award-winning ego--to climb off your bike the day before the Tour de France time trial you're fully and fairly expected to win, all in the name of a colossal crybaby prima-donna masterclass tantrum over the fit of yer skinsuit.  Next year--well, you got rid of 'im for next year, but Rohan Dennis, don't half think your new squad's gonna put up with this crap unless you win the race *first*!

Social Media Master o' the Year: if you don't love Toms Skujins--whether or not you can spell it, pronounce it, or pick 'im out of a lineup--you are one warped, sorry individual.  Even more warped and sorry than those of us who *do* spend 14 hours a day on Twitter!

Cry Me a River Award: Dang, what is this, 2005?  Lance Armstrong.  After 'winning' 7 Tours de France, bamboozling the entire US into a blindly-worshipping cult o' personality, screwing over his own friends and making dozens of millions of dollars he'll *still* never have to give back, thus reassuring a century's worth of future cheat-weasels that slime *always* pays, what's Captain Whines-a-lot cryin' about now?  Right, that he's cruelly oppressed by not being able to cheat at competitive--and let's be honest, meaningless to everyone not personally doing it--Masters' ping-pong because of his voluntarily chosen and richly enjoyed treacherous dirtbaggery.  FFS Lance, pick up a used table at the town dump and upload videos of you smashing it solo against the backboard if you can't live for 2 seconds without the thrill of victory and the roar of millions of admiring fans.  Now either give that mansion you live in to the guys whose careers you destroyed if you *really* want some sympathy, or wipe your tears on those seven yellow jerseys in private!

Punk-!@# Move o' the Year: miraculously, this breaks Alejandro Valverde's approximately 16-year winning streak, as that pathetic !@#$wit who cheated at freakin' *e-racing* far and away takes the prizes.  Cripes, have you *no* dignity?

And Last But Not Least, Slap Fight o' 2019: between Luke Rowe and Tony Martin's DQ-worthy argy-bargy (and let's be frank, outright assault) at the Tour, a mid-interview smack upside the head by a passing resentful colleague, and Nacer Bouhanni looking to sucker-punch just about anyone for anything, these angry little toothpicks can generate a surprising amount of upper-body strength, but for me, the amiable Tao Geoghan Hart and Ruben Guerrero, outrageously pissed at jointly allowing Jakob Fuglsang to take the stage on a breakaway while the two of them d!@#ed around, then devolving into actual post-race fisticuffs, perversely warms my pacifist heart.  Next time, someone intervene quicker--before these flailing incompetents actually knock *themselves* out!

Well folks, them's yer quick and dirty (yep, very dirty) cycling awards for this year.  So collect n to 2020--and guys, just *try* to hold your !@#$ together this season!