*That's* a Freakin' Rest Day?

Pippo, Suave: well, it's sure been an action-packed day o' rest at the Giro d'Italia: while maglia rosa Vincenzo Nibali remains cagey, Cadel Evans professes (not unreasonably) optimism, and the weather looks to toss the GC into chaos as mountain stages continue on the verge of rearrangement, an Italian journalist excoriated humble Scarponi domestique/comelier-than-thou peloton studpup Pippo Pozzato as a vain, lazy, glasses-and-shoe-matching, tv-whoring prima donna, and an angry hosed breakaway rider from Bardiani called him a "mafioso" for allegedly organizing a screw-the-organizers temporary race-slowdown to (not unfairly, for heck's sake) protest dangerous conditions on Mont Cenis. Of course, the entire twitsphere, including the gallant Taylor Phinney, immediately leapt to his defense. Try picking on someone less pretty (and charming) next time, jerkface!

Only the Good Die (Well, Retire) Young: and, in 'retirement' news, poor teamless Levi Leipheimer finally called it quits while guys who profited amazingly handsomely for doing the same disgusting !@#$ but didn't actually get busted for it twice continue in the peloton, as if that makes any sense, and Heras'-Vuelta-thieving weasel Denis Menchov unexpectedly called it a career over "knee trouble." In addition to his impressive palmares, Menchov also managed to rack up a 9-out-of-10 on the doper-suspicion scale in recent years, a truly stellar achievement considering the A-list competition on that front. Don't worry, Denis--'fess up a little, sniffle up a storm, and a lucrative DS gig should soon be yours!

Get In the Kitchen and Make Me Some Pie!: finally, it's really been heartwarming to see the total disregard for women's cycling this past week, as first that pig Wiggo bemoans his lack of manly descending skills, then the course at the Amgen EPO Tour of California isn't even wholly closed to traffic for the women's race, and lastly, the Tour de Languedoc screwed itself and half its amazing peloton by keeping the teams entirely in the dark as to whether they'd even be racing the damn thing right 'til it was time to clip in their freakin' pedals. One remaining bright spot: July's Giro Donne, with 20 teams and 160 riders set to start. What, some other race starts then too? Never heard of it!

Greg LeMond for Prez! Cyclist T&A Update! Save the Giro Donne!

Greeegggggg!: just as Johan Bruyneel feared, that big pack o' "douches" who don't want cycling to be an open encouraged cesspool of stinkin' dopers met to talk sport, and, as Jonathan Vaughters made nice with Cofidis' Eric Boyer after Boyer accused Vaughters of not giving a crap as head honcho when the greed-enabler teams immediately snapped up post-ban drug-weasels as soon as Op Puerto was over, a new white knight has emerged: yes, none less than 3-time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond, routinely derided in Lanceville as a bitter, angry nobody (I mean, for !@#$'s sake, people), is gonna challenge impotent rump-kisser Pat "Dick" McQuaid for UCI supremacy. Frankly, clean as his rep is and sincere his desire to fix the sport he loves, LeMond could've beaten Hinault with a two-foot syringe stickin' right outta his shorts and I'd *still* love to see 'im on the job just to piss Lance off. Greg for President--woo-hoo!

A Philosophical Q: Look, I truly think doping's really, really bad. And given how pissed everyone is they couldn't afford to dope half so well as Armstrong force-fed his crew, I mean, how horrible everyone feels about the garbage-pail days and how eager they are to change things now for the young ones, I really think the teams all hoppin' on this Movement for Credible Cycling thing is great. But Rabobank, Lampre, Astana--all these disgusting clowns are now *begging* to join the kids they used to pick on at the nerds' table. Am I *really* the only one at all suspecting that clean new era, yap, yap, yap, this is just a bunch of kum-ba-yah s'mores-makin' campfire-singin' bull!@#$ and five years from now we're all going to be reading some "shocking" new expose' of their cutting-edge test-evading blood-doping practices? Okay you sweet little innocents, I guess it's just me then--at least, I hope so!

Save the Giro Donne, !@#dammit! Okay, the women already get paid squat, their teams dissolve every fifteen minutes, the glorious Giro Donne is under threat--and don't even get me *started* on why there's no women's Vuelta or Tour--and now, hot on the heels of Vino & Co partying with the newly-elected "Miss Ciclismo," a buncha cyclist babes are 'helping' the sport by posing for calendars straddling giant mountain-bike tires with electrical tape on their racks? Oh sure, it's usually Cipo or Pippo takin' it off for the cameras, and Petacchi can pose in a silk man-nightie with a hot model velcroed onto 'im and still retain his peloton cred--but really, can't we just give these women a *raise* and some *races* to ride in? Since the answer, sadly, appears to be "no," I hope you'll all join me in my new campaign, "Randomly Send Gobs o' Money to Marianne Vos, Mara Abbott and Giorgia Bronzini," c/o this post. *Please*, please save this phenomenal race--just *look* at what we'll all be missing!