It's Yer Holy Crap It's Time for the Mountains Giro d'Italia Roundup!

Okay, one prologue, a couple boring sprints, an ugly transfer day, and two bumpy wake-up calls later, we're finally back and well-entrenched on Italian soil, so to those just tuning in now (and those just waking up), welcome to the smashing 101st Giro d'Italia! So what've we learned, and what's a-comin'? This!

1. Shut up, Froome. Jaysus!

2. Elia Viviani is doing his team, and country, proud. See what happens when all the other top sprinters skip the race in favor of that stupid Amgen EPO Tour o' California or to hold back for the gaudy Tour de France?

3. As usual, the prologue !@#$ed the GC on Day 1. Word time trial champ--and freakishly inexplicable high-peaks whiz kid--Dumo slaughtered the field, with (to be fair, this sucked--I want him to get his !@# kicked staying upright) Froome bashed up from a recon ride and dropping 37 seconds (up to 55 now with him too nervous to use his mot--uh, mojo), flyweight Pinot at 34' on the day, piccolo Chaves at 47, perpetual almost Fabio Aru at 57, and Lopez at 1:14, so it's gonna be a looooooong ride back to the podium for most of 'em. Hell, since apparently being 2 feet taller and 80 kilos heavier won't do the trick, maybe Dumoulin'll have another--nope, I'm sure they've got his digestive system under control this time, you're all just hosed!

4. !@#$IN' HELL ASTANA, CAN YOU *TRY* NOT TO RUN OVER THE INNOCENT RACE MARSHAL/ROAD FURNITURE FLAG ALERT GUYS? Oh, that was the Tour de Yorkshire. !@#$IN' HELL ASTANA, CAN YOU NOT PULL THIS STUPID !@#$ AT THE GIRO OR ANYWHERE ELSE EVER AGAIN YOU EEJITS?!

5. Ya gotta love Riccardo Ricco'. After hiding behind the skirts of first his own girlfriend, *then* his own grandma when he got popped, he's finally decided to stick his hand up like that annoying kid in science class who can't bear to be ignored for two seconds with his new book "Heart of the Weasel"--uh, "Cobra", with the apparent revelation that while he'd definitely still dope today, as one must, he'd probably not be so parsimonious as to refuse to pony up serious dough for medical assistance instead of what he did last time, which was to stick his blood bag in his dorm fridge next to the mold-mangled remains of a two-week-old burrito and the disconcertingly off-smelling mayonnaise. Y'know twerp--everyone *still* likes Rasmussen better, so !@#$ off! David Millar, though, you might beat in a yearbook popularity contest, so I suppose that's something old boy!

5. Stage hunters, enjoy this while it lasts--'cause starting tomorrow, the time-screwed mountaineers are gonna jostle you for anything left that they think they can get. Aruuuuuuuuuuuuu--well, maybe you'd better hold off for a superhuman effort in week 3!

6. Ale Petacchi, who was notoriously busted for asthmatic-rhino levels of inhaler juice a ways back, was waxing poetic on his Twitter about his gorgeous 2004 Giro victories. Okay, he got a *little* wheezy in his day, but am I the *only* one who still loves and misses Fassa Bortolo's beautiful blue train from the long-past eons when sprinters still *came* to the mountain-monster Giro with joy?

7. Outside the bellissime roads of Sicily, meantime, Nacer Bouhanni has apparently gotten into a "violent" altercation with his Cofidis DS on team bus which, given cyclists' usual ineptitude at the manly art of the bar brawl, usually consists of nothing more'n taking a wild swing in someone's general direction with an empty bidon or, God forbid, attempting to give one's rival a "noogie", but with a trained pugilist on the downslide like Bouhanni could actually mean a pretty decent sucker-punch to the noggin. !@#dammit Bouhanni, hold it together--if you blow yer chance at the Tour team, who's gonna be there to body-check that horrid little punk Moscon?

Well, tomorrow the fearsome Mt. Etna beckons. Now *what's* that !@#$ you have to wrap all yer discreet motorized assistance with so it doesn't get molten by lava?