Velominati Super Prestige:
Giro D'Italia 2013
Velominati Community Profile Archive

Velominatus: Lukas

Order: Level 2 Velominatus

Location: Portland, OR

Older in body than in spirit. Former Ski Instructor (Now only instruct my two girls) Former Soccer Player (now coach) Dreamer of living the Vie la Velominati

@Lukas's activity:

Descendeur

We close out the 6 Days of the Giro with our sixth and final installment.A body at rest, stays at rest. A body in motion, stays in motion. Things get a bit more ambiguous when it comes to a body on a bicycle tearing down a twisty mountain descent at speed, particularly in the rain. But it is here, on the boundary between clarity and ambiguity, wher...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. Coming down the Poggio with i4ti during training.  This is what the pros see!  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lH6sjpX-t5U »

Velominati Super Prestige: Giro d’Italia 2013, Stage 10

Day 5 of the Six Days of the Giro continues with an impromptu VSP event.Lets have a look at where we are in the 2013 Giro. Wiggins must have spent time training in Luxembourg because he’s been descending like a Schleck when things get dodgy before disappearing into the team van to have a cry about it. Hesjedal has put in some good moves and...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. Uhhh, upon further reading of the actual rules, never mind. »

  2. Okay, so I didn’t call him Uran Uran.  Can I get a point anyway? »

  3. VSP PICKS: 1. Scarponi 2. Uran 3. Hesjedal 4. DiLuca 5. JJ Cobo Acebo »

Velominati Super Prestige: Giro D’Italia 2013

Twiggo is dreaming of a Giro-Tour double. He has sent out mixed messages about his Tour ambitions. Will he use the Giro as the ultimate Tour preparation or will be burn all his matches in May and hope he can find another pack for July? He has abandoned his successful 2012 Tour run-up strategy of winning every stage race he entered the previous spri...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. Needed some last minute tweaking.  Can’t wait for the racing to start. VSP PICKS: 1. Ryder Hesjedal 2. Bradley Wiggins 3. Nibali 4. Tom Danielson 5. Scarponi »

  2. Why oh why do I have a soft spot for North American riders trying to make it in Europe.  Especially after all the scandals.  Oh well, sometimes things don’t make sense.  Perhaps the weakness that delivered the victory last year will pay off again. VSP PI… »

Velominati Super Prestige: Luik-Bastenaken-Luik 2013

There is something to love about a race that makes a deviation to its route for the simple joy of sending a fleet of professional riders up a fiendishly steep and narrow ramp. The Cote du Stockeu offers zero benefit to the route from a logistical standpoint – in fact, all it does is complicate things. On the way down from the Cote de Wanne &#...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. Thomas DeGendt 2. Igor Anton 3. Ryder Hesjedal 4. Nibali 5. Chris Froome »

Velominati Super Prestige: La Flèche Wallone Féminine 2013

Last year we saw Evelyn Stevens out-last Marianne Vos at the top of the Mur de Huy. The take home message is don’t start one’s charge too early. Vos should know this finish, having won it four times already. It’s hard to know who is on form in the professional women field as the races are too far apart to infer much from the last...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. Emma Johansson 2. Marianne Vos 3. Van Dijk 4. Armistead 5. Kristen McGrath »

Velominati Super Prestige: La Flèche Wallone 2013

We came tantalizingly close to adding a foray up the Mur de Huy during our excursion to Liege-Bastogne-Liege during this year’s Keepers Tour. But good sense and The Anti-V prevailed, as they are wont to do, and only two of us were left wanting a dig at the most notorious finishing climb in the Classics season.I write this, then, woefully igno...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. Managed to get a little race in, and was actually in the lead with about a mile to go.  Not in the lead at the end.  The legs couldn’t back up what the wee little brain told them to do…  More training, smarter racing next time. VSP PICKS: 1. Ryder Hes… »

Velominati Super Prestige: Amstel Gold 2013

Yes it is a race named after a barely drinkable Dutch beer. I have enjoyed Amstel beer, brought to our table by a nice waitress, sitting outside in the Dutch spring. Atmosphere is everything. Do the Dutch brew awesome beer? I drank some good stuff in Amsterdam last spring but I’m pretty sure it was Belgian.Now we begin the Ardennes three race...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. Damn, saw Ryder bridge up to the chase group and had some fleeting hope that he would pull something off, but he crumpled on the last climb.  Props to Roman K. great ride. »

  2. Darts on the wall.  Honestly I have no idea how this race will play out.  I probably should tag Sagan for the win, but something tells me not to.  Oh well. VSP PICKS: 1. Ryder Hesjedal 2. Philip Gilbert 3. Peter Sagan 4. Ian Boswell 5. Cesare Benedetti »

Velominati Super Prestige: Paris-Roubaix 2013

It looks so easy on the television. Well, no, actually it looks pretty bloody hard. We think we have some understanding of how they suffer, how their bodies can take the continual beating. But we don’t really know. Not even by riding these abominations they call roads twice in the space of a few days can we understand the scale of the thing...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. A slight adjustment.  Can’t wait for race day! VSP PICKS: 1. Johann Van Sommeren 2. Greg van Avermaet 3. Edvald Boassen Hagen 4. Tyler Phinney 5. John Degenkolb »

  2. If Sparticus hadn’t fallen I would have gone with the consensus pick, but I think that his luck won’t hold.  My hope (for my picks to be true) is that the favorites will just mark Faboo and a break of enough quality will get away and he won’t be able to p… »

Portland Super Cogal V2.0 2013

...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. After some IPA fueled texts between myself, the Dutch Monkey and McSqueak, we decided that it was time to take this whole Cogal thing up a notch. More specifically, we’re aiming for this to be the standard for which all others will be judged by.

    The date will be August 16th, 2013. We will roll out from Lower Lewis Falls Campground at 0730 on that day as V after VV will be too late a start. There’s a Cat II 14K in, you know, to warm up. Then we’ll get lulled by the speed of an endless decent some 65K long down to the Columbia River. Short trip up the river to White Salmon WA, then we get to go to “work”. A solid 30K of low angle climbing, except right at the end. Screaming fast decent, and of course, another Cat II. I thought it’d be nice to have a short bit of gravelling at the end. So this route is 210Km long with a solid 2700M of climbing. That’s 130 miles and 8800feet of climbing for us Americans that can’t visualize that distance in our head.
    This Cogal is not for the faint of heart, and you REALLY need to assess your ability to finish this during daylight hours. This is truly going to be Rule V/VV stuff. There will be no sag wagon, and while there are small towns to refuel at, the last 60K there’s nothing except the occasional car and no cell service. Run out of gas, and you’ll be sleeping in alone, in lycra, in Sasquatch Country and/or poison oak, with just carbon to keep you warm.
    Once we figure out the number of people giving this a go, we’ll co-ordinate getting cars/ camping supplies to the campsite at the end. The site is wonderful, but there’s no 5 star, marble showers to be had. A glacier fed river will wash away the day. There will be a keg of the PNW’s finest, and Mrs Scaler, Ms McSqueak, and any other tag-along’s that just want to camp, will have food waiting.
    The route is tough, the views second to none, and the suffering: glorious.

    portland super cogal

    Event Details

    Loading Map....

    Date/Time
    Date - August 16, 2013
    7:35 AM - 8:00 PM

    Location
    Lower Lewis Falls Campground

    Cogal Details
    Route Details


Velominati Super Prestige: Ronde van Vlaanderen Féminine 2013

Marianne Vos has never won this? She who wins everything all the time has never won this? Is it not hilly and tough enough? This seems like a tear in the time-space continuum. Someone is going to be wanting to add this to her palmarés. Weather sounds like a cold but dry day for racing. This is a big one, maybe worth two bumper stickers, so ponder...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. Vos 2. Sarah-Lena Hofmann 3. Lauren De Crescenzo 4. Emma Johansson 5. Marijn D Vries »

Velominati Super Prestige: Ronde van Vlaanderen 2013

Imagine a world without the little things we take for granted; a house without a roof, a pub with no beer, a Keepers Tour without any clothes. The last one is a reality for me at the moment, five days in and still no trace of where the hell between Wellington and Paris my bag (filled with V-Kit, shoes, helmet, everything) is. The other thing that h...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. Cancellara 2. sagan 3. Johan Vansummeren 4. Van Avermaet 5. Geraint Thomas »

Velominati Super Prestige: Milan-Sanremo 2013

Finally, we have Milan-Sanremo. I hope pedale.forcetta is ready to shoot some pictures, especially black and white because it will be cold and possibly wet. Throw in a little wind and a race of this distance will weed out the less hardy. Recently, but not too recently, this race would be won out of a decent size field sprint. And yet, besides Fabs...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. I don’t know why I’m not picking Sparticus, but I don’t think that tactically he does’t vave this race figured out.  He’ll pull a big group to the end and get shut out. VSP PICKS: 1. Cavendish 2. Sagan 3. Nibali 4. Edvald Boasson Hagen 5. Hushovd »

Velominati Super Prestige: Ronde Van Drenthe 2013

Ok, so you guys and gals don’t miss a trick, but sometimes we do. In fact, we kind of specialize in it. @Bianchi Denti just texted me to point out, as others have done on site, that we have almost missed the next stop on the VVomen’s VSP calendar, the Ronde Van Drenthe. On International Women’s Day, of all things.All I can tell yo...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. Vos 2. De vries 3. Van Dijk 4. Armistead 5. Cromwell »

The Bikes

The Bike. It is the central tool in pursuit of our craft. A Velominatus meticulously maintains their bicycles and adorns them with the essential, yet minimal, accoutrement. The Rules specify the principles of good taste in configuration and setup of our machines, but within those principles lies almost infinite room for personal taste.It seems in s...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. @G’rilla Don’t you think this would be more appropriate? http://portlandbrewpubs.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/20120303-203912.jpg  In particular when one considers the name of the brewpub that had this lovely thing built! »

Velominati Super Prestige: L’Eroica/Strade Bianche 2013

Until the 70′s it was common to race on gravel roads, but the Paving of the Planet has led to nearly every road being graced by smooth, black tarmac. As is the case with most things, once we are shown the easy path, it is difficult to return to more arduous ways. So it is with gravel roads; we take measures to avoid unpaved roads and in doi...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. Fabian Cancellara 2. Manuel Belletti 3. Peter Sagan 4. Sacha Modolo 5. Lars Boom »

Velominati Super Prestige: Omloop Het Nieuwsblad 2013

Outside my window, its pouring rain. My bike is leaning agains the wall in my office, covered in grim and grit from the ride in, which was characterized by equal parts cold, wind, and rain. The spot in the locker room where I changed before my shower was marked by sand and mud, and when I walked to the shower, I left a trail of dirty footprints.It...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. Let the racing begin! VSP PICKS: 1. Edvald Boasson Hagen 2. Lars Boom 3. Sep Vanmarcke 4. Heinrich Haussler 5. Nick Nuyens »

Velominati Super Prestige: Paris Tours 2012

The final race of the 2012 Velominati Super Prestige season is upon us. It’s not the most inspiring race, supposedly a race for the sprinters. The long straight final run in to the finish line begs for a mass sprint. It should be called Châteauneuf-en-Thymerais-Tours. The route is 235.5 km of small rollers through the French countryside. The...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. Posting all 5 picks.  VSP PICKS: 1. Boom 2. Koldo Fernandez 3. Degenkolb 4. Matthew Busche 5. Chavenel »

  2. VSP PICKS: 1. Boom »

Velominati Super Prestige: Giro di Lombardia 2012

Il Grillo gives it some stick in 06. Photo: actionplus sports images[/caption]Lombardia is a beautiful race. Taking in the majestic shoreline of Lake Como and climbing past the shrine to the Madonna del Ghisallo, its stunning Italian-ness bookends the Monuments along with Milan-San Remo which started them way back in March. And it’s a coming...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. Ryder and Chris make an early break stick.  It’s a pipe dream I know, but really it is my only prayer of moving up the standings this late in the season.   VSP PICKS: 1. Ryder Hesjedal 2. Chris Horner 3. Philip Gilbert 4. Alberto Contador 5. J Rodrigue… »

Velominati Super Prestige: Mens World Championship Road Race 2012

I’m quite upset about it, actually, all this racing that’s been going on in perfectly good weather. Vlaanderen, dry. Roubaix, dry. We were nearly guaranteed shit weather with the Olympics in London, but even then, only the women got to get all Rule #9 on our asses – and only for one race. Damnit, I want Epic, and if we keep insis...

@Lukas's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. Boonen 2. Sagan 3. Valverde 4. Gerrans 5. Hausler »

    2. Older Posts