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

Velominatus: simonsaunders

Order: Level 2 Velominatus

Location: Lancashire, UK

Social:

Doctor- Consultant Endocrinologist, special interest in Insulin Pump Use, Type1 Diabetes and diabetes and sport. Cyclist- Keen, getting better, need to follow #Rule5 more!

@simonsaunders's activity:

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. Just checked in, as been in an Internet free zone-Sweden! ( I’m typo tight to pay roaming charges) well, frig me, I won something! Yea »

  2. Give them a go, hope Wiggo can find some dry weather VSP PICKS: 1. Santambrogio 2. Betancur 3. Nibali 4. Evans 5. Wiggins »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. HMMM, think people will be picking up big points here VSP PICKS: 1. WIGGO 2. HESJEDAL 3. NIBALI 4. BETANCUR 5. SCARPONI »

La Vie Velominatus: Lean Properly

There are always at least two ways to accomplish any task: properly and improperly. Drinking beer from a glass, not the bottle; carrying a full umbrella instead of a miniature fold-up; stirring your gin martinis, not shaking them; wearing french cuffs with a suit, not button cuffs. The Velominatus, of course, is drawn towards doing things Properly,...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. @the Engine I hope you were wearing Assos F1.UnoS5 shorts then, as your chamois memory is brilliant. (memory foam?) Shoes are Bont A1 if you were wondering! »

  2. I would assume that my display of leaning- and incidental hanger of damp cycling kit-  would not be approved? in my defence it is a cramped NHS office and safer than anywhere else, no changing facilities either! Ah the joys of public service »

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 &#...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. No room for Gilbert- bit of a risk! Not that he can’t, its just poor support from BMC team i think VSP PICKS: 1. J-rod 2. Henao 3. Valverde 4. Nibali 5. Dan Martin »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. Ah who knows . I entirely blame the UCI. get these races on the TV so we can see the races and see the form VSP PICKS: 1. Vos 2. Johannson 3. Armstead 4. De Vries 5. Borghini »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. Random win generator picks these. I sense a further slide down the VSP VSP PICKS: 1. Porte 2. Valverde 3. Sagan 4. Gilbert 5. Dan Martin »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. Not sure about this one. VSP picks are getting so tight now, I’m conscious of needing to pull out a big win (like Gilbert) otherwise i’ll slide further into the also-rans. With everyone picking nearly the same riders it’s hard to gain points, my last tact… »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. Random guess generator came up with these…. VSP PICKS: 1. Faboo 2. Turgot 3. Thomas 4. Rolandts 5. Chavanel »

The Double

Winning one Monument in a career is more than most Pros will ever achieve. Winning two in a season, nearly impossible. Winning two a week apart, it has been done more than a few times, by only the toughest of men. The Ronde and Roubaix both have cobbles but that is about all they have in common. Roubaix might be the harder one to win. The evil Lady...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. @Dr C Agreed, if Stannard has any company he’ll be out sprinted. He rode so well in MSR that I think  given the right luck he could be well placed on the run into the velodrome. It’s have to be a Faboo, power TT effort to get there first though. Here’s… »

  2. Got to have a sneaky thought that one of teh Sky boys might come good this year. To be fair though, unless he’s been playing a particularly clever long game Eddy the Boss doesn’t seem to be where he was two years ago, so i’d have to back either Thomas or … »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. bloody t’internet – Rule #5 ! »

  2. Cobbles- a great deal of luck needed here, but hey, lets have a go »

  3. Cobbles- a great deal of luck needed here, but hey, lets have a go VSP PICKS: 1. cancellara 2. sagan 3. chavanel 4. thomas 5. voeckler »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. de vries 2. vos 3. armistead 4. johansson 5. becker »

Velominati Super Prestige: Gent-Wevelgem 2013

Gent (Deinze)-Wevelgem, it starts with 130 km of cruising around Belgium and Northern France followed by a flurry of bergs and then a final 38 km of  flatter riding to the inevitable sprint finish. How hard can the climbing be if Super Mario got over them? Ask the riders from KT 2012, (the ones not in the following car) and they will tell you...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. 32k to go and Sagan in group still away from the Peloton by 1.28 The gap is getting bigger too. So unless the peloton turn on the power soon, it could be all over bar the shouting »

Velominati Super Prestige: Trofeo Alfredo Binda 2013

This is the second round of the Women’s World Cup, the first being the Ronde van Drenthe. Laveno Mombello to Cittiglio, 120 km of racing in Italy. It is a very worthy course and we know who will be wearing the number 1 on her jersey. Enough already, I like Ms Vos as much as the next person but someone has to work her over on the climbs and ri...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. In for a penny, in for a now defunct Lira VSP PICKS: 1. Vos 2. Armistead 3. Van Dijk 4. Borghini 5. Guderzo »

Velominati Super Prestige: Gent-Wevelgem 2013

Gent (Deinze)-Wevelgem, it starts with 130 km of cruising around Belgium and Northern France followed by a flurry of bergs and then a final 38 km of  flatter riding to the inevitable sprint finish. How hard can the climbing be if Super Mario got over them? Ask the riders from KT 2012, (the ones not in the following car) and they will tell you...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. Had a rethink, luckily before the clock ran out! David Millar is a bit of a shot in the dark though VSP PICKS: 1. Fabian 2. Sagan 3. Big G Thomas 4. Flecha 5. David Millar »

  2. VSP PICKS: 1. Sagan 2. Geraint Thomas 3. david millar 4. Flecha 5. Big Phil »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. And I really wanted to include Geraint Thomas, who I think will be the leading Sky rider, he may just sneak top 5 »

  2. Too many good riders, too many options; I think Andy Schleck has made a mistake missing this one ;-) an early solo attempt could have won it! in lieu of him, 5 wild guesses VSP PICKS: 1. Faboo 2. Thor 3. Nibali 4. Sagan 5. Goss »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. Total guesswork! VSP PICKS: 1. Vos 2. Johansson 3. Armistead 4. De Vries 5. Rowney »

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...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. Faboo 2. Flecha 3. peter Sagan 4. boom 5. robbie hunter »

Velominati Super Prestige: Omloop Het Nieuwsblad Women 2013

Finally, some cold nasty Belgian one day racing. Oman, Qatar, does anyone brag about winning those stage races? Yes, they might but really, it’s a tune up for the real season which finally begins this Saturday. Will racing in China or Oman grow the sport? Will there be a new wave of inspired young racers from these countries. Does professiona...

@simonsaunders's posts:

  1. VSP PICKS: 1. Elizabeth Armitstead 2. Charlotte Becker 3. Elisa Longo Borghini 4. Eleonora Van Dijk 5. Lucy Garner »

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