Great masochist ride together with Alex collecting 155 km and riding on some of the toughest Dolomites climbs.

Ride details:

Alex Newport Berra reacted faster as Ferrero after my last post about Nutella jar problem.

Finally I got this limited edition jar with the right number of breakfasts on it. So that I know when it's time to stock.

PS: Thanks Alex, I promised to myself that the other jar was the last Nutella jar for at least until next spring ... now I've to rearrange all my training!!!

This is fantastic:

Qualche impressioni del passaggio degli atleti del Giro d'Italia sul Passo Giau.
Le foto sono state scattate con un iPhone quindi la qualitá é quella che é anche se alcune sono proprio azzeccate.

Some impressions from the Passo Giau and the pro-cyclists of the Giro d'Italia 2011.
Pics taken with an iPhone so the quality isn't at it's best. But some pictures are still interesting

Approposito, per la prima volta nella mia vista ho pure fatto il percorso completo della Maratona dles Dolomites. Sará che sto diventando vecchio ed un po' matto?

By the way, for the first time in my life I rode the full course of the Maratona dles Dolomites. In 25 years I never had the idea to ride it ... is it that I'm getting old and nuts?

Let's face it we cyclists can be considered the same way like fishers, hunters ...

we are all big liars!

We learn it already during races. Instead of fighting until the end it's easier to slow the pace and think about an excuse to tell your directeur sportive, trainer, mates, family why the race didn't went as you wanted.

This 'shortcut' resides in most athletes. The problem gets worser when you keep using this tactic. Doing so you throw yourself in a kind of 'Cul de Sac'. You get so used to excuses that you are believing this are real. You believe you are not trained well and you don't keep the pace, you believe you didn't sleep good and you will start to sleep that way before every race. And the mountain of excuses keeps growing!

At a certain point you start to loose your self-confidence and when this happens you are becoming the puppet controlled by unscrupulous people.

That's the way why cyclists (or athletes in other sports) are starting to accept doping like a normal procedure. Or like Floyd Landis admitted in the interview with Kimmage:

This was what I wrestled with the most; once I accepted that other people were doing it and I could justify in my mind that I wasn’t really cheating anyone else, I still didn’t know if doing that and getting to the Tour de France was ever going to leave me with the feeling that I had accomplished my goal. I couldn’t quite know that until I just did it.

In that parallel world you see it like a normal thing. But if a person has still a good dose of self-confidence then you don't need to follow the herd or deal with people controlling you from the upper floors.

After reading the above interview, I remembered I kept a caricature published in 1998 on the February issue of Velonews. After 11 years, I think this is more actual than ever:

If you didn't loose YOUR self-confidence, then go out and ride your bike because YOU like it. You will see, suddenly the herd will follow you!!!

This is an interesting video and I just can agree with much that was said there.

The only problem when you are cycling on public roads are the car drivers. Twice was I thrown on the road by a car that didn't respect the stop sign and twice was my bike helmet apart. So until I cycle for training 60+ km a day it's better I still wear it.

But talking about helmets I don't agree with the rule that kids skiing need to wear them mandatory.

Here I'm back from a beautiful day at the Plan de Corones/Kronplatz from today Uphill Time Trial stage of the Giro d'Italia

There is not much to talk about, I let the pictures speak but first I want to start with the serious stuff that we are not used to see that much on the Dolomites. Especially, after the long winter like the last one, it was difficult to see so much skin all of a sudden:

5 days before the Giro d'Italia reaches the Dolomites mountains it was time for me and Oskar Irsara to cycle up the road of the 16th stage of the Giro d'Italia 2010. The Time Trial from San Vigilio di Marebbe to Plan de Corones.

Yes we know, we can ride this road whenever we want because we live in this beautiful surroundings, but just in this period of time you find the graveled road starting from Passo Furcia to the top of the climb at the Plan de Corones/Kronplatz in perfect conditions.

And this is one of those climbs that you ride maybe once or maximum two times a year ... just to see if it is still so hard cycling it up. And as every year, I'm still trying to catch the man that under the roads elevates the gradients... 

Here some pictures we posted during our live tweeting today:

First some details of the climb of the stage. Nice right?

Click here to download:

alt_16.pdf (281 KB)

Let's talk about gears, we are mountain mans boys, young, viril, full of power, so I rode it up with a simple 39x25 and Oskar with a 34x23 gear.
Honestly we don't have time to change wheels and gears, we have to train after the challenge launched by our friend Andrea on the last Holimites Newsletter.

But Oskar after 2 km was still feeling strong, at Nencini's switchback he was still in a classical Valentino (The Doctor) Rossi position trying to not loose to much speed for the next turn

If you are visiting the Dolomites for the Giro d'Italia and need some informations about places to stay, tips where to watch the stage and so on just drop us a line in the comment section. We hope to see you on the Plan de Corones on May 25th.

This year only me and Oskar took the risk to cycle from home (Dolomites) to the Garda Lake. Here some pictures of our ride

Snow covered landscape in the Dolomites while climbing Passo Gardena

Short before the town of Bolzano, for the first time of the year we don't need anymore leg warmers.
Disclaimer: no animal/pet was hilled or even hurted for the preparation of this great fur