Thursday, July 9, 2009

2er de Frog

OK .... I know,I know that Bob Roll has educated us all the past few years that the real pronunciation is The Tour DAY France.... but I sorta like the whole frog thing...being as it is the French and all.

Or as I understand it this year it's returned as the Tour de Lance once again.

Damn you moron Americans (Oh ya that includes me) the Tour de France is much more than just a venue for America's favorite Texan (but only because Stevie Ray died) to shine and show the world that Americans are always ready to kick ass on the rest of the planet wanna-be's.

My problem stems from the American Press' tendency to all but ignore the rest of the tours teams and riders.....even other American riders!

I mean...I get it..Lance is the man...he's cool...he's newsworthy....his cause is trendy and legitimately relevant plus he's the second greatest American rider of all time...but come on....It's the Tour de France......something I consider the greatest single race on the planet. A great spectacle in it's own right.

And 'I Know' Lance is synonymous with the tour and has been for most of this decade...damn it..I get it..please....quite slashing my bike tires.........


But there are other very interesting riders leaving their hearts on the road this year in THE tour as well. Just like there is every year. A lot of people that I'm acquainted with.... that have only a passing interest in the event know that I follow it passionately....and will take the opportunity to catch up on what's happening whenever they encounter me......I just wish that once someone...one of them...would ask me something more than "How did Lance do today" or "Is Lance in the yellow Jersey yet?"


But of course I blame the American media and the short attention span of the American public....a short attention span that the press created. It isn't Lance's fault.

Perhaps I should just be happy that cycling is getting any attention at all?

Why am I whining about it?

Because it is a great sport.... unique...complicated....full of interesting history and something everyone of us can do on our own level. Ride that is...which is hopefully what will eventually occur more often all over America once Lance has retired for good in a year or two. Lance himself is promoting that message as well.


So ya...I guess I'll just get out there and do 20 miles or so and pretend that I'm Jens Voigt, Levi Leipheimer, Edde Merckx, Fabian Cancellara or Fausto Coppi. Because you can take the kid off the bike but you'll never get the joker out of his spokes, or the visions of the tour out of his head.

And don't even get me started on where the hell Chris Horner is!

4 comments:

Greig McGill said...

Don't worry Mike, here in NZ the coverage is far more neutral, so we don't see the bias. We have the same problem here though in other sports. Probably because we're so small. Any time a Kiwi does well in something, you never hear the end of it. Then, as soon as they get back home, unless the sport is Rugby or occasionally cricket, their sport carries on getting zero funding and zero publicity.

I'm sure other countries are just as bad, so fear not, we don't see big bad Americans from the outside. :)

soberment said...

Hey Greig...thanks for responding...I wondered if anyone in the world still actually read this thing. I'll soon be off to work where the first question I'll hear is "How did Lance do over the weekend" and I will try to remain calm and civil.

Baublehead said...

We're barely through the first week of the Tour de France, but I can already say that this year's edition will go down in history as signifying the dawn of a new era in professional cycling. Yes, much as Greg LeMond says that the advent of EPO changed the speed of the peloton, the potent media pot belge of 27 hours a day of Versus coverage, Lance Armstrong's comeback, and Twitter now means that no aspect of the Tour de France goes unseen and that we have now officially entered the age of nano-coverage.

Too bad 94.3% of the coverage is about Lance.

That one guy said...

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