York has to be the most fascinating city in the United Kingdom. It has something to do with there having been a city here for around two thousand years. Every corner brings another building that has been around for at least five
hundred years. Some like the Abbey of St. Mary’s are in ruins ( thanks to Henry VIII). Others are remarkably well preserved.
The city walls date from medieval times and are still largely complete.
The best preserved building is York Minister. It took around two hundred and fifty years to build and was dedicated in 1472. It is the sixth cathedral to stand on the site.
The streets around the Minister are narrow and distinctly medieval in character.
After dark something almost magical happens as the town takes on a whole new dimension.
I have just read this article on sleep on the BBC website. The article suggests that our current habit of going to sleep for a solid eight hours (give or take an hour) is not natural and that our ancestors in pre-industrial times tended to sleep in two four-hour spells, first sleep, second sleep with a one or two-hour spell awake in between.
When we visited the Musée de la Grande Chatreuse last year, I found that this was the pattern that the Carthusian monks (whose lifestyle hasn’t changed much since the c10th) followed. They wake up during the night to say the office of Matins. Of course unless you are a Carthusian monk you don’t have to pray:
A doctor’s manual from 16th Century France even advised couples that the best time to conceive was not at the end of a long day’s labour but “after the first sleep”, when “they have more enjoyment” and “do it better”.
What I do know, is that when I was at sea working on traditional watches, four hours on eight hours off and sleeping twice per day usually about four hours at a time, I normally felt better rested than I do now sleeping in a solid eight-hour block.
If you type “jonathan tiernan locke doping” into Google my blog comes out near the top of the first page. This is because on my Home Page there are two posts that mention Jonathan Tiernan-Locke and one that discusses Jan Ulrich’s recent two-year ban. The Ulrich post talks about doping.
I just want to make it clear that I do not suspect Jonathan Tiernan-Locke of doping.
Last weekend Jonathan Tiernan-Locke, won two stages and the overall at Tour Méditerranéen. There was a suspicion that he was slightly lucky and that the shortened stages (due to snow) had somehow helped him. This weekend was the Tour du Haut Var a two-day stage race held in the hills above Cannes and St-Tropez. The stage lengths are around the 200km mark and some of the bigger boys came out to play as well.
A breakaway dominated Stage 1 from Draguignan – La Croix Valmer (189.2 km). Two of them held on to the finish. Jonathan Tiernan-Locke (JT-L from now on to save typing) jumped clear of the peleton on the finishing climb to finish in third place, six seconds behind, and set himself up for today.
Stage 2 from Fréjus – Fayence (205.4 km) was a bit of a brute. Five cols and a viciously steep final kilometre.
The early part of the race had the inevitable breakaway, but JT-L’s team Endura Racing and the Bretagne-Schuller (who had the race lead) with a bit of help from Garmin-Barracuda and BMC rode tempo until it all came back together at the penultimate climb. JT-L started to attack at this point, not full throttle as it was too far out, but hard enough to thin the peleton out and get a feel for who had the legs. This caused a break to form of about ten riders and that is the point at which the video starts.
Three things stood out on the video, when an attack went from the break he didn’t panic, he just settled in, recovered and made sure that he was ready for the final climb, the second thing was just how fast he comes up the hill, The third was that he was going so quickly he almost overcooked an uphill hairpin bend.
The Haut Var website has a video of most of Stage 2 and a full review of Stage 1. Commentary is (obviously) in French. If you have a couple of hours to waste, watch it. Near the beginning of the video the presenter interviewed the great French cyclist Raymond Poulidor. Even though my French is not that great, I understood enough to know that he thinks that JT-L is the real thing. Stephen Roche is also convinced. See this from his Twitter feed.
I know that Philippe Gilbert is probably saving his uphill sprinting for the Fléche Wallon and Liege-Bastionge-Leige, and similarly with some of the other big names in the field, but it is still a very impressive start to the season. It should also get Endura invites to some bigger races. I for one would like to see what they can do in some of the hillier classics.
Robert Marchand has just broken the World (age-group) Record for the distance cycled in one hour.
The full story can be read here. Yesterday (Feb 17th) he rode 24.251km in the hour on the track at Aigle in Switzerland. He celebrated his 100th birthday on Nov 26 last year.
After completing the ride he said:
“For the last five years I have decided not to go for rides of more than 100km,” he went on, adding with supreme understatement, “There is no point going overboard. I want to keep cycling for some time yet.”
On second thoughts maybe I won’t try breaking the record. I’m not all that sure I could beat it now and am half his age.
The final act of the tragedy that became the farce known as “Jan and Operacion Puerto” , concluded a few days ago. The drama began with Jan Ulrich being thrown off the 2006 Tour de France. It ended with the Court of Arbitration in Sport (CAS) giving him a meaningless (he retired in 2007) two-year ban running from August 2011. It also annulled all his results from May 2005 until his retirement. Cancelling his third place in the 2005 tour means that Francesco Mancebo is the rider who moves up a place. Richard Moore has a bit to say about this:
Whatever: it seems a bit rich of the UCI, cycling’s governing body, to have pursued Ullrich with such vengeance when they presided over — and, through their initial inaction, must take some responsibility for — an era so blighted by EPO. Why go after Ullrich and ignore others?
It is a farce that is confirmed by a study of the updated results of the 2005 Tour. With Ullrich’s third-place finish now airbrushed from history, Francisco Mancebo steps up to the podium. That’s the same Mancebo who, like Ullrich, was forced out of the 2006 Tour when his name was linked to Operacion Puerto. In fact, of the revised top ten, eight riders have either tested positive, served a ban or been under investigation for doping.
This leads to one conclusion. The problem was not Jan Ullrich.
It is not clear how far Ullrich’s confessions as to the use of performance enhancing substances went but he has admitted to being involved with Dr Eufemiano Fuentes who ran the Madrid clinic associated with the Operacion Puerto blood doping investigation. He has described his actions as “being a mistake”. Every athlete caught doping describes their actions as being a “mistake”, usually they mean the mistake was in being caught, but he went on to apologise:
“I would like to sincerely apologise for this behaviour – I’m very sorry.”
“In retrospect I would act differently in some situations during my career.”
I have no idea if Jan Ullrich doped throughout his career. His introduction to cycling was through the old East German sports system, so it is quite possible. Having said that, he was not the only cyclist of that era to use performance enhancers. Jonathan Vaughters, now Garmin-Barracuda’s general manager, raced during the same period as Ullrich. He responded to the news with a series of tweets:
Ullrich was a classy rider and probably should have won more than he did, but he ran into Lance Armstrong, who might have been the better rider. Armstrong was certainly much more focused. If Armstrong had worn Adidas kit, as Ulrich did for much of his career, there would never have been any jokes about how far apart the stripes were in the early season races. Armstrong also probably had better support than Ullrich.
His only Tour de France Victory came in 1997, and it is from that tour that I take my abiding memory of Jan Ullrich the rider. His first day in the Yellow Jersey came on Stage 10 from Luchon to Andorra Arcalis. Bjarne Riis, the previous year’s winner, was the leader of the Telekom team, but was not going particularly well. Ullrich dropped back to the team car to ask if he could attack, permission was given, so he did, dropping every one, including climbers Richard Virenque and Marco Pantani. At one point (about 15:30) on the video you will see him looking around to admire the scenery, like a tourist out on a day ride. (He was probably looking across a bend to see how much distance he had put into Virenque and Pantani). That is my memory of him as a rider, just how easy he made it look that day.
I think I am correct in saying that the first eight riders to finish this stage have either been convicted of or admitted to doping. As Richard Moore said the problem was not Jan Ullrich.
Update 30/10/2012
As everyone now knows Armstrong was definitely ‘better prepared’ than Ulrich.
I’m on my way to Brighton, traveling through the snow covered Sussex countryside. The sun is just about above the horizon and is giving everything a pinky orange glow. The stations and small towns are flashing by too quickly. I don’t want this trip to end.
We’re in Brighton now. Still that is the idea of the trip.
The new cycling season is barely a week old and British cyclists have so far recorded five wins, and only two of them from Mark Cavendish. Let’s list them:
We have come to expect Mark Cavendish to win most of the sprints that he contests,as he tweeted @MarkCavendish:
Well, that’s 2 wins from 2 contested sprints with @TeamSky. The lads were incredible at keeping me at the front of a hectic peloton. Thanks
Andy Fenn has just moved up to the ProTour level, joining Omega-Pharma Quickstep in the close season, and the Challenge Majorca races were I think his first ever races at this level, so it is a pretty good way to start. Jonathan Tiernan-Locke is still riding for a Pro-Continetal squad (Endura Racing), but he showed what he could do at last year’s Tour of Britain, when he won the King of the Mountains competition. His win came from a bold attack about two kilometres from the finish and managed to hold off the sprinters to hang on (just) for the win. In addition Adam Blythe (BMC) has been going well at the Tour of Qatar, picking up minor places.
So far it is looking good.
Update 12/02/2012 @ 17:30
Looking even better.
Jonathan Tiernan-Locke has won the final stage and the overall at the Tour Méditerranéen.
Below is a video of his 1st stage victory.
Video of J T-L’s stage four victory. The stage had to be shortened because Mont Faron was closed due to snow. I don’t know if that helped him or not, but you can only win the race that you are competing in.
I know that the Tour Méditerranéen isn’t the biggest race in the world, but it is a significant step up from the Premier Calendar. This could be the beginning of something big. Don’t forget his team Endura Racing are British and have won more stage races this year than Sky.
Because I am currently experiencing computer, or to be more exact monitor problems, blog production has almost ground to a halt. It is possible, as this post proves to produce something on my phone, but it is heavy going.
I may temporarily switch to twitter. @johnm_55 is my user name.
140 characters or less is easier to handle on a touch screen.!!
A Scotsman in Suburbia 