cyclingfiend

If you are looking for someone to repair your carbon frame, resprays, etc., and maybe wheels if not too badly wrecked, give James a call at 082 373 0404. I've seen his work and it really is exceptional!

An interesting character, Froome. Was several years with Barloworld before their demise and never really featured very much with them. Could be that he was not given much freedom, BW then being effectively run by Italians. Only since being with Sky has he come to the fore, and then only since last year. Is it better training or more of a different mindset with Froomy?

Very much in the background of the TdeF frenzy, SA team Tasol GT have arrived in the USA, Chicago area, to participate in a 17 day criterium series. Each day is +/- 100km crits, mostly of about 1 mile laps. Going to be really tough! Just read that Richard Baxter won the first of the series. Despite a busy looking website and Twitter page, there doesn't seem to be any live action reporting and results are sparse so far, which is a pity!

I am a fairly avid follower of cycling and like to see how various individuals performed, my buddies etc., but also amongst the pro guys - who's coming up in the world and who's not, but it is becoming more and more difficult - impossible even - to get results. Sure one can read who were the first 3 on Twitter or whatever but for the other 9999 nothing doing. Typically the men's races in the tour of Bloem and more recently the Kremetart. I can go to cyclingnews.com and get results of races from all over the world, usually within hours of the race finishing, but in SA it seems almost like classified information. There's a glut of local cycling related websites - can't one of these take on the task of acquiring race results and posting them much like the Aussie site? Racetec and Championchip only post results that they time and there are many events they are not involved with (e.g. the 2 mentioned above). Or perhaps someone can tell me that these results are available, I'm just not looking in the right places?

Some time soon a cyclist is going to get killed or seriously injured whilst riding on the road when there is a cycling lane available and all hell is going to be let loose from the press and anti cycling factions. By not using the cycle lanes, you are doing a great dis-service to the cycling fraternity as a whole. Shake off that arrogance that you are too great to ride along with joggers and slow riders!

Following the proceedings from the Cape, I was most impressed by the coverage on Twitter by CycleNation - almost as good as being there (except when they ran out of tweets during the elite mens points event!). Well done to Intellibus and one must also takes ones hat of to Tasol who pretty well dominated the "indurance" events. The madison showed some brute power with Hoffman and Perry taking 3 laps on the rest of the field. A good event all round but don't think there was any media coverage?

And here's a nice pic: Scratch race podium (l-r): Nolan Hoffman (South Africa), Ben Swift (Great Britain) and Wim Stroetinga (Netherlands) http://cdn2.media.cyclingnews.futurecdn.net//2012/04/04/2/bettiniphoto_0105667_1_full_600.jpg

Fantastic result - big boost for Tasol GT. Does this qualify him for the Olympics or is it all a bit late? Swift prevails in men's scratch race Hoffmann dives for silver, Stroetinga takes the bronze An ecstatic Ben Swift (Great Britain) celebrates his world championship in the scratch race.http://cdn3.media.cyclingnews.futurecdn.net//2012/04/04/2/bettiniphoto_0105669_1_full_220.jpg view thumbnail gallery Photos http://cdn2.media.cyclingnews.futurecdn.net//2012/04/04/2/bettiniphoto_0105667_1_full_120.jpg Scratch race podium (l-r): Nolan Hoffman (South Africa), Ben … http://cdn4.media.cyclingnews.futurecdn.net//2012/04/04/2/bettiniphoto_0105673_1_full_120.jpg Ben Swift (Great Britain) won the scratch race world championship … http://cdn2.media.cyclingnews.futurecdn.net//2012/04/04/2/bettiniphoto_0105681_1_full_120.jpg Ben Swift (Great Britain) is the new scratch race world champion. … Page 1 of 1 Ben Swift won Great Britain's second gold of the opening night of competition, his first ever world title in a gutsy victory in the men's scratch race. Swift held off a late surge by South Africa's Nolan Hoffman to win the men's 15-kilometer scratch race. Wim Stroetinga of the Netherlands finished third. Swift chased down Austria Andreas Mueller and Italy's Elia Viviano who had surged ahead of the field with seven laps remaining. With one lap to go, and with his escape companions tiring, Swift surged ahead with a margin just enough to hold off the remnants of the field. "I knew somebody was going to attack in the finish, and just tried to play it cool and make other people chase. It's definitely the hardest I've ever had to work for a track cycling race," Swift said. Hoffman explained that his result was somewhat of a breakthrough. "I've been to all the world cups and I've struggled a bit and I always thought the world champs is going to be hard," Hoffman said.

Got apuncture coming down from Suikerbos - front - nearly came off! After fixing, got on my way then realised I had left my Oaklys by the side of the road. Had to walk back about 500m in very narrow grass verge because of thousands of descending bikes!! Episode cost me almost 30 minutes

AuctionLamb, on 11 March 2012 - 08:24 , said: I think our crash in Elite bunch on Hospital bend was almost as bad as the Ladieszzzz bunch...it was a real tense ride The elite group was way larger than allowed by the UCI for a race of this nature. Don't expect UCI rules apply to the Argus now the Giro has gone but they are made for a good reason.......

Well said. Since the demise of the SACF i.e. When pro cyclists and fun cyclists were totally separate entities, the participation of SA cyclists at world level was regular and quite consistant for all categories. Since amalgamation this has decreased significantly. CSA has too much on its plate, and insuffient expertise, to handle all cycling issues. Obviously money is the big issue and there isn't enough to go round, especially for expensive International events. So CSA has taken the "soft" route - focus on the local money making activities and run down the costly Interrnational stuff. (with results such as no SA men at the Olympics road race and ITT). "Fun" cycling and pro cycling must be controlled separately, with separate funding, etc., etc. Priorites need to be sorted as well. What is most important - to send a bunch of juniors overseas "for experience" or to send an elite team to the world champs? Highly argueable! Needs the right people in the right paces - perhaps the re-structure will accomplish this?

Being now retired and living on a pension, I have to be carefull where my money goes and although living reasonably comfortably, like Grebel, I am more selective about events I enter and do most of my riding on my own or with local groups. I would love to do all the ppa events but they have inflated beyond my means! Probably make this Argus my last as it seems to be becoming more of a business than a cycle ride.

I think it's a stupid event. Apart from cost, half the funride entry end up walking parts of Vissers and all of Odendaal - whats the point of that. Why do we have to tolerate these "special" events? PPA go to the trouble of allocating seedings and setting up a yearly financial plan and then we get organisations who seem to want to do their own thing at the cyclist's expense rather than seek additional sponsors. I did the new 99'er once, it wasn't much fun and to now have to pay more for such an event is folly, strictly for the pro's who have good sponsors!

Road race: 1st James Perry, 2nd Arran Brown, 3rd Nolan Hoffman. Good result for Tasol GT!