Win a Dream Cycling Vacation in Italy

Deadline is tomorrow, Wednesday, midnight Mountain Daylight Time. Contest requires donating to LiveStrong Challenge. Details:

"Dorothy Gibson takes the fight against cancer very personally. She should. She lost her mother and her father to it. Her two brothers are both survivors.

She also loves riding her bike.

And so, after coming home from a once-in-a-lifetime self-guided cycling tour through the heart of Tuscany, Italy, with her friends, Dorothy didn’t just put the memories away. She looked for a way to share the experience, while helping Team Fatty with our LiveStrong Challenge.

And that, combined with the generosity of several Fat Cyclist readers who have volunteered their frequent flier miles, is how we have arrived at this contest.

Win the Terre di Sienna Self-Guided Bike Tour With Cicloposse

I’ll get to Dorothy’s story of her tour in a moment, but first, here are the details of how to enter:

1. Go to Dorothy’s LiveStrong Challenge page and donate any multiple of $5.00. You’ll automatically be assigned a random number for every $5 you donate.

2. Deadline for donations is Wednesday, July 8, at Midnight Mountain Daylight Time.

3. Cross your fingers and hope you win, because this looks pretty darned incredible.

If you win, you get the Cicloposse Terre di Sienna Self-Guided Bike Tour for two, plus roundtrip airfare for two to Italy. Of course, you’re going to need to bring some money for handling buying stuff along the way.

Cicloposse supplies the bikes, pedals, and helmets, as well as pumps, spare tube, patch kits. You could also ship or take your own bike if you prefer. Dorothy and her crew went with a compromise route of bringing their own pedals, saddles, and helmets. Which seems like a good call.

Now, you may wonder, what does “self-guided” mean? Here’s how Dorothy describes it, at least in context of this trip. Self-Guided means you:
-have your luggage in the lobby at the appointed time for transport to the next location
enjoy a leisurely breakfast at the hotel
-carry your raingear, money, passports, snacks, tubes, tools, etc, to take care of yourself on the way (no sag wagon)–just like your regular road rides
-follow the detailed map and route descriptions, odometer, and road signs (good map reading skills a plus, but Cicloposse makes this very easy)
-ride as fast, or slow, as you’d like
-stop when you’d like, eat when and where you’d (they have fabulous suggestions)
-call the hot line number if in need of emergency support
-arrive at your next hotel with your bags already there

I don’t know about you, but this sounds pretty much perfect to me. And from the way Dorothy describes them, Marco and Guilianna Mulas — the owners of Cicloposse — take great care of you and are excited to help out with the fight against cancer, too."

Photos: Dorothy's trip

Source: http://www.fatcyclist.com/2009/07/06/win-a-dream-cycling-vacation-in-italy/

Stories, including cycling trip stories, for the Italian Cycling Journal welcome; contact veronaman@gmail.com

GiroDonne, Stage 4

The stage today was four circuits of a 27.3 Km course in the small seaside town of Porto Sant'Elpidio in the Le Marche region. The stage finished, as expected, in a sprint which was won by Ina Yoko Teutenberg. Next were Kristen Wild and Italian champion Monia Baccaile. Teutenberg covered the 109 in 2h 47' 11", an average speed of 39,191 Km/h. There were no changes in the jersey classications or top GC positions. Emma Mackie, our contributor, missed finishing in the top 10 by one spot.

Tomorrow promises to be a very hard stage with one climb plus a final climb of 1 Km over cobbles at a 16% grade in Cerro Al Volturno.

Stage 4 top 10 results:

1 Ina Yoko Teutenberg (Ger) Team Columbia HTC Women 2:47:11
2 Kirsten Wild (Ned) Cervelo TestTeam
3 Monia Baccaille (Ita) S.C. Michela Fanini Record Rox
4 Giorgia Bronzini (Ita) Safi - Pasta Zara Titanedi
5 Brooke Miller (USA) US National Team
6 Rochelle Gilmore (Aus) Lotto-Belisol Ladiesteam
7 Alessandra D' Ettorre (Ita) Top Girls Fassa Bortolo Raxy Line
8 Suzanne De Goede (Ned) Equipe Nürnberger Versicherung

9 Shelley Olds (USA) US National Team
10 Martina Corazza (Ita) Gauss RDZ Ormu - Colnago

11 Emma Mackie (Aus) Lotto-Belisol Ladiesteam

Top 10 GC:

1 Emma Pooley (GBr) Cervelo TestTeam 8:53:33
2 Mara Abbott (USA) Team Columbia HTC Women 0:01:07
3 Claudia Hausler (Ger) Cervelo TestTeam 0:01:11
4 Judith Arndt (Ger) Team Columbia HTC Women 0:01:27
5 Amber Neben (USA) Equipe Nürnberger Versicherung 0:01:33
6 Svetlana Bubnenkova (Rus) Fenixs Edilsavino 0:01:38
7 Edita Pucinskaite (Ltu) Gauss RDZ Ormu - Colnago 0:02:15
8 Carla Ryan (Aus) Cervelo Test Team 0:03:04

9 Nicole Brandli (Swi) Bigla Cycling Team 0:03:27
10 Fabiana Luperini (Ita) Selle Italia Ghezzi 0:04:12

Jersey classification:

Pink: Emma Pooley (Cervelo Test Team)
Cyclamen: Emma Pooley (Cervelo Test Team)
Green: Mara Abbott (Team Columbia HTC)
White: Elizabeth Armitstead (Lotto Betisol Ladies Team)

Stories, including cycling trip stories, for the Italian Cycling Journal welcome; contact veronaman@gmail.com

Pinarello DOGMA: Goodbye Magnesium, Hello Carbon

Fausto Pinarello was spotted riding a carbon Dogma at the Granfondo Sportful on June 21st. The decaling indicates it is made with Torayca 60HM carbon which is lighter then the 50HM carbon used in the Prince model. The current Dogma, using magnesium, was introduced in 2000.

No official announcements from Pinarello yet but expect to see the new carbon Dogma at the top of the road bike offerings for the 2010 models.

ed. note November 5, 2009: an online comment about the Pinarello Dogma made November, 2009:

"Pinarello is making me laugh.

They are claiming that their Dogma frame weighs 950 grams. Ah sorry... but have you guys weighed one? Their advertised frame weights are with NO paint and NO Bottom Shell, derailleur hanger, bottle bosses, seat clamp, and other little stuff. Well-- you kind of need those when you make a frame don't you?

The 55cm frame I weighed was over 1200g in the real world we know on planet Earth.

Here's a novel idea:
Why not finish building the frame THEN weigh it?"

Stories, including cycling trip stories, for the Italian Cycling Journal welcome; contact veronaman@gmail.com

Emma Mackie Races in the Women's Giro d'Italia, Part IV

Emma Mackie's (Lotto-Belisol) third report in her own words:


Stage 2, Day 3


We have arrived in our new hotel for tonight after a long 4 hour drive! Again there is no Internet access which I am finding difficult. My stay in Italy so far has been going good, although I am feeling the heat as are the rest of the girls! I have still been drinking plenty of coffee every chance I get, I just love the coffee in Italy. So the prologue and one stage have past and I have heard that these are meant to be some of the hardest stages! (I doubt that).After my doping control on the 1st stage I thought that would be it but to my delight and my teammates we woke up yesterday to doping control in the hotel!! The doctor wasn’t very good with his needle and I was left with a dead arm for the rest of the day...ouch.


The stage yesterday was the Individual time trial. It was 15kms long. We drove the course when we arrived and we were all shocked at how hard the finish was. With 1km to go coming off a descent you took a sharp right hand turn and almost immediately went straight up to the finish. I think I could have run faster up it!


My goal for the day was to just finish in a reasonable time but not to blow myself as I’m not much of a time trialer and the GC is not a goal for me. We have one girl on the team, Lizzy (ed. note: Elizabeth Armitstead) who is riding for the young jersey classification. She did a great ride and ended up taking the white young jersey!!


Stage 3, Day 4


The heat again really knocked me around and I felt empty later that night and pretty tired when I woke up today. We had to pack all of our things when we left this morning as we would change hotels for tonight and for the rest of the tour. Today’s stage was one of the hardest on paper and as it turned out on the bike as well! It started off with rain which wasn’t nice and ended in heat again. We had two main climbs. A cat 1 climb and cat 2 climb. We finished again on the top of the last climb which was 10kms long and steep. I think the guys went over the same climb in the Giro d ‘Italia. We had a fast speed going into the first climb and straight away it split into groups. I just tried to get myself into a nice group to get myself to the finish. Lizzy again had a great ride and managed to keep the young rider's white jersey.

I’m always amazed at how much pain you can put your body through in tours and how fast it goes away when you cross the line and finish. So we still have a long way to go so I hope to have some exciting news to come....

Ciao


Emma

Stories, including cycling trip stories, for the Italian Cycling Journal welcome; contact veronaman@gmail.com

GiroDonne, Stage 3

A tough mountain stage today saw Mara Abbott (Team Columbia-HTC) outsprint Emma Pooley at the end of the 106.4 Km stage for the stage victory. Emma Pooley's finish enabled her to take the pink jersey.

The stage began in Calcinaia a Prato and finished with a double ascent of the gruelling Monte Serra climb with a mountaintop finish. Monte Serra, at 917 m. in elevation, is the largest mountain in the Monti Pisani mountain chain.

The 23-year-old American was delighted about the victory. "It's really exciting. There are so many good riders on this team that even though I felt strong, it was difficult to imagine that I could actually be strong enough to go for the win," Abbott said afterwards.

Abbott initially broke away with Pooley on the first ascent of the 10-kilometre Monte Serra, but came off her bike on the downhill section of the climb. "The descent was very tricky because it had rained and I crashed, although fortunately I wasn't injured. Linda [Villumsen, Columbia-HTC teammate] guided me back up to the front group before we reached the Montesierra again.

"Almost as soon as we did, I got away again with Pooley. Then when [Pooley's teammate Claudia] Hausler got across, I attacked and managed to drop her, which left me and Pooley as stage leaders. Pooley did most of the work, but I couldn't collaborate because I wanted to defend [teammate] Judith Arndt's position on GC. Finally at the summit, I attacked about 800 metres from the top and went for the win."

Now second overall, Abbott was cautiously optimistic about Columbia-HTC's chances of winning, either with her or another rider. "There are some very tough stages coming up, but Judith [Arndt] is still high up on the overall so we've got a lot of options, not just me. But in any case, I'm very pleased about things have worked out today. It was cool!"

“It was a hard race,” said Cervelo test team Sports Director Manel Lacambra. “We controlled the race for the first 60 km, and then Pooley attacked on the climb and broke away with a few others. In the decent it was slippery as it was raining. From our team Claudia, Kristin and Emma (Pooley) were all involved in crashes and missed the lead. Claudia and Emma were able to make it back to the lead but unfortunately Armstrong was too far back. On the final climb Pooley attacked again and got away with Hausler and Mara Abbot. It was a hectic final. The finish sprint was won by Mara Abbot ahead of Emma and Claudia. With her second place finish, Emma took also the lead in the overall ranking. Luckily all girls are fine after the crashes and we can look forward to the next stages. I am very happy about the team performances today.”

Emma Mackie's Lotto Belisol teammate, Elizabeth Armitstead, held onto the white jersey.

Stage 3 top 10 results:
1 Mara Abbott (USA) Team Columbia-HTC Women 2:55:32
2 Emma Pooley (GBr) Cervelo Test Team s.t.
3 Claudia Hausler (Ger) Cervelo TestTeam 0:00:36
4 Judith Arndt (Ger) Team Columbia-HTC Women 0:01:24
5 Svetlana Bubnenkova (Rus) Fenixs Edilsavino s.t.
6 Carla Ryan (Aus) Cervelo Test Team 0:01:32
7 Edita Pucinskaite (Ltu) Gauss RDZ Ormu - Colnago 0:02:00
8 Amber Neben (USA) Equipe Nürnberger Versicherung 0:02:05
9 Nicole Brandli (Swi) Bigla Cycling Team 0:02:47
10 Fabiana Luperini (Ita) Selle Italia Ghezzi s.t.

Top 10 GC:

1 Emma Pooley (GBr) Cervelo Test Team 6:06:15
2 Mara Abbott (USA) Team Columbia-HTC 0:01:07
3 Claudia Häusler (Ger) Cervelo Test Team 0:01:18
4 Judith Arndt (Ger) Equipe Nürnberger 0:01:40
5 Amber Neben (Usa) Team Columbia-HTC 0:01:34
6 Svetlana Bubnenkova (Rus) Fenixs Edilsavino 0:01:45
7 Edita Pucinskaite (Ltu) Gauss Rdz Ormu Colnago 0:02:22
8 Carla Ryan (Aus) Cervelo Test Team 0:03:04
9 Nicole Brändli (Sui) Team Bigla 0:03:34
10 Fabiana Luperini (Ita) Selle Italia Ghezzi 0:04:12

Jersey classification:

Pink: Emma Pooley (Cervelo Test Team)

Cyclamen: Emma Pooley

Green: Mara Abbott (Team Columbia-HTC)

White: Elizabeth Armitstead (Lotto Belisol Ladies Team)

Photos: Mara Abbott crossing the mountaintop finish ahead of Emma Pooley; Mara Abbott, Emma Pooley and Elizabeth Armitstead

Stories, including cycling trip stories, for the Italian Cycling Journal welcome; contact veronaman@gmail.com

Wilier Cento1 "Superleggera" at Tour de France

Team Lampre NGC is using a new model of the Wilier Cento1, the "Superleggera", at the Tour de France.

The characteristics of the Superleggera (Superlight) were described by Wilier's Andrea Gastaldello: "Identical to the Cento1 in form and technical characteristics, we have utilized the potential of carbon materials to reduce the weight of the Cento1 Superlight while ensuring the ride quality, efficiency and durability of a bike capable of taking both gold and silver medals at the World Championships.The Cento1 Superlight was 2009 Giro d'Italia by Team Lampre. It is constructed primarily of 46 Ton carbon fiber, while benefiting from the strategic implementation of its even stiffer cousin, Mitsubishi 60 Ton. Its unique and innovative carbon layup also makes it more impact-resistant than other ultra-lightweight materials, and we’ve even come up with a lighter, more svelte aluminum sleeve in the bottom bracket which is molded into the monocoque construction during the final carbon curing process. Research led us beyond materials all the way to paint. The final protective layer on a Cento1 Superlight is a specially formulated paint that provides the same elegant beauty that typifies Wilier Triestina bikes while reducing weight.The result is all the performance you expect from a Cento1 - minus 120 grams!"

Stories, including cycling trip stories, for the Italian Cycling Journal welcome; contact veronaman@gmail.com

GiroDonne, Stage 2

World Champion time trialist Amber Neben (Equipe Nurnberger Versicherung) won the 15 Km individual trime trial to S. Maria a Monte today. It was her first Giro stage victory, and she also took the lead in the GC. In second place was Olympic Gold medalist Kristin Armstrong (Cervelo Test Team) who trailed Neben by 14 seconds. Third on the podium was Emma Pooley (Cervelo Test Team), 30 seconds down from Neben. The highest placed Italian was the Italian national champion Noemi Cantele (Bigla Cycling Team), 46 seconds after Neben.


Neben rode the 15 Km course from Pontedera to S. Maria a Monte in 20'39"26"', at an average speed of 43.574 Km/h. She said, "It was a hard ITT. Glad I drove it before. My FUJI D6 and Shimano Di2 were fantastic."


Emma Mackie's Lotto-Belisol teammate, Elizabeth Armitstead, finished 22nd and took over the white, young rider's, jersey.


Stage 2 top 10 results:

1 Amber Neben (USA) Equipe Nürnberger Versicherung 20:39
2 Kristin Armstrong (USA) Cervelo TestTeam 0:00:14
3 Emma Pooley (GBr) Cervelo TestTeam 0:00:30
4 Svetlana Bubnenkova (Rus) Fenixs Edilsavino 0:00:39
5 Judith Arndt (Ger) Team Columbia HTC Women 0:00:45
6 Noemi Cantele (Ita) Bigla Cycling Team 0:00:51
8 Tatiana Antoshina (Rus) Gauss RDZ Ormu - Colnago 0:00:56
9 Edita Pucinskaite (Ltu) Gauss RDZ Ormu - Colnago 0:00:58
10 Linda Melanie Villumsen (Den) Team Columbia HTC Women 0:01:07


Top 10 GC:

1 Amber Neben (USA) Equipe Nürnberger Versicherung 3:10:18
2 Kristin Armstrong (USA) Cervelo TestTeam 0:00:22
3 Emma Pooley (GBr) Cervelo TestTeam 0:00:31
4 Judith Arndt (Ger) Team Columbia HTC Women 0:00:35
5 Noemi Cantele (Ita) Bigla Cycling Team 0:00:44
6 Svetlana Bubnenkova (Rus) Fenixs Edilsavino 0:00:46
7 Edita Pucinskaite (Ltu) Gauss RDZ Ormu - Colnago 0:00:47
8 Claudia Hausler (Ger) Cervelo TestTeam 0:01:11
9 Nicole Brandli (Swi) Bigla Cycling Team 0:01:12
10 Diana Ziliute (Ltu) Safi - Pasta Zara Titanedi 0:01:15



Jersey classification:
Pink: Amber Neben (Equipe Nurberger)
Cyclamen: Amber Neben
Green: Amber Neben
White: Elizabeth Armitstead (Lotto Betisol Ladies Team)



Stories, including cycling trip stories, for the Italian Cycling Journal welcome; contact veronaman@gmail.com