I’ve been watching the Vuelta on cycling.tv and listening to commentary on Eurosport. Over all I’ve liked it. This is only the second year that I’ve watched it — I did watch it in ‘03, but after the Tour in ‘04, OLN stopped covering it (so by the fall of ‘04, I’d watched three and a half grand tours: half of the Tour ‘03, Vuelta ‘03, Giro ‘04, and the Tour ‘04). It was nice to be able to watch the Vuelta and the outcome was almost exactly what I wanted. I’d rather Angel Marchante was on the podium instead of Valverde, but I like both of the boys.
But, really, today’s stage capped off the Vuelta in a spectacular way. Not the stage itself, but the cyclist who won. Erik Zabel took his second win of the Vuelta. And, of course. Alexandre Vinokourov won the whole damn thing. I can’t express how amazing that is. I stuck by Astana (back when they were Liberty Seguros, and then Astana-Wurth and now just Astana) and I am so, so incredibly glad that Vino won. I’d still be a fan of the team (even with all the new transfers) had Vino not won, but this just makes me so happy.
Next week is the World Championships, which I’ll be following, though unlike the World Cup, I have no real preference for who wins.
