Maurie Kautto dies

More on Vandenbroucke's Injury

And from Steve Sabine: Just a medical note on Franky V's knee. Anytime that you have a fracture you get increased blood flow for healing. This increased blood flow leads to increased growth if the growth plates are not closed. Thus Franky's leg probably would have grown due to the fracture and not due to the surgery. 17mm is not an unreasonable result. In an arm it is not a problem and nobody would notice, but a leg is different. Sometimes the orthopods do procedures to retard growth later on, or try to lengthen the unaffected limb but it is very trick to get right.

We are now into medical analysis on these pages. Anyone want an injury diagnosed!

Jan Ullrich's Programme

California, Round 1, UCI 1998 MTB World Cup

Men, 49 kms:

 1. Rune Hoydahl (Norway) 		     2.23.35
 2. Miguel Martinez (France) 			3.32
 3. Thomas Frischknecht (Switzerland) 		3.39
 4. Christophe Herisset (France) 		3.46
 5. Filip Mierhaeghe (Belarus) 			4.22
 6. Cadel Evans (Australia) 			4.27
 7. Nick Craig (Great Britain) 			4.48
 8. Christoph Sauser (Switzerland) 		4.56
 9. Gregory Vollet (France) 			7.16
10. David Juarez (US) 				7.20
...
15. Bart Brentjens (Ned)			9.07
47. Van Dooren (Ned)			       16.45
59. Tolhoek (Ned) 			       19.12

Women:

 1. Sydor (Can)                              1.54.44
 2. Pezzo (Ita)  				1.07
 3. Dunlap (US) 				4.17
 4. Alexander (GB) 				5.58
 5. Leboucher (Fra) 				6.18

Belgium, Sint-Lievens-Houtem, Women's Flemish Championship

 1. Mullerz-Paulitz (Ger) 	90 km in 2.32.00
 2. Vonckx (Bel)
 3. Toeganioek (Uzb)
 4. Si (Fra)
 5. Missbach (GB)
11. Rombouts (Ned)
12. Melchers (Ned)
13. Borst (Ned)
19. Hulzebosch-Smit (Ned)
22. Elemans (Ned)
23. Van Kuik (Ned)

Western Australian Veterans

A Grade: I McFall	2. A Nagy	3. R Churchill
B Grade: H Wilson	2. A Bennett	3. D McDonald
C Grade: R Sutton	2. D Williams	3. G Lawford
D Grade: B Paxman	2. V Preedy	3. C Lovelady

The Meat Works Unite

Both sponsoring organisations (Jean Floc’h and Mroz) are meat companies - making sausages, patés, ham, saucissons - [Bill notes: it is hard reporting on this when you are vegetarian] - and every week several Mroz trucks come to France to the Jean Floc’h factory in Brittany to take the meat for Mroz in Poland

And already, the MROZ riders rode at the prologue of the Tour of Normandy with a small Jean Floc’h logo on the right side of the chest.

Wine Country Classic, USA

Both the men's and women's crits were almost entirely devoid of any complicated plot lines: in both events, the fields stayed tightly bunched throughout -- with no heroic breaks, desperate chases, or nasty crashes--and both ended in massive, high-speed field sprints.

In the men's race, New Zealand's sprint strongman Julian Dean (Mercury) won impressively, while Shaklee's Nicole Freedman of Palo Alto, Calif., capped off an aggressive race for her team with a clean win.

The Kendall Jackson Winery Criterium course winds through the streets of downtown Santa Rosa, California, taking six corners to circle city hall and the state building. In places, the circuit can be quite technical, in particular where its one left-hand corner is followed almost immediately by a hard right. Riders throwing their bikes through this quick left-right complex--their wheels skittering off the centerline botts dots--always give the impression of being just a blink away from total chaos and severe, blunt- trauma mayhem.

Other than the great racing, perhaps the biggest news of the day was the weather. Overnight a freak front blew through with everything from snow on the surrounding hilltops and monster hail to sightings of funnel clouds. However, by morning, the only reminder of the storm was a brisk, chilly head wind blowing straight up the finishing stretch. By midday, it had warmed up to a point where the riding was about as comfortable as it can be, with puffy little clouds drifting across a bright blue sky.

The men's field varied between a long, strung-out line of riders (when they were hammering) and a curb-to-curb peleton (when they were dawdling along at just under 30-mph). No one launched a serious attack all day, and the only sprints were for the many cash primes. With about three or four laps to go, the speed started to ratchet up and the major teams began setting up lead-outs for their heavy hitters. As the bell sounded for the final lap, the Mercury and Saturn teams each had at least three bodies at the front of the train, and the pace was ferocious.

Saturn was smarting after being shut out in Saturday's Graton Road Race (after putting two riders in the lead break), so they were pumped to bring in a good result in the crit. On the backside of the course Saturn's Frank McCormack positioned himself to lead out teammate Fred Rodriguez, but somehow, around the final corner, Rodriguez missed McCormack's wheel, and instantly, Mercury's Julian Dean and Gord Fraser jumped into his place. In effect, McCormack ended up leading out the two strongest sprinters from the rival team. As soon as he realized the situation, McCormack pulled off, leaving Dean to face over 200 meters of stiff head wind to the finish.

Dean figured it was a long pull into the wind, but if he blew up, his teammate was right behind to come around, so he just put his head down and hammered off the front. In the end, the Kiwi had enough power to hold off the field all the way to the line, but Fraser made it close with a bike lunge while Dean was sitting up to salute the madly cheering crowd. The result was nearly a photo finish, but one that looked good for Mercury from any angle. A rather disheartened Rodriguez salvaged what he could for Saturn with third place.

It was a great day for the Mercury team. Not only did they place one-two in the race, they sewed up the team championship in the California Spring Classics Series and walked away with an additional $1500 prize for that accomplishment. Saturn placed a close second in the series, with Navigators a distant third.

The women's race followed almost the same format as the men's, with almost the only attacks being to snag the swag on the prime laps. The Saeco-Timex squad came into the day leading in the Spring Classics team standings, but they were entirely absent from the field. Most of the team was competing in Australia, and Linda Jackson, who won Saturday's road race, was not entered in the crit.

In their absence, the Shaklee team became the driving force in the race, going after almost every prime and generally pushing the pace throughout. Shaklee's Nicole Reinhart took three out of the five primes and her teammate Louisa Jenkins took another.

Eventual winner Nicole Freedman (Shaklee) did venture out around mid-race on a tentative, one-lap attack, but soon returned to the fold and waited for the final lap. Shaklee set themselves up well on that lap and, down the final straight, they did a very business-like job of delivering Freedman to the line well clear of the competition. Jennifer Evans of Team EDS spent most of the race near the front, shadowing the Shaklee train, and it paid off at the finish with second place. Reinhart added to her haul of booty in the primes with a third place finish.

In the end, the lead in the Spring Classics team standings that Saeco-Timex had going into the race was insurmountable, in spite of Team Shaklee's efforts, and they collected the $1500 first-place prize in absentia. However, Shaklee's busy day vaulted them past Ralph's/Klein into a close second place in the final standings.

Wine Country Classic, Santa Rosa, California, Criterium

Men, 90 minutes

1. Julian Dean (Mercury), Hamilton, New Zealand; 2. Gord Fraser (Mercury), Ottawa, Ont., Canada; 3. Fred Rodriguez (Saturn), Piedmont, Calif.; 4. Mike McCarthy (Saturn), New York, N.Y.; 5. Patrick Eyk (Navigators), Holland; 6. Yannick Cajon (SRC Dominic), Quebec, Canada; 7. John Leonard (LeMond); 8. Derek Bouchard-Hall (Shaklee), Menlo Park, Calif.; 9. Matt Koschara (Shaklee); 10. Antonio Cruz (Mercury), Sparks, Nev.

Women, 60 minutes

1. Nicole Freedman (Shaklee), Palo Alto, Calif.; 2. Jennifer Evans (EDS), Austin, Texas; 3. Nicole Reinhart (Shaklee), Portland, Ore.; 4. Brenda Brashears (PowerBar), Grants Pass, Ore.; 5. Aleka Skouras (Ralph's/Klein), Los Altos, Calif.; 6. Kelly Herndon (Peninsula Velo), Menlo Park, Calif.; 7. Marie Holjer (Jane’s Cosmetics); Sweden; 8. Jeanne Golay (Schwinn Paramount), Glenwood Springs, Colo.; 9. Debra Durand (San Diego Cyclo Vets), San Diego, Calif.; 10. Bonnie Breeze (PowerBar), Columbus, Ohio.