2014 Pro-cycling season thread

With 2013 done and details emerging on 2014 grand tours and more, I thought it was time to get this going.

I'll start - Adam Blythe has just signed for the UK based NFTO team for next season.

Inrng's sum up of the 2014 calendar and also links to the iCal

Reports in Italy that Riis has sold his Saxobank team to ex-sponsor Oleg Tinkoff for €7m..
Seriously - you couldn't make this stuff up.. Is it Italian April Fool's Day?

Like the result of a competition to come up with the worst possible name for a team.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/kazakhstan-to-launch-new-uci-continental-team

http://http://www.feltet.dk/octo_cms/files/Feltet.dk/Billeder/2014/Hold/Lotto-Belisol/Lotto_Belosol_2014_troje.jpg

New lotto belisol jersey.

Fuck you and your golden shoulders Quigley.

The funniest transfer news ever

Cobo signs for Turkish super dopers Torku Seker Spor

Anyone got odds on Tour of Turkey 2014?

^^ facepalm. Has he not gone back to being a sparky yet?

Hunches, predictions and the like...

Is Sagan going to step up and take a Monument? Will it be a Boonen Vs Cancellara spring? smacks lips. Are the rumbling rumours about Wiggins qua Roubaix worth taking serious or just pure lols?

Ah yes, and those other races - the long ones. Who's going to race what? Seems the TDF is going to get a near full house: Froome + Nibali + Quintana, etc.

What about the Giro? Seems nicely poised: Purito vs Porte?

And anything else worth looking fwd to? The Pantani film for example: OMG!

Can you guess what destroyed Lachlan Morton's bikes back home in 'Straya?

If you guessed "a fucking big (now ex-) eagle crashed into them" congratulations

Fucking spiders, birds of prey, burn it all down

^ saw that on your twitter. Oof.

Hunches, predictions and the like...

Is Sagan going to step up and take a Monument? Will it be a Boonen Vs Cancellara spring? smacks lips. Are the rumbling rumours about Wiggins qua Roubaix worth taking serious or just pure lols?

Ah yes, and those other races - the long ones. Who's going to race what? Seems the TDF is going to get a near full house: Froome + Nibali + Quintana, etc.

What about the Giro? Seems nicely poised: Purito vs Porte?

And anything else worth looking fwd to? The Pantani film for example: OMG!

Um, I think the word is that Quintana will be targeting the Giro, which seems a bit of a shame.

Will be interesting to see how Sagan does this year and if Cancellara will give it his all. Hoping that Stybar will get to have another bite at PR too..

Forgot to mention Bert. Says he's gonna get his prep right this year...

Shame about Nairo... Could be tasty tho: Quintana vs Purito Vs Porte Vs Evans...

Hoping that Stybar will get to have another bite at PR too..

Big +1 to that.

I want to see Cancellara take on (and take) the Hour record. The rest of 2014 is just a big dope-filled, WWF wrestling-esque masqurade of lies, damn lies and power meters.

Fancy Betancur to win LBL or Lombardia. Sagan will tear it up in the classics and win at least two. Cancellara will be focusing on the hour. Cav to win fuck all stages at the Tour. Froome to crash out in week one.

All quite pointless but if one of those things happens I will be pretty smug momentarily.

"Riding Grand Tours relaxes the brain".
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/adam-hansen-aims-to-finish-his-tenth-grand-tour-in-2014

I want to see Cancellara take on (and take) the Hour record. The rest of 2014 is just a big dope-filled, WWF wrestling-esque masqurade of lies, damn lies and power meters.

I vaguely recall the rules for this being set at 1970s technology. Would be nice if Fabs ends up on here bidding for some ancient frame and wheels and haggling over the price of some c-record cranks...

Yeah, they changed the rules so it's now the Athlete's Hour and must be conducted using a standard position on a Merckx type bike, ie. spoked wheels, metal tube frame, no aero aids, etc. The UCI were worried the positions and aero bikes were taking away from the rider's performance during the record.

This doesn't stop riders working within the UCIs silly rules like Sosenka who apparently used a very heavy rear wheel for flywheel effect and super long frames within whatever morphological rules they came up with to limit positions.

dressing for pleasure (CF reveals TS 2014 kit :/)

nipples.

^^^ surely in the first place it should've been deemed fucking stupid to allow the use of aerodynamic enhancing parts/carbon when the first records were set on steel? unfair much?

^^ hahahahahaha cheeky pose there Chris