The Final Cycling Weekend of the Year
This is the final weekend of 2021 of any importance in the world of cycling. We are ending with a bang: Paris-Roubaix, the hell of the North, an exclusive affair only reserved for the strongest.
But first,
Remco’s Public Relations Team Earned Their Keep
Remco has a serious image problem. During the world championship, he and his PR team provided an answer. He worked for the Belgium team. He forewent his own chances. He pulled hard.
Merci Remco, Merci.
And yet, his participation in the Extra Time Koers television show, provided yet again more fodder for the tabloids.
Did he pull too early, so he didn’t have to ride against his teammate, Julian Alaphilippe? Did he disobey team directives by pulling too early? Did he try to sway the team coach on Saturday morning by asking clarifications on the team strategy?
Who cares!
Jose De Cauwer said it best: let’s have a beer or coffee to talk it over … and move on. Indeed, move on! The Belgian team didn’t win. That’s cycling.
There is still a lot of work ahead to turn Remco into Mr Sympatico.
Paris Roubaix, the Hell of the North
This weekend is a rare (covid-19) fall edition of Paris Roubaix. The race is always hectic and chaotic. It is a test of the equipment, as much as it is about the riders. You need to be strong and have a lot of luck to win this race. Because of it, Paris-Roubaix isn’t my favorite race. Nevertheless, it is heroic.
To get into the mood, this Friday evening, I am watching the 1976 documentary, A Sunday in Hell. The documentary provides a rare behind the scenes of what the race was in the 70s, among the GOAT, Eddy Merckx, Monsieur Paris-Roubaix, Roger de Vlaminck and many others.
And then there is always Tommeke! (Does he also carry the title Monsieur Paris-Roubaix? He is worthy of it.)
One last time this year waking up very early California time to watch pro-cycling.
October 1, 2021
Val
Val is the best documentary I watch all year. It tells the story of Val Kilmer, as narrated by his son, and through his movies and the many home movies he amassed.
It is amazing how much of his personal life, and life on set, Val captured with a camera. He was TikTok before TikTok was popular.
As an eighties kid, I grew up with Ice Man. He was the cold jock in Top Gun. The anti-hero.
You can be my wingman any time.
As a geek, Anthony Edwards (Goose) was my pilot. Goose was Revenge of the Nerd’s Gilbert, Gilbert was Goose.
I just wanted to say that I’m a nerd, and I’m here tonight to stand up for the rights of other nerds. I mean uh, all our lives we’ve been laughed at and made to feel inferior. And tonight, those bastards, they trashed our house. Why? Cause we’re smart? Cause we look different? Well, we’re not. I’m a nerd, and uh, I’m pretty proud of it.
Then, a friend at high school introduced me to the music of The Doors. I went from dark New Wave music to the mesmerizing sounds of The Doors. I wasn’t a big movie going guy, but I had to watch the movie The Doors. Val Kilmer was the spitting image of Jim Morrison in the movie. It has been one of his best performances. (I never got to watch his stage performance of Mark Twain.)
I read all the poems of Morrison, and became a huge Doors fan, 15 years after Jim Morrison’s death. Somewhere I have a picture of me at his grave in the Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris.
I am the Lizard King
I can do anything
I can make the earth stop in its tracks
I made the blue cars go away
The documentary doesn’t go into a lot of details about his throat cancer and his tracheostomy. Yet, they don’t shy away from it, as Val is featured multiple times, having difficulty to communicate.
Of course, this is his documentary. There is always another side to the story. The New York Times sketches a more balanced picture of the actor - Cancer has taken his voice, but the unlikeliest movie star in Hollywood history still has a lot he wants to say.
His casting problem was solved for him when no one wanted to work with him anymore. The roles went to people who, presumably, were not known for unkindness toward movie crews; the phone stopped ringing. In his book, he sums up this period like this: “In an unflinching attempt to empower directors, actors and other collaborators to honor the truth and essence of each project, an attempt to breathe Suzukian life into a myriad of Hollywood moments, I had been deemed difficult and alienated the head of every major studio.”
By watching the documentary, I learned that Val Kilmer is a lot more than Top Gun and The Doors. He is an artist and “filmophile”. Living modestly, filming, writing, and painting.
September 25, 2021
The World Championship Week Continues
A few comments leading into the apotheoses on Sunday with the Men’s race.
King Ganna
It was no surprise that Filippo Ganna won the world championship time trial. It was close. Wout only lost by a handful of seconds. My prediction for number 1 and 2 was not difficult. Remco Evenepoel winning bronze was a happy surprise, and surely boosts his morale.
Remco Has a Serious Image Problem
Remco Evenepoel is seen as the lone wolf, the rule-breaker and the anti-team player.
Sven Vanthourenhout, the coach of team Belgium:
If I doubted even 0.01% about Evenepoel, I would not have selected him.
It’s odd that you have to make such as statement.
Also Eddy Merckx commented critically:
If there is only one leader, you really shouldn’t take Evenepoel. He rides mainly for himself; we saw that at the Olympics.
Remco responded arrogantly and hinted that Eddy Merckx held a grudge against him for not joining Axel Merckx bicycle team.
Given the stink around him, his answer should have been smart, succinct and humble: “Sorry to hear that. I will show my worth to the team and in support for Wout.” And then put his legs where his mouth is and support the team.
Remco’s PR team has its work cut out for him.
There is only one way to make this right: as long as Wout is in the race, Remco must follow the team orders and support Wout. That’s it. No opportunistic break away. Even if he were to win the rainbow jersey with a selfish breakaway, it would be a Pyrrhic victory.
Only the Best Wout Can Win This
As we saw in the U23 men’s race, a lot can happen in the race where it may not be hard enough to break the peloton. Quite a few others can snag the victory from team Belgium and Wout Van Aert.
I predict it will be one of the shadow favorites who will snag the gold. They include Mathieu Van Der Poel and Tom Pidcock. Both riders have been quietly preparing for this race. Both have a strong finish.
Still, Go Wout!
Helmet Off to Otto-Jan and Elodie
In De Tijd van ons Leven two amateur time trialist trained to not finish last. It was a great and fun show to watch. 
The results: Otto-Jan put beat out Christopher Simons of Ghana. Otto-Jan held an average of 41.58km/hr. Elodie came with an average of 34.64km/hr very close (41 seconds) to Pakistani Jan Asma.
Helmet off to both.
September 21, 2021
The Rainbow Is Coming Home
Tomorrow morning starts the cycling world championship week. Hundred years of rainbow colors! And this year, it is happening in Flanders.
Tomorrow is the Men’s Time Trail race, 43.3km from Knokke to Brugge.
Here’s my prediction.
- Filippo Ganna
- Wout Van Aert - I’ll be rooting for him. A second spot will fan his hunger for a week later.
- Stephan Kung, current European Time Trial champion. He is in form.
Remco will put on a solid performance, but won’t be on the podium, nor is Primoz Roglic or Rohan Dennis.
Sadly TV-maker Otto-Jan Ham won’t beat the slowest rider, and thus fail in his attempt. Elodie on the other hand does have a chance. The Flemish TV show “De tijd van ons leven”, where they train to be time trialists, has been great entertainment. Yet, it shows how hard cycling is, and that it takes a lot to be a professional rider. Geen pannekoeken!
September 18, 2021
That Escalated Quickly
I know social media can be nefarious. It is a mystery how companies use your information, and share it with others. Case in point:
I was exploring bicycling groups near me, using Strava. There is the Gravel bikers group in Santa Cruz, and the competitive road cycling team in San Jose.
One of the groups I ran across is training for the annual AIDS/LifeCycle ride between San Francisco and Los Angeles. They also welcome cyclists who aren’t partaking in the ride, and just want to go out on practice rides. It looked interesting.
I clicked on the group’s website, a Facebook group, and joined them on Strava, as it looks like a good not-all-too-competitive group.
Shortly thereafter, while scrolling through Twitter (note: not Facebook nor Strava), I was served up a promoted tweet for HIV medication. Wow! That escalated quickly simply from joining a cycling group. Does everybody who Rides For The Cure suffer from diabetes or breast cancer themselves? I think not. Not everybody pouring a bucket of ice over them is an ALS patient, are they?
The link was obvious: AIDS ride -> HIV medicine. Yet, it was concerning how this link was shared across social media platforms in a heartbeat. Which other companies have been served this information and to what purpose?
September 17, 2021
The Matter App Has Potential (Yet Still Needs Some Work).
I recently started using a new reading application called Matter (getmatter.app). The application is in an early beta.
It is both brilliant and a bit confusing.
The application collects articles to read later, either online or offline. In that way it is similar to Instapaper and Pocket. It has a browser extension to collect articles.
One great feature is that you can subscribe to newsletters or forward newsletters to Matter. I read these newsletters like I read a blogpost or an article online.
With an Apple Pencil in hand, I highlight interesting passages in the articles. I am not limited to a number of highlights as has been the case with free edition of Pocket.
Sharing highlights is very easy. A clear image with the highlighted text is created that you can then share via social media.
Thus far, the Collect - Read - Highlight - (optionally Share) works well.
The team working on Matter is responsive to feedback, and has an easy way to provide it into their slack channel.
There are a few things which confuse me, don’t work yet or are lacking. (I realize this is still an early Beta product).
- There is a concept of Discover, Inbox and Queue. The navigation between them, how to process them, or move things needs from fine tuning. E.g., In discover-new-articles mode, you can not swipe to dismiss an article. I keep seeing the same discovery list. Also the add-to-queue swiping action didn’t work yet in the Beta.
- You can add “Writers” to your list of people to follow. It is not clear where the list of writers comes from. From my twitter feed? From a list curated by Matter? How can I find more?
- When sharing a snippet, the imagine only contains the highlight and not a link to the article containing the highlight.
- It wasn’t immediately obvious to me to see all my highlights in one place, or to search through them. You can export them Notion or Readwise. I presume you can search through them there. I would love to just see them all within Matter.
- The most important missing piece are privacy settings. I don’t want to share everything I read. Currently, all your highlights are visible to others who follow you. Rather, I want my highlights and the articles I read to be private by default, and public by choice. (Btw - How does this work when I share a highlight to the paid newsletter? Are people able to access the paid newsletter content this way? That would run afoul with those companies quickly, no?)
Regardless of the current shortcomings, this application has potential for the avid reader and curator-type of person.
September 13, 2021
The Anton Ego Among the Sport Journalists
Many years ago, I read Karl Vannieuwkerke’s book Renner willen worden. It is a great story of what it takes to become a semi-professional bicycle racer. Procycling is the hardest sport on earth. It takes an immense
With the world championships cycling in Belgium this year, television maker Otto-Jan Ham and former Olympic runner Eloise Ouedraogo put on their spandex to become time trialists. They will race against the clock with the best in the world. It is a futile endeavor to take on professionals who train for this for years.
Nevertheless, it is wonderful television: the sweat, the tears, the meals, the professional guidance.
Then, today I read a column (in Dutch) by a Belgian sports journalist.
He makes a few similar remarks how big of a challenge it is. That’s obvious. But it he doesn’t leave at that. There is a lot of critique, even ridicule about the most recent performance statistics of Otto-Jan Ham. Why do columnists default to the negative? It reminded me of Anton Ego, the food critic in Ratatouille.
It really doesn’t matter how they will fare in Knokke. What matters is setting a big, hairy and audacious goal - a BHAG. Then enjoy the journey attempting it. That’s why the show is called “The Time of our Life”, and not “The road to victory”.
September 12, 2021
Twenty Years Ago
A little while after 6am Pacific time, we were awoken by a phone call. The phone never rang in our apartment, let along at this early hour of the day. Unlike today, we were not accustomed to start our day this early. It was my mother in law calling from Argentina.
“Are you all ok?”
I had no idea what she was talking about. Did we miss a California earthquake? What was going on?
“Turn on the television. An attack on New York.”
My wife, then 7 months pregnant of our first child, joined me in the living room to watch the news coverage. We were in shock.
When we saw the first tower collapse, I was in utter disbelief of what I was witnessing. Those feelings were quickly replaced, not by anger (I skipped that stage), but by the knowledge that many in the United States were already lacing up. This is going to escalate quickly.
That’s my earliest recollection of what transpired on September 11, 2001.
Later the day, I recall standing huddled with my colleagues at Sun Microsystems in Menlo Park around a television in the break room. Somebody had set one up, and hung an antenna on the window. Nobody was doing any work. We were all glued to the news, all day long.
Only much later did we learn that one of our Menlo Park colleagues was on the hijacked flight from Boston. The company placed a small memorial bench in the campus court yard.
September 11, 2021
Heisenruling
In quantum mechanics, Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle points out that there is a limit to the accuracy with which we can observe physical quantities of a particle.
In software, a Heisenbug is a software bug which disappears when we start debugging it. (This often means that a debugger or the addition of debug messages alter the timing of the program execution sufficiently to avoid the problem to occur.)
Listening today to Preet Bharara’s Cafe Insider podcast about the Texas Senate Bill (SB8) on abortion, I realize there is also such a thing as a Heisenruling. A Heisenruling is a favorable ruling which can not be celebrated by the plaintiff, as the celebration would lead to the undoing of the ruling.
I enjoy Preet and Joyce breaking down the cases and rulings. Perhaps I missed a career in law somewhere. Can you combine engineering and law, other than when practicing patent law? I digress.
In the podcast episode, Preet points out that the majority Supreme Court opinion has not been covered a lot in the conservative media.
There was a report that FoxNews barely covered this decision.
He points out that this could create a big backlash, which could set in motion the undoing of the ruling. Hence a Heisenruling.
September 9, 2021
Donald Trump’s legacy is not the America-first mantra, the wall, the cozy relationship with Putin, the economic shadow fight with China, bleaching COVID-19, nor the two impeachments. It isn’t even the takeover of the GOP and the surrender to the right-wing lunatics in this country.
Trump’s legacy is three-fold. First of all, Trump enabled the Mitch McConnell judiciary take-over, beyond a conservative Supreme Court. A much more conservative judicial branch will have a long lasting impact in the US.
Secondly, Trump eroded key functions of the US federal government. Michael Lewis details this in his book, The Fifth Risk. For example, in his contempt for reason and science, and in his fight against climate change, Trump gutted the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency, NOAA. The scientists which worked tirelessly to provide critical weather information for air traffic, ships and farmers, and were forced out, aren’t coming back. There are many more such dramatic changes in the government.
Thirdly, Trump enabled the dismantlement of any reasonable discourse. “Fake news!” “They are out to get me!” “The radical left.” “Alternative Facts” We will suffer the impacts from this for years, starting with the prolonged Covid pandemic. We lost critical analysis, in-depth reporting and civil debate. We lost a scientific debate.
Instead, we got groups of Google-enabled pseudo-scientists, talking heads, conspiracy-theorists, all amplified by Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, and an army of Russian and Chinese bots, spewing “their opinion”.
Here’s the script to both recognize fake news or to create it yourself:
- Start with “What the mainstream media doesn’t want you to know”. Or “You are only going to read this here.”
- Throw in a cherry-picked fact out of a scientific report, and indignantly cry foul how the Nobel-prized authors have been silenced, or even have disappeared. “Their information has been removed by Big Tech.”
- Trot out a fancy title: Doctor, PhD, scientist, etc, (Hello Doctor Mengele). Establish their credibility with a long list of educational institutions and awards. Neglect any mention of their money making side business in food supplements, or how they are no longer board certified (Dr. Rand Paul, we meet again).
- Repeat how they have been silenced by secretly funded dark powers, or by the Silicon Valley techies.
- Omit any facts, any serious arguments, any peer-reviewed data, reason or logic. No need to string a few coherent thoughts together. Remember, the rant must go on.
- Call foul: follow the money!
- Send it to the bots to distribute it widely. Appear on extremist (u-hum Murdoch) radio and television shows.
- Rinse and repeat.
The pattern is all too clear in the many articles I get get forward and read. So much that it undermines any potential new insight the article might bring. My immediate reaction is file under /dev/null.
This is unfortunate, as I do want to remain open to the potential of pharmacy-grade ivermectin or about the real effect of masks.
September 2, 2021