Vuelta - TTT

At last! La Vuelta has started, we had the TTT yesterday evening, and it looked like a hot start to the race, with temperatures of 32c, which is 89 degrees in old money. "Phew, what a scorcher", as they say.

Luckily, this year the whole of the race is taking place in the northern half of the country, so it should be less baking hot, and hopefully we'll get less of the barren plains of central Spain - you remember, mile after mile of brown, brown, brown, dotted with the occasional zombie town.

The first time I saw a zombie town, I asked LLB what the zombies ate. "Each other," he replied, "or passing cyclists."

No wonder the organisers have chosen to move the route away from the central zombie region.

So, TTT: our coverage started with shots of Contador, predictably, and it was nice to see that as Stinkoff walked up the steps to the presentation podium, Sky were walking down, and Chris Frome slapped Contador (in a friendly way) on the shoulder as they passed.

The start ramp has to be the biggest ramp I have ever seen: it was massively wide, massively long, and very strongly red in colour. BMC were completely invisible as they lined up for their start...

I hate to say this again, having said it at the Giro earlier this year, but it does rather look as though most of the teams have sent their z-teams to the race. There were hardly any "big" names, apart from Contador of course.

Possibly that is always going to be a problem with an end-of-season race: riders are tired, or injured, or have announced that they are transferring and therefore aren't being allowed to race by their mean-minded teams... it seems that it's more a case of "can we scrape up a team" than "we'll send X to target the GC/stages/points".

As we all know, Andy and Frankie Schleck aren't there, nor is Jakob, nor Fabian, nor Jensie: so who am I going to be following for this race? Who have the teams scraped up, then? Here's a quick gallop through the teams:

Movistar: Cobo, unlikely winner of last year, even more unlikely to win this year, plus a load of blokes with unpronounceable names, that I've never heard of.

AG2R - John "No you can't have my bike" Gadret, well-known selfish rider, appears to have been rewarded by being number 1 in his team. interestingly, bearing in mind the Jakob issue, Nico Roche is there, even though he has already announced that he's leaving the team to go to Stinkoff. (See, Mr Bruyneel, other teams are happy to send departing riders to UCI races, nyah nyah nyah)

Andaluthia - nope, don't know any of them, but then I wouldn't expect to.

Astana - nope, no pets there. No Vino either, perhaps he really, really, REALLY has retired this time?

BMC - well, Gilbert is the only big rider, and he's been in terrible form all year, poor guy: all that fuss last year, winning practically everything he started, big transfer, big money, and this year? Not a thing. He must be sweating buckets. At least he's not the only one, Cadel Evans hasn't exactly shone this year, either. Interesting to see that Gilbert, although not the Belgian TT champion, was still wearing the "special" helmet in the Belgian colours. Wonder if he sleeps with it, as well?

Caja Rural - plucky wild-card entry, not a hope in hell of winning anything but I confidently predict that they will be in every break of every day.

Cofidis - very odd to see their name all over the finish line, as their sponsor is obviously sponsoring the race as well! Most of their riders are completely unknown to me, so we won't worry too much about them.

Euskaltel - ah, my dear little carrots. I'm so pleased to hear that their main sponsor has signed up for another three years, and that they are not changing their team kit. They are such a funny little team, they hardly ever win anything, their bike handling skills are so legendarily bad that they are now famous for always crashing, hence the phrase "the bleeding carrots" which you might hear the English-speaking commentators using. Igor Anton is my "pet" carrot, and I'm pleased to see that he's leading the team this year. Let's hope they don't fall off too much.

FDJ - nope, don't know any of them.

Garmin - yay! Good to see that Honorary Schlecklander JVS (Johan Van Summeren) is still on form, he's there at number 99, lanky as ever. I don't think I know any of the others.

Katusha - ah, the Dark Lords of Katusha, cloned and ready to ride.

Lampre - nope, no pets there.

Liquigas - I'm amazed they had enough riders left to fill a team, so many of them seem to have jumped ship already. Seven are already confirmed as going to other teams, and so far the only person joining them is a solitary neo. Does make you wonder if they will be around next year. Of their Vuelta team, I don't think I've heard of a single one of them.

Lotto - Ah, they have a Schlecklander pet, Gianni Meerkat (Meersman)
and at least I have heard of some of their riders.

Omega Pharma have Tony Martin back on form (we hope) after a really bad early part of the year. And he's supported by Cataldo, who is a bit of a dark horse and might surprise us all.

Orica - lots of Meyers, no Gerranses.

Rabobank: well, at least I've heard of most of them. We know Ten Damme, the Wolf Man, with his hairy, scary face.

RadioShack - oh dear, I am supposed to say nice things at this point. Err, Go, Linus, Go! Go on, lad, show them all! Give 'em hell!

Sky: not an "A" team, but they've sent Chris Frome, who now has the weight of expectation on his shoulders, and it will be interesting to see how he copes with it. There's also Flecha, who, along with Johnny Hoogerland, is a special pet, after that disgraceful incident with the tv car in the Tour of 2011. Also Rigoberto "So good they named him twice" Uran Uran, with his hair flowing freely (and un-aerodynamically) in the breeze.

Argos Shimano - nope, no pets.

Stinkoff: interesting gossip, Navarro is leaving the team, yet he was one of Contador's lieutenants. Hmmm. Other than that, nothing of interest: of course we will be watching Contador, I don't think we can avoid it, and maybe it's a good thing we don't have Andy here, otherwise the commentators would spend their whole time drawing comparisons between Conti's situation and that of Frankie. Which would be unfair on several counts.

Finally, Vacansoleil, nothing of interest there.

So, on to the TTT itself: there was an awful lot of really bad riding going on! Orica were shattered in no time, riders all over the place: Garmin had a bad crash, with three riders down, which must have been heartstopping for the rider who had just dropped off the back and was thankfully pedalling gently for home: suddenly he had to accelerate like mad in order to catch up, as he might well be needed at the end. They were leading by one second at the half-way stage, but that crash really ruined their chances.

Shack made a reasonable start, they were a bit ragged but not as much as some of the other teams. BMC made a surprising good finish, Gilbert was leading them in strongly, perhaps he is coming back into form, after all?

As an aside, it was lovely to see the big green banners for local sponsor Fertiberia again: or, "Fartibottom" as LLB and I call them, having found out that it's a fertiliser.

We also spot a lone Lux ensign, could it be for Didier? Or was it a pair of staunch Frandy fans, determined to show their support even though neither Andy nor Frankie is in the race? Either way, go Lux ensign wavers, go!

The current leaders, rather than being allowed to get changed, do a cool down, sit in the shade etc are forced to sit in a row on canvas chairs on the podium, which I think is particularly cruel as we get close-ups of their worried little faces as each team approaches the line. Will they be beaten? Will they have to stay sitting in the sun?

BMC are currently sweltering on the chairs, then Rabobank come in and have beaten them by a second. They start to get up, pick up their scattered kit, wipe their faces, cry quietly etc, but no! The time has been changed, they are still winning. Oh, hang on, they have been given the same time. Oh dear, more confusion, will they have to sit on each other's laps?

Luckily our coverage goes back to the race, we see Omega arrive, just one second down. No! Their time is also being adjusted, now they are all on the same time! This is ridiculous, are we supposed to stack the riders three high? Those canvas chairs will collapse, I tell you.

Two minutes later and it's all been sorted out, Rabobank have taken over the chairs, and they are all wearing freezer-pack cool vests, what a brilliant idea.

Euskaltel arrive at the finish, and what do I see? One of them already has a bandage on his arm. See, they just can't help falling off!

Sky come towards the line, and Rabobank start to get to their feet, ready to depart from the podium chairs. But Sky don't win! Rabobank are visibly disbelieving - then jubilant - they have beaten Sky at a TT!!!

But more is to come - Movistar, last off the ramp, come in 10 seconds faster!! LLB and I look at each other in disbelief, and one of us (all right, I admit it, it was me) wonders out loud if the organisers could have "fixed" the timer clock.

Rabobank clutch their heads in disbelief - they have lost to Movistar.