The Dark Knight

So I saw "The Dark Knight" on IMAX yesterday. Visually it was stunning. I would definitely recommend seeing it on IMAX if you can. That said the audio was off. The dialogue track(s) was being constantly drowned out by the background noise. It seemed particularly acute at the beginning of the movie, so either they noticed it and adjusted for it, or I got used to it. I suspect the latter since the person I was with noticed the same thing, but near the end of the movie. It was a good movie, I really enjoyed it and felt I had definitely got my money's worth. It was not however the "Greatest Movie Ever!!!" which seems to have been the opinion of everyone I talked to who had seen it and the users of IMDB.

For one thing I'm getting a little tired of villains who primary superpower seems to be an unearthly command of logistics, human resources and organization. Obviously I don't want to spoil the movie, but The Joker is able to tackle transportation and recruiting issues that sizeable corporations would have a tough time with while operating completely out in the open, to say nothing of doing it in secret while the target of a city-wide manhunt. Obviously this is a point that bothers no one but me, so I shouldn't even bring it up. But on the off chance that part of that 0.0001% of people who are mentally defective in the same fashion as me, I thought I'd mention it.

Anyway like I said, don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed the movie (though I also think it could have stood to be shorter) and I would definitely recommend it, unless gore really bothers you. There's a particularly gruesome... thing... in the movie. Which turned my stomach a little bit. It's just not the greatest movie ever.

We burned the forest down.

More Sleep

Well after sleeping for 7 hours yesterday during the day I had no problem laying down at midnight and sleeping for another 9 hours. So for those keeping track at home that's 16 hours of sleep in 20 hours on half a pill... But other than the guilt I'm suffering from being a total slacker, I'm feeling a lot better. But you can see why I am very sparing in my use of them.

As you can imagine, since I was only awake for a couple of hours since the last time I blogged there's really not much else to report.

Death rides a Cervelo SL R3

Muscle Relaxant

I have back problems, but doesn't everyone? In my particular case the middle three or four vertebra in my back settle into kind of a fixed and locked position. The pain then radiates around the rib cage and overall it's pretty painful. There are some stretches and so forth that I can do that help relieve the pain but eventually it gets to the point where I have to sort of reset it by taking a muscle relaxant. Which of course given my low tolerance for just about all drugs knocks me out pretty good.

I've been meaning to take a muscle relaxant for about two months now, but since I was afraid that it would take me completely out of commission for 24 hours there was always some reason why I couldn't. It had finally progressed to the point where it was seriously affecting my sleep, and so this afternoon after I got back from donating platelets. I called around to make sure there was nothing critical and then I took half a muscle relaxant. Previously I'd always taken a full pill. Not sure why, I had always thought about doing a half, but never had. Of course I've only taken it 2 or maybe three times in the past.

After taking it I slept for about seven hours, in the middle of the day. We'll see how that affects my sleep tonight. My back feels a lot better though I'd venture to say that it's not quite as fully "reset" as it is when I take a full one. After waking up I was still a little groggy and possibly grumpy, my apologies if you happened to be the victim of that. But probably within nine hours of taking it I'm feeling pretty good. This is encouraging, because unless I'm mistaken it means I can take a half before I go to bed and not have to worry about entirely clearing my schedule...

Of course I don't want to get too dependent, but given that I got the prescription over a year ago I don't think we're in any danger of that yet.

I'm old and getting older by the second

TdF and 4E Campaign

Well the Tour is over. Carlos Sastre managed to turn in the time trial of his life on Saturday and held of Cadel to keep the yellow. I really think it came down to the two teams. CSC was incredibly dominant, while Cadel generally didn't have a team mate in site when it crunch time came. It was precisely for the reason that I didn't pick Cadel. As a whole the tour seemed more suited to the climbers which is why I looked at Cunego, who dropped out near the end with injuries. I feel like Sastre winning in some ways vindicates my pick, but oh well. You might ask why I didn't pick Sastre. That's a good question. I guess to be candid I was still bitter from the time when Tyler Hamilton was on CSC and he was supposed to be co-captain with Sastre, and I felt that the divided attention may have cost Hamilton some support. Course Hamilton is so deep into suspension and so old (37) that it's unlikely we'll ever see him at another grand tour.

Speaking of suspended riders next year's Tour could be very interesting. Ivan Basso will be back. Astana with Contador and Leipheimer will also be there (barring any new revelations). And of course I'm sure that Cadel and Sastre will be back as well. Add in all the new revelations from this year like the Schleck Brothers, Bernard Kohl and Vandevelde and before you know it you're talking about a very crowded field of contenders. I'm looking forward to it. I'm also looking forward to the Vuelta a España. They're doing the Angliru. Can you say 23.6%?

The first session of the 4E campaign went really well. I'd printed out power cards for all of the individual powers and that really helped to keep things moving. I would say that combats went much faster than 3E combats, though I'm comparing 1st level 4E combats to mid-level 3E combats, so that's kind of an apple and oranges comparison. I also used some dungeon tiles for the setting. They were a little more difficult to set up than I thought. I had assumed I could just page through and pull some out and be up and running within a few minutes, but it turned out that putting it all together and finding the stuff I wanted was more time consuming than that. I think before the next session I'm going to have to go through before hand and mark the ones I want with post it notes.

I think the part I was most pleased with (other than the player's having fun) was the ease with which I could toss in a variety of interesting monsters and create interesting encounters. This part is as advertised. I can now spend a lot more time on design and story creation, and a lot less time building stat blocks. That part really excites me and it was the promise of that which convinced me that I could do a homebrew, so it's good to see it panning out. I'll have to post the story some other time (assuming anyone is interested) I'm out of time for blogging for the day.

Because you're mine I walk the line.

Gaming Post You've Been Warned

A while ago I was offered a spot as a player in a new 4E game. Initially I said I'd have to think about it, which as we all know is code for I'd really like to, but I'm way too busy. Once we decided to spend some time roping up before we tried the overhang a thousand feet up, I thought, hey, I should be able to make some time to roll some dice. Of course before that I'd decided to switch the family campaign over to 4E and had the idea of doing it as a complete homebrew. Yes I made this decision before roping up, and yes I'm not sure entirely what I was thinking there either. The first session in that campaign is tomorrow, and if you've ever started a homebrew campaign you know that getting it started is an awful lot of work.

So I slammed with work, on both fronts, but at least one of the fronts is something I really enjoy. So I'm going to do just that, and enjoy it. I'll let you know how the first session went on Monday, but I have high hopes that people are really going to enjoy themselves.

Finished Oak Cabinets

July 24th

July 24th is a state holiday here in Utah. We call it Pioneer Day (I never knew that it was once called "Day of Deliverance"). There are parades and fireworks and barbecue's etc. For my wife's family it has additional significance (no, not because she's Brigham Young's great-great-great-granddaughter, it's actually on the other side) it's her mother's birthday. Family legend has it that for a long time as a little girl she thought that the parade was in her honor.

Most people get the day off, or take the day off. I'm in the office, but no one else is. I'm not bitter, it's nice to occasionally have a day where you're working and no one else is, allows you to catch up on stuff. But it's not going to be all fun and games today we're celebrating my mother-in-law's birthday this evening with dinner, a wading pool and fireworks. I bought the fireworks yesterday and I'm somewhat excited to set them off with the kids. I spent a little extra and got a special surprise, we'll have to see how it goes. I'll let you know.

Just came up with a new emoticon for sanguine [:<≠>

l'Alpe d’Huez

Well I was up again early this morning. Like really early, 4:30 am. But it's Alpe d'Huez, I mean how can anyone sleep? Anyway, it's still to early in the stage to say much about it (it was sad that Vandevelde was dropped and then crashed yesterday). So I'll just refer you to this great article on the 1986 Tour and the battle between Greg Lemond and Bernard Hinault that culminated on the ascent of Alpe d'Huez.

I'm definitely napping today

The Alps

Well the Tour is in the alps. Today and tomorrow's stage are brutal. Today isn't quite a mountain top finish but it might as well be. The final mountain tops out at 2802 meters (9193 feet) before a 23.5 kilometer (14.6 miles) descent to the finish. Yeah you can make up some time on the descent if you were behind at the summit, but not a lot. And then tomorrow the Tour goes over the Galibier, Croix de Fer before ending on top of Alpe d'Huez. So three hors category climbs, I fully expect that we still won't know who's going to win after today and tomorrow's stage. But anyone who shows any weakness is definitely going to be out.

Of course many people reading this entry are going to say "Who cares? They're all gigantic drug users anyway." And certainly having Beltran, Ricco and the Barloworld rider all get kicked out for drugs has not helped that image, but let's set that aside for the moment. Ed sent me a link to an interesting article from the BBC, talking about concerns about doping at the Olympics. What I found interesting is that the expert they cited for their assertion that positives were being ignored was the director of the Astana team's anti-doping program. Remember? The team that the Tour Organizers decided was too tainted by drug use in the past. I'm not sure if that rises quite to the level of full on irony, but it is weird.

Of course for me personally the biggest problem with the Tour is not the doping, it's the fact that it starts so early, particularly on mountain stages. Today's coverage started at 4:30 am. I didn't quite wake up that early (and yes I know I'm under no obligation to watch the tour at all) but knowing that it's on, it's hard not to want to be up watching it, so I was up about 5:15. As a result of this and previous days my sleep schedule is not quite as tight as I would like, though I am following the "take a nap every day" part of the plan.

Uh, no, you got the wrong number. This is 9-1…2.

Flogging Molly

Well I went to my first concert in probably 6 years (obviously I'm not counting symphonies and similar events) on Saturday. It was loud and hot and I spent a lot of time standing around compared to the amount of time people were actually performing, and tickets were cheaper at the door then they were in advance and the opening act was kind of annoying (there's a reason most rock songs are 3-4 minutes, not 12) and a can of soda cost $3 and a bottle of Gatorade cost $4, BUT despite all of that, once the main act, Flogging Molly came on it was awesome. Here's a video to give you an idea of what it was like:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxKWF37OFMw

Anyway it was a lot of fun. Much more fun than I expected. I may have to do it again in another 6 years.

Next time I'll bring earplugs

More Doping

As Ed mentioned in his comment on yesterday's blog there's been another doping scandal at the tour. This time it was Riccardo Ricco of the Saunier Duval team. This was a particularly big blow in that he had won two stages in fairly impressive fashion and as someone who was only 24 was viewed as someone who was in the new generation. A generation that was hopefully free from drugs. I guess that wasn't the case. Although when you look at how much he idolized Pantani that should have been a big clue.

In any case people are pointing to this as evidence that the tests are working, and I sure hope they're right. The only thing, in my mind, worse than busting a bunch of dopers and giving cycling yet another kick in the crotch would be to incorrectly bust a bunch of cyclists. But once again the narrative makes sense. You've got someone who idolizes a cyclist who took drugs, who does remarkably well, better than expected and took a brand new form of EPO. That last bit is a big one. WADA had never announced that they had a test for this new form of EPO, so there's a good reason to suspect that Ricco may have thought that he could take it without running any risks.

So there you go. At least he wasn't in yellow (though he was the white jersey and the polka-dot jersey wearer...) In the course of the reporting I found out that my man Cunego has a tattoo that says "I'm drug free" (or "doping free" I imagine it's actually in Italian...) Now obviously hypocrisy is not unknown, but imagine for a moment that he was busted, and he had that tattoo. That would open him up to so much crap that just that scenario alone would be enough to make me think that there might be something there.

Dreaming of a drug free Tour

Games

For a variety of reasons not worth going into we've decided to dial things back a bit with the new company. You could say that, in the terms of Spinal Tap, that we're turning the dial from 11 back to 8 or 9. What this means is that I might actually have some time to do something fun. Not a lot of time mind you, in fact when I look at all the things I've neglected around the house, and the time it will take to get back on top of that I probably don't have any time, but let's imagine, that in theory I might. The question then becomes what game should I play?

It's too bad Diablo III isn't going to be available for quite awhile. I'd play that for sure. Beyond that I'm not sure. A good rpg would be nice, but I haven't seen one of those in awhile. I've got some 4X games that I could play, and that's not a bad idea. Galactic Civilizations came out with their final expansion. So that sounds fun, but it doesn't sound awesome, if you know what I mean. I am playing a little bit of Weewar, which has been awesome, but that's only 20 minutes a day, so the search continues.

I did hear about a pretty cool game yesterday which is supposed to release this summer. It's called "Hinterland". Here's the feature list:

* Fantasy role-playing and character development
* Party-based tactical combat, including item use
* Base building, including building upgrades
* Innovative combat stat leveling system
* Random world generation for maximum replay
* Folklore / fantasy setting
* Intimate scale

Apparently you're in charge of a small group of peasants and you're supposed to lead them off into the hinterland (get it?) and establish a village. Obviously it's entirely possible that they've tried to pack too much into the game, but if that's not the case then this could be the greatest game since Master of Magic...

Nap Time

Viruses, Worms, Trojans etc.

Well my wife clicked on a seemingly innocuous link yesterday and next thing we know we have this nasty Trojan on her computer. It's hard to say how it happened. It could be that her FireFox wasn't completely up to date, or maybe it was Windows that wasn't all the way patched, or perhaps it was something else entirely. In any case I've spent about five hours so far trying to clean it and I've managed to get it down to the point where there's a single .dll. The root of the problem if you will. And no matter what I try I can't get rid of that last .dll.

While I can't exactly pin the blame on where the bug got in, I can definitely pin the blame on not being able to delete the file. That's Microsoft. On any other OS I'd have no problem deleting the file, but somehow Microsoft through some combination of the registry, permissions, and pure unadulterated evil has managed to create a situation where I can't, in safe mode, with any utility know to man, with all of the resources of the internet at my disposal, delete this one file. It's enough to make me violent.

Next step is to track down an XP install disk (I don't have one but I do have a genuine copy of windows, just ask Microsoft, I've even got the cool sticker...) and try deleting it through the recovery console. If that doesn't work I guess I'll have to "repave it" as they used to say at my old job.

At the final judgement someone at Microsoft will have a lot to answer for

Hautacam

Well the first big mountain finish was today. As usual it doesn't tell you who will win the tour, but it definitely tells you who won't. Valverde and Cunego are almost certainly out of the running for the overall. They didn't completely crack, but they lost 4+ minutes to Cadel Evans and almost that much to all of the other contenders. So there goes my prediction, though I would like credit for avoiding Valverde. And now that Evans has yellow we'll have to see how his team holds up. He only has a lead of 1 second over Frank Schleck, and CSC has a much better team. Being in yellow by only a second is something you expect to see the day after a prologue, not going into the first rest day.

No further word on Beltran or his B sample. Phil and Paul actually haven't talked about him much. I did read that yesterday's victory by Ricardo Ricco was "too impressive" and people are starting to question whether he's clean. I guess that's where the sport is at, and it's not a good place to be. Overall I was kind of disappointed in the big contenders. There were a couple of attacks but nothing really significant. Still the group was whittled down to five. Christian VandeVelde was in that elite group of five and he's definitely been one of the big stories of the tour. I certainly hope that he continues to do well.

They're lucky Contador couldn't make it

More on Beltran

Another quick note on Beltran. I'm relatively convinced that he's guilty, but I can't understand why they announced the whole thing before the B sample was tested. Once you've hauled the guy away in a police car and it's been in all the newspapers, that provides a serious disincentive for a lab to reverse all that by declaring that the B sample was negative. How hard would it be to wait for that before exploding everything? I'll just tell you that if the did those two things 1) waited for the results of the B sample before doing ANYTHING (telling anyone) and 2) had the B sample tested at a completely different lab (preferably in another country even). Then I would feel totally comfortable saying "Yeah that dude did it, kick him out of the race and off the team." Whereas now, I'm reasonably comfortable in saying that out of all the people busted for doping that one of them (maybe even more) was probably innocent.

That's all folks!

Beltran

Today was almost entirely consumed by family stuff, but I have a couple of minutes so I thought I'd answer Ed's question about my reaction to Beltran. Well first off it's kind of early to really have much of a reaction, though certainly I was really hoping that this would be the first tour in a while without even the slightest hint of doping, so this has ruined that. As I look at Beltran, he's 37, he's certainly past his prime. EPO is something which does definitely help, so it basically passes the smell test. I guess at this point we just have to wait for the counter-sample to be tested. I guess it's too much to expect that a completely different lab will test the counter sample?

My ancestors were all like a billion times tougher than me

Sleeping schedule

Things have actually calmed down a little bit and so I'm thinking of trying to napping idea. For awhile things were so crazy that my bedtime had been pushed back to like 2 or 3 am. But then this week the kids started summer school (it's called "Beyond the Basics") and they have to be up every morning at 8, which is kind of early if you went to bed at 3 am and didn't fall asleep until 4 am. The summer school is kind of cool, it's two weeks and there's sort of a theme. So my oldest daughter is doing some kind of history/archeology course while my oldest son is learning how to design web pages on a Mac. My #2 son is also in a course, but I don't remember off the top of my head what the theme is.

Anyway so the schedule I'm hoping to maintain is to go to bed at midnight, wake up at 6:30 and then take a two hour nap every afternoon. I did the waking up at 6:30 this morning, and of course since I haven't had the nap (and it's my first day). I'm pretty tired, but I'm optimistic that it will work out. My chances of success will be even better once school starts since my youngest will be in afternoon kindergarten. I mean that almost seems like a situation where the universe is laying out the "nap welcome mat" if you will.

Tour-wise it was a good stage, though none of the riders I was pulling for did as well as I'd hoped. Cunego finished 29th, 32 seconds behind the winner, Millar finished 39th, 51 seconds back. Kim Kirchen, riding for the American Team Columbia took yellow (by finishing 5th on the stage at four seconds back), so that's pretty cool. Evans and Valverde crossed the line in 2nd and 3rd, so they are shaping up to be the big contenders, though I still have my doubts about Evans' team. They didn't have to do any work and yet my man, Popovych, was the only one from the team who finished anywhere near the front (and he was 38th, 49 seconds back), on a stage that was really pretty minor compared to the really high mountains. I guess we'll know more come Monday.

Richard Nixon's Head: Hello Morbo, how's the family?
Morbo: Belligerent and numerous.

Tdf: First Time Trial

Well the first time trial was yesterday (it should have been on Saturday... but I need to let that go). Stefan Schumacher, a man no one would have picked to win the stage before the start came away with a surprising victory. Of the people expected to be overall contenders Cadel Evans did the best, though Kim Kirchen and David Millar both beat him. Neither of them are expected to be able to keep up in the mountain, but who knows. David Millar (now sitting in 3rd overall) has predicted that he'll take the yellow jersey on tomorrows mountain top finish. It's not much of a mountain top, only a Category 2, but you can bet there will be a split in the field. My prediction is that one of the three Schumacher, Kirchen or Millar will end up being a surprise contender for the overall.

If you want to win the tour you can be a time trial specialist who stays close in the mountains or a climber who tries to stay close in the time trials (or you can be Armstrong and dominate both). Of the people considered to be in the latter group my man Cunego did the best. Of the people in the former group Valverde did the worst, coming in actually behind Cunego. Of course he still has to climb well, we'll know more on that count tomorrow, but not enough. We'll know who definitely isn't climbing well, but not the reverse. That won't come until Sunday's stage, and we'll definitely know by Monday's stage.

As far as today's stage, it was pretty boring except for right at the end. There had been a break away of three people all day long. I think they had been out in front for nearly 200 kilometers. People expected them to be caught at 20 km out, then 10, then 6, then 2. Finally with maybe 500 meters left the peleton caught 2 of the 3 cyclists, but there was still one guy out in front. Finally 50 meters from the finish line they caught and passed him and Mark Cavendish a brit riding for the American Team Columbia won the stage in a field sprint. 50 meters!!! That's got to be annoying.

I wouldn't know anything about having something snatched away at the last second

Tdf Stage 1

Well Valverde won the first stage of the Tour which is a strong statement about his overall chances. He's definitely one of the favorites, and the acceleration he was able to put in right at the end was one of those great moments that makes me love cycling. I considered picking him as my "horse" but I feel like he's too fragile. Of the three tours he's started he's only finished one. I think obviously the more tours you're in the more experienced you get and the better you are at avoiding the kind of things that are going to take you out of the tour. I guess we'll see what happens.

Another interesting note about this tour is that while there are only 4 Americans riding (Hincapie, Vandevelde, Frishkorn, Pate those all sound like very American names ;) ) for the first time ever there are two American Teams (Columbia and Garmin-Chipolte). So you've got more American teams than ever before but fewer actual Americans in the race since probably before the 7-11 team started racing. Of the two teams I like Garmin-Chipolte better though the really don't have anyone who has a real chance at the overall, with the possible exception of David Millar who in days past was sometimes talked about as a possible successor to Lance Armstrong, but his climbing has never developed, but he is a great time-trialer and we'll have to see how he looks on Tuesday in the first time trial.

In addition to getting rid of the prologue, they got rid of time bonuses at the finish and at the intermediate sprints. What do they have against the sprinters? This effectively means that there's no way to be in yellow as a sprinter unless you win the very first stage, which today was conveniently at the top of a hill... I don't like it, it makes it less exciting. With no time bonuses you'll never have a moment like the 2003 tour when Ullrich was so close to Armstrong that he tried to pull some of the time back by contesting an intermediate sprint. Let's hope that this is a temporary change.

It could be I don't like the changes because I'm a curmudgeon...

My "Horse" for the Tour

Well the Tour starts tomorrow morning. I was amazed to find out that for the first time since 1966 they're not doing a prologue. I have to say that I'm disappointed. And I figured that if they didn't have a prologue they would definitely have a team time trial, nope not that either. I have to say overall I'm disappointed, I mean first they don't invite the defending champion back, and then no prologue or team time trial? I'm losing faith. Anyway I figured I'd better give you my pick before the race actually starts (although since the first stage isn't a prologue, it's not going to be nearly as informative).

So here it is. I'm going with Damiano Cunego. There was a big part of me that wanted to go with Cadel Evans (and I'll still be happy if he wins), but I really worry about his team. I think you can get by with a weaker team if you're not a favorite, but going in as a favorite with a weak team is a big problem. Plus I really feel that we're still in a transition period in the tour and that we're looking for the next dominant rider to emerge out of the ranks of younger riders. I think Cunego could be that rider.

In any case we'll see how it turns out. This tour is at least as wide-open as last year if not more. I'm still made about the prologue, but I expect it will still be an exciting race.

Oh, and happy 4th of July!

Sleep Recap

I ended up having to be up until 2 AM while I waited on one of the other partners to finish something, so taking a nap in the evening wasn't a staggeringly bad idea just a moderately bad idea, since without it there's no way I could have stayed up till 2 and with it I only ended up tossing and turning till maybe 3:30 (up again around 9). My wife, daughter and sister-in-law are going to a late lunch so I need to watch the younger kids so I'll take a nap then. I can already taste it. Other than that, "The Dude abides", as they say.

Well. I guess we can close the file on that one.

Sleep Schedule

My sleeping schedule is all screwed up. I knew this would happen eventually. My partners (one in particular) have notoriously screwed up schedules and it's only natural that we would get involved in some project where my sleeping schedule would end up moving later and later. I don't think that the situation is permanent, but it's going to take some effort to get things back to some semblance of normality. To give you an idea of what I'm talking about. Last night I went to bed around 2:00 and because of some of the business related stress I discussed earlier in the week I don't think I fell asleep much before 4:00. My sleep was not very deep (I think I woke up a couple of times at least) and then by 8:30 I was up for good.

As a result of this I was pretty tired, and really planned on taking a nap this afternoon, but there was just no way. We're still right in the middle of things and we'd gotten another counter-offer we needed to respond to. So 7:00 rolled around, I'd fed the kids dinner and I was pretty tired, things had finally calmed down and it seemed like a good idea to take a nap. So I slept from 7 to 9. It still seems like a good idea, but I'm sure when 2 am rolls around and I'm tired but not sleepy it won't seem like such a great idea. Oh well, I guess it's too late to rectify it now.

Super atomic wedgie stress

Tour De France

My Dad asked me last night when my Tour de France coverage was going to start. I had actually thought about it yesterday, since it's getting close, but I had some whining to do and that takes precedence over sports. If you're curious the hierarchy is actually projectile vomiting > whining about being over worked > whining about being tired > whining about not being able to goof off as much as I want > gaming > incisive political commentary > sports > boredom > Celine Dion. I other words it's good that I whine a lot or your might end up getting some Celine Dion posts. While the Tour is actually on sports moves to between to right after "whining about being overworked", but since it doesn't start until Saturday it's still fairly low.

In any case as you probably already know Contador, the winner of last years Tour, is not going to be there this year, and neither is Leipheimer. Which takes away the two people I would have picked as overall contenders. Second place last year was Cadel Evans (Leipheimer was third) and he's the pre-race favorite with Valverde a close second on most people's list. I wouldn't mind seeing Cadel win I've been a fan of his ever since he led the Giro for a day back in 2002. But he's been kind of inconsistent. Valverde also has a pretty big question mark by his name, most Tours (as I recall) he hasn't even finished. I'm thinking that this year will be another one where someone surprises us. For now I'm not sure who my horse is, but I'll let you know before Saturday.

Mostly just hoping for no scandals...