Simeoni steamed at Giro snub
Probably the best headline velonews.com has ever written. I think the reason I find it so awesome is because I have an assumption in my brain that the term "steamed" isn't one used by Italians. I have no evidence to back this up, but I'm sticking by my assumption of ignorance.
This is sort of funny on another level because as an American cycling fan and more importantly a Lance Armstrong cycling fan, I'm pretty much programmed to hate this guy. Simeoni for a long time was the guy in the professional peloton who bad mouthed everybody else in the sport of doping. Anytime somebody won, Simeoni would make public statements that the guy was on the juice. Of course he made these accusations towards Lance and anybody that's seen Lance in a press conference when he's angry knows he's not always a nice guy.
There was that one little incident in I believe the 2005 Tour de France when after making more doping accusations Simeoni tried to get into a break away. After bridging up he looked over his shoulder and saw that he'd been followed by a yellow jersey. My intention here isn't to get all cycling dork on you, anymore than I already am, but if you aren't in the know, a break with the yellow jersey stands about a 0% chance of surviving. The rest of the field simply won't let the yellow jersey ride up the road. The rest of the guys in the break see Lance and all exclaim, "what the hell are you doing here?" Probably in like 10 languages and what they actually said may or may not translate in that exact way. None the less Lance calmly explains that as long as Simeoni is in the group, he was going to be there too. If Simeoni went back to the peloton, he'd happily drop back as well. They voted and Simeoni was sent back. These kinds of decisions about who can stay in a group happen all the time, it usually doesn't involve quite the display of power that Lance threw down in this particular case.
Of course later that day Simeoni was all upset and crying about how Lance was hurting his chances of making a living and that he was a big Texas bully. Lance made it clear that he was basically protecting the interest of the group. Nobody in the peloton wants the guy that constantly bashes them to win, so he was making sure he didn't.
So, back to present day and Simeoni finds himself as the current Italian national champion on a smaller tier 2 pro squad. There are so many bike teams in the world that want to come to these big races that very, very few tier 2 teams actually get an invite. Simeoni's squad was left off that list for the Giro this May and of course he's upset again. He thinks the race is disrespecting him by not having the Italian national champ in their country's grand tour. Maybe I just don't like the guy but I don't see his point. It's not the national championship race, it's the Giro, they are totally different. If he wanted to ensure his presence in the Giro maybe he should have taken a contract with a team that would be big enough to get an invite.
When Lance announced his comeback and originally said the Giro would be his main goal there were about two weeks of articles where Simeoni was asked how he felt about it and if he thought there'd be any more battles on the road. Both parties stayed pretty neutral, but I am hoping beyond hope at this point that Simeoni starts crying conspiracy theory about his exclusion.
I mean, it only makes sense that Lance would keep him out!
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