Vanderkitten & Exergy Get New Bikes

Wilier Triestina to sponsor Team Vanderkitten and Team Exergy

Two US-based women's pro cycling teams have chosen to straddle Italian Wilier Triestina bikes for the 2013 season.  Team Vanderkitten, headquartered in Mountain View, California, had ridden Focus bikes for the last three years.  

A team photograph from the Vanderkitten website gives everyone a pretty good idea who each of these team members might be.  With their helmets, sun glasses and identical kits, can you tell which one is Ruth Winder?  How about Jazzy Hurikino?  Sadly, as a publicity photo this is quite similar to a group picture of Saudi women in burkhas. And this from a sport that constantly complains of lack of exposure.

Team Exergy, with two medal winners at the 2012 London games, Kristin Armstrong and Lauren Tamayo, is getting a Wilier Triestina sponsorship after switching from Felt bikes.

Rothko's No. 1 (Royal Red and Blue)

$75 MILLION

Little Mike and the Breeder's Cup Turf

The valiant Little Mike, overlooked by the bettors with odds of 17-1, was taken out of his normal control-the-pace style by a streaking Turbocompressor yet managed to hit the finish line ahead of betting favorite Point of Entry and a host of accomplished turf runners from all over the world in the 2012 edition of the Breeder's Cup Turf, a 1 1/2 mile run over the grassy course at Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, California. Little Mike's victory took only .03 seconds longer the world record for the distance, set in 1989 and brought the gutty 5 year old gelding's earnings total to $3,074,412 with 12 wins in 21 starts.

Emma Johansson, Lizzie Armitstead and Others Move Their Cycling KIt

Swedish general classification star Emma Johansson has switched allegiance from the Norwegian Hi-tec team to the Australian Orica-AIS group, essentially as a replacement for retired German leader Judith Arndt. Although Arndt may have been more effective in the time trials than Johansson, Emma has been a very effective rider in both one-day and stage races and is always a podium threat, even after breaking both collarbones in a head-on collision with a car during training on the Canary Islands earlier this year.  In spite of this physical setback, she returned to the peloton later in the season, winning the Swedish national road race and time trial championships, finishing fifth overall in the Giro Donne and 6th in the Olympic women's road race.



Twenty-three year old British track and road racing threat Lizzie Armitstead has moved from the now-disbanded Netherlands team, AA Drink-Leontien,, to another Dutch assembly, Dolmens-Boels, after winning the silver medal in the 2012 London games road race.  In 2011 she was the British national champion on the track in the both the points race and the scratch race and the national road champion as well.



Personable Aussie sprinter Chloe Hosking was once considered to have professional potential.  That potential has been realized with successful American and European campaigns in the kit of HTC and its successor Specialized-Lululemon.  Chloe has joined the Scandinavian Hitec Products UCK team, along with  other young budding stars Rachel Neylan, Rossella Ratto and Emilia Fahlin.





 The Optum Pro Cycling powered by Kelly Benefit Strategies women's team was led by Durango, CO native Carmen Small in 2012 as she brought home the NRC individual championship.  Next year she'll join Evelyn Stevens, Ina-Yoko Teutenberg, Trixi Worrack, Loren Rowney and others on the Specialized-Lululemon roster.



The aggressive style of popular African-born rider Sharon Laws will make her a favorite of followers of her new home in the Lotto Belisol line-up.







PastaZara-Cogeas-Manhattan will be the new home of Olympian and 2008 world time trial champion and 2003 US national road racing champ Amber Neben.


Megan Guarnier, Emilia Fahlin and Amber Neben will all be wearing different kit in the year to come.

Gustave Molinari Quote From Cafe Hayek

A quote from Don Boudreaux's Cafe Hayek:

is from Roderick Long’s translation of Yves Guyot’s February 1912 obituary, from the Journal des Economistes, of Gustave de Molinari:

But how is this contradiction to be reconciled – that the protectionists and socialists, who call for intellectual liberty and political liberty, intend to make use of it to impose economic servitude?

They affirm the fitness of every individual to influence the general direction of the country, to criticise, to judge every question, and at the same time, they deny his fitness to regulate his own affairs; the protectionists subject him to a fine if he wishes to buy this or that product or to devote himself to this or that industry, this or that trade, which does not suit them; the socialists of all descriptions intend, by means of so-called social laws and labour legislation, to substitute, for the individual’s will, his initiative, his judgment, his responsibility, the decisions of a government composed of individuals, as if power conferred infallibility on those who govern, and as if the governed were nothing but incompetents.

Mark Rothko's "Black Stripe (Orange, Gold and Black)", $20 million?

Hurricane Sandy has extended the suspense on how much a number of works by impressionist, modern and contemporary artists will sell for in a postponed auction at Sotheby's and another scheduled sale at Christie's International in New York according to this WSJ article.

One of the potentially most valuable of the items on offer at Christie's will be Mark Rothko's "Black Stripe (Orange, Gold and Black)", slated to go for in excess of $15 million.



I'm not going to bid quite that much.

Kauto Star Retired

Two-time Cheltenham Gold Cup winner and steeplechase legend Kauto Star has been retired by trainer Paul Nicholls and owner Clive Smith.  Regular rider Ruby Walsh describes his relationship with the most successful National Hunt competitor of this era here.  In addition to his victories in the prestigious Gold Cup, Kauto Star won the the King George VI chase 5 times and a total of 16 grade I races in his nine year career, that included 23 wins in 41 starts and earnings of L2, 375,883.

While races over hurdles and fences is a fringe activity on the American horse racing scene, it's the focus of fans from the fall to early spring in the British Isles.  The Cheltenham Festival at Prestbury Park on the edge of the glorious Cotswolds is one of the premier European sporting events, attracting an army of Irish punters and other racing fans from all over the world.