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Jim Caple of ESPN said exactly what I feel regarding the 2008 Tour De France in his piece today. It seems that Jim and I both are avid fans who also understand the true nature of cycling and doping in comparison with other sports. Mr. Caple’s only mistake is including David Zabriskie on the 2008 Garmin Chipoltle TDF team as Zabriskie is still sidelined from his Giro crash. Bottom line, Jim and I both know that the roads of France in July are filled with great athletes not cheats.

In his piece, Jim makes the same point I have made for a long time - that major US sports could not and would not survive as they are if they same doping rules were applied to them as cycling. Cycling is considered dirty by many simply because it works so hard to be clean. You catch more when you look more. Anyway I will be on my trainer watching EVERY SECOND of the 2008 Tour and loving the fact that the French will NOT win their race yet again.

(story here). Jim as I climb Alpe De Huez from the comfort of my air conditioned home on my trainer I will think of you - my brother on two stabilized wheels and a good saddle.

Sony has rolled out a new firmware upgrade for the PS3 - story here.

Now if they would just get it below $250 - including a 60GB hard drive or larger - I would think about buying one. Until then I will stick to my 5 year old PS2 and my Wii - including Wii Fit. Yeah that is right I got a Wii Fit…and oh yeah it ROCKS!!! Never thought weighing in good be fun. Unfortunately it keeps telling me that my Wii fit age is 6 to 8 year over my real age due to my inability to balance on one foot.

Floyd Landis lost his last appeal to regain his 2006 TDF Yellow Jersey. The CAS decision also requires Landis to pay a 100K in legal bills for the USADA having to defend their case against him. Full story & full details at Velo News here

Reuters story here, ESPN story here, & Cycling Weekly’s story here

I really like to see the images that Google news puts with the stories on its page. I know they are selected randomly, but they are still funny.

Well Microsoft stops selling Windows XP to end users and computer manufacturers officially today, but Intel is not upgrading to Vista. WAY TO GO INTEL. For a ALL AMD ALL THE TIME GUY like me it takes ALOT for me to brag on INTEL, but this time I FULLY FULLY FULLY YELL LOUDLY FOR INTEL!!!

Microsoft bought Powerset - a startup natural language search engine - so maybe Microsoft is really ready to give Google a run. I doubt it though. Of course I would also take this to mean that any Yahoo and Microsoft deal is gone for good. Yahoo had better partner up with Google and MAYBE save themselves. Story about Microsoft purchase of Powerset here

Floyd’s Landis’s last and final - probably - appeal is suppose to come down tomorrow. Wonder if Landis could get a ride by Saturday if his yellow is restored…I doubt it but hey it would add more drama to a already drama filled race. Velonews story here

Heck with Astana out (which means #1 & #3 from the 2007 TDF are not racing), and green jersey 2007 Boonen not in the race Landis could only add a bit more drama and excitement. Of course if it was 13 offensive Brits, 12 drunk Irishmen, 10 angry Scots, 25 snobby Frenchmen, 8 insame Americans, 22 arrogant Spaniards, 30 elitist Italians, 15 doped up Russians, and 54 misc riders from the rest of the world all on 1963 Schwinn Varsity’s on French roads in July for the Yellow Jersey I would watch it. Of course any time there is not a Frenchman in yellow I am happy.

How I missed this I don’t know, but I did. Ross Perot, founder of EDS & Perot systems and former candidate for President of the USA, has launched a blog devoted to charts and graphs. These are not any charts and graphs though, they are charts and graphs that analysis Social Security, Medicare, government spending, government holdings, education, etc. Seriously, this really is a excellent analysis tool of the federal gov ment. Perot’s Charts here