Ripped from Cyclingnews

I thought this was good. The Lion King breaks it down for Ball.

Cipollini and Ball's relationship on the rocks

The relationship that was started last fall in a Las Vegas discotheque could come to an end if Mario Cipollini does not get his say in the management of Rock Racing. The Italian, who came out of retirement at the age of 40 to race in the Tour of California last week, and his lawyer met with the owner of the team, Mike Ball, yesterday to discuss the coming season.

"We need to sit at the table and make clear who is in command," said Mario Cipollini in an interview with La Gazzetta dello Sport's Luigi Perna. The Italian from Lucca and lawyer Giuseppe Napoleone were scheduled to meet with Ball later in the day.

"The boss is Ball, but after him it is me. Therefore I want to manage the squad starting now. I can organise the participation in [Milano-] Sanremo. To find men to race is not a problem. ... If Ball does well it will continue, otherwise goodbye. I now understand that the name Cipollini still has value, in the United States and elsewhere."

Cipollini was happy with his return, but not with the fiasco surrounding the team and Ball's backing of Tyler Hamilton, Oscar Sevilla and Santiago Botero. The riders, all allegedly linked with Operación Puerto, were barred from racing by the organiser, but continued along daily by riding behind the race caravan and signing autographs for fans at the stage villages.

"For a week I had an infinite amount of patience ... Maybe it was my great desire to return to racing with an important project. However, we can't go forward like this. We are not able to continue to pull along this heavy weight that ruins our image, and now Ball also understands this. It is not enough to advertise and show off models."

En Vogue

Racing with your name on the frame.

Sexy Gathering

Pro/1/2 staging at the Cherry Pie RR.

2008 NAHBS Report

Here's how it went for 3 days at the show.
Me to showgoers, "Hi. How ya do'n?"
Showgoer, "Good"
"Where ya from?"
"Portland" (at least that was the majority of the people)
"Great! I'm from Salem."
"Really?!" they'd say with great suprise.

Another question I would get was, "Is this aluminum?" I guess people had never seen shape steel tubes before.

In all it was a good show. I handed out a ton of business cards and went though 100+ stickers. I met a lot of good people and I learned a lot having John Slawta displaying next to me. We'll see about going to Indy next year.

Cyclingnews.com Luv

James Huang of Cyclingnews stopped by the booth on Sunday to snap some photos. I was stoked because I was sure to not get any coverage from VeloSnooze or BikePDX. And we all know cyclingnews.com is the shiznit and the only real cycling website worth reading, well 'cept for Pez. Check it out.

SS MTB

Road

Jersey

Eff-Yeah

Just got back from the show.....I'm spent. I'll get a full report from the show up a little bit.

NAHBS Pre-Show

Got the booth set up tonight. Check it.

Getting my shiznit to the show. About $15K worth of bikes and equipment stuffed into the back of the Element.

Someone to do the heavy lifting.

Wheel in the goods.

Set up, ready for showtime.

Oh Dude,

Tomorrow I set up for the big show. I only have few more things to do :) Apparently my stress is showing. Vickers was nice enough to give me a hug today when I walked into the shop to pick up some tires for a bike. Thanks.

Got a text message today from the author of everyones favorite pro blog. Look's like Omer is going to start updating again. Let's hope he can keep it up.

WebSite Re-Do

A few months ago I was looking for someone to rebuild my lame attempt at being a webmaster. Who I found was a furry transplant from the mid-west. He agreed to rework my website while he adjusted to his new moister environment.

Check it out, I think it looks like someone actually knows what they are doing. Great job, yo!