Mr. 49%? I hope not.

Fabulous Fabian Cancellara's win in yesterday's Stage 3 of le Tour was absolutely thrilling. Well, until about five seconds after he crossed the line, when I remembered which team he is on and who runs that team. Any fan who is not skeptical these days of any fantastic race results is a fool. The greater fool still is the fan who denies that when the master puppeteer, Bjarne "Mr 60%" Riis is pulling the strings, "probs doping" is the operative phrase.

Tyler and Ivan both suddenly went from really strong to insanely strong. Let's not forget Bobby J's resurgence either, though Jullich's never been found to be a doper. Are we to believe all this is due to some glorified paintball boot camp? Even this generally optimistic and positive reporter knows that CSC's military-style team-building exercises do not make anyone ride faster.

Fabian, your ride was amazing and I, for one, admire your panache and your enthusiasm for our sport, but fear the worst. My vocabulary is not colorful enough to speak for my degenerate colleague Mr. 60, but he no doubt thinks you're a shameless ****ing doper.

Doping, natch.

The inaugural U.S. Open Cycling Championships was held today in Richmond, Virginia. Don't worry if you've never heard of it, Mr. 60 hadn't either.

They race organizers managed to attract NBC, which aired the last two hours of the race. This is called instant legitimacy.

Never mind that holding this race the day before the Tour of Flanders is like comparing the love scene in "The Lady and The Tramp" to the Bukkake finale in "The DaVinci Load". By the way, that last title is totally NSFW. Completely. Unless of course it is SFW, in which case, right on!

Anyway, the race was won by Svein Tuft of the Symmetrics Pro (!?!) Cycling Team. In so doing, he beat out all of the top domestic squads including Toyota-United, Health Net, and Navigators.

Who is Mr. Tuft?

The portly Mr. Tuft.

We've never heard of him nor his team, and we doubt you have either.
We'd like to think that this is a miracle story. Mr. 60 would love to report that this 80 kg. rider has just scored the win of his life through hard work and dedication. But he's been racing since 1999 and his biggest road race win to date is the 2004 Yaletown Grand Prix, in Vancouver, BC. Wait. He won the what? The where? Exactly. We're going to go ahead and file this one as probs doping: Svein Tuft.

Who's first?