Two Weeks Until Christmas

Well it is less than two weeks to go until Christmas, looking forward to see my son Philip home from college, but I really seem to get tense during this time.  Too much stress from work and too much stress from 7 year old with nothing but time to drive me nuts.  Great kid, but when Christmas gets close he gets to be a bit hard to handle.  Planning on an hour long ride on the trainer today, still raining outside.  I think I'll watch some of the 2005 Paris-Nice while I ride, the year Bobby Julich won.

Wish I had the time and resources to go to bicycle races with my family every weekend.  Although that assumes that they would like to go.  Andrew enjoys going to cyclocross races, but only because he gets to play with other kids when he goes.  Not that he likes to watch the races themselves.  Drew has some balance and fine motor skills deficits, so he hasn't mastered riding his bike without training wheels yet.  I hope this spring we will be able to get him on the bike w/o training wheels.

Quite a few people are discussing the Sky versus Garmin teams for the Tour de France already, debating the strength of each team.  I like Bradley Wiggins, not that I have ever met him, but like I said before I think he didn't do right by Jonathan Vaughters and his team.

I have put together a list of wikipedia entries for the major races, or at least the ones I could remember for your reading enjoyment:

La Primavera
Milan - San Remo


Cobbled Classics
Paris -Roubaix
Gent-Wevelgem
Ronde van Vlaanderen (Tour of Flanders)

Ardennes Classics

Amstel Gold Race
La Fleche Wallonne
Liège–Bastogne–Liège

Other Classics
Clásica de San Sebastián

Paris - Tours

Giro di Lombardia

Stage Races

Tirreno-Adriatico
Paris - Nice
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré
Giro d'Italia
Tour of California
Tour de France
Vuelta a España

Formerly Contested Races
Grand Prix des Nations

I will continue to add to this list and publish a nearly complete list.  At least with the wikipedia entries there are more historical facts and a list of past winners and links to the actual race website if the race is still being contested under the original name.