I’m pretty sure we all want to ride strong all season long. Whether you have a full season of racing or you just want to be ready for a charity ride six months from now, you probably have some sort of training plan to accomplish your goals.

Stick to your plan and you could ride strong all season, but it’s not guaranteed. But there’s something that will help increase your chances for riding strong all season…

Want to know what it is?

Then read my article How to Ride Strong All Season Long: Don’t Get Hurt! over at Training4Cyclists.com.

This is the craziest roller riding video I’ve ever seen. As if it’s not hard enough to ride no hands or one foot on rollers, this guy decides to ride with no hands and one leg! It’s insane!

I think the hardest part is clipping back in without a hand on the bar, but he makes it look easy!

(I first saw the video at http://teamchainreaction.com/video/hungerford/ but that site seems to have been taken down.)

As if the owners and organizers of the Tour de France haven’t done enough stupid stuff in the past few years, they’ve already gone ahead and ruined the 2008 Tour.

How? By not including Team Astana. In other words, 2007 winner Alberto Contador and my main man (who took 3rd last year, by the way) Levi Leipheimer won’t be able to compete.

It’s ridiculous! This could be Levi’s best shot at the win! (And he’s like 35 now, it’s not like he can say “oh well I’ll just try again some other year.”)

So… they’re kicking out the good riders so that we can watch a bunch of mediocre competitors? How exciting… :/ (Note that I’m using “mediocre” in a relative sense.)

That will suck for viewers, but it will be much worse for the riders that are still there. In my experience, winning a race due to the fact that better racers didn’t show up isn’t much of a win.

And here’s the dumbest part of all this - the lame reasoning behind it. Tour director Christian Prudhomme said the Astana team was left out due to their tarnished reputation and the fact that they couldn’t be trusted.

Now that may have had some merit last year, but this is a totally revamped team. Not only does it include two incredible athletes in Contador and Leipheimer, but legendary Team director Johan Bruyneel. All the dopers were thrown out.

So really what’s happening is that Astana is being penalized for reinventing itself into a reputable team. They took a stance against doping and now have a good organization - and they were denied an invitation to the Tour!

But we can fight back! Sign the petition: Let Levi Ride!

Photo credit: Neeta Lind

I love pizza, so anytime I can get three mediums for just $5 each, I get excited. I was kind of excited for the Domino’s 5-5-5 deal just because it’s fairly cheap, but the Pizza Hut Pizza Mia deal really had me excited. (Although not quite as excited as I was when a local pizza place for doing 3 large pizzas for $5 each!)

Pizza Hut’s commercials claimed “sauce from vine-riped tomatoes” and “whole milk mozzarella cheese with a hint of cheddar.” What really stands out in my mind though is that the Pizza Mias looked really good!

(Plus when you consider that most fruits/vegetables are picked before they ripen so that they don’t bruise during shipping, the promise of “vine-ripened tomatoes” really is something special.)

It just looked so good I had to have it. So I ordered some…

And then I got a brilliant idea - I would write about it on my website! So at the last minute, before getting the pizza, I looked it up on the internet to see if anyone else was writing about it.

I was a bit surprised to see conflicting reviews online already. Turns out the Pizza Mia has been out for a while, and despite the heralded sauce and mozzarella, some people say they are terrible pizzas!

What did I think?

I thought it was some of the best pizza I’ve ever had. Really. The first thing I noticed was the amazing aroma, which I later learned was due to the robust sauce and soft cheese packed with flavor. The sauce tasted like a real tomato sauce and it had a nice oregano flavor.

The crust is nice and chewy; it’s definitely not a thin crust but it’s not as thick as their pan pizza. The best part? No grease! At all! It was nice and dry and crispy on the outside but still soft and chewy inside. (Normally I avoid Pizza Hut because the pan pizza is dripping with grease…)

The Pizza Mia is not loaded with mounds of cheese, either, so it’s healthier all around. I actually like my pizza with less cheese so this was great. It’s probably best enjoyed without any toppings, although I enjoyed one with onions, which added to the spicy flavor (and by spicy I mean ’spices’ like oregano, not ’spicy’ like hot buffalo wings.)

[Note: Some other website reviews said the pizza sucks and the crust is like cardboard. Their local Pizza Hut staff must be sub-par, because my pizza was put together nicely.]

My final verdict is…

If you like a good, authentic pizza, the Pizza Mia is awesome. It’s more like something from a ‘mom and pop’ pizzeria than a national chain. It also appears much healthier than a typical pan pizza, so I’d recommend it for anyone who would rather not have their arteries clogged from one meal.

If you want a thick greasy crust loaded with cheese and other toppings, though, this isn’t for you.

Don’t get me wrong, the best pizza still comes straight out of Italy, but this was great for a national chain restaurant. And let’s face it, can you afford to fly to Italy every so often just to get a slice of pizza?

[Click here if you would like to get your product reviewed on CoachLevi.com.]

Have you ever been leading a race and you got so excited and caught up in the moment that you had to throw your arms up in the air, even before crossing the finish line?

Well, this guy did, and look what happened to him…

Oh boy… that’s a very important lesson in racing - do not celebrate too early! You never know what could happen…

Well, actually you do: you could lose the race, get laughed at by crowds of spectators, and then end up looking like a jackass on YouTube for all eternity!

Hopefully now you won’t have to learn the hard way. Instead, take a lesson from this poor chap who already gave up his podium spot, got laughed at, and still looks like a jackass on YouTube.

If you don’t want to be remembered like that, I suggest taking a look at this thorough guide to proper victory salutes over at Cozy Beehive. It has everything you need to know about looking good when you win!