CyclingNews: Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank) is now on the point of claiming his second Vuelta a España and his fifth Grand Tour. But as the 29-year-old from the small town of Pinto just outside Madrid said in a long (virtual) winner’s press conference after the Bola del Mundo stage, he is having a hard time believing that he is really going to win it.

Results - Stage 20...

CyclingNews: Denis Menchov took a memorable win atop the Bola del Mundo on stage 20 of the Vuelta a España. The Russian beat breakaway companion Riche Porte (Team Sky) after the pair had broken clear on the lower slopes of the demanding final climb of the day.

CyclingNews: Nino Schurter led the Swiss sweep of the top three places at the elite men's cross country world championship in Saalfelden, Austria on Saturday afternoon.  The all red-and-white podium also include Lukas Flueckiger and his brother Mathias in second and third spots respectively.

VeloNation: Biggest climb of the race to decide three-way Spanish battle for the race.

VeloNews: When a tool comes along that helps both the race and the shop mechanic, you know that its manufacturer is onto something. This is the case with Abbey Bike Works’ Crombie Tool. It’s a cassette lockring tool. What makes the Crombie a bit special is that it fits over quick-release nuts. This speeds up the process of changing cassettes significantly.

Races & Results.
Vuelta a España -  Aug 18 - Sept 9 (Stages & Results),
Giro Toscana -  Aug 29 - Sept 2 (Stages & Results),
Mountain Bike Championships - Aug 31 - Sept 9 (Races),
CyclingNews: More...

CyclingFans: Saturday's Vuelta a Espana Stage 20 departs La Faisanera Golf. at 12:30pm CET (6:30am U.S. Eastern) and is expected at the finish at Bola del Mundo at around 5:40pm CET (11:40am U.S. Eastern). Vuelta live streaming video should get underway at around 3:15pm CET (9:15am U.S. Eastern).

VeloNews: Friday’s 19th stage pushed ever closer to Madrid and the conclusion of what’s been a wildly exciting Vuelta a España.

VeloNation: Australian champion outpaces Greg Van Avermaet on false flat finishing straight.

VeloNation: World champion hopes for an amicable separation and that British team doesn’t demand a release fee.

VeloNation: Belgian champion outsprints Mark Renshaw and Oscar Freire after a long day of breakaway.

CyclingNews: Julie Bresset (France) did the double this season by pulling off a win at the elite women's cross country world championship just three weeks after winning the Olympic Games.  Behind the first-year elite French woman, the race was for second, with Gunn-Rita Dahle Flesjaa (Norway) taking silver and Georgia Gould (United States) taking third.

BrowneEye: While the athletes and management look to be making strides in the right direction others in the media are digging in because they are: too dumb to realize that this is a new era, covering their butts as they can see the coming fallout of their Armstrong sycophantic ways, or just completely out of their minds from drinking the yellow Kool-Aid.

CompetitiveCyclist: Most impressive technology of the show: It was an easy choice to award this to Shimano Dura Ace 9000 mechanical shifting. Shimano has made its cable-actuated shifting so crisp and friction-free that it begs the question, "Why go electronic?" Both the front and rear shifting operated with near-effortless purity. It shifts faster than Di2 and offers superior tactile feedback while costing and weighing well less.

CyclingFans: Saturday's Paris-Brussels departs Soissons at 11:20am CET (5:20am U.S. Eastern) and is expected at the finish at Brussels at around 4:30pm CET (10:30am U.S. Eastern).  Paris-Brussels live streaming video should get underway at around 2:30pm CET (8:30am U.S. Eastern).

SBS: In order to move beyond the dark days of doping, the International Cycling Union (UCI) is considering introducing an amnesty for riders and officials to confess to doping offences in the wake of the Lance Armstrong case.

CyclingNews: There is no appeal in the works by the UCI over the lifetime ban of Lance Armstrong, and the nullification of his results imposed by the US Anti-Doping Agency, Reuters reported today.

SBS: Chicago Marathon director Carey Pinkowski confirmed Friday that the ban meted out to Lance Armstrong by the US Anti-Doping Agency means the cyclist can't run in the race.

VeloNation: German sprinter shows versatility in defence of teammate Charlotte Becker’s overall lead.

International cyclo-cross commences on Saturday with the first UCI race of the new season at Rohrbach’s Ellison Park Cyclocross, a two-day UCI C2 event in Rochester, New York.

RBAction: Bradley Wiggins will begin a nationwide lap of honor on Sunday when the four-time Olympic champion and Tour de France winner is among the field in the Tour of Britain. This July the 32-year-old became the first British winner of the Tour de France, road cycling's supreme test of endurance, and Wiggins followed that up in August with Olympic time-trial gold at the London Games.

CyclingNews: Ondrej Cink capped off a great season on Friday afternoon by winning the under 23 men's cross country race at the UCI Mountain Bike World Championships in Saalfelden, Australia. Earlier this year, he won the European U23 Championships and two U23 World Cups, one in Houffalize and one in Nove Mesto.

VeloNews: On August 1, Spaniard Luis León Sánchez (Rabobank) bolted from the start house at the London Olympics time trial, but he didn’t get far.

VeloNews: Thor Hushovd’s sub-par season came as a result of a virus and muscle inflammation, BMC Racing doctor Max Testa said Friday in a release. The former world champion recently underwent four days of testing at the Salt Lake City Health and Fitness Institute.

SingleTrack: Ondrej Cink earned the privilege to wear the rainbow stripes of the world champion jersey with his winning ride in the under-23 men’s world championship race Friday in Saalfelden, Austria.