Bicycling: Valkenburg course suits punchy Slovak, but is he too tired?

VeloNation: July/August races revert to original pre-Olympic slots; Hangzhou returns despite 2012 cancellation.

VeloNews: After a season of surpassing expectations, Tejay van Garderen lines up Sunday as an outsider for the rainbow jersey in the elite men’s road race.

Races & Results.
UCI Road World Championship -  Sept 16-23 (Races & Results),
Tour of Britain -  Sept 9-16 (Stages & Results),
Vuelta a España -  Aug 18 - Sept 9 (Stages & Results),
Tour of China -  Sept 7-13 (Stages & Results),
Mountain Bike Championships - Aug 31 - Sept 9 (Races),
CyclingNews: More...

CXMagazine: In a cyclocross race that saw searing attacks, surprising drops, the return of a master and a race-deciding crash, reigning US National Champion Jeremy Powers (Rapha-Focus) won the 2012 CrossVegas Elite Men’s race in a commanding solo performance after overcoming a lackluster start.

CyclingNews: After announcing the recent acquisition of Liquigas Sport by Brixia, the team known as Liquigas-Cannondale will become Cannondale Pro Cycling Team in 2013. It will be the first time Cannondale has title-sponsored a ProTeam and seemed a fitting next step for the brand that has enjoyed a strong relationship with the squad managed by Roberto Amadio.

PodiumInsight: Anthem Sports of Cambridge, NY and the Art Longsjo Foundation announce a preliminary agreement to bring the Fitchburg Longsjo Classic cycling race back to the calendar for American cycling for 2013 and beyond.

CyclingNews: Acquarone comments on potential for Giro start in the USA.

road.cc: Well-priced, comfortable bars that look great too.

CyclingNews: Tony Martin (Germany) took his second straight time trial world championship title, but it couldn't have been much closer. He visibly slowed in the final kilometers and beat Taylor Phinney (United States) by a mere 5.37 seconds.

CyclingNews: Ninth at two minutes and 30 seconds down on Tony Martin was not the result that Alberto Contador wanted to get at the UCI Time Trial World Championships on Wednesday, but the Spaniard put a brave face on it at the finish line.

CyclingNews: Dutchman reacts angrily to questions on Armstrong testing.

VeloNews: Taylor Phinney and Tejay van Garderen proved once and for all they are no longer riders who will someday be a force in the international peloton.

CyclingNews: Euskaltel-Euskadi manager Miguel Madariaga has said that hearing about the death of Víctor Cabedo on Wednesday afternoon was his worst moment during his long career in the sport. Madariaga received the news from Euskaltel team leader Samuel Sánchez, who was a close friend of Cabedo and rode with the 23-year-old at last week’s Tour of Britain.

PEZ: Mrs. Connie Phinney - mother of the elite TT silver medallist Taylor - out on her bike. One wit suggested she was out looking for the five seconds which Taylor had lost.

BikeRadar: Although a few individuals have been playing with 650b wheels on 26in bikes, Litespeed may be the first company to make a bike with a built-in geometry conversion solution. Dubbed MWC (Multi Wheel Compatible), the system consists of a creatively used, concentric bottom bracket in a press-fit 30 frame.

road.cc: Good lightweight dry lube but possibly not vastly superior to others on the market.

BikeRadar: "The Landlord Series is just an experiment, really," Raleigh USA's Mark Landsaat said. "We only make limited quantities of each of these bikes, and when they're gone, they're gone. People who buy them end up with a pretty unique bike."

BikeRadar: K-Edge has added a new upper-end version of its popular braze-on chain catcher for 2013. The new Professional model now attaches to its own concave washer with an extra bolt that not only makes it easier to adjust but also locks it in place with 50 percent more force, according to K-Edge. At Interbike, K-Edge also showed early versions of time trial bike mounts for SRM and Garmin.

CyclingNews: Euskaltel-Euskadi’s Víctor Cabedo has been killed in a training accident that occurred early on Wednesday afternoon in Almedijar, just a few kilometres from his home in Onda, in south-east Spain. According to initial reports, the 23-year-old was on a descent on a rough section of road when he was in a collision with a vehicle.

VeloNews: In April, Alex Howes made a spring classics debut worth remembering. He wants to revisit the front end of the race on Sunday in the Limburg hills of the Netherlands.

road.cc: A light aluminium stem with added flair.

VeloNews: Five-time Tour de France winner Miguel Indurain called the dark clouds over professional cycling “sad” on Thursday, and said he wasn’t sure what should happen to Lance Armstrong’s seven Tour titles.

CyclingNews: Paul Kimmage has received a subpoena from the Swiss district court that will hear the defamation proceedings instigated against him by current UCI president Pat McQuaid, his predecessor Hein Verbruggen and the UCI itself.

VeloNation: Contador, Basso, Scarponi, Beloki and Manzano amongst witnesses called.

VeloNews: Lance Armstrong, whom the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency handed a lifetime ban in August, will take the start at the Superfrog Triathlon in Coronado, California, later this month. Organizers on Wednesday announced a new partnership with the Livestrong Foundation and confirmed that the banned former world champion would take part in the event, which is not sanctioned by USA Triathlon.

The UCI has now rated Dwars door Vlaanderen -- the traditional opener of the three-week Cobbles season -- as a 1.HC race, up from the 1.1 classification of last season. The bottom line is that the total of points awarded goes up. The winner gets 100 UCI points instead of 80; places go 15 deep instead of 12; and some other confusing UCI rule stuff applies. Bottom line, Dwars gets more enticing.

Off The Beaten Path:  "A journalist who was going to ride his bike across Babyshoe Pass in the Cascades this week, rather than walk the halls of Interbike, was somebody I wanted to meet. I had suggested we get together when he passed through town."

BikeRadar: The miniscule Looxcie 2 certainly takes a different approach to many video cameras, concentrating on what people tend to do with footage instead of absolute image quality. Maximum resolution is a modest 480p but Looxcie has made it remarkably simple to share your view of the world – instantly.

CyclingNews: Qatar has been awarded the 2016 UCI Road World Championships, it was announced Wednesday. Cyclingnews first revealed in August that the bid was on track, with this year’s Worlds in Valkenburg named as the location for the Qatar announcement.  No dates have yet been announced.

VeloNation: American heartbroken, Belarusian elated, both motivated by result after defeat to Tony Martin.

BikeRadar verdict: 5 out of 5 stars. "All the tools you could need in one simple box, with quality the order of the day."