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Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood: Levi for Georgia, Horner stateside with aching leg
The buildup for the April 19-24 Dodge Tour de Georgia sure took some interesting turns this week. First, cycling’s biggest star announced that he … okay, well, he didn’t actually make an announcement, but he said he would make an announcement about something important at the Tour de Georgia.
Everyone’s buzzing about the possibility that Lance Armstrong will either announce his impending retirement, following the 2005 Tour de France, or, given his recent visit to Italian magistrate Giuseppe Quattrocchi, announce an attempt at a Giro d’Italia-Tour double this year — and then ride off into the sunset with a six-pack of Shiner Bock under one arm and a truckload of endorsement contracts in the other. Whatever his plans are, it’s the biggest buzz in a week of cycling that saw Armstrong’s Discovery Channel teammate Stijn Devolder win at Three Days of De Panne while Belgian Tom Boonen (Quick Step), a favorite for the upcoming Tour of Flanders, Ghent-Wevelgem and Paris-Roubaix, crashed out of De Panne, bruising his back and requiring stitches to his hand.
Other big news related to the Tour de Georgia is the as-yet-unofficial announcement that Gerolsteiner, headed by American Levi Leipheimer, will participate. This brings the total number of ProTour teams in Georgia to six: Discovery, CSC, Saunier Duval, Phonak, Crédit Agricole and Gerolsteiner. And with five of those teams potentially led by Americans – Armstrong, Bobby Julich, Chris Horner, Floyd Landis and Leipheimer – Georgia could just prove to be the greatest week of stage racing yet witnessed on North American soil.
There are, however, a few caveats to this scenario. Word is that Julich, whose renaissance continues with his win at Criterium International last week, hasn’t yet committed to the race. It would be a surprise if Julich, who finished fourth in Georgia last year behind Armstrong, teammate Jens Voigt and Horner, didn’t return looking to improve at his country’s biggest event. Last year Voigt crossed the pond to ride in support of Julich, and there’s no reason to believe he wouldn’t do the same this time around.
While Armstrong, Landis and Leipheimer are committed to racing in Georgia, the other unknown quantity is Horner, winner of the inaugural Tour de Georgia in 2003, the same year he won in Redlands and San Francisco and led out Saturn teammate Mark McCormack to the stars-and-stripes jersey in Philadelphia. Horner rang VeloNews Wednesday evening, on his way home to Bend, Oregon, to let us know how things have been going on the other side of the Atlantic.
As it turns out, how they’ve been going is not too well. A crash at Tirreno-Adriatico left Horner with tremendous pain in his left leg, and he’s back in the U.S. with two purposes: to prepare for Georgia, and, if needed, to have his own doctor conduct an MRI to determine the extent of the damage. Although initial X-rays showed no fractures, Horner said three weeks later he’s still having trouble walking.
“The damn thing won’t heal,” Horner said. “It’s like, ‘It’s been three weeks now, how much longer does this need?’ I rode the day after Setmana Catalana [March 26] and haven’t ridden since.”
Horner’s troubles began on March 10, while sitting in the middle of the pack during stage 2 at Tirreno-Adriatico. A sudden turn, combined with some gravel in the road, sent him to the ground.
“It was just a dirty road,” Horner said. “I’m on the far outside, and all of sudden we’re going left. I hit the brake and the front end of the bike just washed out.”
Though he was able to remount and finish the stage, things turned black shortly afterward.
“Stage 3 was 240km, and all through the day my left leg was just incredibly painful,” Horner said. “At the end of the race I could barely walk to the team car. After an hour-long transfer, it took two guys to carry me into the hotel. The X-rays showed nothing is broken in the bones, so I said, ‘Okay, let’s see what happens.’ I took two days off, and then rode two hours easy and it seemed to be okay, but not great.”
Team doctors assured Horner that not only was nothing broken, but there wasn’t likely a muscle or ligament tear. If there had been a ripped or torn muscle, they told him, the pain would be as persistent on the bike as it is off the bike. The team doctor told Horner it was likely a muscle spasm or some sort of contusion around his left hip. But training through it didn’t help, Horner said, and the pain has persisted.
“When I first stand up from sitting down, it’s really painful,” Horner said. “After a minute or so it goes away, but when I sit back down it’s painful.”
Though he skipped Milan-San Remo, Horner’s team directors encouraged him to race at Setmana Catalana, where he finished top-10 in a pair of sprint finishes on his way to 16th place overall. But, Horner said, that was an awkward performance.
“I guess it was a respectable ride, for pedaling with one leg,” he said. “Every time I went to push hard, the leg just wouldn’t deliver. It showed that I have got some form, but I was just in so much pain. It wasn’t so bad when I was on the bike, but every time I got off the bike I couldn’t even walk to the hotel room. It would take me 10 minutes to walk what should have been a two-minute walk. “I didn’t really want to do Setmana. I knew how bad the leg was. I didn’t think it would do me any good to do Setmana, but the team directors thought it would be good to do some more racing before I came back to the States. I don’t think it helped the leg, I think it stopped improving. I wanted to come back as soon as it went bad. I wanted to come back to the States, go see my own doctor and start preparing for Georgia and the Giro. That’s been my goal since day one anyways.”
Horner said if the problem isn’t better in the next few days, he’ll go in for an MRI. If the magnetic imaging reveals something serious, Georgia might be off the schedule, leaving the Giro as his next big goal. But he added that should the injury heal quickly, he believes he can come back to form in time to give Armstrong and the rest of the European-based Americans a run for their money in Georgia.
“With Levi and Bobby and Floyd and Lance, it’s going to be an all-American showdown,” Horner said. “I’d hate to miss it. Right now I’m not even really worried, I just need it to start getting better for tomorrow. I think three weeks is enough time to come into really good form. It all depends on what the leg will do between now and then.
“I’d like to start real training tomorrow. I can train through soreness; I just need to find out if that’s all it is. If I can train, I can show up [to Georgia] close to 100 percent. If not, I’ll have to think about the Giro. I’m not going to the Giro to ride gruppetto, that’s for sure. If the leg stays sore, there’s nothing I can do, and then I’m just at the Giro looking stupid.”
