The Tour de France started today! As I write this the prologue is going on (although none of the big names have gone yet, so we don't know who will lead tomorrow). Google is offering team HTC-Columbia's stats realtime in the tour via an API, so I may play around with that a bit (or at least collect the data... I've never looked at pro riders' stats before).

They also have a good explanation of power, and why it's an interesting metric. I really have no concept of what my power:weight ratio is (I've never ridden a bike with a trustable power meter), but it would be interesting to see what my power:weight was versus a pro. Some day when I'm rich I'll get a power meter :-)

Anyway, it's going to be an interesting tour. Will Vino ride for Contador? Will Basso win? Can Lance's monster of a team get a W? Who knows, but it'll be fun to watch over the next few weeks :)

Unfortunately, the spam on my blog appears to have continued. Thus, I've implemented an anti-spam procedure in GTFO: the dreaded CAPTCHA. In the spirit of the framework, though, I've tried to make it pretty easy... all it requires is that you type the word 'orange' in to the form. This wouldn't be enough to fool human attackers, but I believe there's a number of years left in AI/NLP research before my blog will start being spammed again ;-). Sorry for the inconvenience, but I don't like logging in every morning to delete the spam.

In other news, I'm back from the UK. Lots of photos were taken (both by me and by others), and I'm sure I'll have those up soon.