Some cycling news plus Royal Wedding Fever (yes, I've come down with it too)

Almost one week after my last post, here I am writing a few things about cycling and about (guess what?) the Royal Wedding. Oh yes. You thought you could break free from the 'event of the year' by ending up on this blog, didn't you? Well, sorry to disappoint you, but I've come down with 'the Royal Wedding Fever' too. If you feel you can't stand another long comment of someone about the 'marriage of the century', go to the second part of my post: I won't be offended by your decision.
Actually, in the last months I did try to ignore the royal marriage as long as I could. After all, I don't know Kate and William, so I thought that I shouldn't have cared so much about their wedding. 'Just leave them a bit of privacy, poor things!', I thought every time I heard news about their marriage.
Just this morning I abandoned my indifferent attitude and I started feeling pretty excited about the wedding. So excited (and curious) that, as soon as I came home, I abandoned my dignity in the garden, entered the house and immediately asked: 'What was Kate wearing this morning?!?' to the first person I saw (who was my dad, aka the only creature in the house who hadn't watched the wedding). Ok, perhaps I've exaggerated this part. Actually, I must confess that the first thing I asked as soon as I entered the house was: 'How many seconds of advantage does Sorensen have on the peloton?'. Then, I asked about the wedding :P

In the last days I've tried to give a reason for all the big interest around weddings and , in particular, I've thought a bit about why women love marriages so much.
In my opinion, there are at least three elements that make most of us women go crazy about weddings. First of all, there's a 'historical' reason, if we can call it this way. In fact, girls start hearing stories like 'Snow White' and 'Cinerella' when they're 3/4 year old and they don't forget about them until they eventually come down with Alzheimer. These fairy tales enter our girly genes as soon as we start understanding things, just like they entered our mothers and our grandmothers' genes in the past. And how do these fairy tales always end? Well, simple: there's a commoner who marries a gorgeous prince and has an amazing wedding. An amazing wedding with 4 WHITE horses pulling a carriage, the prince wearing his best uniform, the bride wearing the most beautiful dress ever and the church bells ringing happily as soon as the married couple leaves the church. Now, compare this typical 'happy ending' of a fable to the story (and the marriage) of Kate Middleton: there isn't any difference,is there? (No, the fact that William is becoming bald can't be considered a difference). Imo, that's what we girls love so much about important weddings: every time, it's like watching a fairy tale that comes true.
Another important 'marriage love' factor, imo, is that there's a truly important wedding just once (or twice) every 30 year. Watching it (even if on your own little telly) makes you feel like you're part of the history of the world, it makes you able to say 'I was there!' when people in the future will talk about the wedding of William of England and his wife. After all, who doesn't love being part of the world history?
As we girls grow up, actually, another 'wedding love' factor makes its appearance on the stage: the love for dresses. And where can you see more dresses than at a wedding? And where can you see more dresses than at a royal wedding?
I think it's because of these three reasons that many people (especially women) couldn't help watching the wedding this morning (or catching up with it this afternoon). Apropos, thank you BBC News for the super long coverage!!!

Anyway, I realise I'm digressing. Talking about the Royal Wedding, I must say that I really liked it. Kate looked very nice and natural and with William she forms a very nice couple. Talking about the Prince, my mother's best comment about the ceremony was: 'Poor guy! And to say he had so much hair when he was a kid!' Btw fear not, William: you can ask Berlusconi what treatment he used to make his hair reappear on his head again. If it succeeded with him, it will surely succeed also with you.
Talking about fashion, I really liked the dresses worn by Kate (of course), by her sister, her mother and by Victoria Beckham. As far as the Queen is concerned, my sister said 'she looks like a banana'. I actually found her very sweet, in her yellow dress, looking like a normal granny who goes to her nephew's wedding. Actually, this morning the most discussed issue at school was: how does William address to her grandmother? I mean, does she call her 'Dear Grandmother'? Or does he refer to her as to 'Her Majesty'? Or do Harry and Will simply call her 'Betty the Granny'? (It's a fascinating topic of discussion, isn't it?)
Still talking about today's topics of discussion at school, one of the most 'successful' ones was the following: 'which prince am I going to marry?' Here you have some pictures of the Princes that haven't got married yet. Most of my friends went for Harry, but I'm afraid that they're not the only ones who had this idea today, while watching the marriage...
Talking about the nobles who took part in the ceremony, it was nice to see the faces of some people whose existence I had ignored until this morning. I was really curious to see the Grand Duke of Luxembourg (of course) and I was shocked when I saw the dresses of two of the members of the Royal Family (the Duchesses of York, perhaps?). However, I was very relieved that no one from Italian government attended the ceremony. Otherwise, we would have distinguished ourselves in a negative way even today. Moreover, I was very happy to see that no one from Casa Savoia went at the wedding either. I wouldn't have beared it if Emanuele Filiberto had started singing and dancing at the post-ceremony party. In fact, whereas Holland has a guy like Boogerd taking part in 'Dancing with the Stars', the Italian edition of the programme has had the Prince Emanuele Filiberto amongst its most famours performers. Thanks God Italy's no longer a monarchy.

CYCLING NEWS:
After expressing my few trivial thoughts about THE wedding, let's finally talk about cycling. Today was a joyful day for the whole AAVL, who could cheer for Vinokourov's victory in Neuchatel stage of Tour de Romandie. Vino followed Toni Martin (who had attacked with 2 kms to go) together with Cherel and he eventually won the eventual 3 men sprint. Cherel complained about Vino's way of sprinting, but imo the Kazakhistan rode in a correct way. The Frenchman tried to pass where there was no space, it's not Vino's fault if he made that mistake!
Still talking about Tour de Romandie, yesterday stage was won by Damiano Cunego and everyone was very happy about it (at least here in Italy). Moreover, CA Sorensen tried to escape from the peloton yesterday and he tried again this afternoon. Today he's even remained alone at the front o the race for some time, before being eventually caught with just 10 kms to go. Chris looks very good in these days and this makes me ask why he's not taking part in the Giro (and the same goes for Vinokourov and Cunego).
A rider who certainly won't take part in the Corsa Rosa is poor Daniele Bennati, who crashed two days ago in Romandie and broke his right collarbone and 4 ribs. I wish him a fast recovery and I hope he'll be able to race problems-free in the second part of the season.
Also Kiserlovski has had some physical problems lately. The Croatian rider in fact has just discovered that he has a cracked vertebrae, which is a consequence of his Paris-Nice crash (the one in which he ended up under a truck parked at the side of the road). Hopefully he'll be able to take part in the Giro, since I have high expectations on him.
Talking about another race that is going on right now, Tour of Turkey is a goldmine for sprinters. In fact, every stage of the race so far has been won by a sprinter. Today it was the turn of Andre Greipel, whereas Saxo Banker Jaroslaw Marycz, who attacked in the last km of race, couldn't get to the top 3. However, chapeau for trying.
So, these are some of the cycling news of the last days. As you can see, it isn't much. In the next days I'll probably post something about the Giro, so stay tuned!