OK, I'll try to make this my last Tour de France-related post. For a day or two, at least.

I got names for the OLN host team for the Tour - Kirsten Gum and Bob Roll. Bob is a former cycler, member of the original 7-11 team, former Motorola rider, done the big races (Tour, Giro, Suisse). He sounded less like an imbibing John C. Reilly yesterday, perhaps he was keyed up given the excitement of the L'Alpe d'Huez ascent.

Gum is a reasonably seasoned news/sports anchor, having done some work for ESPN Outdoors programming and even some NASCAR. Creative Loafing Online lauded her previous work in Charlotte. Assuming that's her, she's let her hair grow.

Given that OLN is working with what I assume are French TV-provided visuals, they're doing OK. They could use some spotters on the course during mountain stages, given how often they were at a loss for knowing where a specific person was on the course. My thought is that they should adapt the GPS technology used for NASCAR's on line and PPV coverage for the Tour so they could keep tabs on specific riders. Not sure how easily you could adapt the tech for bikes, but if it was possible, that'd be cool.

Most impressive riding of the last couple of days would be from Tyler Hamilton of nearby Marblehead, who is climbing well and staying in the top 5 to 10 riders overall, all while cycling with a collarbone that's fractured in two places.

I was actually in Marblehead yesterday, which is the only reason I know offhand that Hamilton is from there (they've got a sign up in town; I suppose if he wins the race they'll have to move the state high school sailing champs sign at the town line). Sarah and I went yesterday for a little day trip, as she'd never been and I've only been once or twice (never had much of a call to go there).

For this local foray I was the cause of its abrupt termination, as I had some sort of reaction to something in my lunch. As reactions go it was minor - slight puffiness and discoloration to the lips - but enough to hit the road and stop at my brother's house for some Benadryl. Thankfully I'm on call this week; I fear another local tourism trip would wind up with one of us breaking a bone or something.