agonist/antigonist

 The return of the king...again. Previously... Tadej Pogacar easily dispatched all-comers for the second year in a row, taking four stages and the mountains classification in the process. Jonathan Milan won the points competition and Florian Lipowitz the young rider classification. Wout van Aert won the final stage on the non-traditional but now canonical  Champs-Élysées. The (only) one that got away            The Course  Starts in Catalunya, then hits the Pyrenees before the Massif Central, then the Vosges mountains, and finally the Alps before the finish in Paris. There are rumblings of independence protests in during the Barcelona stages, so we'll see if the race can start without a hitch or if we'll see some 2025 Vuelta-style neutralized or preemptive finishes .  The 2026 route in all its glory    To be blunt, we Pogacar in the race, any stage has the potential to be a decisive. But, regardless, here are some of my key sta...

At the Tour of Romandie this week, Primož Roglič has drawn some (to say the least) cycling pundits for his seeming lack of serious demeanor in a stage race where his teammate placed second overall while Roglič seemingly lost needless time on stage 3, then went in the break on stage 4 instead of working for Lipowitz.  The attentive among us will have noticed that this behavior is a hold-over from the last week of last year's Tour de France, where Roglič went on several ill-fated escapades up the road, losing his top-5 placing in the process, all while seeming nonchalant. Coupled with a sparse racing calendar so far this year and a long break in racing planned until the Vuelta a España in August, some are wondering if the Slovenian is already riding off into the sunset at age 36. No crocodile tears but maybe an alligator smile? While this may, in fact, be the case, I am not so sure. We can argue that Roglič should have worked for Lipowitz in Romandie, given Lipowitz was branded with ...

 I'm feeling a bit rusty... Hills on hills on hills...a circuit in the Lombardy region of Italy. There's over 2000m of climbing in 150+ km of racing. The start list is high quality, so I don't see much chance for a surprise winner here. None of the climbs are long, and none are consistently steep, but these types of races tend to be taken very aggressively by the peloton, so I wouldn't be surprised to see the winning group get away before the penultimate climb. Contenders ELISA LONGO-BOURGHINI -- Once again very fast in the early season, she already has the overall in the UAE plus the Jabel Hafeet stage. Was one of the strongest in Strade, but suffered from a mucked-up finale. Plus, she took a dominant win on an easier parcours in Italy last weekend, I don't see why she shouldn't be the favorite, especially with such a strong support group. KASIA NIEWIADOMA -- With Vollering missing out on the final in Strade with a mechanical, she looked to be the favorite unti...

 For context: I applied for assistant professor positions in Europe, Canada, and the United States of America in 2023. That year, I got two Zoom interviews (one went well, and one went very poorly to the extent that it was unclear to me why I was being interviewed), no on-site interviews, and no offers. I skipped the 2024-2025 cycle and am in the middle (well, closer to the tail end) of the 2025-2026 application cycle. As I write this (16 January 2026), I have had four Zoom interviews, one on-site interview, and no offers (update 24 Febrauary 2026: I had my second-ever on-site interview last week). This cycle I have applied to universities in the United States of America and in Europe (a total of 16 applications submitted so far). I received my bachelors degree in chemical physics from Centre College in 2015 and my PhD in physical chemistry (advisor: Marina Guenza) from the University of Oregon in 2021. I was a postdoctoral associate in the Institute of Physical Science and Technol...

When one door closes, another one opens...as the men's race is wrapping up, the women's race is winding up. Previously... Kasia Niewiadoma took the overall title over Demi Vollering after a nail-biting finale up Alpe d' Huez. The victory was assisted a bit by Vollering's late crash on stage 5, were only one teammate fell back to assist in the finale. The 2024 overall podium Le map avec Zwift Nine stages in total, starting in Brittany...it would be nice if the race were two weeks long with a rest day, but oh well. The first two stages are punchy, then two sprint stages, then another lumpy stages, and finally, the last four stages are proper mountain stages, although there is only one HC finish. My Key Stages Stage 1 profile Stage 2 profile The first two stages are tailor-made for someone like Marianne Vos, but other punchuers should feature...I am thinking of Liane Lippert or Puck Pieterse or Mischa Bredewold. But it will be interesting to see who SD Worx prioritizes for...

 Christmas in July? Maybe for a certain Slovenian...it's been another orbit around the celestial body at the center of our solar system, meaning it's once again Tour time. Previously... France won the first two stages (including a very nice yellow jersey for the soon-to-be-retired Romain Bardet) before Tadej Pogacar went on a 19-day barnstorming tour of France, swiping five stages and eviscerating all-comers, including his two closest rivals, both still on the mend from a horror crash in El País Vasco. Regardless, it was likely the most dominant performance in over a decade, since the glory days of the mechanical Team Sky GC juggernaut. In short, UAE and Pogacar put everyone to the sword early and once again ascended to men's professional cycling's throne on the legendary boulevard of...erm, in Nice. UAE once again bring a murder's row of support riders and all three of Pogacar's biggest rivals have once again faced major setbacks in their preparations for the w...