The above video is a poached screen-capture of Mark Webber’s absolutely spectacular and amazing crash at the Formula One GP of Valencia this past weekend. Since the powers that be controlling how Formula One broadcasts are handled tend to have a dim view of rebroadcasts, even when taken by pointing a camera at a TV screen, this may or may not be viewable for very long. However, there are scads of TV screen caps of this wreck on youtube at the moment (in case the embed above gets yanked…), because it is too awesome not to be seen over and over again. It should be noted at this point that Webber emerged from this crash unscathed. Now watch it again.

What does this have to do with bikes? Well, for contrarian fun, one could use this crash and Webber’s subsequent uninjured state (check out that slow-mo bit as he goes upside down then lands upside down just before the camera gets ground into the tarmac) as a ringing endorsement of the ability of carbon fiber to withstand truly massive amounts of damage, when designed properly. However, watching as the air is filled with carbon fiber confetti from both Webber’s and Kovaleinen’s cars, the carbon haters of the world could point to the debris and scream out, “See! Lookit how fragile that shit is!” Yeah, we know, cars are not bikes and vice versa. Now go watch some of the video footage again. Pretty. Damn. Impressive.

Aside from that, it should be noted that Webber actually rides bikes, and has some nice titanium souvenirs as part of that life:

Image poached from News of the World. Click the pic for the full story

Dude is hard, pure and simple. And can wreck with the best of them when it comes to wadding up real expensive carbon fiber race cars. Argue your carbon fiber pro/con love/hate to the end of time, we’re just stoked he walked way intact. That, and we can’t help but be awed by the imagery:

Shaky bad video screen grab courtesy of the BBC, apparently

Meanwhile, back in the world of bikes, Dust-Star At Tahoe hosted a round of the Pro-GRT this weekend, and the Syndicate boys showed up during the four-week long hole in the World Cup Schedule to trash Roskopp’s house and do some bike racing. Evidently it went well:

Minnaar with the big check, Peaty with the perfectly placed photo-bomb thumb. Don't spend it all in one place, guys...

The race winning happened in spite of training methods that at best could be described as “questionable”:

Now, it is painful to have to say this about the Current World Cup leader (bike) and reigning World Champion (skates), but come on, guys, where is your dignity?

And the fact that the winning took place on those bikes made out of the same jive material as that hokey F1 car that fell to pieces earlier in this post:

Click this pic to get Syndicate Den Mother Kathy's report on the event, as well as to see even more incriminating photos of why people should not rollerskate. Photo credit for all Dust-Star images given to Den Mother Kathy...