The Mailbag is a regular department on VeloNews.com. Write to webletters@insideinc.com. Please include your full name, hometown and state or nation. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. Writers are encouraged to limit their submissions to one letter per month. The letters published should not be viewed as reflecting the opinions, policies or positions of VeloNews.com, VeloNews magazine or our parent company.

Ugly crash in Mexico
Dear Editors,

Thought you guys might care about this. It spooled into my news feed this morning. What a tragedy.

Amazing how an un-cropped picture tells more of the story: looks like the pace car actually moved out of the way just before the driver hit the peloton. In the pace driver's defense, it's impossible to imagine someone would actually roll right into a race.
Tim

What say you now, Mr. ASO?
Dear Editor,

Congratulations to Alberto Contador for his gritty Giro victory. His victory guarantees that without Astana's participation, the Tour de France winner in 2008 will forever have an asterisk by his name (*did not have to compete against the strongest team and best rider).

ASO's actions to single out Astana are inconsistent (other teams embarrassed the tour last year but are welcome in 2008) and now cheapen the race they wanted to protect.
Bob Nicholson,
Huntsville, Alabama

We are not nutjobs
Dear Editor,

re: Tuesday's Legally Speaking column

I realize that Bob Mionske is free to write about whatever he feels is appropriate, but when I read the introductory “guns and religion” paragraph to his latest installment I had to check to make sure I wasn’t reading Westword. (Don’t they encourage tolerance in Boulder? ;-) )

Regardless of the correctness/lack thereof of Sheriff Alderden’s interpretation of Colorado bicycling law, indulging in gratuitous stereotyping of him as an activist nutjob lawman (whether the shoe fits or not) certainly won’t discourage non-cyclists who may link to the article from elsewhere from gratuitously stereotyping us as activist nutjob cyclists. It’s a vicious cycle (pardon the pun).
Bill Rupy,
Goshen, New York

More on the Cupertino crash
Dear Editor,

In response to Curtis Bayer's letter of May 28.

While the CHP may have conducted the investigation of Santa Clara County Deputy James Council with integrity, there was still different treatment for the Santa Clara Deputy than there would have been for any other driver if that driver had not been a deputy: he was allowed to leave the scene and go home without a sobriety test.

Had any civilian driver killed Kristy Gough and Matt Peterson by crossing over the middle of the road and plowed into law-abiding cyclists, they would have been required to submit to a sobriety test and likely would have been held in custody had they tried to leave the scene of the collision. Until police officers and sheriff deputies involved in these kinds of collisions are treated exactly like anyone else, there will be questions about the integrity of the investigations.

I wonder if there would not have been a greater charge (based on the deputies reckless disregard for human life by staying up all night knowing he would have to operate a motor vehicle as part of his job in the morning) had the driver causing the deaths of Matt Peterson and Kristy Gough been someone other Santa Clara County Deputy James Council.
Mike Pearson,
Sacramento, California

More on the crash and Bayer's letter
Dear Editor,

I'm offended by Curtis Bayer's 'I told you so.' So a sheriff's deputy mows down three cyclists, killing two and "faces exposure of up to two years in prison." Wow. So basically the life of a cyclist is worth less than a year in prison.

And he sees nothing wrong with this?

Make no mistake about it: cyclists are second-tier citizens.
Christopher Sullivan,
Brooklyn, New York

More
Dear Editor,

In reference to Mr. Bayer's "told us so" letter ...

"He faces exposure of up to two years in prison ..." for recklessly ending the lives of two people in a most gruesome manner and seriously injuring a third. Not to mention the incredible emotional toll on those who got to witness the carnage first hand ... That seems like a pretty light penalty.

I hope the families of the victims have civil recourse as an option. If this happened because these deputies are required to work excessive hours, then the sheriff's office is equally culpable.

Every time I take to the roads, I accept that I am putting my life in the hands of my fellow citizens at the wheel of their cars many of whom are eating, reading, shaving, applying make-up, and of course talking on the phone ... At some point people have to be afraid of significant consequences for killing someone with their car as a motivation for paying attention to driving their car. Else the "accidents" will continue, and everyone will continue to read about them, say "Gee, that's sad ..." and then get on with their day... drinking, eating, talking, and oh yeah, driving.

Mind the line ...
Jeff Warman,
Yorktown, Virginia

Didn't like much about the Collegiate Nationals
Dear Editor,

I just read the article on collegiate road nationals in Fort Collins.
Pretty weak, and inaccurate. I thought there was an interesting thing that was left out of the article. That being, the fact that the men's races were shortened because the organizers didn't secure enough course marshals and there were unsafe racing conditions. I liked the excuse they made up about snow rolling in, real creative. The section that was taken out would have had a big impact on the outcome of the race.

This was the worst run national level race that I have ever attended. The conditions on the course were downright dangerous. Without sufficient course marshals you never knew if there was going to be a car in the middle of the road around any corner, and there were
numerous close calls between riders and cars.

Colorado State University and the organizers of this race were lucky that there weren't any serious injuries. Also, whose idea was it to select a crit course with a 2 inch groove in the middle of the road at the fastest part of the course? Might as well add an alligator pit.
Bike racing is dangerous enough, no need to make it more dangerous!
Joey Thompson,
Durango, Colorado