With three days to go in the Giro, Nibali looks all but certain for final pink. (Photo courtesy of Team Astana | Facebook)

 A quick roundup of recent stories, most about pro cycling, that I found worth reading.

By Daniel McMahon

Nibali won the Giro’s uphill TT on stage 18 Thursday, re-confirming he’s the strongest rider in the race. He gained time on next-best Evans, who had an off day. Evans leads Uran by just 10 seconds with three stages to go. Scarponi is close behind, in fourth. So Evans has work to do still. VeloNews

Evans’ poor performance in the TT was a surprise to most. On Twitter he called his performance “abysmal” but praised Nibali as being in a class of his own. Note in the same tweet he included the hashthag #goodtraining, so expect him to be well ready come the 100th Tour de France, which starts in 37 days. Twitter

Indeed, for the 2011 Tour champ the glass is half full. “Of course second is better than third place, and fourth is a pretty horrible place to finish in a Grand Tour.” VeloNews

On the road to becoming BMC’s leader at the Tour, a good start is to win California, but it’s still not as good as going podium at the Giro. VeloNation

The highly anticipated battles on the Gavia and the Stelvio are gone because of likely bad weather in the Dolomites. Stage 19 has been altered cancelled because of snow. Cyclingnews

With his race being another big hit this year, Giro director Michele Acquarone asserts that the sport needs more great races. SBS Cycling Central

A look at what some pros opted to ride in the uphill TT at the Giro. VeloNews

Get your cycling-lit fix with The Cycling Anthology: Volume Two. Features writing by some of the sport’s best journalists. Cycling Weekly

A word on the rise of Lawson Craddock after his top-10 finish at California. Steve Tilford

A response to the WSJ story about the death of Lycra from Patrick Brady. Red Kite Prayer

BikeRadar.com editor in chief Ben Delaney tells the story of his “electrical” at the recent New York gran fondo. BikeRadar

Team Blanco, formerly Team Rabobank, could become Team Belkin. Cyclingnews

If you’re going to see a race in person, especially for the first time, ditch the camera when the riders come by and just enjoy the moment. The Inner Ring

McQuaid writes an op-ed: “Cycling has an extremely bright future.” Cyclingnews

A new video profiling Axel Merckx, DS for Bontrager, as he continues to grow young talent after the departure last year of Dombrowski and Boswell, both of whom are now riding for Sky. YouTube

On Facebook, Giant challenges Specialized to aero test:

As always, add links to interesting stories I may have missed in the comment section below. Or email me here.

On Twitter: @cyclingreporter

 A quick roundup of recent stories, most about pro cycling, that I found worth reading:

By Daniel McMahon

With less than a week to go in the Giro, Niabli appears unbeatable and is set to win his first Tour of Italy, writes Gregor Brown for VeloNews.com.

But Evans, second on GC, says the race ain’t over yet, reports Ben Atkins at VeloNation.

Brown, this time writing for Cycling Weekly, on why the Giro continues to be an aggressive race.

And even if Evans doesn’t win, it’s still a big step toward team leadership at the Tour, writes Sean Lee on The Roar website.

thewashingmachinepost reviews the new second edition of Maglia Rosa. The Inner Ring also has a review.

As for last week’s Tour of California, won by Tejay van Garderen, Cycling Tips has a stellar photo set.

Fred Dreier, writing for the Wall Street Journal, has a story about “Cycling’s Occupational Hazard” and concussions. It also tells the story of Evie Stevens’ recent crash.

2r magazine is apparently available on the iPhone now; until recently it was available on the iPad only.

Random video of the day: “Frenchman rides rocket bike to 263km/h” via BikeRadar.com.

Sven Nys, world champion of cyclocross, is planning to race CrossVegas this September.

Joe Parkin, writing on pavedmag.com, has a story about being a bike racer.

Neal Rogers, writing on VeloNews.com, looks at Jonathan Vaughters and Lance Armstrong and their “improbable reunion.”

Several riders have announced they’re retiring, including Leipheimer, Petacchi, Creed, Klier, and, most recently, Menchov.

As the old dudes retire, the new generation steps up: Matthew Beaudin of VeloNews profiles the best young rider at the Tour of California, Lawson Craddock. (If you missed it, I spoke with another young gun, Joe Dombrowski, last week, before he flew back to Nice.)

Writer and analyst Edward Pickering has left Cycle Sport to become a freelance journalist and author. He has a new book out: The Race Against Time.

The new June issue of peloton magazine is dedicated to Italy, Pinarello, the 1988 Giro, and more. This is the promo video:

In non-racing news, my editor friend Bill Walsh, copyman at the Washington Post, posted a video less than a week ago on YouTube and it already has nearly 1 million views. (Walsh contributed some blog posts to Bicycling.com when I was the editor there).

The Italian Cycling Journal remembers Andy Hampsten’s Giro victory, 25 years on.

Chalet is a new “quarterly cycling and art publication” out of NYC.

The Red Hook Crit, which advertises on this site, is holding its inaugural Brooklyn Navy Yard race on June 8.

Manual for Speed has a revamped website. There’s almost always something interesting to look at there.

On Twitter, Jered Gruber continues to be one of the standout photographers at the Giro:

As always, add links to interesting stories I may have missed in the comment section below. Or email me here.

On Twitter: @cyclingreporter