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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/2009 Giro d'Italia/archive2

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Karanacs 21:30, 9 March 2010 [1].

2009 Giro d'Italia

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2009 Giro d'Italia (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Nominator(s): Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 06:36, 6 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
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I believe all concerns from the previous FA and PR have been addressed. I have heard from fellow editors in passing that they believe the article satisfies the FA criteria, so here I am to try again. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 06:36, 6 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comments. No dab links. No dead external links. Alt text present and good. Ucucha 13:36, 6 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Image check: 6 images, besides free logos/icons; all are from commons and either CC-by-SA or free. All attribution-required images have the photographer listed. I'm doubtful of the quality of File:Venice, lido, stage-1, giro, italy 050.jpg (in which you can barely even see the subject in the thumb in the article) and File:Garzelli 2009.jpg (odd expression, but more importantly a fan coming out of his lower back) but I'll leave comments on their inclusion to other reviewers and leave this as a technical review. --PresN 16:09, 9 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm more attached to the Columbia-High Road pic than the Garzelli pic. The Garzelli pic was really just one of the first I found on commons that was from this race, and there are several others. Perhaps make the Columbia-High Road pic bigger, like the infobox map? Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 00:47, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe crop the CHR-picture, such that is shows only the team?--EdgeNavidad (talk) 07:50, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I changed the picture to File:2009 Giro d'Italia, stage 1 cropped.jpg (a cropped version of File:Venice, lido, stage-1, giro, italy 050.jpg). I hope it is better? --EdgeNavidad (talk) 23:52, 11 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support: I did a copyedit of the article a few months ago, but apart from a minor grammar cleanup there wasn't too much to do. The fundamentals of the article are strong, and they have certainly improved since the last FAC. I like the Garzelli picture; there may appear to be someone coming out of his back but the emotion on his face says enough about his performance to make me think the image should be kept. Cheers, Apterygial 20:31, 14 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comments – Skipping the first couple sections since I remember looking at them last time, and will start reviewing in the preview section. Didn't find too many issues with what I looked at.

  • Can we link the Spanish race that Lance Armstrong crashed in (the Vuelta a Castila de Leon)?
  • Race overview: "as an elite group of favorites emereged, a group that included...". First, I believe "emereged" is a typo. Second, "an ... group" and "a group" is a glaring redundancy in the prose. To fix this, change the latter to "emerged, including...".
  • More repetition here: "in their protest. Although the protest...". Giants2008 (27 and counting) 15:17, 17 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Source comments What makes these reliable?

RB88 (T) 02:06, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

They may not be the New York Times, which I would love to cite every time but obviously can't, yet I think they fit the conditions set out by WP:RS – Articles should be based on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. While "reputation" is obviously subjective, the facts presented by these sites are easily corroborated by others (which I guess means the citations can be replaced, if I need to go that route). Steephill culls many reliable sources such as cycling news and VeloNews. Further, the only thing that one is used for is an opinion, that stage 16 was the queen stage. I don't think we need the New York Times to back up the claim of a popular perception. The only reason that citation is really there is because while it's the only one I could find in print that called stage 16 the queen stage, television commentators frequently called it that, and I have no idea how to cite that or if it's even possible. Daily Peloton is definitely a secondary source, akin to Cycling News. Steephill is probably a tertiary source, but WP:RS says these are ok when used to give overviews or summaries, but should not be used in place of secondary sources for detailed discussion. I'm certainly not using it for that. Additionally, one of the Daily Peloton articles is used for that Coppi phrase that Ucucha picked out above that I've not yet revised. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 23:30, 20 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Just to provide a quick note on one comment above, it is possible to cite a TV broadcast. If you use templates, cite video is what would be used. If you need a formatting example from a sports FA, 1995 European Grand Prix uses it a couple of times. Considering that a TV broadcaster would likely be a better source than a website of uncertain reliability, it would be worth the effort. Giants2008 (27 and counting) 16:11, 28 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I was worried about it being (inherently) unverifiable. A weblink is independently verifiable. You have to take my word for it when citing a TV broadcast. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 19:49, 28 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • At this moment, I see no open problems. Is there anything I missed? I think the article is in great shape, the only thing I am not so sure of is whether the full "Points earned in the Giro d'Italia" table is not too much detail, and a top ten might be more suitable. Other than that, I would not like to see this nomination fail because of lack of attention. (I support the nomination, but that does not really count because I am involved in the WP:CYCLING project.)--EdgeNavidad (talk) 11:24, 4 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • I agree with EdgeNavidad... This article does look in great shape now, and the only thing I have fixed is the "Points earned..."-table. I've hid the riders whom are not in the top ten, and made the table collapsible. This will enhance the flow of the article, and will reduce excessive scrolling. Great work so far, Alex! It has taken some time, but it seems like this article soon will become a FA. =) lil2mas (talk) 01:31, 7 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Concerned about the prose. I looked only at the lead, which suggests that a good run-through by a third party is necessary.

  • Nit-pics:
    • "tarting in Venice, and finishing in Rome,"—I'd remove the first comma for better flow.
      • Done.
    • The riders visited, not the path or the Giro: "The Giro was raced on a unique path through Italy, visiting some historic cities and towns in Italian cycling."
      • OK with "taking the peloton to some historic cities and towns" ?
    • Remove "any"? Remove "race's"?
      • I prefer "any" being in there. I revised the second phrase to in the second and third weeks of the race proved deceptively difficult. I agree that "race's" is a tad clunky, but to just say "second and third weeks" seems inexact. I don't know. It might be because I've been reading this article nonstop for close to a year now.
    • Para 3 is gawky:
      "A rider protest took place during the race's ninth stage, a criterium in Milan. This protest was nominally about the safety conditions of the criterium stage, but it was also brought about by life-threatening injuries sustained by Pedro Horrillo the day before. The protest involved the riders not contesting the stage except for a final sprint finish, a decision which proved controversial with race organizers and fans." [Try this:]
      "Riders protested during the ninth stage, a criterium in Milan. This protest was nominally about the overall safety conditions of the stage, and was sparked by life-threatening injuries sustained by Pedro Horrillo the day before. In the protest, riders failed to contest the stage except for a final sprint finish, a decision that proved controversial with race organizers and fans."
      • Done, except for a tweak to "riders declined to contest" since it was a calculated decision, and not a failure.
    • "He subsequently tested positive for banned performance-enhancing drugs, casting doubt on the legitimacy of his performance." Err ... isn't the first clause so obviously cheating that the second clause is unnecessary? Tony (talk) 03:26, 5 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • Well, the fact is Di Luca is maintaining his innocence, to the point that makes one wonder, if only for a moment, why he would if he weren't. It is possible for his side of the story still to be true. Take for example Tyler Hamilton's excuse for doping the second-to-last time he was caught - chimerism. It is very, very unlikely to have been the underlying cause for Hamilton's irregular levels, but it was scientifically possible. As soon as the CAS throws the book at Di Luca, I think we can be a bit more firm here, but that hasn't happened yet, and won't for some time. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 05:33, 5 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Support Weak support Weak oppose Comments. I am only partway through the article but I have some fairly minor prose concerns, and some concerns about the way the sources are being used. Between the two I feel there's enough of a problem to justify an oppose. Generally what I'm seeing is some slight imprecision in phrasing. Prose examples (as I say, these are minor; the source issues are a bit more of a concern):

  • "distances between stages covered by bus or car (green)" in the caption in the infobox: the map doesn't really show distances; it connects stages (in red) with green lines to visually indicate the sequence of the stages. My rephrasing is precise but clumsy and too long to use; the current caption is concise but not quite right.
    • Two definitions of 'distance' - it does not show that "100 km" (or whatever) is between the stages, but it does visually represent the space from the end of one stage to the beginning of the next, which is what the caption is meant to convey.
      OK; I'm not crazy about it but it'll do. How about "Overview of the Giro route: race stages from Venice to Rome (red); riders traveled between the stages by bus or car (green)". Up to you; I'm not completely convinced this is an improvement. The map doesn't try to make the green lines follow actual routes in any way, which is reasonable but disconcerting where the green line crosses water as it does near Trieste, especially in conjunction with the "bus or car" comment. The green line is merely connective tissue, and my phrasing doesn't quite make that clear either. Anyway, this is OK as it is. Mike Christie (talk) 13:28, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The route was designed to commemorate 100 years since the first Giro d'Italia": one commemorates an event, not a time period.
  • "instead favoring slightly smaller climbs occurring in greater frequency, such as on the Monte Petrano stage": not sure if this is an error in modern usage, though I think it would be improved by putting "those" after "such as", but I think it would be better rephrased.

Additional points, not prose-related, but also showing a lack of precision, this time in rephrasing the sources:

  • "Race organizers were forced to alter this stage to cover only the Italian side of the Alps rather than also visit France, as there were concerns that the radio frequencies the teams were using to communicate might not be available in France as they were in Italy.[27] Also contributing to the change was the state of the roads, after recent landslides.[28]" The sources cited don't really support this phrasing; the first one says "the original route was too remote and French radio communication could not be assured" and the second one says "due to a combination of natural hazards (landslides) and a clash between Italian and French radio frequencies". There is no mention of recent landslides, only of a hazard; and no mention of unavailability of a particular customary frequency.
    • Ugh. This used to be "concerns over the availability of radio communication in the area," but that was deemed to be too vague. I'm not sure what else "a clash between Italian and French radio frequencies" can mean, but I don't want to directly quote that article. Or do I? Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 03:57, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      The sources seem slightly at odds, here, don't they? Once says there's a clash, and the other says it's too remote -- surely contradictory? My guess is that the reporters involved each rephrased a source (maybe the Cycling News article is a loose use of the Reuters source). I think you could revert to your original wording, which is indeed a little vague, but footnote it to both sources and comment on the slight discrepancy. That would address the vagueness without distracting the reader with a pedantic comment about the sources. E.g. put this in the footnote, along with both citations: "A Reuters news report said that the radio communication might not be available throughout the stage, but a Cycling News report instead blamed a 'clash between Italian and French frequencies'". As for the landslides, your rewording is fine. Mike Christie (talk) 14:07, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • I don't know how to do that (footnote), unless it's just using <ref> tags again. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 19:54, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
        I've put in the note -- yes, it just goes in the refs. If you don't like it, revert and we can talk about other ways to do it. It's not perfect because the cite templates put a period at the end of the text which really shouldn't be there; some editor don't use the templates for that (and other) reasons. 21:11, 6 March 2010 (UTC)
  • "Some speculated that RCS had included the long Cinque Terre time trial in stage 12 specifically to help Armstrong": again, the source doesn't really say this; it says "RCS Sport appeared to have presented Armstrong a gift with the stage". That doesn't imply specific intent, just that Armstrong would be the one to benefit, and that RCS Sport made the decision. Your version isn't implausible, but it's not quite what the source says.

-- I will keep reading the article for as long as I have time tonight and will add more examples if I can. Mike Christie (talk) 01:31, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • "After a protracted appeal with the UCI" -- "appeal with" is an odd usage; shouldn't it be "to"? The source cited doesn't say anything about an appeal with/to the UCI; is there a separate source for that? (Not critical if there isn't; he clearly would have appealed so it's not controversial, but a source wouldn't hurt if you have one.)
  • I think the table in the "Classification leadership" section could use an explanatory sentence. After about thirty seconds of pondering I think I figured it out; it shows who was the leader in each award category by the end of each stage. If that's not right, then it definitely needs an explanation.
  • This is not something on which I'd oppose, but I noticed you do have an awful lot of repetitive links in this article. "Astana", for example, appears about ten times, and is linked every single time. I understand that it's tempting to do that in tables, which readers may study independently of the rest of the text, but surely not every occurrence in a single table needs to be linked.
    • This is customary in WP:CYC articles (meaning any revision will seem awkward to me at first). What do you suggest? Not link any of the team names in the tables? What about the riders? They obviously won't appear twice in the same table, but many of them (Menchov, Di Luca, Sastre) appear in multiple tables. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 04:06, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • Also, it's not so much a matter of navigation for me as it is mere visual aesthetics. To have 3 links and 7 non-linked terms, or vice versa, or whatever, would look strange to me. That's why it seems logical to link nothing there – the teams are all named in the, wait for it, "Teams" section anyway. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 04:32, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      The aesthetic point occurred to me too, and I think the best solution is to leave it as it stands for now -- this precise point is not covered by WP:OVERLINK and although we may end up with a style guideline that addresses this, we don't have one now. Mike Christie (talk) 13:42, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The top five finishers in each stage also earned points; 16 went to each stage winner and a single point for fifth each day": what did the second, third and fourth place finishers get? You could just say "16 went to the stage winner, with a diminishing point rewards for the lower-placed finishers", or you could give all five numbers, but just first and fifth is a bit odd.
  • "instead favoring slightly smaller climbs occurring in greater frequency, such as on the Monte Petrano stage": do you need this? It's not in the source, though I don't doubt its accuracy, but a reader is naturally going to interpret this as a statement about Zomegnan's intentions for the route, which would need sourcing, rather than a simple statement about the nature of the course. And a question from a cycling ignoramus: does "smaller" here mean shorter, or less steep, or a combination of the two?
    • Shorter. I'll rephrase this to make it sound less like a conscious decision, and more like a simple description of the route. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 04:32, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • And it's really not necessary to invoke Petrano there at all, actually. I'm not sure why I added that in the first place. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 05:16, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
        Your new version now reads "it instead included stages featuring multiple climbs reaching shorter altitude". Can we improve "reaching shorter altitude"? I don't think you really mean altitude, which is relative to sea level; aren't you referring to the ascent? How about "with lesser ascents"? Mike Christie (talk) 13:36, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
        • Done, but altitude is fair usage. Both are commonly expressed in cycling climbs. Sometimes a stage will begin at elevation – stage 5 of the 2009 race is a good example. That route climbed a short distance before descending, and that climb was expressed both in terms of "altitude" and "ascent," depending on the source. One stage in this year's Giro will actually dip below sea level, believed to be a first in the race's history. So it's not as wrong as I think you think it is, but it's not something I feel I need to fight about. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 20:12, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
          OK; I didn't know that about usage in cycling. Readers unfamiliar with the terminology, though, will probably prefer "ascent", so I think the change is for the better. Mike Christie (talk) 21:01, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The article isn't far from FA overall, and I'm aware that some of that above are nitpicks; that's why this is a weak oppose. -- Mike Christie (talk) 01:50, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry, but which is it? Must the article directly quote its sources (to which Ucucha objected) or is interpolation permitted (to which you object) ? I'm also guttingly aware that this review comes just hours before this is supposed to be closed, one way or the other. I'll try to address what you've raised. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 03:00, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I am not sure how Mike's and my comments contradict each other; the text of the article should be supported by references that contain the same ideas that are present in the article, but direct quotes should generally only be used when their wording is especially trenchant. Ucucha 03:10, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Nosleep, I realize my oppose came very late. Since I'm about to go to sleep here and I see you're working on it, and since I think the problems are quite fixable, I am converting my weak oppose to a comment for now; I wouldn't like to see the article archived after you have fixed the issues. I will check in the morning and hope that I will no longer see any reason to oppose. Mike Christie (talk) 03:20, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Hopefully Sandy Georgia (or whoever) will give this an extra day or two. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 04:20, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I have changed to weak support above; I agree with Tony that some more work on the prose would be good; I will try to do some work there but I'm not the top copyeditor here. (Psst -- get user Finetooth on it if you can.) Thanks for dealing so well with a very late oppose. Mike Christie (talk) 14:11, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I have now changed to full support above. If I come with anything else in the prose I will take it to the article's talk page, but as it stands I think this is FA quality. Mike Christie (talk) 21:18, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think I've revised everything. Now *I* feel like I need some shut-eye. I'll check this again in a few hours – if it's closed by then (hopefully not), leave me a message on my talk page if there are further concerns. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 05:22, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

But are you arranging for an independent run-through of the prose? If I picked up that much just at the top, more is required. If the article is promoted, this should be the first priority. Tony (talk) 12:36, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I would have no problem with that. I just got a teensy bit stressed having an oppose come in exactly a month from when this was first posted, and it's a little hard for me personally to pick things out on an article I've read so many times. The two PR's each only got one review (maybe the first would have gotten more if I hadn't been so trigger-happy coming here, but I sort of doubt it), so I have sought this, but unsuccessfully. Nosleep (Talk · Contribs) 19:50, 6 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
In response to Tony: I've done another fairly detailed pass with notes on the article talk page, and Nosleep has resolved almost all the resulting points. Mike Christie (talk) 02:40, 8 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Always better to have an independent person do it: they have strategic distance from it. I didn't oppose formally. Sorry to come along so late. The fact that it's been here a month means it was not prepared well enough to nominate, I'm afraid. Tony (talk) 11:01, 8 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Tony, I'm not sure whether in your comment you're under the impression I'm a nominator -- in fact my review of the prose was independent. My involvement with the article is limited to this review. Doesn't mean I succeeded in fixing the prose, of course, but I think it's improved. Mike Christie (talk) 11:23, 8 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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