Friday 20 March 2009

Sitting in McDonalds thieving the internet...still.

This blog is in much need of some TLC. I can’t remember the last time I gave you a picture to look at, let alone a video. Unfortunately it takes time and more importantly, internet time and although I have plenty of the former, I have precious little of the latter. So for now you’ll have to imagine what the bike races look like, just think of loads of blokes dressed in different shades of Lycra, a few bikes, the occasional hill and you’re pretty much there. Anyway, In Britanny, because it’s such a cycling popular area, as well as loads of other sports, they put the results of every race in the regional paper, Ouest France. So after every race we’ve done ok in or if there’s an article on us, we buy the paper, cut out the important bit and stick it on what we have now christened as the ‘Media Wall’. So far we have a nice little collection and I imagine by the end of the season we may well have several Media Walls, you’d hope so anyway. One day, when we have internet, I’ll take a photo and you can see it too! How exciting.


We have had some introduction of other entertainment; we have been kindly lent a television to use by one of the clubs officials, as well as a Playstation well stocked with games not from the official but from Rob Orr, our occasional team mate. This has kept the kids busy while I keep house and do other important things like writing this, it hasn’t stopped our games of rummy though. The cooking continues, so much so that we have decided to start a cyclist’s recipe book. Every time we make something new, we take a picture and write down how to make it. When I get round to it I’ll post each one on a separate cooking blog so if anyone who’s reading this fancies a go at making it, which I doubt, they can just go ahead and do that now.


Which leads me nicely onto the weather, it has been nothing short of splendid this past week with cloudless skies and temperatures reaching into the 20’s. Apparently it’s set to continue into next week as well, so for the moment, it’s happy days. I even donned the shorts once for a training ride! Crazy I know, especially for mid March, but it was crying out for me to do it. The uber tan-lines shall soon be returning. The weather was also good for our races.


Which leads me nicely onto the races. We had two at the weekend, the first one a 162km Elite Nationale, the Souvenir Louison Bobet and the 2nd a smaller 135km 1/2/3 race, both with a nice bit of ‘en ligne’ with finishing circuits. Unfortunately Matt had been ill all week and decided to sit them both out, so it was just me and Nathan with a few of the French guys. The first race was fairly interesting, the two pro teams in the area, Bretagne-Schuller and Besson Chaussures both had teams as well as all the big teams in Britanny, very similar to last week really. The race took just over 4 hours and I’d struggle to tell you all about it and most of it was boring anyway, so here it goes. It was pretty hard early on and then a break went and then it got easier for 100km, then we got onto the finishing circuit with 30km to go. Right that brings it up to the interesting bit. I was casually riding round the finishing circuit wondering if I could scrounge any kind of result from the race when all of a sudden a small break went up the road. It started to get bigger and bigger and I thought maybe I should be in it, so I got in it. Then with less than to lap to go I thought I should attack, so I attacked. I got away with two others and we worked really really hard, then I messed up the sprint a bit and finished 2nd, which meant I was 20th overall...sweet.


Which leads me nicely onto my next race. It was slightly different I was still buzzing a little bit from what I’d done the day before and thought I was superman, but I wasn’t. I went with a lot of moves at the start, attacked loads, generally foolish behaviour. Then the actual move went, was I in it? Of course I wasn’t, that would be asking far too much of superman. So the next 80km were pretty boring, and then we moved onto the finishing circuit. I was casually riding round the finishing circuit wondering if I could scrounge any kind of result from the race when all of a sudden a small break went up the road. It stayed quite small and I thought maybe I should be in it, so I got in it. We worked really really hard and caught the second half of the break with 600metres to go, but my legs hurt like Thor himself had smashed his mighty hammer upon them over and over with every pedal stroke on the deathly steep finishing hill, so instead of possibly finishing 6th, I finished 19th.


Which leads me nicely onto my conclusion of both races. I was pleased with Saturday and but not so much Sunday.


Which leads me nicely onto other news. Unfortunately we didn’t receive a cake this week, but we have our fingers crossed for next week, or possibly the week after, we best get a cake... Our next race is in Normandy as apparently they can’t find a race in Britanny to do, which somehow I find hard to believe but I’ll turn up and ride my ass off wherever I’m taken, so it barely matters. Now I have a plate of sausage and mash to attend to, don’t worry the recipe will be available soon, in all good book stores and some rubbish ones.


Until next time,


Ciao for now.

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