Saturday 11 April 2009

King of the mountain




How slack am I? Very is the answer to that question. A whole week and whatever without writing something, I’ve let you down, I’ve let the team down, but most importantly, I’ve let myself down. I do have an excuse though, that is lots of racing. Last week from the Saturday to the following Sunday I raced more days than I didn’t, so I’ll get right onto telling you all about them. The first race was the two day Fleche d’Armor, it included a long road stage on the Saturday, a short Time Trial on the Sunday morning and another decent road stage in the afternoon. The only thing I do need to tell you about first is how we went looking for a different bakery on the Friday afternoon, Matt pointed out that we had all accidentally walked over a 3-drain (3 drains in a row), he told us every time he did this something bad happened the next day. Me and Nathan scoffed at this foolish superstition and enjoyed the below average baguette we bought from the new found bakery.

The first stage was nothing short of a farce. Well not quite until 30km anyway when the big team Cotes d’armor put the hammer down on a very tough cross wind section and split it up, I was dallying around about 5 wheels too far back and ended up chasing this most vital of splits. We were riding along at a good pace and just about had the lead group in sight when, all of a sudden, half the cars went right and we went straight on. No one seemed to know what the hell was going on, some people turned around some went straight on, I followed the majority and somehow we got back on the course behind all the team cars. It was at this point that everyone seemed to decide the organisers didn’t deserve a race and it turned into a very large club run that went on for the next 90km. During all this commotion Matt had put his front wheel into someone’s pedal and ripped 4 spokes out of it just as the hammer went down. After a frantic 30 minute chase he got onto the back of the cars a little before the bunch found their own way there, rendering any effort he did put in a bit pointless. Oh well, stage races are good because they have more than one stage.

Next up was the TT, 7,8km of slightly rolling but mostly flat route. Me and Matt had planned our finishing positions in the bunch the day before so that he could finish and get the disk wheel and deep section front zipp back to me for my start. It was close, very close, I signed on with 10 seconds to go, got on the bike with 5 seconds, clipped in on 3 seconds and had to start in my biggest gear not having had time to change it. Nevertheless, I felt half decent and blistered past my minute man at about 5km and sprinted in to post 10.14. Matt had earlier posted a quick 10.10; these times put me and Matt in 1st and 2nd which is how it would remain until the last 10 riders. The GC contenders put in some pretty good times on their fancy bikes (me and Matt had to stick clip-on TT bars on), but by far and away the most impressive was Johan Le Bon. He won by a massive margin, posting a 9.20 averaging over 51km/h. To put that into perspective, the criterium international TT won by Tony Martin on the same day over a very similar distance was run off at slightly more than a 1km/h less. In fact from 2nd (9.52) place down to 10th (10.15) it was quite close, matt ended up 6th with me coming in 8th. We were quite pleased.

After a quick shower and some food it was time for the afternoon stage. A good 125km along the coast, occasionally heading inland to find a big hill. I had no plan in particular except to try and do something worth remembering (which usually just means finishing!). I followed some wheels early, before after about 15km launching my own attack pulling away a group of 11. We quickly pulled out a good gap getting it up to 2.30 at one point. Another large group of 20 came across to us before it quickly split up again on a hard hill where some big attacks came. I worked to stay in the front group as it kept going up steep hill after steep hill. The front group had now been whittled down to about 12 of us again, but the bunch was coming back fast being driven by Le Bon and his cronies. We reached the finishing circuit with a 20 second gap, only 3 short laps and we were there! Our group started to attack each other with a small group getting away, I tried to keep the speed high so we at least finished ahead, but I had done a lot of work early on and was now paying the price. On the bell lap we still had a small advantage but if you looked behind too long you’d be caught. This must have happened as with 3km remaining I saw Le Bon roll along side with the rest of the jerseys. Darn. I followed what I could and my severely dampened sprint took me into 13th place on the stage. The first stage had wrecked everything and I finished 38th overall, which was a tad annoying, but I soon got over it.

While getting changed we wondered where Matt was, no one had seen him finish or even come past on the finishing circuit. It was all a bit worrying, he had been seen coming across to us with the Le Bon group but had seemingly disappeared. I saw one of the team helpers walk up with his bike, the forks somewhat bent in the wrong direction, interesting. We found him in an ambulance headed to the nearest hospital; I jumped in for a lift and found his spirits weren’t too dampened. After a quick x-ray we found he hadn’t broken a bone apparently, but a cast was put on anyway for good measure.

The next race was on the Wednesday, the Elite Nationale Grand Prix U. My legs didn’t feel too clever in the first 50km whatsoever and I thought I was in for a long day. Things didn’t get much better as the hammer kept going down to bring back breaks, splitting it up in crosswinds and bringing it back together. I hovered around in no particular position wondering when something good might happen, then we hit this wall of a hill out of nowhere. It went on and everyone was forced into their smallest gears, there were too many people all over the road to move forwards so the guys at the front had it easy. I was pretty close to the back and as we crested the hill it split into groups of which I was in the very last, in fact I was last man altogether. We dallied around until two others decided they’d had enough and attacked across to the peloton, I followed busting several guts to hold the wheel before finally latching onto the back of the big group. I looked round and saw the small group a long way off the back, I wouldn’t see them again this race.

Once I’d recovered I moved up towards the front and learnt that a group with all the favourites was up the road after the hill. I decided I had nothing to lose and put in one effort which was quickly shut down, before going again not long after. This time a got a small gap so carried on going, I looked round to see a group of about 12 riding off from the peloton. I waited for them and then helped them pull away and we were soon flying. It didn’t take us long to get up to the leading group and I was happy as Larry, whoever he is. This is about where it got hard. We went up another wall of a climb which split it up yet again, it came back together again after much pain and then a small group went just before moving onto the finishing circuit. I followed what I could, but by now I was crème caramelled and sprinting out of corners was taking some serious effort, let alone sprinting after attacks. I managed to hang on, but had nothing left for the finale and had to roll in for 25th place which I wasn’t so disappointed with, having been last man about 50km earlier.

The next day Matt decided to take his cast off and try and get out for a ride. We took it very easy, but by the end of it he didn’t seem to have done his arm much good. He spent the rest of the evening bathing it in cold water and we went to bed thinking he might have just sprained it. Then, at approximately 2.30AM, he knocked on my door saying it hurt so much he couldn’t take it anymore. At first, I was sceptical especially in my semi-conscious state, but when I saw him shivering in pain just sat down I started to believe him. I went to action stations creating a makeshift ice bag before ringing one of the club officials who might least mind being rang at crazy o’clock. Luckily he answered at the 2nd attempt and it was off to the hospital again. This time they found he had broke a bone, the scaffoid or something, a very small bone in the wrist that could apparently cause much discomfort, no sh!t. They wrapped a good solid cast that would need to be worn for 6 weeks and we went back to bed. Happy days.

Our next race was the Tour du Pays de Lesneven, similar to the Fleche d’Armor but with a team time trial rather than individual. The first stage went round some nice coast line before heading inland, we went up the first King of the Mountains prime and I decided to have a bash, leading the peloton over. I found out after that a group of 5 had gone up the road without me seeing and I hadn’t actually scored any points. I went for the next one as well, this time 2 had dropped out of the break and leading the peloton again gave me 2 points. After that I followed a few attacks and got away in a group of 9, I thought this would be good until the finish but as we reached the 3rd KOM point and I won outright, we were caught by a split up bunch. It stayed like this until the last KOM point where I moved up into a good position I sprinted for all I was worth to take it. Now the bunch split up yet again and I was caught between the two, eventually deciding I was better off waiting (not really, I just couldn’t catch the front group). It came back together on the finishing circuit just as a group of 11 clipped off, I was more concerned with working out whether or not I might have taken the jersey and really wasn’t enjoying these last few km’s anyway. It turned out that the guy who had taken the two early KOM points was in my team and thought he had won the jersey, only to find out I had won the last two and scored a couple extra points! This meant I had the jersey, I felt bad, well not really, I felt great. I’d never had a jersey before in any race, this was quite an experience and I wasn’t about to lose it, the jersey that is.

The TTT wasn’t much to talk about, I think we did as well as we could have with the team, but they are always fun to do. The afternoon stage was where it was at, I had a jersey to keep. On the start line I was at the back thinking I’d quite like to be at the front and then I remembered, I’m wearing a jersey, move aside boys. So I strode to the front, cool as, and posed for photos with some dignitary of the town. The first KOM was very early on after only 6.7km so the plan was to sit on anything that moved and get it finished quickly. After a small detour and an interesting crash from Nathan, I jumped away, chasing after a small group which suddenly turned into a big group of 15 or so. We pulled away quickly and coming into towards the KOM point I was nicely positioned before opening up a mighty sprint with 200m to go. After a short challenge the others decided they weren’t going to get more points than the person who already had the jersey and slowed up, saving their legs. We continued to work well and pulled out over 3 minutes on the peloton before they started chasing. We had a healthy gap coming into the next KOM points and I took maximum points on all of them, guaranteeing my spot on the podium that afternoon. Why not go for the stage. From there on I worked rather hard, intent on holding the gap on the bunch led by BIC 2000. It felt great, especially being in a jersey. We held it at 1.50 for a while before getting onto the finishing circuit. Here it came down rapidly before we were finally caught, I was in pieces and duely sat-in for the ride. It was only now that I realised how knackered I really was and with about 2.5km to go I dropped off the back and rolled in on my own, a warrior, grrr.

The podium was good fun, especially with Ms Finistere handing out the flowers, I certainly couldn’t complain. The Master of Ceremonies thankfully asked only simple questions and I gave him some nice simple answers and everyone was happy, especially Ms Finistere at the fact I was on the podium. And now I’ve tasted it, I want some more, I don’t know where, I don’t know how, but I will soon be on the podium again. We’ll see.

F*@king 3-drains,

Until next time,

Walk safe.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You forgot the videos on the BIC2000 site in which we get a glimpse of you in action (so to speak) http://www.bic2000.net/bic-2000-tv-videos.html

Anonymous said...

Not to mention those pics on the COC Fougaires web site http://cocfougeres.fr/ Under "En images" (lefthand side) then "Route" and then pick a race you did.