Wednesday 23 September 2009

Encore Une Fois



As you may or may not have noticed, the blog went through a long long period of neglect. It’s not that I didn’t want to write it, it’s just that when there are 3 of you living in a small apartment, it’s a lot harder to find time to write good quality script. So in the end, as the weeks passed without me adding anything, I decided to leave it until the end of the season and then do one last update to let you know how it went. But instead of doing the whole ‘write and interesting blog thing’ I’ll just write something interesting facts and figures. So here are the ones that sum up my season:

4 times on the podium
1 KOM classification
1 win (in England)
6 top 5’s
12 top 10’s
23 top 20’s
1 bout of fatigue lasting 2 weeks
50 Days of Racing
4 Time trials
8 DNF’s
1 crash
4 Punctures in races
1 Puncture in training
Several trips to the hospital for Matt’s scaphoid
The breaking of nearly every wheel I own including a rather expensive Zipp 404
8 Michelin Pro 3 Race Tyres
2 Chains
2 Sets of bar tape
8 Books
4 Paintings
Quite a few primes
3 Pots of Herbs grown
3 Pots of Herbs not picked in time and left to wilt and die
The discovery of the Croissant Amandes aux chocolat
A massive amount of help from the John Ibbotson Fund
1 Case of online fraud involving my debit card
1 Smashed Pyrex dish while making lasagne
Many trips to the café
Hundreds of cups of tea
1 Holiday in Provence
3 Times up Mont Ventoux
4 ferry journeys
A few pieces of stolen corn to check the ripeness
Lots of new friends
Many good memories

There are many more, but these are the most relevant. The end of my season came at the Duo Normand, a 54km 2-up Time trial over a few tough little digs. Me and Matt decided to have a crack at it and see how we could go against guys given money to do it. To prepare we were lent bikes to use, both of which were highly unsuitable. Mine was a compact 54cm Frame, which for someone measuring 6’4” looks a little ridiculous, but I made it fit. Matt’s frame on the other hand had such a relaxed seat-tube angle that we had to fashion a seat post that held a saddle far forwards enough to make it not look like a recumberant, but we managed this as well. In the end we just about had bikes that were similar to sizes that we might have actually needed...nearly.

We practised all week and come Sunday we felt ready to smash some ProTour riders. We didn’t look very professional warming up though as I didn’t have a turbo and so had to go and ride around on my own while Matt did a proper warm up. Our modified bikes passed the hasty relaxed bike check, almost too relaxed for a UCI ranked race, but much better than some of the anal things I keep hearing about in the UK. We rolled down the start ramp and were off, straight up the hill that the ramp rolls into. Fortunately for the most part the first 27km were downhill or flat, it was during these kilometres that I felt ok and tried to keep a good pace up.

Matt took a while to get warmed up and just as he got going we hit the hilly back section of the course. I went through a bad spell and struggled to come through as Matt powered on, although somehow I managed to find myself on the front going up a lot of the hills, how this happened I have no idea. I got back going again towards the end of the ride and we kept it as high as we could. I very nearly stacked it on a dead turn before a 6km run back to the finish, coming into the corner way too fast before locking up my back wheel twice and sliding along a bit, much to the horror of the crowd watching at the corner. After a few gasps of terror, I held my cool and managed to finally turn the bike round the corner, the crowd were impressed. No time to take plaudits though, the last 6km were agony as they were mostly uphill, but the 2km downhill to the finish was much nicer.

We came across the line to post a 1.13.51, which wasn’t bad, but I think with properly set-up bikes, a little knowledge of the course and a bit more preparation we could have at least got into the 1.12’s, but there we go, maybe next year!

Speaking of next year, I decided that I didn’t want to go to university this year (this was after seeing the book list I was supposed to read some of, if there is one way to put someone off going to university who isn’t massively decided it’s to show them a list of the most boring books in the world), instead I want to have one more shot in France. It will be my final year Espoir so I really want to be the best I’ve ever been and find my highest level, wherever that may be. After that...who knows?

A la prochaine
Alastair