Sometimes you’re the hammer and sometimes you’re the nail.

Kreiz Breizh Elite turned out to be a bit of a crap tour for me. I went into it with pretty big ambitions, really good form and, apparently, some bad luck. Stage 1 was a slightly intimidating 200km monster, a good hour longer than the races I’ve become used to, but in the end it wasn’t at all bad. 

I had fantastic legs and that always makes for fun racing. I was getting stronger and stronger as the stage went on which was cool. Unfortunately a break that went quite early on had all the big teams in and that was that, so I tried to save my legs for the TT the next day.

The next day came and I got up bright and early to fit in everything, including a super-duper long warm up routine to get the previous day out of my legs. I should have saved my breath! As I rode from the team bus to the start line I punctured the disc wheel I’d borrowed. One slow wheel change later and there goes my starting time. 

I set off nearly three minutes late on a normal rear wheel and went at about 90% to get round within the time limit cut-off. For those that don’t know, there’s a stage time limit which was the winners time plus 25%, so I couldn't hang about. Again I had amazing legs, and minus my late start, I wasn’t far off winning pace despite cruising the final few k. Let’s just say I was ‘disappointed’.

Lads on tour sheltering from the deluge, just before Stage 3.

Stage 3 was a shorter afternoon affair and after surviving the killer opening circuits around a 4k town loop on the narrowest, slippiest lanes, in a huge bunch, in the pissing rain, we were off. It was fairly fast all day, but was controlled by the leaders Rabobank, so I contained the urge to do something stupid and sat tight. With a lap to go, around 8.5km, on the finishing circuit I attacked. No one came with, so I blasted through the line solo with a handful of seconds. 

Attacking the lead-out trains.

Unfortunately I was caught about 3k later, just before the top of the long steady climb by various teams riding for a sprint and from there I just came in with the bunch. I was glad to show my face and a bit of my form anyway.

The final stage was another wet one and having had stomach ‘issues’ in the evening before and then the morning I didn't have high hopes. I tried to get in the break but didn't manage it and then I went downhill from there. I couldn't really eat as I was feeling rough, but I had to make myself because you can’t ride 175km on just air.

Getting around.

I went out the back door about four times but I’m becoming fairly satisfactory at riding the convoy now, so I got back on okay. I should count my blessings as I avoided a pretty nasty crash coming onto the circuits when 10 guys including those in front of and next to me decked it at 50kph. I was happy to finish a pro race against some pretty good teams and not feel at all out of my depth. For the time being I'm going to rest up and get over this stomach bug.

Happy to see the finish line.

France: parts one and two

The last few weeks have been quite labour intensive on the bike: a labour of love of course! We’ve been back and forth to France four times which has meant I’ve seen the inside of a lot of different hotels and spent copious amounts of time counting the hairs on the back of my hands in the car. I even read a book.

Standard car activities: phone subwoofer and crisp & salami sandwiches.

First up was a one day called the GP Beauchamp where we fairly successfully cleaned up: we got four riders in the break of twenty, dropped some strong riders in the crosswinds and then claimed 1^st, 3^rd, 10^th and 11^th.

"This is the best echelon ever!"

Then after two days respite, casually spent driving the width of France and back, we returned to frog territory for the Tour de la Manche. My personal recollections of this race are few and far between (consigned safely into my black box of past torments, to be unlocked no doubt through extensive therapy in future years). It was quite hilly (ha!) but I was holding out for the time trial on day three which, unsurprisingly, turned out to include an ascent or two. Being a filthy tester I put massive amounts of pressure on myself (all bottled up, obviously) to perform despite it not suiting me, and conveniently ignoring the fact that my current form was worryingly errant. I took myself apart and, despite being most probably the slowest up every one of the three climbs, managed a respectable 12^th. I was moderately pissed off, but at least my white skinsuit looked snazzy. I finished the final stage and headed home for some Nutella based healing.

And that's the way the cookie crumbles

Cycling is a damn hard sport. I say this as I’m sitting on the sofa, drinking coffee and watching De Ronde Van Vlaanderen. This might sound like a piss take but I think I need this after what happened on Friday. I’m not alone either; Llewellyn Kinch is also next to me on the sofa, legs up. We both started Triptyque des Monts et Chateaux on Friday, a three day stage race in the Flemish Ardennes, and finished our respective races several hours later. I managed to hit the deck about 20k in, got up and chased back on, hit the deck again at about 40k, got up and chased back on and made contact just before the first climb. 

Nature photography last week, naturist this week.

It was the worst timing possible and over the top I was in the box hanging on to the back of the bunch, the last wheel of the big long line, heading downhill, with a tailwind, at about 70kph. I lasted about 10k on the very back of the bunch and then blew up. Llewellyn did a little better than I did in one sense, he made it to 115k, but he did end up in hospital after smashing his face onto some cobbles. Six stitches later and his face has seen better days, but he’s doing alright. Another of our teammates, the Australian Gus, got taken out by a Kazakh who rode straight into a traffic island with his head down, but he managed to get back on and finish with two broken levers which was impressive.

Kinch faced up to the cobbles.

All in all it was a pretty awful day for the team: none of the remaining riders from the team were in the front groups and therefore are probably out of contention for the GC unless there’s a serious shake up in the final tough stage on Sunday. It was a personal disaster for me too. I couldn’t suffer enough to get back into the race after the second crash; after I’d gone down again I just lay there for a while in disbelief. Having the team manager watch from the car as I slowly unravelled at the back of the race is an experience I don’t want again too soon.

Mind of a moron(?)

If you’ve ever wondered what goes through the mind of a rider when they attack from a long way out then wonder no more, because I did it last Sunday, and I’m here to spill the beans. Here is my inner monologue.

‘I’m feeling quite good now. I think I’m stronger than these other guys in the break. The bunch is getting pretty close. We need to go harder or we’re going to get caught. Ah what, there’s oil on my new white bar tape! This cross wind is getting pretty boring. Wow they know how to make bumpy roads in Belgium. I’m going to go a bit harder now and see what happens. Is anyone going to come with me? Oh that’s good that guy’s coming across to me: oh no he’s not. Is that the bunch behind? I’m going to look forwards now. Can I make it round this corner without braking? I can make it round this corner without braking. I’m not going to make it round this corner without braking! I should probably stay upright I think. How far is it to the finish? Not so far. Two laps from here, only two laps; that’s alright. How long was a lap again? 10km or so wasn’t it. Oh shit.

20k to go: Okay that’s it, nice big gear, push the pedals. I can’t see them behind right now, that’s good. Why is no one clapping? Belgians. Oh no there’s a crazy lady, my biggest fan.

19km to go: I feel good. This is easy! Maybe I’m not going hard enough, I’ll go a bit harder. I can’t breathe! Okay that’s too hard, easy tiger. This corner’s good because I can stop pedalling for a second or two. My ear’s itchy.

18km to go: Out of sight out of mind. This is fine; maybe if they catch me I’ll still be able to sprint anyway. Stay on the drops; that’s not back pain, that’s just character building stuff.

17km to go: How long is this lap? Have they sent me the wrong way because I’m not a Belgie? Maybe I should take the union flag stickers off my frame. They do look cute though.

16km to go: I haven’t changed out of the 11 in a while, what a big strong boy. I need to pee.

15km to go: This road is too straight, I need some corners soon. Omega Pharma are probably all on the front right now. Goodo.

14km to go: I know this hill. I attacked here once. Twice more up it and then I’m home and dry.

13km to go: That’s the bunch. They look pretty mad.

12km to go: Maybe if I celebrated as I went over the line this time they’d be nice and give me the win?

11km to go: Hey crazy lady! You’re my favourite.

10km to go: Next time round through the finish and I’ll either be very happy or very sad.

9km to go: Distance means nothing when someone means everything.

8km to go: This energy drink tastes funny. I can’t really see straight. Probably shouldn’t crash.

7km to go: If they catch me now I can definitely sit in and win the sprint. Definitely.

6km to go: What am I doing here? Am I enjoying this? Maybe I should get a real job.

5km to go: I must be close now. My legs are starting to go. Just once more along this crosswind section. Where is the bunch? I hope my legs look good on telly.

4km to go: Up this hill, out the saddle, power power power. MY LEGS FEEL FINE.

3km to go: Put it in the eleven. Don’t hit any stones. Are my brakes rubbing?

2km to go: Crazy lady, you’re a hero. Round this bend, don’t hit the curb.

1km to go: I can’t see the bunch. This is actually happening! I’ve just remembered why I do all the training and sacrifice stuff. This crowd is incredible; they’re going mad for it! This celebration is going to look so great on video! Hahahaha.'

http://www.focus-wtv.tv/video/wielrennen-gent-staden

Gent Staden

Josh and I rode the point to point race today, and it went pretty well! It was rather jumpy at the start with it being a lot of people’s first race of the season and a load of attacks were going off the front. I followed quite a lot of them, wasting some energy but finally a decisive break did go; without me in it! I had to go, so I jumped out the bunch and caught two guys mid way across the gap. They weren't super strong so I did some longer turns and we caught the group of nine or so after three of four kilometres.

From there we worked quite well together, although some of the Belgians were doing the usual trick of missing turns whenever they could to take a drink, or scratch their nose or something similar. We had a reasonable lead on the bunch but as we got onto the finishing circuit it was coming down, so I decided to attack. I planned to take a few guys with me but no one was following me too closely and I didn’t want to slow down so I put my head down and plowed on.

In hindsight I may have attacked too early, but once I was out there I had to commit. So that was how it was, head down to the finish - a little over twenty kilometres. Not far, in theory. I seemed to hold what was now the bunch at around thirty seconds so it was at no point comfortable. I wasn’t certain I’d won until the final 500m.

Blowing kisses to a roaring crowd is something that is totally irreplaceable. It was absolutely amazing!

Holding on to my helmet on the 2km of cobbles!

I'm actually quite tall I swear. The Belgian champ looks well chuffed.

This was just after I'd ridden all the way up bunch on the pavement, dodging street furniture: standard Belgian riding.

THE GUN SHOW.

Perf’s pedal road race – how was it for you?

On Saturday night I was excited for my first road race of the season. I find that I can never get a really decent night’s sleep before a race but I woke up feeling pretty good in the morning. The drive to the race was just over an hour, so I took my portable music device (my laptop people, I don’t have one of these mp3 fandangoes) and listened to some chilled tunes on the way there. Some people like to get pumped up before racing but I find I’m the opposite – I need to relax and calm myself, because as soon as I get a number on I seem to get over-excited.

It was quite a cold day so I did a twenty-five minute spin on the turbo in the car park to get the blood flowing. The race started off steadily with a large contingent of UK Youth riders amassed at the front, which was to become more and more familiar as the race went on. It was naturally jumpy racing, with everyone trying to remember how to ride in a bunch and several people managing to hit the tarmac unfortunately. I hovered around the front of the bunch though and stayed out of trouble, and in most of the breakaways. These were doomed breaks of course! Despite seemingly every split having several UK Youth riders in it none of them were sticking, so I resigned myself to it being a sprint at the end. With a lap to go the boys in white got into formation at the front and everyone else decided that that was just fine! There was a straight, fast section on the course followed by a left hander and some twisty corners, then up a short climb to the finish. I knew that Chris Opie was the man who the lead out train was for: I stayed with him in Holland a few years ago so I know what he’s capable of in the final few hundred metres. The short answer is – a lot more than I’m capable of! Waiting for a sprint against Chris, Marcin and any other unknowns was unlikely to be fruitful for me so I took a flyer just before the sharp left-hander. I got a reasonable gap through the twists, but looking back was a daunting experience with Magnus Backstedt and co. furiously snapping at my heels.

It was not to be, and I was caught on the short climb about one kilometre out from the finish. I’d managed to split the bunch though and hung onto the back of the nine man group (more or less anyway) to get tenth. It was a pretty disappointing finish for me. I felt like I had a lot more to give but the way the race panned out didn’t allow it.